Becoming a Jett Girl (The Bourbon Series) (38 page)

“I do care about you…”

My head snapped up to look at him. “No, you don’t. If you cared about me, you never would have dropped me like you did. You never would have made me feel like a cheap whore that you were tired of. I have been paid for sex many times, but never once did I ever feel cheap and used. But, after you refused to even be near me the past couple of days, you made me feel like a used slut that you were too good to be with.”

“That was not my intention.”

“Then what was?” I asked, as my chest heaved from being too worked up.
 

Jett opened his mouth to answer, but then shut it as he was racking his brain to figure out what to say. Too little too late, I thought, as I huffed and stormed off. In the far distance, I could hear him call my name, but I didn’t listen. I just continued forward; I had a date to make.

Chapter Thirty Nine

“Thinking About You”

Jett
 

Fuck me.
 

What possessed me to tell Goldie why I picked her? I never told anyone about my mom, besides Kace, but that fucker could care less, so why did I tell Goldie? Why did I even follow her to the cemetery in the first place? I’ve been doing a good job of keeping my distance, staying away from her maneating ways, but for the life of me, when I observed her from my third floor window walking in the direction of the cemetery, I had to follow her; I had to see her.

I remembered the day I saw Goldie specifically. She was wearing cut-off jean shorts, an oversized T-shirt with a boy band on the front and a sad looking pair of Converse. She was tapping her foot to music I couldn’t hear, but could tell made her happy because the smile on her face as she drew the intricate curves of my mom’s grave fascinated me. The way her fingers stroked against her thick drawing paper urged me to get to know her, to have her fingers make the same strokes on my body. Little did I know, once I followed her, that she was going to need me more than I was going to need her, but at the moment, I wondered if it was the other way around. I refused to acknowledge that thought and continued to convince myself that the infatuation I had with the smart-mouthed girl was because she was new and she was different; that was it.
 

 
I walked back to the Lafayette Club, replaying the conversation I had with Goldie just moments ago, as I chastised myself for confessing to her about how I thought we were brought together by my fucking dead mom’s spirit.
 

What. The. Hell.

It was a little intense. I didn’t quite expect her to run away from me, but I didn’t expect for her to fly into my fucking arms either, not like I wanted her to or anything.
 

Shit.
 

What the fuck was I thinking? I actually wasn’t thinking. I hadn’t been thinking since the moment I buried my fingers into that sweet pussy of hers. She bewitched me that night with the way she responded to my touch, the innocent looks she gave me, and the way she thanked me for saving her. That night, she drove a wedge into me and staked her claim.
 

Now I was in a hell of a spot as I fought for my own sanity and losing Goldie. I knew the distance I put between us was hurting her, but I couldn’t bring myself to call her up. Instead, I called up Babs and Pepper and talked to them…fucking talked to them!

When the hell did I ever talk? We didn’t talk about me, we just talked about their future and what they planned on accomplishing after they left the Lafayette Club. Babs wanted to design her own makeup line named after her Jett Girl name. She had mock ups of all her designs for packaging and started mixing her own colors for eye shadow. I didn’t know much about the makeup side of things, but I sure as hell knew how to help her market herself and that’s what we’ve been working on the past couple of nights.
 

Babs was on her way out and I couldn’t be happier with the way she’d turned her life around. She was my first-ever recruit and I was sad to see her go, but proud she was able to accomplish something while she was here. It meant what I was doing for these girls was actually something good.
 

I started walking up the stairs to the third floor when I stopped at the second floor landing where Kace was sitting, staring straight ahead at me. He stood up, grabbed my arms and ushered me up the rest of the steps. By the time I reached the top, I shook off his hands and pushed him to the side. The man had the ability to kill with one punch, but he didn’t bother me. I knew I could stand my ground with him.
 

“Watch it,” I said, as I stood a couple paces away from him.
 

Kace paced the floor of the third floor landing as he said, “Do you know what you are doing to her? Do you realize you are pushing her completely away, to the point that she is going to leave the club to go back to her old life? Is that what you really want?”

“She told you that?”

“She said she didn’t know if she could stay. Where else would she go if she didn’t have the club? She doesn’t have parents to lean on and her only friend is the one from Kitten’s Castle. You are driving her back to her old life, the complete opposite of your goal here.”

I blew out an exasperated breath as I headed to my office to grab a drink. Once I had a handle on some bourbon, I whirled on Kace and said, “What the hell am I supposed to do? She is…she’s too much for me.”

“Shocker. I fucking told you she wasn’t the girl for this club. Now, not only have you hurt her, but she is probably going to be worse off because she won’t be able to get her old job back after the way you told off her old boss. You have made her life a living hell.”

“I’ll give her as much money as she wants.”

“You really think she is going to take your money? You are more delusional than I thought.”

“What?” I shrugged my shoulders, “She took Rex’s money.” The minute the words escaped my mouth, I regretted them instantly. She was right, I did treat her like a whore. I was about to take a drink of my bourbon to sooth the aching burn in my chest when I was pinned against the wall. Kace’s forearm cut off my throat as his other hand pushed against my shoulders. I dropped my glass and upper-cutted my fist into his stomach, making him buckle over.
 

“Fuck you, you don’t deserve the way she looks at you,” Kace said, as he was bent over, but then quickly stood up. The man was a machine. “You don’t deserve her.”

“And what? You do? Is this what this is about? Your infatuation with a girl you can never have?”

“You treat her like crap…”

“That’s where you’re wrong. I’ve given her everything I have except myself; that is just something I can’t hand over and I know it’s the one thing she wants. I might have pulled away from her the past couple of days, but it was for her own good. She was becoming too attached and I had to put her in her place.”

“Well, by you putting her in her place, you only ended up driving her away instead…into another man’s arms.”

I stilled at Kace’s words. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Where do you think she is right now? She sure as hell isn’t pining after you in her room. No, she is at a café meeting up with Rex Titan as we speak.”

Pure and jealous rage ran through my body as I thought back to Rex’s text. Son of a bitch!

“Why the fuck didn’t you stop her? Is this because you want her? You think that by her talking to Rex she is going to find out everything about me and not think that I’m man enough to take care of her?”

Flashes of Natasha leaving me for Rex ran through my head as I spoke. Her ring left on my dresser with a note saying she wanted more, more than I could give her, reminded me of what a sorry excuse for a man I was. Her words still rang through my mind to this day. I wasn’t good enough, I wasn’t rich enough, and I wasn’t strong enough for her. She needed a man who was established, she needed a man who didn’t lean on his daddy—which I didn’t—and she needed a man who could give her what she wanted physically, which I did, lying bitch. I was nineteen then, with four buildings under my belt and a growing business, but that wasn’t good enough for her; I would never be good enough.
 

Rex’s maniacal laugh passed through my ears in the far distance as I remembered him talking to me about his new wife at a business meeting. How she had the longest legs, a perfect head of blonde hair and the most beautiful steel eyes he had ever seen. The minute he described his wife, I knew it was Natasha and the sardonic look on his face confirmed it. She told him everything she had told me when she broke things off, which broke me as a man. It was all a game to Rex, but to me, it was my life. From that moment, I swore to never get involved with another woman because, even though I wanted to help the lost souls of the women on Bourbon Street, I couldn’t trust them, any of them.
 

“Frankly, I didn’t feel like stopping her,” Kace said, breaking me from my thoughts.

“What the hell am I paying you for then?” I asked, as I slammed my fist on my desk.
 

“Not sure, but I’m out. I can’t take this bullshit anymore. I’m sick of you playing around with her heart only to break her, just like Natasha broke you.”

“Fuck you, you know nothing about that.”

“Don’t I, though? I was there, man. I know what happened to you…”

“Really? Because I remember you were out trying to make a name for yourself, a lot of good that did.”

“How many times are you going to throw that in my face?”

“You killed an innocent human!” I raged. “You killed a man with a family, a daughter, because you were drunk off your ass and had a temper that was uncontrollable. You could be in jail if it wasn’t for me.”

“You think I don’t fucking know that? Jesus fucking Christ, you practically remind me every damn day of my life about what I did. I feel guilty enough as it is, I don’t need your dickhead of a mouth running off at me and reminding me of my greatest sin.”

We stood there staring at each other as we aired our demons. We were the only ones who knew of them and we kept it that way. Even though, most of the time, we fought until we were either blue in the face or we were in a fistfight, we still kept our demons to ourselves. It was a basic understanding in our friendship.
 

“Fuck, I’m sorry,” I said, as I ran my hand through my hair. “I just…I just don’t know what to fucking do. She makes me lose everything I ever believed in. She makes me think that there is a possibility of a future. She brings up feelings that I never wanted to explore again and didn’t ever plan on exploring again.”

Kace walked toward the door and turned around to face me. “I think it’s time you shuck the vagina and pull your balls off the shelf. If anything, you just need to make it right with the girl because, how you’re treating her now is pushing her in the wrong direction. You’re about saving these girls, so fucking save her, Jett. Offer her a set, she deserves it and needs it more than anyone.”

Kace was referring to the lingerie set I gave every Jett Girl once they became official. I normally didn’t have their set made until I actually thought they were ready, but the minute I invited Goldie to become a Jett Girl, I had her set made. I knew, deep in my gut, that she was going to be a Jett Girl and now that I had her in my club, I had a choice to make. Do I keep her in the club and have her annihilate me one slow kiss at a time or do I push her away, save myself, and send her into the arms of Rex Titan?

Fuck…

Chapter Forty

“Love the Way You Lie”

Goldie/Lo

There he was, sitting at a table in the corner of the café in a finely tailored suit, one leg crossed over his knee and his arm draped across the back of his chair. He commanded the attention of every woman in the room and there was a reason why, he was sinfully sexy in every way. His dark olive skin, chestnut hair and almost-black eyes made him look practically sinister, but I knew better; I knew he had a heart inside.

The minute he spotted me walking toward him, he sat up straighter as the corner of his mouth twitched with excitement. It was the main difference between Rex and Jett, Rex didn’t mind showing his facial expressions, whereas Jett hid them very well, unless there was a lapse in his control and he showed a meager ounce of emotion.
 

“Kitten,” Rex said softly, as he got up and placed his hand on my arm, while brushing a light kiss against my cheek. “I didn’t think you were going to come.”

“I always come when you’re involved,” I said with a wink, making him shake his head.
 

We both sat down as the waitress brought us some coffee that smelled like absolute heaven. It was either coffee made from blessed coffee beans or I didn’t get out much; it was most likely the latter. It wasn’t like I was living in jail, but being able to venture out of the club, meet up with friends and enjoy the aromas of another kitchen other than the club’s was refreshing.
 

“I’m very content that you decided to come meet me. I wasn’t sure about your level of commitment to Jett.”

At that moment, a surge of guilt ran through my body. Yes, I was fucking pissed at Jett for his mind games and I wanted to break his dick off with one swift clench of my pussy, but I still had a sense of loyalty when it came to the man. He was the one who took one look at me and wanted to save me. Fuck, he wanted to save me.