A Wish Upon Jasmine by Laura Florand

half his forearm.
    “Then what’s worth you, Jess?” That dangerously sensual menace, like the soft pad of a panther’s feet as it backed a mouse into a corner.
    “A heart!” she said wildly. His fingers stilled on his cuff. His eyes lifted suddenly to hers, the sea just before dawn.
    Oh, God, what had she just admitted about her romantic, wistful insides? She yanked herself back from the counter. “Nothing you can give!”
    He didn’t move a muscle. Not the fingers on his cuff, not the taut, strong forearm half-revealed, not even a shift of his chest to breathe. And then the fine muscles at the corners of his lips pressed down, revealing again the tiny lines he was too young for, and he dropped his left arm.
    “Well, obviously not if you want a heart,” he said sardonically. “You’re sure you wouldn’t accept a more practical form of currency for one of your perfumes? Hard to deposit a heart in a business account.”
    Oh.
    Oh, they were talking about…a perfume. How had she gotten so confused as to think they were talking about her? About him? Her face flamed.
    Daddy, make me a baby star.
    Daddy, make me a dragon’s call.
    “They are worth that, though,” she murmured wistfully.
    “What?”
    “Somebody’s heart,” she said, hopelessly. “A real perfume is.” A perfume made out of the perfumer’s own heart.
    But that kind of exchange didn’t work, as her poet-perfumer of a father had learned, as work of his art after work of art got eaten up by accountants in the designer houses or floundered and failed to attract any but a niche group of buyers once released. Nobody wanted to give their hearts. They wanted Spoiled Brat—their own scent version of a selfie. Look at me! It’s all about me! Love me, but don’t expect me to ever turn this camera around and point it at you.
    “Well. Since I obviously don’t have one of those,” Damien said with a dark, vicious irony, “perhaps we could agree on some other price.”
    “For…a perfume?”
    “That’s right.”
    “A custom perfume…from me?” She didn’t mean to put that incredulous emphasis on me , but…well, Spoiled Brat had permanently condemned her in the eyes of most perfumers. Like a top chef who launched a frozen food line. The nose who had made Spoiled Brat was not exactly the kind of nose the financial elite of the world went to for their unique, classy, bespoke perfume. Heads of marketing, on the other hand, practically kissed the air every time her name was mentioned.
    Of course, he was the moneyman. And Spoiled Brat made money.
    “Yes.” He rolled up his right cuff.
    God, she wished he would quit undressing. Or maybe just…start on the buttons running down his chest. Undo them, like he had that night, one…by one…by one…
    “To sell?”
    “Oh, no.” The danger and power of him filled the room like a scent that obscured all the others. “Only for me.”
    She blinked down at the cufflinks, watch, and coat on the counter. She didn’t even know what they were worth. Twenty thousand? Probably a fair price for a custom, unique perfume from a top perfumer.
    Which she of course was. Spoiled Brat had hit number two, no matter how much that infuriated the academy of good taste.
    She’d had such a hope of breaking out of the Spoiled Brat role with the start-up niche perfume company she’d helped found with quixotic actress Tara Lee, but then…well, he’d happened to that dream. Just snatched it right up without a single person even needing to talk to her about it, leaving her with ten percent of the shares in a start-up that had just been swallowed whole by one of the major fragrance companies. Exactly what she’d been trying to get away from.
    “Shall I write you a check?” Damien said.
    “No.” She put her hand over the items. “No. I’ll take these.”
    Exactly what she’d gotten from him the last time. The removal of a few items of clothing for the chance to touch him, while she, like an idiot, had thought they