I felt something shift in my chest, and my cock was ready to go off at the slightest touch, something that had never happened to me, not even when I first became sexually active. I left her brother still talking on the deck as I jogged over to her and lifted her out of the pool. She’d been soaking wet and I still had my shirt on over my swim trunks, but I pulled her against me so hard, she couldn’t miss the fact that I was already pulsing for her. All she would have had to do was stroke a single fingertip down my shaft, and I would have erupted all over her sweet body.
I heard her soft gasp and shivered as her glittering eyes filled with heat.
If Cannon hadn’t pushed me into the pool then and there, I wasn’t sure what I would have done. Instinct had been screaming at me to kiss her, to let the world know this girl was mine and I would fucking destroy anyone who so much as thought about touching her.
But as the cool water enveloped my head and I came up for air, seeing the pissed-off look on Cannon’s face, I knew I couldn’t make Shaw mine.
If I took what I wanted, it would mean giving up Cannon.
And as much as I wanted his sister, I wasn’t willing to ruin our friendship.
We weren’t just best friends. He was my brother, my partner in crime. No girl, not even one who held a piece of my heart, could tear us apart. I wouldn’t allow it.
Picking up my shirt off the floor by the TV, I pulled it over my head as I left the bedroom.
As I turned for the stairs, my gaze fell on Shaw’s closed door, causing my cock to flex in my shorts and my heart to sit a little heavier in my chest. As I walked past it, I stroked my fingers over the door, wishing it were her skin I was touching.
Downstairs, I went straight to the kitchen in search of food. I was so comfortable at the Cage house, it was like a second home to me. I knew where everything was—and even where Aunt Dallas hid the good snacks so Cannon wouldn’t eat them all in one day. Shaw had shown me the secret stash when she was ten, making me promise never to tell her brother.
Grabbing a mixing bowl out of one of the cabinets, I poured myself a huge portion of cereal before grabbing a spoon. The sun was reflecting off the ocean outside, and I walked out onto the deck to soak up the rays as I ate my breakfast.
While I stood there, I saw Mason run down the beach with Oscar at his side. Spotting me, he lifted his arm and waved, and I tossed up my hand to wave to my younger cousin.
“Got a big enough bowl?”
I turned at the sound of Uncle Axton’s voice. Taking another bite of my cereal, I shrugged. “This was as big as I could find. Maybe your wife should invest in some larger bowls.”
Snorting, he dropped down in one of the chairs beside where I was standing. “I’ll be sure to mention that. You call your mom?” He pulled his phone out of his pocket and started texting away. “She’s been blowing up my phone this morning, wanting to know if you’re still alive and shit. I snapped a few pictures of you and Can snoring your asses off, and she calmed down.”
“As soon as I opened my eyes, I texted her,” I assured him.
“You got plans today?” he asked when he put the phone down on his thigh a few moments later. “Going to a party? Got a date?”
“Nah.” I shoveled the last of my cereal into my mouth. After chewing and swallowing, I set the empty bowl on the rail and leaned back, crossing my arms as I tipped my head upand enjoyed the heat of the sun. “I haven’t dated in…” I frowned and opened my eyes. “Damn, I really don’t know when the last time I had a date was.”
No, that was a lie. I remembered. Because it had been the night before I realized I wanted Shaw. Since then, I hadn’t found anyone I wanted enough to take out. I’d gone to parties, flirted, but I hadn’t even gotten anyone’s number, let alone a kiss. It just felt…wrong. Like giving another girl even a little bit of my time would hurt Shaw. And the thought of Shaw hurting always made me my skin feel too tight.
Uncle Axton’s brows lifted at my answer. “You’re a sad excuse for a rocker, boy,” he muttered. “When I was your age—”
He broke off just as the door slid back and his wife stepped outside with a glass of sweet tea in her hand. He pressed his lips together, but she gave him a dry look. “No, please. Tell us exactly what you were doing at his age.”
“What were you doing at eighteen, baby?” he asked, narrowing his eyes on her.
“I spent a lot of time in London when I was eighteen,” she said with a shrug. “Working. With other models. Male models. Hot, mostly naked male models.”
Growling something under his breath, he grabbed her and pulled her down onto his lap. Somehow, she didn’t spill a single drop of her tea. Laughing, she kissed him before lifting her blue gaze to me. “So no parties and no dates.” She looked thoughtful for a moment before glancing at the door that led into the kitchen. When I followed where her eyes had strayed, I saw Shaw watching us from the doorway.
Noticing I was looking her way, she stuck out her tongue at me and turned away. Giving me the perfect view of her ass in a pair of tight black leggings. Fuck. That ass had starred in every dream I’d had in the past year. Every damn one of them.
“No,” I told Aunt Dallas after I cleared my throat. “Just hanging out around here. If that’s okay.”
“Hell, I don’t remember the last time Cannon spent an entire weekend at home.” She took a thirsty drink of her tea, which I knew had enough sugar in it to cause anyone to go into a diabetic coma. If I took one sip of that tea, I would have been so high on sugar, I would have been bouncing off the walls. “I think this calls for a celebration. Let’s have a home-cooked meal,” she suggested to her husband.
“Who is going to be cooking?” he asked skeptically.
“I will.”
“Pass,” he muttered, and she flicked him on the nose, making him snap his teeth threateningly at her finger.
“Fine. Takeout, then. I just want a nice dinner with my kids home for the first Saturday in forever.” She kissed him again and then jumped to her feet. “I’ll even make popcorn after, and we can all watch a movie together in the living room.”
She was still talking as she went back into the house, making Uncle Axton shake his head at her back, but his eyes lingered on her ass as she walked away.
The hunger I saw in his hazel eyes was something I recognized. Because it was what I felt in my own gaze when I looked at Shaw.
Chapter 3
Shaw
The events of the afternoon before hadn’t even been on my mind until we sat down to dinner Saturday evening and Dad played the video I sent him of Mom literally busting some guy’s balls.
Jagger and my brother were laughing their asses off, cracking joke after joke until Dad told them why Mom did what she did. My brother lost his grin, but it was Jagger who pushed his tacos away so he could grab my hand and squeeze.
“Are you okay?” he half growled, and I felt a thrill travel up my spine, causing me to fight a shiver at his touch.
Hearing Cannon mutter something vicious under his breath, I reluctantly pulled my hand free and picked up my fork to dig into my rice and beans. “Nothing happened,” I assured him. “The guy was just looking at me. I’m a model. It’s my job to let people look at me, you know.”
“Not the way that fucker was looking at you,” Mom gritted out. “I’m just lucky the redhead was able to keep me from being arrested. It would have been worth it, though.”
I sighed heavily. Whether Mom wanted to admit it or not, we both knew that most of the photos I ended up starring in across the world were used as spank-bank material. It didn’t matter that I’d never done a nude photo shoot. Or that I was sixteen. I’d been modeling since before my teens, and I was aware there were some sick people out there. As did both of my parents. Which was one of the many reasons they had been so reluctant to let me start modeling in the first place.
But even back then, I’d known what I wanted and fought for the chance to prove I was strong enough and determined enough to succeed. At first
, Mom had been unhappy with my career choice. She’d been forced into the same profession by her own mother when she was a kid, and she had hated every moment of it. But when she saw how much fun I had, and how good I was at what I did, she’d eventually calmed down and started helping me climb the ladder to the top.
Now, I was one of the highest-paid models worldwide, and it was all because she had my back.
Deciding to drop it, I cut into my chicken burrito and stuffed my mouth with a huge bite, while around me, the conversation turned to something less explosive than the creep from the day before. But while Cannon and Dad talked about the new material OtherWorld would be working on in the studio in the next few weeks, I felt Jagger’s eyes on me.
Chancing a glance at him while my brother was distracted, I found Jagger with a murderous look on his face, but his pale-blue eyes were full of concern.
“I’m okay,” I mouthed, and he seemed to relax, if only a little. I reached forward and stole a bite of his nachos, making him grin and roll his eyes, but he pulled his plate back toward himself and picked up one of his tacos.
“What movie are we watching?” Dad asked as he picked up his and Mom’s now-empty dishes before nodding at Cannon to help.
“I thought watching a movie together was just a suggestion,” my brother grumbled. He took Jagger’s plate and stacked it on top of his own before taking mine and following Dad to the sink.
“Nope,” Mom told him, popping the “p.” “I haven’t had everyone home on a Saturday night in forever. We’re doing this. Decide what you want to watch, and how you want your popcorn, before I start making the choices for you.”
“I vote scary,” Jagger spoke up.
“I second that,” Cannon announced.
I pressed my lips together, knowing I was already outnumbered and there was no reason for me to argue. It made me wish Violet were there so she could back me up and tie the scary-themed movie with a comedy.
“As long as there are no clowns, then fine,” Dad said as he rinsed the plates and started stacking them in the dishwasher.
I bit my lip, knowing he’d made that stipulation for Mom’s sake and not his own. My brother and I had heard the story of how Dad saved Mom from a haunted house clown room enough times to know that her fear of clowns was no joke. But it still made me smile to think about my father valiantly carrying my mother out of her worst nightmare come to life.
“I want M&M’s in my popcorn,” I told Mom before draining the last of my vitaminwater straight from the bottle.
Standing, I rinsed the bottle before placing it in the recycling bin. “I’m going to take a shower before we watch a movie,” I announced. “I assume we have a little time before it starts since we’re having snacks and we just ate dinner.”
Mom glanced at her watch. “You have a little over an hour. I think I’ll grab a shower too, and we can cuddle on the couch in our pajamas.”
“I’ll bring us a blanket,” I promised over my shoulder as I took the back stairs up to my room.
I don’t know why I took my time in the shower; it wasn’t like I needed to impress anyone. Though I wanted to spend some alone time with Jagger, even if it was just to watch a movie with only the two of us, it wasn’t like he would try to make a move. He knew how I felt about him, and despite my seeing the same hunger I felt blazing out of his cool-blue eyes from time to time, he’d made it plain that he wasn’t interested in acting on his feelings.
Instead of drying my hair, I just pulled it into a ponytail to keep it out of my way and grabbed a pair of sleep shorts. Rather than putting on a bra and being uncomfortable, I grabbed a hoodie and the promised blanket for Mom before leaving my bedroom. As I walked into the living room, it was to find my mother in similar attire, except she had gone with sleep pants. But her damp hair was up in a knot and her hoodie was one of Dad’s.
I glanced down at my own hoodie. One I’d stolen from Jagger months before when he’d left it lying on the chair after spending the night. He’d come over looking for it the next day, but I’d claimed not to have seen it.
Noticing it now, he rolled his eyes at me, and I winked as I took my usual spot on the sectional beside Mom. Dad took the seat on her other side, and I spread the soft, plush blanket across the three of us before he handed out individual bowls of popcorn.
Cannon dropped down on the other end of the sectional beside his friend just as the movie started, and I decided watching Jagger watch the movie was more entertaining than actually watching the movie myself. I wasn’t a fan of being scared, so I tried to avoid it as much as possible.
Before the movie was even over, Cannon had fallen asleep, his snoring drowning out the sound of the chainsaw onscreen. Jagger took the chance to stuff candy and popcorn pieces into my brother’s mouth, and a few times, he jerked awake, chewing the snack and not even curious as to how the food got there.
Giggling, I snuck over and grabbed a few Cheetos out of Cannon’s bowl before arranging one out of his nose.
He startled awake again just as the last person was being sliced and diced while some girl screamed in the background. “What’d I miss?” he muttered to his best friend, and I hid my grin as he looked over with the Cheeto sticking out of his nostril like a big orange booger.
Mom snickered beside me but didn’t give it away as she recanted the death of the last few people.
Then he scrubbed a hand over his face tiredly and felt what shouldn’t be there. “Damn,” he muttered and tossed the Cheeto into his bowl disgustedly. “I’m more tired than I realized if I’m feeding my nose in my sleep.”
“Yeah,” Dad agreed, his face completely serious even though he’d been silently cracking up while I’d put food up my brother’s nose only moments before. “Maybe you should head to bed, bud.”
“I think I will.” Yawning, he stood. “Night.”
“Goodnight,” I murmured, giving him a beaming smile that he rolled his eyes at and climbed the stairs to everyone else telling him goodnight.
I heard his bedroom door shut, and then we all burst out laughing. Tears of mirth in my eyes, I didn’t even care that I had to clean up his mess. Mom and Dad went to bed a few minutes later while I was still cleaning up the pieces of popcorn Cannon had spilled during the movie, leaving me alone with Jagger for the first time in forever.
Suddenly feeling nervous, I carried the mostly empty bowls into the kitchen and put them in the dishwasher. Grabbing us each a drink on the way back, I asked Jagger if he wanted to watch another movie.
“Sure. I’m not even a little tired.” He took the diet soda I offered before patting the spot beside him that my brother had occupied earlier. “Sit here and share the blanket.”
Tugging on the throw, I pulled it across us and happily snuggled in beside him. His arm casually went around my shoulders, pulling me closer as he flipped through the newest releases to see what our options were. “I know you don’t want another scary movie,” he said as he scrolled down the movie titles. “How about this action flick? Think you can handle it?”
I read the blurb and nodded. “Seems okay, I guess.”
As the movie started, Jagger’s hand slid from my shoulder down my arm. Goose bumps popped up in its wake before his hand came to rest at my waist, right above the top of my sleep shorts. I bit my lip, holding on to the moan that wanted to escape when his fingers skimmed over the skin as he smoothly tugged my hoodie out of the way.
When I chanced a glance up at him as the movie started to see his reaction to touching me like that, his gaze was on the TV, his jaw relaxed as if he didn’t even realize the effect he had on me. All he was doing was holding me, the same way he’d done my entire life. There was nothing sexual about it, except for the fact that just his touch was enough to make me ache.
I wanted to climb onto his lap and rub myself against him. I wanted him to pull my ponytail free and wrap my hair around his wrist and kiss me like he couldn’t get enough of my taste. I wanted to know if his cock was as big as I suspected it was
after having felt it against me a few times in the past.
“Fuck,” he muttered, his hand on my waist clenching into a fist for a moment before relaxing again. “Shaw, please stop squirming.”
His tortured plea was the only thing alerting me to the fact that I had been squeezing my thighs together and shifting from side to side in an effort to find some measure of relief from the ache throbbing between my legs.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, half embarrassed, half pissed that he didn’t just grab me and put me out of my misery. There was no way he didn’t know how I felt, and I thought maybe—just maybe—he felt what I did. It wasn’t possible for there to be this kind of tension between us if we didn’t have at least a little shared chemistry.
Right?
He brushed his nose over the top of my head. I heard him inhale deeply and couldn’t contain my shiver. “What are you thinking about, Dimples?” he rasped close to my ear.
“I was wondering if kissing you would be life-changing or if maybe I’ve just built it up in my head,” I told him without turning my gaze from the screen. There was a careless challenge in my voice, as if it didn’t matter if he took me up on it or not. Like it wouldn’t change anything if he suddenly kissed me or if all we did was watch the movie, when inside I was pleading for him to show me I wasn’t wrong about how he felt.
“I know it would be life-changing,” he whispered, his nose nuzzling a few strands of hair off my neck before tracing little circles below my ear. “I’m just unsure if that is a good thing or not.”
I lifted my shoulders in a small shrug. “I guess it’s only a good thing if you’re willing to fight for what comes with it.”
“And what comes with it?” His voice had gotten deeper, but there was a huskiness to it that made my lady parts melt, and I had to press my thighs together as hard as I could in an attempt to alleviate the ache.
Wanting Shaw (Rockers' Legacy Book 5) Page 2