She was so confused. She knew they cared for her, but this was insane. She owed a lot of money. They covered eighty thousand like it was a few hundred bucks. They got her heat turned on in her apartment building because they didn’t want her to be cold. They didn’t want her working because they wanted to take care of her. Was this a fairy tale come true or a nightmare that would explode in her face with time?
“Say good-bye to Freda and Alvin. We’re going home now,” Jax whispered.
Mariana looked at Freda who smiled at her, and Alvin looked about to burst into laughter.
“You think this is funny?” she barked, and Alvin and his expression changed and now he looked stern, too.
“Do as your men say. They care for you and getting out of that neighborhood sounds great to me.” With that, Alvin walked out of the room.
Mariana was in shock. Even Alvin didn’t like her neighborhood and seemed angry that she lived there.
“You call me later about the jobs next weekend.”
“She’s done, Freda,” Jameson interrupted.
“I will let you know. Thank you for everything.” Mariana hugged Freda good-bye then followed Jax from her home. She was trying to think of what to say to Jax and Jameson as they got into their Range Rover.
As they headed out for the nice area of Houston, she knew they were headed toward her apartment building.
“I don’t want you to see it,” she whispered from the backseat.
Jameson turned around to look at her. Jax glanced to her from the rearview mirror. His dark-blue eyes looked intense as usual.
“There’s nothing to be ashamed of. You’ve had to sacrifice a lot. You’ve been on your own and, as you said, alone to fend for yourself. You’re done being alone. You’re done starving from not having enough money or the ability to take care of your health. We’re taking over. We’re taking care of you and it’s because we care. Get used to it.”
Great, now Jameson was acting just like Jax. She didn’t dare reply what was going through her head. She didn’t want to be bossed around, yet knowing that they paid off her loans, her mother’s bills, and turned on her heat made her feel aroused. She was losing her ever-loving mind.
They did this to her. They made her feel appreciated, sexy, and alive from their possessive behavior. If she were smart, she would exert some form of independence and not allow them to think that they could tell her what to do with every aspect of her life. The more she thought that they wanted her to be their puppet the angrier she became. By the time they pulled up to her apartment building and parked the car then entered the crappy entryway, she felt the fight within her diminish.
One look over her shoulder at Jax and Jameson and she could sense their disappointment and disgust with the place. As they climbed the three flights of stairs since the elevator was out of service as usual, she noticed that her apartment door was unlocked.
“Oh no,” she exclaimed, and immediately Jameson was placing her behind him and both men pulled out guns.
“Where did you get those? What are you doing?” she asked in a panic. They were carrying guns all morning and she had no idea?
Jax entered, and she feared that he could get hurt, but then again, they were professional. She was probably robbed because she didn’t come home last night. Someone was watching her place waiting for the opportunity to break in.
Jax walked back a few seconds later.
His search was fast, but her apartment was so freaking small the tour was as quick as a hiccup.
“It’s all clear, but the place is a mess. Completely ransacked.”
“Oh God.”
Jameson pulled her into his arms and hugged her.
“There’s not much to salvage, honey. Clothes are torn up. I think we should call the police and bring you back down to the Rover,” Jax said then stared at Jameson. She noticed the exchange of looks, and it bothered her. Something told her that he wasn’t telling her everything.
“Wait, I want to see.”
Jameson pulled her back, kind of hard.
“Let the police come. They might be able to fingerprint the place and find out who was responsible.”
“No. I want to look.”
She pulled from Jameson and pushed open the door. The place was a complete mess and appeared as if a bomb exploded in it. The further she walked in the more it became clear that nothing was taken, it was just destroyed.
She walked to her bedroom and gasped, covering her mouth.
The words “DIE BITCH” were painted in red on the walls and the letters dripped like blood. A brown knife was sticking into the pillow. Her bras and panties were ripped to shreds.
Jameson wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her out of the room. She could hear Jax talking into the phone.
“Get them here now. Jameson is taking Mariana back to our place.”
Chapter 11
Mariana sat on the couch with her feet tucked under her butt and a blanket over her. She was waiting on hold on the phone for someone at the college’s main office to assist her with replacing her textbooks. She had just paid for the ones she was using.
She couldn’t get the images out of her head. The bloody words, the torn garments. Everything she owned was destroyed. All her clothing, her crappy furniture, her books for school. Everything. Who would do something like this?
“Who are you on the phone with?” Jameson asked as he stormed into the room. He looked fierce as he grabbed the phone from her hands and disconnected the call. She jumped up, the blanket fell from her shoulders, and she yelled at him.
“Why did you do that? I’ve been on hold for fifteen damn minutes with the college main office.”
“For what?” he asked, not even caring that she yelled at him and was angry. He was acting pompous.
“I need new books and a new schedule and study guide. I have an exam on Thursday that I need to study for and that was destroyed by whomever ransacked my apartment. You had no right doing that.”
He closed the space between them in no time at all. He pulled her into his arms, she gasped for breath, and he squeezed her to him.
“Fuck!” He growled as he lifted her up so that she was forced to straddle his waist.
She knew something was terribly wrong. They were all on edge, obviously, but Jameson had disappeared for a while, saying he had phone calls to make and Jax still hadn’t returned from her apartment. She was worried, and they were both uptight.
Mariana pulled back and cupped Jameson’s face between her hands. “What is it? What’s going on?”
She could practically see the struggle going on in his eyes and facial expression. He was worried.
“Baby, I just can’t get the images out of my head. The words on the wall, the knife in the damn pillow. What if you left last night and went back there without us?”
She hadn’t even thought about that. She was still trying to recover from Ellington’s assault.
“I didn’t even think about that, Jameson. Don’t make yourself crazy worrying about the things that could have happened. I was here with you and Jax. I was safe.”
He squeezed her tighter, and she felt his hand cup under her ass. She was so small compared to him. She felt feminine and delicate in his embrace.
“You’re staying here with us. This is your home now,” he said through clenched teeth. This wasn’t the type of invite she would hope for if she was going to take a chance on this type of relationship. She took an unsteady breath.
“I don’t have anywhere else to go. I was barely paying the rent there.”
“Remember, we took care of your bills. There aren’t any more. Look at this as a fresh start. Jax and I want to take care of you. We want you here with us.”
She thought about his words and how it felt to be in his arms.
“I don’t really know you at all.”
He moved toward the couch and sat down, with her still in his arms and straddling his waist.
“What do you want to know?”
<
“No. But we do have some close friends of ours we were in the Marines with. They live outside of the city. They actually own a really cool restaurant and bar with their fathers.”
“What’s it called?”
“Casper’s. It’s really nice and they have a bunch of pictures from boot camp and other places they were stationed. Their dads were in the military as well.”
“Dads? You mean like more than one? How can that be?”
He ran the palms of his hands up and down her thighs. Despite the jean material she felt the warmth penetrate right through to her skin.
“Baby, they’re a family. John Luke, Jasper, and Davie married Eve and they had three sons, our buddies, Garrett, Gunner, and Wes. Maybe we’ll take a trip out there this weekend. We have a house about twenty minutes from Casper’s. It’s on a nice parcel of land. It’s really beautiful and peaceful there.”
“You own this penthouse and a house with land?” she asked.
He smiled at her. “We’ve worked really hard for our money, baby. I invented that panic button plus a bunch of other things that help soldiers in combat and spies,” he teased as he squeezed her hips then pulled her close and kissed her. At least she thought he was teasing.
“How long were you in the military?”
He got awfully quiet as he caressed her hair away from her face and kept his hand on her shoulder and against her neck. Once again, his hold was possessive. It seemed both brothers liked to hold her in ways that made her feel cherished yet also sexy.
“I was in for a little under fourteen years.”
“Fourteen years? How old were you when you enlisted? How old are you now?”
“I enlisted when I was twenty. Jax was almost twenty-three at the time and already enlisted. We were living on our own, trying to survive. We were doing okay but we wanted more. We wanted college education and careers. We figured we could join the service and get our education but it turned into so much more. We both have our masters degrees. Mine is in biotechnology and Jax’s is in engineering. But we loved serving in the military as commandoes. We have special abilities and we used those to run and maintain our security company.”
“I’m really impressed and you invented that panic button, too. That is amazing. I don’t even have my bachelors degree yet. I’ve been taking classes when I can, but I’m already twenty-four.”
“You’re young enough and determined to get that degree. You’ll do it. You’re going for a business degree, right?”
“Yes. I want to run my own art gallery one day. But I think now, I’ll settle for just being a director of one. But there aren’t any jobs in that. At least at none of the galleries around here.”
Jameson smiled.
“Maybe something will pop up sooner than later.”
She shrugged her shoulders.
“What about you? Any family or old boyfriends that might show up looking to reclaim what’s ours?” he asked as he squeezed her hips then ran the palms of his hands up her chest to cup her breasts. She absorbed the feel of his large hands, and then his fingers pinched the material of her bra, trying to pinch her nipples.
She lowered her head and closed her eyes. She couldn’t help but feel sad. She had asked Jameson to tell her about his life and Jax’s, and now she should share more about her own.
“My dad left my mom when I was three. Not sure why, but she always said he cheated on her and that he was a drunk. But my mom wasn’t any better if that was the case. By the time I was fifteen, she was doing drugs. Prescription drugs actually. I was working by then, waiting on tables and babysitting and trying to go to school. High school sucked because we didn’t have a lot of money and I didn’t have a lot of clothes. Anyway, by the time I started applying for college, her habit got worse and she started bringing home money, telling me that when I was in school she was working.”
Jameson rubbed her thighs again and held her gaze.
“I actually thought she was involved in prostitution. She never brought anyone home but she would get dressed in this very tight, sexy dress and leave. Sometimes for days at a time.”
“What did you do about food?”
“I lived on raw hot dogs and whatever I could bring home from the diner I worked at. The boss was a jerk. He didn’t allow anything to be taken for free and I didn’t want to spend my money. Anyway, in a matter of a few months, my mom got arrested for possession and selling. She was locked up for a while. I would visit her in jail, but then I graduated high school and wanted to go to college. I stuck around here because of her. I guess I hoped that she would get better. You know, maybe wake up and see that doing drugs was wrong and that I needed a mother. No such luck.”
“What happened to her?”
Mariana thought about it. How her mom looked and how she found a dirty needle lying on the tile floor and an empty prescription bottle next to her mom.
Mariana tried to get up off of Jameson’s lap, but he didn’t allow it. He gave her hips a little jerk and a squeeze.
“I want to know.”
“I’ll never forget that day. I came in from working all night. One of the other girls didn’t show and my boss made me work her shift. I needed money for books for college so I stayed. If I hadn’t, who knows if my mom would have shot up and took the pills.”
“What?”
“I found her on the tile floor.”
“Oh, baby. Shit, I’m sorry.”
“She was so gray and old looking. Her hair was greasy. There was a rubber strap around her upper arm and a dirty needle on the floor next to her. There was also an empty prescription bottle. She died from either an overdose or just too many different drugs in her system.”
“I’m so sorry you had to see that, Mariana. I couldn’t even imagine having to witness something like that.”
“It doesn’t matter now. She’s gone and she wasn’t much of a mother anyhow. She left me that damn loan she took out. It was a constant reminder of her habit, her life, and all she hadn’t given to me as a mother.”
“That’s gone now, Mariana. No more bills laying over your head.”
She held his gaze and placed her hands on his shoulders.
“I wish you hadn’t done that. It was so much money and it wasn’t your burden, it was mine.”
“You don’t seem to get it, do you? We care about you. A lot. We take care of those we care about and you needed the help. We don’t want you working so much while you’re trying to get your degree. We want you to have time and energy to be with Jax and I,” he said then winked and smiled.
She couldn’t help but to blush then smile back.
“Are you two for real?”
He squinted his one eye at her.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“I’m a bit of a pessimist, I guess. Experience has shown me that sometimes things aren’t always as they appear and people can change right before your very eyes.”
“You don’t trust me or Jax?”
“It’s not trust per se. It’s more like fear of history repeating itself.”
“Go on and explain.”
“There’s nothing to explain.”
“Who was he and how did he hurt you?”
She was shocked. How the heck did he figure a man was involved? She shrugged her shoulders and told him about Gavan.
“What an asshole. But, it worked out. You belong with us, not him.”
She hesitated to be completely honest with him. Even doing that scared her. Opening up her heart for pain and admitting her fears would give him and Jax power over her. Her heart battled her mind. She had taught herself to not rely on anyone. Too many people promised faith, commitment then failed to come through. Would Jax and Jameson be different? Could she trust them?
She felt his fingers under her chin as he tilted her face toward his. She locked gazes with his dark-blue eyes. “Hey, you got awfully quiet. What’s wrong?”
“Honestly?”
He smiled softly. Her heart melted, and that feeling of distrust slowly diminished.
“Honesty is important in a relationship.”
There he was talking about relationships again. Could they really want her?
“Are you sure you want to be in a relationship with me?”
His thumb caressed across her lower lip.
“As sure as I’ve ever been about anything in my life. It’s simple. It’s right.”
“How do you know?”
He squinted his eyes at her a moment.
“Baby, you really have a difficult time trusting people, don’t you?”
She didn’t reply. She didn’t need to as she held her serious expression.
“What are you so afraid of with Jax and I?”
Her heart raced. She felt her hands become clammy as she swallowed hard. Honesty. I have to tell the truth and if they hurt me in the end, then I will once again be alone in a world waiting to eat me whole.
“I can’t help but be fearful that you’ll leave me, too. For something or someone better.”
He placed his palm against her cheek and held her gaze. “Baby, we won’t leave you or hurt you, because you are meant for us. Jax and I have never felt like this about anyone, ever. I know trust is difficult for you, and after what you shared with me I can understand why. But, you need to trust me. I won’t leave you and neither will Jax.”
She hugged him tight and felt the tears well up in her eyes.
“I couldn’t stand it if you left me. Either of you,” she admitted, and he squeezed her to him then began to kiss her cheek. She pulled back, and he covered her mouth with his own.
She immediately felt Jameson’s hands move up and under her shirt. He released her lips a moment to pull her shirt over her head. The feel of his strong, large hands pressing against her skin, maneuvering her to his liking, aroused her senses. He explored her mouth with his tongue while nimble fingers unclasped her bra. Pulling his lips from hers he continued to kiss her, spreading loving along her jaw and neck as he lifted her by the hips so he could feast on her bare breast.
“Oh, Jameson,” she whispered, running her fingers through his hair, pressing her breast firmer against his mouth. He nipped and pulled on her nipple, making her panties wet as desperation filled her.
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