JAX (The Beckett Boys, Book Two) (13 page)

It’s her.

My heart stops then kick-starts so hard it feels like it might jump right out of my chest. There Brooklyn is, in the flesh, wearing a pale pink tank top and black shorts, her hair pulled back in a ponytail, her face fresh and beautiful.

Our eyes connect. With stilted steps, she makes her way closer to me, peering around the bar, eyes unreadable. There have been a number of small changes over the last few weeks…I guess they’ve added up, now that I’m looking at it. We’ve done a little painting, a little cleaning.

She’s chewing on her lower lip as she approaches the bar. I can’t read what’s in her eyes. She used to be so open and vulnerable to me, and I destroyed that by being a fucking idiot. “Jax.”

“Brooklyn.” Her name is torn from my mouth, a plea, a prayer. God, I want to reach across the bar and touch her skin, and it’s taking all my strength to keep my hands at my sides. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m…living with Gail and Samantha.” She takes another look around, and I see something in her eyes. A flicker of emotion. “Everything is different in here.” She pauses. “You look different. And act different.” She’s been watching me with the customers this whole time.

“It was time to make some changes,” I tell her.

A customer a few seats down waves at me.

“Wait right here,” I say and go refill his beer. I keep my eyes on her the whole time, afraid I’m hallucinating. She’s here. She’s here, and living nearby.

I have a chance.

When I go back to her, I can see her chest rising and falling hard. She’s biting her lip more, dragging the delicate flesh between her teeth. Her eyes fill with tears. “This was a dumb idea. I shouldn’t have come.”

“Wait, why not?” I move to work my way around the bar to reach her.

She shakes her head and before I can approach, she flies out the door.

Fuck. No. I’m not letting her get away again. I dash after her. “Brooklyn! Stop!” She doesn’t turn back around, walking fast up the sidewalk, head down. I catch up to her and grip her arm, making her face me. “I don’t understand. Why are you here? And why did you just fucking leave?”

She looks up at me, tears streaming from her eyes, a total kick in my gut. “You’re different now—you dress different and act different. The bar is completely changed since you’ve been running it in your brother’s absence. And all it took was…” she swallows and finishes, “it took not seeing me anymore to make that happen. But you couldn’t do it for me.” Her last words are a whisper I can barely hear.

“No, that’s not true.” I clutch her chin and make her look at me. Her eyes are watery and she tries to peer over my shoulder, but I shake her face gently until she stops avoiding me. “These changes in me, they’re because of you.” I swallow. “When I lost you, I had nothing left. So I distracted myself with work.” I dare to stroke my thumb over her flesh, and her eyes drift closed. Tears leak out down her cheeks.

I can’t help it. I kiss them away. She gives a soft sound then pulls back from me.

“I distracted myself, and yet I couldn’t stop thinking about you. Realizing you were right. I should never have let you go. I should have fought for you, should have proven myself worthy of you.”

Her body trembles, and she peers up at me. Her eyes are mingled with fear and wariness and confusion. “I…don’t know what to say.”

I’ve been waiting to have this conversation with her, so I plunge forward. “I’m not perfect. God knows that.” She gives a watery laugh in response to my comment, but I continue. “I’ve fucked up more things in my life than I’ve done right. But the best thing I ever did right was being with you.” I tug her to me, feel her soften against me, and hope burns in my gut like a forest fire. She still has feelings for me. I can feel it in her body, see it on her face. “Brooklyn, you make me want to be a man who deserves you. I’ve missed you so fucking much.”

“I’ve missed you, too. I thought you’d call.”

“I was trying to be respectful of your wishes and stay away. But I was already thinking of ways to come find you. I was going to drive to New York.”

That makes her smile again. “Thank God you didn’t, because I’m not there.”

“Obviously.” I quirk a brow. “So why are you in town? Why didn’t you move home?” The question I really want to ask is, why is she here, in front of me? Why did she come to Outlaws?

She draws in a deep lungful then exhales. “I couldn’t leave. I’m not the person I was, either. I didn’t want to go back to that life, the one where I was supposed to fit into the mold of what they want for me. You changed me.”

I capture her mouth in a kiss. I’m instantly drugged, possessed, hungry and aching for this woman who hasn’t been mine for weeks. But she’s mine now—I’m never letting her go again. She opens to my kiss and I stroke her mouth with my tongue. Her sighs fuel me, feed the fever in my blood.

When we stop kissing, I suddenly know what I need to do.

Ever since the other night after me and Smith talked, I’ve been replaying everything in my mind and I keep having this fantasy of the way things should’ve gone between me and Brooklyn.

And maybe it’s just a fantasy, but I’m sick of living in my shitty, clueless reality that I made for myself.

So I decide to just run with my feelings. Drop to one knee in front of her and gaze into those beautiful eyes.

Her mouth opens. “Jax?”

As I kneel in front of her, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I made the right decision. My heart is fucking bursting and I swallow hard, smiling up at this woman.

I press kisses to her left hand. “Brooklyn, my life means nothing without you in it. You’ve made me realize so much about myself. You’re the woman I want to fall asleep beside every night. I’m tired of being afraid. I want to take a risk with you. I’m so in love with you, I can’t imagine ever feeling this way for anyone else. It would be impossible.”

Her breasts rise and fall with her rapid breath. “God, I love you too, Jax. I’ve missed you.”

“Marry me. Be my love. Be my wife. Let me show you every day how special and amazing you are.”

Her small gasp fills the space between us. “The way you’re looking at me…”

“Like what?”

“Like something I’ve craved with you for so long.” She swallows. “Yes, I’ll marry you.”

With her words, I rise from my knee and grab her. Swing her around, raining kisses all over her face. Her giggles make me feel buoyant, alive. She wraps her arms around me and buries her face in my shoulder, and I still, press her sweet body close to me.

Vow to myself that I’ll be a man worthy of her love.

“Come on, let’s go inside. We have an announcement to make,” I declare, taking her hand.

Her face turns pink, and she smiles. “You’re going to tell people?”

“Fuck yes I am. I’m proud as hell to be engaged to the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met. Why wouldn’t I want to brag about it to the world?” I pause and take her mouth one more time in a kiss, our private moment before I tell everyone else. “I love you, Brooklyn.”

“I love you too, Jax.” Her smile is sweet and shy and it fills my soul, thaws out all the numbness that had taken up residence in me since she left. I can’t ever go back to the man I was. And somehow, that’s perfectly fine with me. Because I get the best tradeoff—Brooklyn’s love.

“
I
t’s
hot as balls out here,” Asher groans. He waves his hand in front of his face in an effort to cool himself off. “Great day for a grillout, dumbass,” he says to Jax with a wink. “It’s gotta be the hottest day of the year.”

“So go stick your face in the cooler,” Jax retorts, flipping the hot dogs on the park’s grill. “This is a beautiful Michigan summer day. Get used to it.”

I laugh and grab a bag of hot dog buns, bringing them over to the table. Smith’s sitting in a special camper chair with his broken leg propped up on a bunch of cushions, his crutches close by. Being cooped up inside was starting to grate at him, so Aubrey’s been taking him on trips out of the house. When I suggested last week we have a family picnic to celebrate Asher’s twenty-first birthday, she gushed her thanks and hopped right on the idea.

Aunt Sylvia closes her car door and saunters over, bearing two pie tins. “Key lime pies for my favorite boys.”

“God, I love you, Aunt Sylvia,” Jax gushes as he comes over and kisses her on the cheek.

She puts the pies down and swats at him. “None of that gushy kiss-up shit. I know you too well. Now go flip them burgers and dogs before you burn it. I’m not eating nasty-ass dinner.”

We burst out laughing, and Jax shuffles away. “Fine, but you know you love my kisses,” he tosses out over his shoulder.

I put out paper plates, giving one to Smith to hold on his lap, then handing Asher another. “So, do you feel twenty-one?”

He laughs, his deep voice resonant. It’s crazy how much he looks like his older brothers. He’s reserved, but not in the scary way Smith is. Just…quiet. “Feels just like twenty,” he says, grinning. “You ready to go back to school?”

Asher shrugs uncomfortably, tension clear on his face. “Yeah, sure.”

I frown and reach out to grab his shoulder. “You okay?”

His fake smile is so like Jax that I’m taken aback. I see that’s a family trait. “Totally fine. Don’t worry about me.”

“Brooklyn, I need help,” Jax hollers from the grill.

“You’d better go before he sets something on fire,” Asher teases. The earlier tension is gone—I almost feel like I imagined the moment.

I shake it off and head to my fiancé. My fiancé—it’s so strange saying that. Strange and wonderful. We decided that I’m going to move into his apartment at the end of this month. Since it’s a two-bedroom, it won’t put Asher out. But we need to do some rearranging to make room for my stuff, too.

I reach over and touch the strands of hair at the base of his neck. He shivers. “You beckoned me?” I ask. “And so gently, I may add.”

“Very funny, darling. Here, take these burgers and put them on the table, okay?” He takes a paper plate from my hand and scoops up the meat. I usher it back over and return to take hot dogs. When I get back, Smith and Asher are already eating.

“What the hell, guys?” I tease them. “You can’t wait for your brother?”

“Eh, fuck him,” Smith says around a mouthful of meat. “He’ll be fine. Boy could stand to lose a few pounds anyway. I can count on my dick the number of times that asshole waits for us before diving into chow.”

Jax shoots his brother a glare. “Hey, fuck you. I look amazing. Don’t I, Brooklyn.” He gives me a heated look that makes my lower belly clench.

Oh God, yes. He knows he looks good. More than good. At least he hasn’t lost his healthy ego. I laugh. “You’re divine. A god incarnate. A blessing for us mere mortals.”

“You’re making me gag,” Asher says, rolling his eyes.

We chow down on our food and just chatter about everything and nothing. It’s amazing, how quickly this clan has accepted me as one of their own. When they found out Jax and I got engaged, Aubrey screamed loud enough to wake the dead, then hugged me for a good five minutes, or so it felt.

Then she went right into asking what our wedding plans are. I told her we weren’t sure yet, that we wanted to see how my semester was, but possibly a Christmastime wedding. Of course, that made her swoon and got her stamp of approval.

Not to mention, I need to talk to my parents before planning a ceremony.

They don’t know yet. But we’re taking a road trip to see them tomorrow and stay the weekend. My parents aren’t thrilled to have him coming back, but the weeks of absence gave us all a lot of time to think. The fact that my mother’s willing to give it another shot helps me feel hopeful. I want her to love him the way I do.

We finish eating, then clean up our mess. Apparently, the Beckett boys never buy birthday presents for each other. Instead, they “gift” the special brother with some kind of brotherly beating. Aubrey, Aunt Sylvia, and I stand off to the side and laugh as Jax runs over and tackles Asher to the ground.

The two start wailing on each other, rolling around on the ground. Smith is bellowing at them both to stop being wimps. When he gets tired of yelling, he grabs the bag of burger buns, rips off big hunks, and flings them at the brothers.

That has me bent over laughing so hard I can’t breathe. These guys are insane. At first, their actions and the way they talk to each other—which seem strangely hostile—bothered me. But I’ve grown to understand that’s how they show affection, oddly enough.

I couldn’t imagine Della and I acting that way.

After the birthday ass whooping is done, both guys rise off the ground, dust themselves off, then pat each other on the back.

“Well, done, fucker,” Jax says with admiration. “You’ve gotten stronger. All those hormone injections must be doing right by you.”

Asher rolls his eyes. “You wish. Maybe it’s just because I’m beautifully ripped and young, and you’re old and about to die.”

“Okay, fools,” Aunt Sylvia says. “That’s enough of that shit. Sit down and eat some pie before I cram it in your mouths.”

I smother a laugh, and we all eat dessert. The rest of the day passes quickly, and before I know it, we’re telling everyone goodbye and in Jax’s car on the way to his apartment.

His hand slides into mine and he strokes my skin with his thumb. Brushes a kiss across my knuckles. “I love you.”

I never get tired of hearing him say it. “I love you, too.”

“Are you nervous about tomorrow?”

I nod. “I’ve been sick to my stomach for days now. The anxiety is killing me.” I know I’m putting a lot of pressure on this one event, but I just want it to go right. Jax deserves that chance.

“It’ll be fine,” he tells me in a gentle voice. “We’ll work everything out. I promise.” But I know he’s nervous, too. He hasn’t slept well the last couple of nights.

When we get into his apartment, we collapse on the bed with a loud sigh.

“God, I love bed,” I say happily. “I love it so much.”

His hand snakes out to brush the exposed strip of flesh at my bellybutton. “I love naked bed time.” His hand gets my core clenching instantly.

“I love naked bed time, too,” I say, sitting up and whipping off my clothes. I hop to my knees and straddle him. The raw appreciation in his eyes as he cups my breasts makes me feel sexy and loved.

“It’s impossible that you’re this beautiful,” he says. His thumbs rub my nipples, and the bead from the attention.

I lean down and brush my lips against his. He deepens the kiss, tugging me to lie flat on him. “I need you,” I tell him. “Please. Inside me.”

I shift off him so he can undress. He reaches into his side drawer and pulls out a condom, rolling it on. Then I’m straddling him again, his hands clenching my hips, and I slide onto his rigid cock.

We both sigh in pleasure.

“Fuck, I never get tired of being inside this pussy,” he says with a groan. He thrusts his cock into me deeper, and I grind on him. I’ve learned it feels good on my clit and it drives him wild.

I’ve also learned that being on top of him means his cock is stroking my G-spot much better. And Jax loves making me have multiple orgasms this way.

He grabs my wrists and presses my palms to the wall right above his head. My breasts dangle near his mouth. “Don’t you move,” he warns. Then he sucks a breast into his mouth, his tongue swirling, and grabs my hips with tight fingers. Pounds into me.

I shudder from the onslaught of his mouth, his cock, his hands. My lower belly is pulsing from the sensation. “That…that feels so good,” I manage to say.

“I want your come all over me,” he growls against my breast. His mouth shifts to the other one, and he bites down on the nipple, causing me to cry out. It hurts, but it feels so good, especially when he sucks the tip into his mouth. That tugging sensation helps to push me right to the edge.

I begin to writhe on him. Let myself grind on his pelvis, take him for my own satisfaction.

“Fuck yes,” he encourages me. His hands slide down to my ass and he spreads the cheeks apart to help him dive deeper.

And then my orgasm is crashing over me, a surge that makes me stiffen and give a quiet cry. I keep my hands on the wall, though I’m shaking all over, my pussy pulsing in time with my heartbeat. Oh God, I feel like I’m breaking into pieces, shattering apart on this man.

When the feeling ebbs, he flips me until I’m on my back, then lifts my knees and presses them toward my chest. His face is dark, tense with his desire.

“Come for me,” I tell him. I need it more than anything right now, to make him feel as good as he makes me feel.

I stroke his chest, his shoulders, his throat, his Adam’s apple, and Jax pumps that hard cock into me. He’s panting, his pelvis slamming against mine. With my legs back, it’s driving deep into me.

“Yes,” I say. “God, that feels so good. Yes.” My head falls back and I give in, let him take me the way he wants.

His speed becomes more erratic. He pants above me, pressing wet kisses to my legs, drawn up to my chest. “You…feel so fucking good, baby,” he groans.

“I want that come,” I beg him. “Please, give it to me.”

My words send him over. He stills, his entire body a stiff board, the veins standing out on his neck. Then he gives a loud moan and looks down at me as he spills his seed. His eyes are filled with lust and awe…and love.

Right there. I’m bathing in it. All his walls are dropped down at this moment between us, and I can see everything he’s feeling.

When he finishes, his body relaxes. He doesn’t pull out but lowers my legs and rolls us to our side. I drape my thigh on his hip. Enjoy the sweet decadence of this gorgeous man’s naked body pressed to mine.

He finally disposes of the condom, cleans up, then comes right back to my side. Wraps me in his arms. We fall asleep that way, curled against each other. My favorite place to be.

* * *

M
y stomach is a writhing mess
. I sit beside Jax in the car in the driveway, staring at my parents’ front door. I feel like I want to puke all over the place.

“Hey, you okay? I’m getting worried about you,” Jax says, a frown marring his face. “Are you that concerned about your parents?”

The drive here was trouble-free and smooth. But I wasn’t able to relax and enjoy it, despite Jax making a special road trip mix for us—a sweet gesture that warmed me. The whole eight hours, worries filled my mind and I struggled with how to find the courage to talk to him about it.

He grips my clammy hand. “Talk to me. If you want to turn around and head back, we can. Though I could use some sleep—”

“I’m pregnant,” I blurt out. Oh shit, this wasn’t how I wanted to say it. I gather my courage and look him in the eyes.

His mouth is a wide O and he’s staring at me.

“Um.” I clear my throat. “I…I’ve been sick the last several mornings, and I realized my period was overdue, so I snuck out and got a pregnancy test, but I didn’t have the balls to take it until this morning, and it came back positive.” I suck in a breath to feed my starving lungs. “I’m sorry. I…know this is a shock for you.”

“I’m going to be a dad.” The words are quietly delivered.

I nod. “I mean…assuming you want to keep it.”

“Of course we’re keeping it.” Jax’s brows draw together and he stares hard at me. I can’t read his face. Then the realization of it all hits him, and his eyes widen with wonder. “Oh my God. I’m going to be a dad.”

Hot tears prick the backs of my eyes. “Are you okay with this?”

“How did it happen?” I can see him doing mental math.

“It wasn’t that night on the car. I already did the same math. Had to have been another time we had sex.” A flush rises up my throat. “I should have been on the pill to protect against this.”

His hand reaches out, and I see it’s shaking. He touches my face. “Oh God, this is really happening.” Then he leans over and presses the softest kiss to my mouth, and my heart erupts in another surge of love for him.

“You’re not mad?”

Jax pulls back and looks at me in confusion. “Why would I be? It’s not like you got into this alone.” He grips my fingers, which are still cold, and rubs them. “We’re already going to get married. This is just going to…change our timeline a bit. But we’ll make it work.”

“I think I’m due sometime in January,” I tell him. “So maybe I can take the spring semester off school to raise the baby and start again next fall.”