Before she could spend too much time wondering about it, Lucas pulled Jenny with him down into one of the wide, plush leather chairs that were situated in pairs on opposite sides of the coffee table, and started talking about how they’d fooled around in the back of the Uber they’d taken to get there. His voice was far too loud, considering there was a child in the room, and Jack quickly leaned over, telling him to watch his mouth before either she or Jonah could do it. Lucas apologized and quieted down, but it didn’t take long for everyone there to realize the guy was already hammered.
“What’s wrong with Lucas?” she whispered, as Denny leaned close to refill her wine glass.
“Just ignore him,” Denny muttered with a frown. “He’s in a mood.”
As soon as Denny headed back into the kitchen, Jocelyn cast a worried look up at Jonah, who was sitting beside her, his arm wrapped around her shoulders, holding her close to him. “Is it me? Is my being here somehow upsetting him?”
“No, baby. You didn’t do anything,” he assured her in a low voice, pressing a soft kiss to the center of her forehead. “He just gets like this sometimes.”
Before she could say anything more, someone knocked on the door, and Gabe walked over to let in a lovely young woman who Jonah introduced as “Keaton McKenna, Jack’s precocious baby sister,” which had the girl rolling her eyes and laughing.
Keaton was only three years younger than Jocelyn, and beyond beautiful, with long dark hair and light blue eyes. She was dressed in an edgy outfit that consisted of distressed jeans and a baggy, off-the-shoulder black top, which looked amazing on her tall, thin frame, and seemed a perfect fit for her quirky personality. According to Jonah, Keaton was a creative spirit still searching for what she wanted to do in life. She was smart as a whip, but had never been interested in getting a degree. Instead, she dabbled in art and drama classes, while playing acoustic gigs on the piano all over the city.
The guys all took turns hugging her, complaining that they hadn’t seen her in ages, and it was clear that they were all close—and that they viewed her like their own little sister. All of them except for Lucas. He remained in the chair with his unusually quiet date, looking as if his mood were deteriorating by the minute.
“I love your name,” Jocelyn said, as Keaton took the spot on the sofa beside her.
“Thanks. Our mom is a huge Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson fan, so she named us after them,” Keaton explained with a friendly smile, nodding toward her brother.
“That’s awesome. They’re two of my favorite actors.”
They talked for a while, discovering they both loved the same little bookstore that wasn’t far from where Keaton lived. But then Jack asked his sister if she could help him whip up their famous family salad dressing in the kitchen, and she laughed as she moved to her feet, ribbing him about never remembering the recipe.
Setting her wine down on a coaster, Jocelyn turned toward Jonah. “Do you think we should give Nic a break?” she asked him in a quiet voice. “He’s been keeping Davey entertained ever since we got here.”
He looked over at them. “Naw, he’s getting a kick out of the little dude.” Bringing that brilliant blue gaze back to hers, he smiled as he said, “But don’t be surprised if Davey starts asking us for art supplies. I think Nic’s enthusiasm for drawing might be rubbing off on the kid.”
“I think he stole Davey’s heart at the words ‘draw an elephant’,” she said with a soft laugh, knowing how much her son loved anything that had to do with animals.
She was smiling as she watched Nic turn Davey’s paper around so that he could see what he’d drawn, when she felt Jonah lean in closer to her. She thought he was going to give her an innocent kiss on her cheek, but felt the tip of his tongue graze her skin instead.
“What are you doing?” she whispered, casting an embarrassed, wide-eyed glance around the room. But no one was paying them any attention.
“Tasting your pink little cheek,” he murmured, before nipping her earlobe with his teeth. “In case you were wondering, it tastes delicious.”
“I’m g-glad,” she said shakily, and it was impossible to control her body’s reaction to him, her nipples pulling into tight little buds beneath the light silk of her dress.
Or course, Jonah being Jonah, he noticed her reaction the instant he pulled his head back, a slow, wicked grin kicking up the corner of his mouth as his smoldering gaze swept over her breasts. “Almost as sweet as your hot little pussy. And your beautiful tits.”
Her eyes went even wider, and the heat in her face was making her cheeks burns. “Shh!”
“Don’t worry, baby, no one can hear me.” He leaned forward again and kissed the corner of her mouth. “Though from the way you’re blushing, they’ve probably already guessed that I’m whispering dirty things to you.”
“You’re outrageous, Mr. Cartwright,” she said with a strangled laugh.
“True,” he husked. “But you have to live with it, Miss Brenna, because I’m also yours.”
Her breath sucked in on a sharp gasp, and she blinked up at him. “I don’t think I’ll ever get used to hearing that.”
“Yeah?” He smiled, and his heavy-lidded gaze turned incredibly tender. “Then I’ll just have to keep saying it until you do.”
CHAPTER SIX
A moment later, Denny called everyone into the newly remodeled, extended dining room, and Jocelyn was relieved to see that she and Davey were sitting with Jonah at the opposite end of the table from Lucas and Jenny. They spent the next hour enjoying the amazing food and lively conversation, and it was clear to Jocelyn that Jonah and the other four Atlas owners were more than just friends—they really were a family. She could see now why he’d wanted her and Davey there, and no longer cared if it was right or wrong to rush into their relationship. Sitting by his side, as he laughed and talked with his friends, while taking the time to carefully cut Davey’s steak into tiny, child-sized pieces, she realized that the only thing that mattered was how they felt about each other. Not their pasts or the mountain of what ifs that could plague not just theirs, but anyone’s relationship.
At one point, she and Jonah both noticed the way that Gabe was staring at them as they talked to Davey about what they should do that upcoming weekend, and she could just hear Gabe’s low voice as he leaned toward Jonah and said, “You look happy, man. Happier than I’ve ever seen you.”
“That’s because I am,” Jonah replied with a warm smile, and Jocelyn was pretty sure that in that moment he claimed ownership over yet another piece of her heart.
Nearly everyone there, including the normally quiet Nic, had made a point of commenting on how good Jonah was with Davey, except for Lucas. He wasn’t even his usual friendly self with Jocelyn. Instead, he spent his time throwing back one gin and tonic after another, while muttering things under his breath to a bored-looking Jenny Velasquez.
As the evening wore on, she noticed that Jonah was giving his friend some sharp looks of warning, and Lucas’s behavior was beginning to make her nervous. Especially when he started in on Jack’s sister. Jocelyn didn’t know what the story was there, but she’d caught Keaton watching Lucas more than once, and had a feeling the girl had a huge crush on him. But Lucas seemed to make it a point to ignore her, unless he was saying something shitty or snide.
As they all gathered back in the living room with their after-dinner coffees, getting comfortable on the sofas and chairs again, Keaton asked Jocelyn if it would be okay if she took Davey into the kitchen for some homemade ice cream that had just finished setting, since he hadn’t eaten the cheesecake that’d been served for dessert.
“I’m sure he’d love that,” Jocelyn said, since it was obvious from the way Davey had been following Keaton around that he had a bit of a crush on her. And she knew Keaton, who seemed to be a natural with kids, would keep a close eye on him.
“Aw, look at that,” Lucas sneered, as Keaton took Davey’s hand and they headed toward the kitchen. “The kids are grabbing ice crea
m together. I was starting to feel like we were babysitting them both.”
It was obvious, from the way her shoulders stiffened, that Keaton had heard him, but she kept happily chatting away with Davey, who was thankfully oblivious to the tension in the room.
“What the fuck is your problem?” Jonah growled at Lucas, the second Davey and Keaton had disappeared through the kitchen door.
Before Lucas could respond, Jack spoke up as well. “I think it’s time you lay off the booze, man. You’re acting like an asshole.”
“Yeah?” he laughed, taking his arm from around Jenny’s shoulders and leaning forward in the chair they were sitting in. A sharp smile started to curl the edges of his mouth as he looked from Jack to Jonah, and Jocelyn had a bad feeling the situation was about to get a hell of a lot worse. “Then I guess you don’t want me to start in on how I ran into one of Valerie’s old friends the other day, huh? Would that start rattling too many skeletons in the new family man’s closet?”
“Lucas, you’re drunk,” Gabe growled in a low voice, sounding pissed.
But it was Jonah who was livid. He mirrored Lucas’s pose from where they were sitting on the sofa, and as he leaned forward to set down the Pepsi he’d been drinking, he said, “If I were you, man, I’d think long and hard about what my next words were going to be.”
Setting his drink down so hard that some of it sloshed onto the table, Lucas grabbed Jenny’s hand and stood, pulling her to her feet along with him. “I guess that’s our cue to go,” he said, and there was an unmistakable slur to his words, making it clear that he was headed hard and fast toward being completely wasted. Jocelyn held her breath, praying he would just walk away. But as he let go of his date’s hand and slung his arm around her waist, yanking her into his side, he looked back down at Jonah and smirked. “Jenny and I are gonna hit Vane later,” he drawled. “Let me know if you want to come by and join us after you drop off the new fam. We nearly fucked the place to the ground the last time we were all there together.”
Jocelyn gasped, her pulse pounding in her temples as she realized Jonah had had sex with the beautiful brunette. And to the woman’s credit, she appeared slightly horrified by what Lucas had just said.
“Lucas!” Gabe snapped, looking furious now. But it was nothing compared to how Jonah reacted.
“What the ever-loving fuck?” Jonah snarled, already on his feet, his hands fisted hard at his sides, before Jocelyn even had a chance to blink.
“Hey, it was just a suggestion,” Lucas laughed, and there was a bitterness to his deep voice that she’d never heard before. “I mean, sooner or later, you’ve got to be real, right? You can’t keep hiding your true colors forever, man.”
A chill swept down Jocelyn’s spine at those particular words, making her think of the texts she’d received on Sunday night, and she shared a worried look with Denny as Jonah moved past her in a blur, snarling, “You stupid son of a bitch!”
Thankfully, Gabe was closer to Lucas, and he managed to grab the tall blond and start dragging him toward the door before Jonah could reach him. Jenny shot everyone an embarrassed look before running after them, and Gabe dragged Lucas into the outside hall, with Jonah and Jenny following. It was Jonah who slammed the door to the apartment behind them, but the rest of the group could still hear their raised voices as the three friends started arguing.
Keaton walked into the living room with a giggling Davey in her arms, took one look at everyone’s tense expressions, and locked her worried gaze with Jocelyn’s. “If it’s okay with you, I’d like to take Davey out onto the balcony and show him the view. I promise I’ll keep a tight hold on him.”
Twisting her hands together in her lap, she shot Jack’s sister a grateful smile. “Thanks, Keaton. That’d be great.”
Fortunately, Keaton and her son were already outside when Jonah roared, “I should fucking kill you!” followed by the sound of something heavy slamming up against the hallway wall. That “something” no doubt being Lucas.
“Just forget what he said,” Jack murmured from the opposite sofa. “The guy’s drunk and in a shitty mood.”
“Yeah,” Nic murmured from one of the other chairs. “Lucas can get like this if he drinks too much.” He shot her a grim smile as he added, “I know he’s gonna feel like the world’s biggest asshole when he sobers up tomorrow and realizes what he did. He’s gonna hate that he acted like a dick in front of you.”
She gave him a wan smile and nodded a little, straining to hear what was being said out in the hallway. But their voices had dropped to guttural snarls that she couldn’t make out.
“Jace,” Denny whispered, looking as pale as she felt. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” she whispered, licking her lips. But she wasn’t. Inside her chest, her heart was thudding with hard, painful beats, and she couldn’t get the destructive, devastating images of Jonah, Lucas, and the gorgeous Jenny that her brain kept supplying out of her head.
Suddenly the front door opened, and a tense-looking Jonah stalked back into the apartment, followed by Gabe, who shut the door behind them. There was no sign of Lucas or Jenny, and she let out a small breath of relief as she met Jonah’s dark gaze.
He stopped in his tracks the instant she looked at him, and whatever he saw in her eyes made him flinch, as if he’d just been dealt an invisible blow.
“Come on,” he muttered. “We’re getting the fuck out of here.”
“I’ll go get Keaton and Davey,” Jack murmured, moving to his feet and heading toward the balcony doors.
Jocelyn’s knees shook as she stood up, and Denny quickly came over to her, giving her a tight hug. “I’m so sorry Lucas acted like an ass,” her friend whispered in her ear.
“It’s not your fault,” she said, hugging her back. “And thanks so much for having us over. I was having a really good time.”
“Me too,” Denny said, pulling back and giving her a determined smile. “And we’re doing this again as soon as we can, minus the drunken drama.”
She joined Jonah by the door, and to her surprise, Nic and Gabe came over and gave her hugs as well. And in that moment, Jocelyn realized that any lingering awkwardness she might have felt over what had happened in Jonah’s office in front of Nic and Jack, and what she’d learned about the threesome he’d had with Denny and Gabe, had been completely dispelled in the face of Lucas’s behavior. Their show of support made her feel like an official part of the group, and in a weird way, it almost felt like she should thank the jackass.
Gabriel leaned over and murmured something to Jonah that she couldn’t hear, and then Jonah took her hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. Keaton and Jack came back into the room with a smiling Davey, her son completely oblivious to the tense drama that had just taken place. He ran over and grabbed on to Jonah’s other hand, which brought the first genuine smile to Jocelyn’s lips since Lucas had started acting like a jerk. Nic bumped fists with Davey, telling him it was awesome to meet him, and the rest of the group followed suit. She had a feeling that Davey’s new thing was going to be the fist bump, and she could already see him teaching the move to Piper the next time they were together.
They headed out then, after a still worried-looking Denny had hugged all three of them, and made their way down to the parking garage. Jonah lifted Davey up into his car seat and got it secured like a pro, then hit a button on his key fob that had a small video screen sliding down from the top of the car. A second later he had Davey’s favorite cartoon playing, and then he pulled a pair of headphones from the back of the front seat, slipping them over Davey’s ears. Her son stared up at the cartoon in awe, and Jocelyn realized that Jonah had just managed to secure them the opportunity to talk on the drive home, without having to worry that Davey could overhear them.
After he shut her door for her, ever the gentleman, he walked around to the driver’s side and climbed in. He worked his jaw a few times as he started the powerful engine, then began to reverse out of the parking space as he quietly said, “I don’
t even have the words to explain how fucking sorry I am you had to hear that shit. But it won’t happen again, baby. I’m fucking done with him.”
“Don’t say that,” she murmured, feeling ill inside. “He’s one of your best friends, Jonah.”
He slid her a stark, pain-filled look, before pulling out into the evening traffic. “He tried to hurt us, Jace. Tried to destroy what we’re building.”
“I got that. It was, um, kind of hard to miss. But do you know why?”
“Fucker wants you for himself,” he growled under his breath, squeezing his big hands around the leather steering wheel.
“What? No! I think he’s just…hurting.”
He made a thick, frustrated sound in the back of his throat. “So he wanted to bring me down with him?”
“He was also drunk, which everyone knows can make us do and say things that we later regret. I think he was just lashing out, and you were an easy target. Because of…you know. The things that you’ve both…done together.”
“Christ, Jace. I haven’t fucked Lucas,” he scraped out, his grip on the wheel so tight his knuckles were turning white.
“Okay. But I’m guessing that you’ve fucked a lot with him.”
“Shit,” he cursed, the hoarse word sounding like gravel in his throat. “Shit. Shit. Shit!”
“Jonah,” she said softly. “I went into this thing with you knowing that you have a… Well, an unusual past.”
His nostrils flared as he sucked in a hard, sharp breath. “Yeah, but that fucking past isn’t ever going to be shoved in your face. I’ll do whatever it takes to keep that from happening.”
The Next Play: Part Three Page 8