Fighting Ever After (Ever After #3) (30 page)

Not even
twenty four hours – that was all it took for me to become one of
those guys
,
the ones I used to shake my head at and swear I would never be. The ones who
pathetically dote on their girls and don’t care how much shit anyone gives them
for it, and I took a lot of shit, especially during the backyard volleyball
match when they managed to pull me away from her. I’ll admit I might have been
trying a little too hard, but she was mine now; I didn’t want to give her any
reason to doubt me, to doubt us.

The sun had
long since gone down by the time everyone started clearing out. I wanted
nothing more than to get Jaxyn back home. I’d enjoyed the afternoon and sitting
around the fire with everyone as it grew dark, but now I just wanted her to
myself and she still needed to check on her house and pick up a few things next
door.

When I went
looking for her, I found her in the kitchen with Dr. Cross. He’d already given
me some of the dad talk earlier, like any father would for his daughter. I
don’t know if I did much to relieve his fears. He knew my reputation and that
left him more than a little unsure, but I was glad Jax had him.

“You ready
to get stuff from next door?” I asked her.

“Yeah.
We can go now.” She hugged and kissed him on his cheek
before taking my hand and walking with me over to her house. I’d never been
inside of any place that had caught on fire, so I was unprepared for the thick
smell of smoke that still lingered and the ash that dusted most of the surfaces.
The kitchen had been completely destroyed, and was now nothing but a blackened
pit.

I could tell
Jax was becoming overwhelmed and I couldn’t imagine what was going through her
head; this was her home, where she’d grown up,
the
place she shared with her mom. I knew it had to be more than a little hard to
see it like this. I couldn’t help imagining all the ways it could have been so
much worse – if she had been inside, or if that neighbor hadn’t seen the guy
fleeing.

 “Hey,
nothing was damaged that can’t be replaced. A little bit of paint and some new
boards and it’ll be like it never happened,” I tried to reassure her. She
squeezed my hand a little tighter and then led the way upstairs to her room.
Once she had everything we needed gathered up, we carried it out to the car,
making sure to lock up and reset the new alarm she’d had installed at all our
urging.

I slammed
the trunk closed on her bag and then we went to collect Spade and Ace. We
bumped into
Vi
and Jake on their way out as well. When
they invited us to brunch with them this week, my first instinct was to groan
and make up an excuse. A double date, or whatever the hell it would be, was not
something I ever would have considered in the past. I rarely did anything that
could even be considered a date period; that led to all kinds of problems, like
expectations of commitment and romance. It took a second for it to sink in that
none of that stuff freaked me out as long as it was with Jax. Brunch with
Vi
and Jake still wasn’t something I was going to get
excited about, but when I saw the hopeful expression on her face as she looked
up at me questioningly, I knew I would do it for her.

It wasn’t
until we were back home – I kind of liked that right now home was the same
place for both of us – and we were alone in my room, getting ready to watch a
movie, that I realized she’d noticed my initial hesitation to accept the
invite.  

“If the
brunch thing is a little too ‘couply’ for you, or if it makes you
uncomfortable, we don’t have to go. I don’t want you to feel like you have to
just for me.”

 
I knew she meant it, that she wouldn’t hold it
against me if I wanted to back out, but I also knew it would disappoint her.

“It’s not
that. I just . . . I’m not used to wanting this. My first reaction when things
start to look like a relationship is to bail. But I do want this with you,” I
told her and meant it. She smiled and melted into my arms. I would go to a
hundred stupid brunches, or whatever she wanted, to see that smile. I brushed
my lips over her forehead and tucked her into my side before pressing play on
the movie – one that was not based off a romance novel, but instead featured
aliens and a lot of shit getting blown up. The best part was that she’d picked
it
herself,
now that she wasn’t trying to torture me,
at least not with chick flicks. Having her gorgeous and tight little body
pressed against me all night was its own kind of torture.
Sweet,
sweet torture.

I rubbed my
hand up
Jax’s
leg, gently squeezing her bare calf and
looked over at her to see that she had lowered her book and was eyeing me over
the top of it. She was laid back on the couch, her head rested against the arm,
and her pale porcelain legs poked out of her cotton shorts and stretched across
my lap. This is how we’d spent most of the afternoon since she woke from her
nap. I’d worked her hard this morning, but I think I’d more than made up for it
afterward.

I continued
to caress up and down her leg and watched her raise her book back up and
pretend to be immersed in the pages, or really only one page, because I noticed
she never turned it.
Must have been a fascinating page.

I thought
back to earlier this morning and how irritated she’d pretended to be at me and
then how it had felt to touch her so intimately and make her forget all about
that irritation.

Princess had
not been happy with me when she emerged from the bathroom, fresh out of a very
lengthy shower. Not at all, if the glare she’d aimed in my direction was any
indication.

“Oh come on,
you know you had fun.”

“Fun?
You and I have very different understandings of what that word
means,” she mumbled, pushing past me to enter the bedroom. It was only a little
run . . . a little nine mile run, but she’d asked for it with all her
competitive trash talking about running circles around me. Around mile seven I
stopped hearing anything from her except groans and heavy breathing. By mile
eight I thought I might have to carry her back.

I followed
her and went to sit on the bed, watching her as she
unwrapped
the towel from her hair and began combing her fingers through the damp
tendrils. “
Aww
, do you need a massage?” She stopped
and peeked over her shoulder at me.

“Well my
muscles are a little sore.”

“Then get
over here. I’ll make it all better.” I grinned at her and she started to make
her way over to the bed, but then halted.

 “Wait.
Massage isn’t code for something else is it?” She raised a suspicious eyebrow
at me.

I chuckled,
“Not unless you want it to be.” At first she seemed to consider it and I
thought I had her, but then her face hardened. I sighed, “That’s what I
thought, but you can’t blame a guy for trying.”

She walked
over and crawled up onto the bed, peeling off her shirt so that she was left in
her sports bra. I swallowed dryly as she stretched out on her stomach. I
hesitated just a second before crawling up behind her and kneeling over her
with a leg on either side of her hips so that I was straddling her delicious
ass.

What did
I get myself into?

I started at
her shoulders rubbing out the tension I could feel there. Her whole body
relaxed beneath me as she let out a sigh and her eyes drifted shut. I needed
something to distract me from all the things I really wanted to do with my
hands. “Tell me about this tat,” I said as I ran my fingers over the piece of
art on her back. There was a bird cage on her right side, the door hanging open
with a broken padlock and a little sparrow flying free up toward her opposite
shoulder. I knew it had to have significance and I was genuinely curious about
what it meant to her.

“I got it in
Tennessee, the day after I left Massachusetts. That was the first place I
stopped. I stayed there for about five months,” she spoke soft and slowly and I
imagined how it must have felt for her to finally get away after so long of
feeling caged, what that freedom must have felt like for her. Probably a lot
like the freedom I’d felt when I told my parents I’d quit Harvard and was going
to pursue my music.

 I
continued to work my hands down her back while wondering if she’d been afraid
of someone coming after her, if she’d been looking over her shoulder or if
she’d just taken that freedom and kept on running with it, never looking back.
She was incredibly brave to have left everything she knew behind and take on
city after city until eventually ending up in Portland. My girl was incredible
and I couldn’t get past the part where she was mine.

I slid my
hands lower and lower down her back, massaging deeply until I came to her
waistband. I just barely slipped my fingers beneath and caressed the lowest
part of her back, just above the swell of her ass. Her body shuddered and I
couldn’t help myself; I had to have more of her. I ran my hand back up her
spine and leaned down, pressing my lips softly to the place where her neck met
her shoulder. Her lips parted as she sucked in a deep breath and then slowly
released it. I slid the strap of her bra over her shoulder and followed the
path with my lips. While I tasted her skin, I slid one hand down her arm to her
wrist, and then dragged it above her head. I curled my fingers briefly over
hers, pressing her hand into the mattress before trailing my fingers back down
her arm to her side. Her soft sigh undid me and I started kissing down her
spine as I wrapped my hand around to the front of her ribcage. I rubbed circles
with my thumb as I slid my hand higher. My thumb grazed the underside of her
breast, just touching the edge of her bra. I wanted nothing more than to remove
it, but I felt her breathing speed up and knew we were entering into unknown
territory for her.

I stilled my
hand where it was and pressed another kiss to the crook of her neck, fully
expecting her to put the brakes on. After a minute, when she didn’t, I slowly
edged my hand up under her bra, lowering my weight to one hip so that I was
stretched out along her side, with one leg resting between hers. The new
position allowed me to slip my other hand beneath her, sliding it down her
abdomen. She was still resting with one cheek pressed to the mattress, her eyes
closed and lips slightly parted. I dropped my head to her ear and pulled her
earlobe between my teeth, gently nibbling and sucking it while I slid my one
hand a little lower.

I don’t
think I’d ever been this turned on in my life as I dipped my fingers just
inside her shorts, and squeezed her breast with my other hand. She groaned, but
it sounded more like frustration than satisfaction and it was followed by a breathy,
“Stop.”

I stilled my
hands, but left them where they were. “We don’t have to stop now. We’re
together,” I whispered in her ear. “I want to be with you in every way.” I’d
never wanted anyone more.

 “Yes
we do,” she protested weakly, like she didn’t want to anymore than I did. “We
can’t do this. If we’re going to work, we have to be about more than the
physical. Please don’t ask me to compromise what I believe.”

I exhaled
and slipped my hands out of her shorts and bra, feeling like a giant dick. I’d
let myself get too carried away and then tried to push her into something she
wasn’t ready for. I’d promised her a massage and just a massage, and then
hadn’t kept my word. I pushed myself up on my knees again, straddling either
side of her waist. She started to sit up, but I gently pressed her shoulders
back down. “I didn’t finish your massage.”

“Are you
sure that’s a good idea right now?” No I wasn’t, and I was sure she could feel
me hard against her backside, but I needed to prove to both of us that this
wasn’t just about sex for me.

 “I’m
sorry I got carried away, but I promise I’ll behave myself. Just relax.” It was
hard to do, but I did behave myself and keep my hands from straying. To keep my
mind occupied, and off of the other places I wanted to be touching, I asked her
more questions about the places she’d lived and how she’d ended up in Portland,
and why of all the places, that was the one she liked the best. Eventually the answers
stopped coming and I realized she’d drifted to sleep.

That brought
me back to the present, where I was pretty sure she was about to fall asleep on
me again. I stopped massaging her leg and gave it a light smack. “Hungry?”

“If you’re cooking for me.”
She flashed a wide smile in my direction,
one that I found hard to resist. After I made dinner for us, we took it out on
the back deck since summer was still in full swing. We sat out there, talking
and watching the sun sink over the city, and then to feed the sugar monster
living inside of Jax, we went inside and made ice cream sundaes. We took them
into the living room, returning to the seats we’d occupied most of the day.

She’d filled
her bowl with equal parts ice cream and strawberries and then smothered them
with almost an entire bottle of caramel sauce. I went with the classic
chocolate, which worked out nicely. I dug my spoon into her bowl, stealing
bites at every opportunity, but because she’s actually part alien and not human
female, she wouldn’t touch my chocolate.

She popped
another spoonful of ice cream into her mouth and I tried to steal another bite
from her bowl, but when I did she pulled her spoon from her mouth, dipped it
back in her bowl and then smeared it across my face. I was actually stunned for
a moment while she laughed, so pleased with herself.

I snatched
her bowl away from her and had her off the couch and pinned with her back on
the coffee table before she could quit laughing long enough to realize what had
happened. I used one hand to keep her wrists pinned on top of her belly button
and straddled her hips so she couldn’t buck or fight me. With my free hand I
grabbed my bowl and spoon, grinning as her eyes went wide and then narrowed.

“Don’t you
dare!
”

I just
grinned down at her, and then used my spoon to drizzle chocolate all over her
face and neck while she squealed and squirmed. “
Mmm
,
now don’t you look tasty, Princess,” I said once she was good and
chocolatey
. She was trying so hard to be mad, but I could
see the smile tugging at the corners of her mouth no matter how hard she tried
to scowl at me. I proceeded to lick every last drop of chocolate from her skin.
She laughed and struggled to get free until my lips fell on her neck. My
kissing and sucking became less sloppy and more sensual and she relaxed back,
tilting her head to give me better access. I took it.

She groaned
and then I sealed my lips over hers, pulling her up and into my lap, dropping
us back onto the couch. She was an awful sticky mess, but for a few minutes neither
one of us cared about anything except the way our mouths connected and moved
together.

“You really
are a mess,” I chuckled, earning me a smack on the arm when we finally broke
apart. “And you’ve made me a mess as well.”

“It’s your
fault,” she accused.

“Well then,
let me make it all better and help you wash off in the shower,” I suggested,
grinning.

“I don’t
think so.” She climbed off my lap and made her way to the bathroom.

“We really
should conserve water, you know global warming and all that shit,” I hollered
after her. She looked back over her shoulder, shaking her head, before
disappearing behind the door. I gathered up our dishes and carried them to the
kitchen. For the second time today, I found myself waiting for Jax to emerge
from the shower. I used the time to clean up the mess from dinner and send off
texts to the guys reminding them not to stay out too late because we had
another important meeting with the label first thing in the morning. After
that, if everything went the way I hoped, we would be signed and immediately
get to work in the studio recording our first album.

In all the
down time I’d had the last few
weeks,
one thing I
could say is that I’d been able to work on a lot of new material, even with Jax
constantly trying to get her hands on my composition book, begging me for a
peek. As much as I’d pretended to be annoyed, it became somewhat of a game
between us then, and when I finally gave in, her female insight into the lyrics
actually proved helpful. Not that I would admit that to her.

During those
days, all I had wanted was for one moment where I didn’t have to be guarded
around her and keep her at a distance. Now the nights of watching her disappear
behind Chris’ door, and then falling into bed with her on my mind, were long
gone. Instead, when it was time to say goodnight, I took her hand and pulled
her into bed with me, tucking her into my arms as I had grown accustomed to the
past few nights. If I had my way, she’d never sleep anywhere else.

I knew
convincing her of that would be a challenge, especially since tomorrow she was
meeting with the construction guys who would be starting on her house. It
wouldn’t be long, maybe just another week or two, before she was able to move
back in there. If I couldn’t convince her to stay, then I might have to follow
her. I didn’t want to lose a minute with her, especially not knowing how crazy
things were going to get with the band. A tour had been mentioned, and I wanted
as much time as I could get with Jax in the months before they made that happen.
Leaving her scared me for a handful of reasons. I wasn’t sure what that time
away would do to us; if I’d discover that I loved the freedom of the road more
than I missed her, or worse, that she didn’t miss me.

Right now I
couldn’t imagine being away from her for weeks, maybe months on end and not
spending every moment counting down to when I would be able to see her and have
her in my arms again, but we were only days into this relationship. I couldn’t
determine what the future held for us based on how I felt right now, when it
was so new and I felt like she was setting fire to everything inside of me,
igniting a passion I’d never experienced. I knew from experience how it could
so easily burn up and leave behind nothing but a pile of ashes and embers where
those feelings once were.