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Chapter 1

Jasmine’s POV
“This can’t be the proposition she was going on and on about for weeks with her annoying ass voice which always makes my damn ears ring! Miss. Rhino can’t be serious!
This has absolutely no benefits nor profits behind it and as matter of fact, if we invest, we would be at a loss!
I’m not interested in this.
Why the hell I hired her?”
He looked at the documents in the folder on his desk I had brought in for him by his Chief Operating Officer, Miss. Rhino.
“Get Ms. Rhino on the line and instruct her to find herself in my office immediately!”
“Yes sir,” I answered sharply.
“And Miss. Blackman, reorganize my schedule for the upcoming week. Cancel that nonsensical meeting with Mr. Hoggers since I’m not interested in investing one billion dollars in his shitty business.
Also, fax those documents to the sixth level and proof read these for me before one p.m.
And can you send Julia a bouquet of white roses with a note attach to it which reads ′thank you′ and get my father on the line,” he ordered although it may sound like he was asking me.
I nodded yes and took two stacks of paper from his hands and exited his office immediately.
I called Miss. Rhino and informed her that she was needed in Mr. Hollen’s office.
“Sir, your father is on line one,” I said to him through the phone once I had phoned his father.
“Mmmh,” he answered back and took the other line.
I ordered the bouquet of white roses and had it delivered over to Julia’s apartment and began faxing the documents to the sixth level as he said.
Afterwards, I began to proofread the other stack of papers he had given me. I would call Mr. Hoggers lastly because I knew he would request to speak to Mr. Hollen directly and since he was on the phone with his father, and Miss. Rhino was on the way to see him, he wouldn’t appreciate being distracted by Mr. Hoggers’ call.
Evan Hollen was my boss and a very successful, rich and powerful one. I had been working for the company for a total of one year. Finishing college, it was a dragged finding a decent job that paid well within my city but luckily for me, I applied to Hollen Tower when I saw an ad in a newspaper for a personal assistant role.
Hollen Tower was established and operated by his father before him. The company was one of the most successful and well developed organization over the globe. Great Cooperative, solid partnerships and a body of well educated and experienced and trained staff took the company to its highest peak and Evan Hollen stood above it with his father’s relinquished crown and well-deserved titles. He would be damned if someone tried to damage what his father started and worked so hard for. He had the temper of a shark, the personality of a dragon and the untimely patience of a baby.
But let’s not forget about his best features. His dark silver grey eyes were everything.
His sexy lean body always carved sharply in his expensive Armani suits.
Okay, you got me. I had the biggest and most unstoppable crush on my boss and I couldn’t help myself.
Evan Hollen was too fine not to have a crush on.
It’s okay to have a secret crush on a very attractive man, right?
Even if he is your boss?
“Miss. Blackman! Can I be buzzed in please?”
A voice snapped me right out of my lustful thoughts.
Miss. Rhino was at my desk, pencils and folders in hands and tapping her left foot impatiently on the tiled floor.
“Yes, one moment please,” I responded, putting the images of my boss to the far back of my mind.
I called Mr. Hollen’s line and informed him that she was here. After he told me to let her in, I hit the buzzer and she strolled into his office with her head held high. She always thought she was above everyone else working at Hollen Tower.
I hated the best bone in that woman. She was a tall, slim woman with pale cream skin. She was thirty years of age but she liked younger men like Mr. Hollen. There was once a rumour circulating about the two of them but I found that very hard to believe. She still had the body of a model but she was utterly not his type. The woman had a personality of a beast and she thought she was better than everyone in the company, except Mr. Hollen of course. She possessed a high job position, she was the COO after all, but she still had to answer to Mr. Hollen.
I continued to proofread the documents in front of me, making the necessary changes and corrections. I enjoyed my job because it made life easier for Mr. Hollen. He had a personal assistant but he fired her on the spot when she developed feelings for him and began flirting with him in his office and since then, he hadn’t hired another one. I was the one doing the duties a personal assistant ought be doing plus my secretarial duties, but I didn’t mind or complained one bit in view of the fact that I was being paid double my monthly salary until he hires another personal assistant.
He should get a male assistant who doesn’t have a thing for the handsome boss.
The ladies always lusted and drooled over him, always wanted his attention and time, always talked about him. He was indeed handsome, one of the most handsome men I’ve ever laid my eyes on. His skin tone was perfectly tanned and I always wondered why.
Is his mom a black woman...or does he have black people in his family?
He doesn’t talk about his parents much and he doesn’t like the beach and the outdoors much either, so why the naturally tanned skin?
Half an hour later, I was already finished. I was a quick but assertive employee. I had to be because the boss hated it when his employees were skylarking on the job or persons not meeting his deadlines.
My deadline was one p.m.
I looked up at the wall clock; it showed fifteen minutes to one.
Then Miss. Rhino barged out of his office and stormed passed me with a frown and unpleasant look on her face.
I peeled myself off the chair and knocked on his office door afterwards.
“Come in Miss. Blackman,” he spoke.
His voice was the ‘Shawn Mendes’ to my ears. I heaved a smile and walked into his office.
“Here are the papers you asked me to proofread. I’ve made the necessary changes and corrections for you. Before I leave for lunch, I would get Mr. Hoggers on the phone because I strongly believe he would request to speak to you.”
“Mmmh. I’ve been thinking about something,” he began, leaning back in his big leather chair and stared at me with those beautiful, grey, luminous orbs.
I gulped my fear but his eyes were easy to read. One thing I had quickly learnt when I began working here, was that his eyes were a tell.
I avoided trouble, getting mixed up with gossips and falling in with the wrong crowd. I couldn’t afford to lose my job any time soon. It paid very well and my mom and my younger sister were depending on me.
Mom had a lung failure condition.
My younger sister was still in college and depended on me financially to put her through. It was just us living together at my apartment in the city.
Recently, my mother’s condition had gotten worse but with the medication and treatment I was managing to pay for, she always pulled through and felt better again.
“How would you like to be my personal assistant and I’ll hire someone to fill your place?”
I was dumbfounded for a moment.
Me? As his personal assistant?
I would be honoured.
PA’s had a higher salary than the basic secretary and I couldn’t do both jobs forever so obviously I was going to pick the one with the higher income behind it.
It wasn’t just about the money though, I had the knowledge, skills and levels to be his Personal Assistant and that was what I had applied for at the very beginning but the position had already been filled, however since my resume was so impressive and captivating, Mr. Hollen didn’t want me to work anyway else but Hollen Tower so he hired me as his secretary.
I worked my tail off in high school and all throughout college. I hardly had time for boyfriends and dates and fun. My mom had the lung condition since the beginning of my high school year but it wasn’t that bad back then as it was now. She managed to work and she supported me in every way a child needed support from their parent. I never knew my dad and mom never talked about him much, she would only mention him when I asked about him but as I grew older, I saw the pain in her eyes every time so I stopped when I understood what he had done.
Bottom line, she was there for me so now it was my turn to be there for her. If I could make enough money, we could afford to get rid of her condition permanently.
“Thank you Mr. Hollen and I accept,” I said to him as I beamed a bright smile.
He nodded and gestured for me to leave his presence. He was a man of very few words, he only spoke to me when he was commanding and he hated repeating himself to people, even to his father and the women he dated.
Don’t get me started on those women he usually dated. He was always spotted with famous celebrities or they were frequently throwing themselves at him like prostitutes.
The last one he dated, he dumped her because she was annoying and nagging and always popped up at his office without notice. He hated those things in a woman and whenever he was done with them, he sent them white roses.
I don’t get why he does it. Roses are nice flowers so wouldn’t it just lead the women on even more?
I took my purse and changed into my flats and went to lunch. I always changed my heels when I left the office. I hated heels, they hurt my feet so much but Hollen Tower had a dress code requirement one must abide by or else one would be out on their ass and searching for another job without recommendation or references from the company.
As I walked out, Julia Starlet, a famous movie actress and the woman Mr. Hollen already dumped this morning, walked in.

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Chapter 2

Evan’s POV
I stood up at my desk, ready to call my best friend Zack to meet up for lunch. We had been best friends since our high school days and all throughout the years at Harvard University where we both mastered in Business Administration and Management, Marketing, Accounts and Communication. The requirements for being and becoming CEO’s.
“Hi darling,” a voice greeted as I was walking to my private elevator. I turned around slowly, knowing who it was, and she immediately threw her arms around my neck and drew me in for a kiss.
I pulled away gently.
“What are you doing here?” I asked her.
I wasn’t expecting her and I hated it when people showed up on me unwelcome.
“I wanted to surprise you and take you out to lunch.” She was still cheerful.
How do I shut her down gently? I asked myself.
Julia Starlet was a twenty four year old female actress. Tall, slim, blonde and beautiful to look at. I adored her bright brown eyes and the elegant way she applied her makeup. She was flawless but she was only a one night stand I met at one of my father’s functions and I had no true intentions of having anything solid with those types of women who appeared to be so easy to get into bed and always eager to spread their legs for a rich guy.
For Pete’s sake, the same night I met her, was the same night I ‘bedded’ her. She was like so many others but I was the revelation of myself and I wanted- no, scratch that - I NEEDED to change my lifestyle. Eventually.
“Actually I’m getting lunch with my best friend,” I said, typing into my phone, responding to an email.
“Well can I come along? And would you stop texting and pay attention to me?”
I heaved a sigh. She was already getting on my nerves.
“No.” I retorted, walking into my elevator. She followed me in.
“Evan. I want us to become exclusive. Let’s make it official and become a real couple,” she suggested with a smile.
My eyes moved from the phone and scanned her.
She must be out of her mind.
"No,” I said again and turned my attention back to my email.
“So you think that you’re going to sleep with me and dump me the next like a piece of garbage? Who do you think you are?!” She roared at me before snatching the phone out my hands.
“What the hell! Give me back my phone.”
“No! You’re not breaking up with me!”
She threw the phone on the elevator’s floor and used her heels as a weapon of destruction by stomping repeatedly onto it until it was nothing but bits and pieces underneath her. I looked at the woman acting like a crazy lunatic next to me.
I chuckled and shook my head.
“Am I funny to you?” she asked, looking at me when she was through with destroying my iPhone with the heels of her stiletto.
“Listen Julia, you’re a nice girl, really, but I don’t revolve around you. You were just a onetime thing and I have zero intentions of taking you home to my family. This basically means, I have no intention of making you my girlfriend, fiancée, wife and baby mother.”
“But you sent me flowers.”
She was about to cry. Her eyes welled up and she was getting red in the face like a steamed lobster.
“I always do that. That’s how I say thank you and goodbye.”
I exited my elevator and informed security to escort her off the premises. I was not in a mood for listening to any more tantrums from an emotional wrecked woman.
I started my Bentley and drove to a near but illustrious restaurant where my best friend Zack was already waiting.
We always met here whenever we decided to have lunch together and catch up on things.
“You look drained,” he greeted, patting me on the back as I sat down at our table.
“You don’t know the half of it and I just had to deal with Julia.”
“Julia?”
“Yeah. The movie actress I met at dad’s gala last Wednesday.”
“Oh well she wasn’t so bad. She was very beautiful and seemed friendly and...”
“Easy.” I finished for him.
He laughed.
“Well, not everyone is the same. The lady who gives it on the first date could very well be the wife material. I don’t think that defines a woman,” he put in his two cents while opening the menu which was placed on the table in front of us.
“Well I do. I wouldn’t trust her if she spreads on the first night, bro. She knows nothing about me, not even my second name but she’s ready to sleep with me and you’re saying ′could be wife material’.
No! I call it gold digging.”
“Evan, you’re twenty five. You’re not getting any younger. When are you going to settle down and find the right woman?”
“Dude... Don’t you start with me... Please leave those kinds of lectures for my mom. She’s the only one who always preaches to me about settling. I’m not ready for all that as yet. I know exactly when I would settle and what I’ll settle for. I don’t want a famous actress, models or anyone within those categories. I want normal.”
We ordered our lunch and a bottle of mild alcoholic beverages. After lunch, I went back to my office and he went back to his. He also managed his father’s firm but his dad was still CEO.
“Miss. Blackman, order me a new iPhone and have it sent over to my office. Also, you’ll be starting as my new assistant so I want you to get all the secretarial applications and bring them to my office,” I demanded to my secretary who was acting as my personal assistant as well since I fired the previous one.
The one I had fired, she was unprofessional to have barged into my office and took off her bra and threw it at me like a stripper.
“Want to have some fun boss?” she asked.
“Have some fun at a new job because you’re fired!” I responded without even looking up at her.
All I heard was a low growl and her heels hitting the floor as she walked out my office.
Maybe she got the wrong impression when I told her I wanted her in my office right away.
Hell, I was about to fire her anyways. She messed up my schedules the day before.
I hated employees who couldn’t control themselves. I wasn’t interested in any help of mine nor could I ever saw myself being. I was the boss and my tolerance was very thin, the slightest sneezing could throw me way off.
“Yes sir,” Miss. Blackman responded and immediately went to the pull out the cabinets in search of the applications. I went into my office, closed in the door behind me and sat down in my comfortable office chair.
I gazed around and imagined how my father must had felt when he accomplished all of this. He was my role model and my mentor, that was one of the reasons why I never changed a thing in the office. Everything was the exact way he left it and his office was now my office. His picture still hung on the wall. And the photograph, with him in his clean white tuxedo, mom in her very beautiful wedding gown and Emily and I in our white baby suits in their arms, was on my desk, positioned at an angle that was visible for my eyes only. It was my favourite picture although I couldn’t remember that actual day, I was barely five months old.
I raked my fingers through my hair as a knock came on the door.
“Come in Miss. Blackman,” I instructed.
I always knew it was her, she didn’t have to call to inform me she was coming to my office like what she had to do for everyone else.
She opened the door and walked up to my desk.
“I’ve found them.”
“Okay,” I replied and took the folder from her hands and placed it on my desk. There were many applications. Hundreds if not thousands and I wanted the best of the best.
“Miss. Blackman, transfer all the calls to my extensions and join me in here so we can go through these together,” I said, daring not to touch the application until I had help.
“Yes sir,” she answered with a smile and withdrew quickly.
I liked that about Miss. Blackman, always cheerful and up for any task and challenges I threw her way.
“This one is too shallow.”
" Too deep and egotistic.”
“Too short.”
“Too self expressive.”
We looked through the applications for the remainder of the afternoon.
At the end, four applicants stood out.
“What’s my schedule like tomorrow?” I asked her.
“There’s a meeting you have with the investors at 11:00am and the fifth level meeting at 2:00pm. You’re free before and after the hours of these two meetings.”
“Great, okay.
Call in these applicants and inform them that they’ve been selected for an interview tomorrow at 8:00a.m sharp. If they’re not interested or they’ve already found another job, here are the others.” I handed her three more applications which I also found impressive so I used them as a stand-by. Just in case.
“Okay. I’ll get on it right away,” she said.
I looked up at the wall clock in my office. She was already over time. It was 4:30 p.m and she finished at 4:00 pm. I wanted to stop her to tell her I’ll do it myself but she was already out the door, making phone calls.
“Mr. Hollen, I’ve contacted the first four but two had already found another job and are no longer interested since they’re out of the country so I’ve contacted the standbys.”
“And?”
“They’ll be coming in tomorrow at 8:00a.m. Here are the names.” She handed me a piece of paper, “Good afternoon sir,” she said again and turned to leave.
“Thank you.” I said and she turned back at me, smiled again and left.
Wow. She’s amazing.

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Chapter 3

Jasmine’s POV
"Thank you.” He said to me.
Had you ever had that feeling where you felt like you were back in high school and your dreams were finally coming through because you’re getting noticed by the popular guy who also happens to be your crush?
Well, that was what it felt like with Mr. Hollen but I had to be very professional with and around him now that I was going to be working even closer with him and may have to accompany him to meetings and business trips. I didn’t know how I was going to contain and control myself but I had to.
Losing my job was not an option.
I arrived at my apartment. Pushed the key into the lock and opened the door to reveal my mother sitting at the couch, reading one of those gossip magazines.
“Hi mom,” I greeted her, shutting the door behind me and taking my handbag off my shoulder.
“Hi Jassy, how was your day?”
“It was great. My boss is promoting me to be his Personal Assistant. I’m starting on Monday. Someone else would take over my previous position,” I explained to her with some excitement in my voice.
“That’s great. Congrats.”
“Thanks mom. Is Zenia home from school yet?”
Zenia was my younger sister and my best friend. She attended a community college since I couldn’t afford to put her through an Ivy League college and still paid the bills and put groceries on the table and took care of mom.
It wasn’t a burden to me but at times we did not had enough, especially when mom’s lungs started acting up. I was still paying the medical bills from the last treatments.
I went to my bedroom and sat down on the bed, exhausted and hungry. I had walked all the way home from work to budget on cab fares however, I was so grateful because Hollen Tower was approximately one mile away from my home.
I changed from my working attires and went to the kitchen to get dinner started. I was going to make lasagna, potato salad, green vegetables and rice with red beans in it.
Zenia walked through the front door.
“Hi mommy,” I heard her voice greeting our mother.
“Hey baby. How was school?”
“It was all good. I have an assignment I need to complete. Is Jassy home yet?”
“In here!” I called to her.
“Hi sis,” she said to me as she came up and hugged me from behind. “What you’re cooking already smells delicious. I’ll get change and come back to help you.”
“Don’t you have an assignment to do?”
“Yeah but I already completed most of it with my free periods. I took your advice.”
"Always advance when you can,” we both said together with a laugh.
Zenia was twenty years old, four years younger than myself. It was easy to tell that we were sisters because she looked like me.
We possessed the long black 4a type hair, dark brown eyes with naturally long lashes, fallow brown complexion or a chocolate complexion as some people may say. Our mother was African American but she told us that our father was from Mexico.
That bastard.
When dinner was finished, I set the table and Zenia poured us some drinks. We sat down around the three seater dinner table and started eating.
“Mommy, how are you feeling?” Zenia asked her.
Mom looked pale and flushed like she hadn’t been eating properly.
“I’m fine,” she replied in very low whisper.
“You don’t look fine,” I said, studying her.
Sweat was pouring down her face and she made attemps to dry it off with a kitchen towel.
“Zenia, Call 911.”
“No! I’m fine. I don’t want to go to a hospital again. I’m fine. It’s just hot in here, that’s all. Lets eat,” she briskly responded and dismissed the concerns from us.
Zenia got up, closed in the windows and doors and turned on the air condition units.
“That’s better mom?” she asked her.
“Thank you sweetheart.”
We ate in an awkward silence after that, Zenia and I glancing ever so often at her. There had been occurrences where she fainted in front of us and that always scared the shit out of me.
We finished dinner and I went to do the dishes while Zenia went to her room to complete her assignment. Mom went back to the couch and watched television, one of her favourite shows, Fred. G. Sanford. I heard her laughing and it made me smiled to myself.
After the dishes, I was completely drained. I went and sat down next to my mother on the couch and watched the television with her. The comedy was almost over when suddenly she started gasping for oxygen and holding her throat as if something got caught in it.
“Mom! MOM!” I yelled.
She rolled off the couch and fell onto the floor with a crash. I retrieved my phone from my pocket and dialled the emergency number and related the situation to the dispatcher.
“An ambulance is on its way ma’am,” he assured me.
“Please hurry. She’s not moving. She’s... not.... breathing....!”
“Can you administer CPR?” he asked.
Zenia appeared and began screaming with fright.
“Mom! Please not again!”
“Zen, she’ll be okay. She always pulls through. She’ll pull through this one again. She’ll be ...alright,” I said to my little sister with my voice already breaking.
“Ma’am?” the dispatcher’s voice came again.
“Yes I’m here,” I answered with tears streaming down my face like rain on a rooftop. I hated seeing my mother like this, looking like she was close to her grave.
I pushed Zenia aside and got to work.
I Placed the heel of my hand on the centre of my mother’s chest, then placed the other hand on top and pressed down by five - six cm at a steady rate of one hundred to one hundred and twenty compressions per minute.
After every 30 chest compressions, I gave two rescue breaths.
I tilted her head gently and lift her chin up with two fingers. Then I pinched her nose and sealed my mouth over hers and blew steadily and firmly into her mouth for about one second. I looked at her chest and it rose. I gave another two rescue breaths and another cycle of chest compressions and two more rescue breaths until the emergency help arrived.
I pulled Zenia into my arms and comforted her as we looked on. They placed an oxygen mask on mom’s face which was connected to an air cylinder. This was going to put air to her lungs until she’d manage to fully breathe on her own again. They placed her on a stretcher and carried her out to the back of the ambulance. We went with her.
She was rushed into an Intensive Care Unit but my sister and I were not allowed into the room.
We sat down on the chairs in the waiting area, lingering until a doctor would see us about her condition. We knew she had end stage COPD but Mom never smoked nor took any drugs or did drugs. Her lungs should be healthy, but it just weren’t.
I hugged my little sister tightly.
After two long hours and a half, a doctor came up to us.
It was Doctor Summers.
We recognized him from before and he recognized us too.
“Miss. Blackman’s daughters, I’m afraid I have some bad news,” he began.
My heart stopped. My body went numb and I couldn’t even stand on my own two feet. His facial expression was sad and full of pity as he looked down at us. Zenia looked up at him, tears flowing down her face.
“Oh God, what’s wrong with our mother?” I asked, fearing the worst but hoping that it wasn’t the worst.
His mouth trembling to let the words fall out.

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