by Cindi Madsen
I spun around and put a good foot of space between us, my crossed arms coming up as an extra barrier. “No.”
He stared at me for a couple of beats, each second making the space smaller and smaller and him bigger and bigger. “Well, in case anyone else in this house is wondering, I haven’t settled down quite yet. And I’m always up for a little fun.”
The way his voice dipped with innuendo seemed like a dare, like he wanted to see if I’d flirt back, like we used to in the before period.
I froze, afraid to move or so much as breathe, because I didn’t trust myself not to take the bait, even though I knew there was a hook hidden underneath it. One minute we’d be having fun, the next we’d both get sucked under the current of our constantly pulsing sexual attraction, and the one after that we’d have a major blowout and he’d be judging me and the way I lived my life.
Something akin to regret crossed his features, but I couldn’t tell if it was regret over venturing into flirty territory or that I wasn’t taking him up on it, or regret that we’d ever gone there in the first place. It disappeared as quickly as it showed up. He ran a hand through his hair and then hefted the bag in his hand. “I’m going to take care of this trash.”
“I think that’s a good idea.” Then again, having a little fun seemed like a pretty good one too.
Bad thought. Bad, most definitely un-robot-like thought. How inconvenient that when Jackson wasn’t being completely infuriating, he could be kinda charming. Or maybe that was just my dry spell talking.
That’d be easier to convince myself of if I wasn’t standing in a swept-out attic. An awful notion hit me, and I stepped out just in time to see Jackson’s delectable backside retreating down the stairs. “I swear, Jackson Gamble, if you put those spiders anywhere but the trash, you’ll wish for death before I’m done with you.”
He cast a devilish grin over his shoulder. “The thought never even crossed my mind, but now that you’ve given me the idea…You might want to sleep with one eye open.”
His evil laugh carried up the stairs, and I shook my head, plotting ways I’d pay him back if he stooped that low. We’re talking dismemberment, possibly after pushing him out a second-story window, and I was confident even Savannah wouldn’t fault me for that.
I heard a door swing closed and crossed to my old bedroom window, where I could see him lower the trash bag into the ugly blue Dumpster taking up most of the driveway.
Looks like I’m going to have to beef up my resistance efforts…
…
Boxes surrounded me on all sides, obscuring the floral couch and the stripped-bare walls. I’d called Dixie and asked what she wanted me to ship to her and what she wanted me to give away or toss, and she told me I could get rid of everything except for her scrapbooks.
I was going to just throw it all in Jackson’s truck to take to Goodwill when he returned from Sunday dinner at his parents’, but then I’d opened up the boxes and dug around, looking for treasures.
A lot of old clothes that would probably never be in style again filled several boxes. One was filled with my high school clothes, and I ended up putting on a fashion show for Black Widow. Most of the items were on the tight side, and I’d attempted some fashion risks that I couldn’t quite pull off—the generic Juicy Couture velour tracksuits, the ruffle skirts that I wore with also-generic Uggs.
I had nothing on my mom and Dixie’s clothes, though. As I sorted through them, it was like scenes from my childhood flashing before my eyes, only the good times instead of all the bad.
I’d taken my first trip to the emergency room after roller skating into the corner of the fireplace mantel and splitting the spot above my eyebrow open. Mom had been wearing a pink halter top that used to embarrass me, even though she’d looked amazing in it—that was probably why it was so traumatic. It attracted men like bees to honey, and I’d secretly been glad when the blood wouldn’t come all the way out. Not sure why she’d kept it, but it was about time it bit the dust.
Dixie’s favorite flannel shirt was in here, too. She’d worn it often, and one especially vivid memory came to mind, of her patting my hand and telling me that boys would always be intimidated by me, but a real man would know how to handle me at my best and my worst.
I’d just had my first breakup cry session on the rocking chair in the corner after Jimmy Walker told everyone he’d only gone out with me because I had big boobs but that I’d turned too clingy.
Yeah. Back in high school, I’d done the clingy thing. In my defense, he was my first, and I knew that Mom was getting close to marrying…Barry, I think? Which meant we were most likely going to move (we did), but I thought that if I had a serious boyfriend, Mom would let me stay and live with Dixie (I didn’t get to test my theory, but doubtful).
In the end, it was a relief to move away for a while.
Barry was one of the better stepdads. He taught me how to golf, and he’d let me borrow his car a lot. In fact, for a little while, I’d dared to think that he might stick and that moving hadn’t been so bad after all.
But of course, he didn’t last—they never did—and by that point, I was so sick of hoping only to be more disappointed in the end.
Back in the present, I closed up the boxes, not sure I could take anymore memories. A picture frame caught my eye, and I retrieved it from the pile of photos that used to line Dixie’s fireplace mantel. The frame held several photos: a snapshot of Mom and Dixie and their dates at their high school prom, their dresses metallic pink and blue and their bangs exceptionally puffy; one from their college days; and another with the three of us, when I was four or five years old. Then the last one, a picture of me receiving an award at school my junior year.
Through the years and the moves and Mom’s different guys, the one solid relationship I knew would always be there was Mom and Dixie’s, and even they hadn’t made it.
Because of a stupid guy.
I mean, Rhett wasn’t stupid. He was smart and funny, not to mention loving and accepting, and my very favorite of Mom’s exes. But she had cast him off, and then he and Dixie crossed paths a few months later. Dixie claimed she’d tried her best to stop it, but she fell head-over-heels in love.
More proof that if you didn’t stop it in its tracks, it’d come and destroy everything you loved.
Yes, love destroyed love.
It was like those drug commercials where they show all the beautiful, happy people hugging and kissing and, like, frolicking and shit. But if you listen, in the background there’s a person talking as fast as humanly possible, listing several serious side effects. Things like this may cause fuzzy vision, heart palpitations, severe mood swings, and vertigo.
Sound like anything else you know? Like, say, love?
All those side effects plus ignoring your family and friends who’ve been there for you your entire life, putting your daughter second, letting a guy you didn’t even like all that much break up a friendship that spanned more than three decades, and being foolish enough to think that the payoff would still be big enough if you could just find the right one.
Okay, some of that might be projecting, but I’d seen my mom do every single one of those things. Which was probably why, during my first few relationships, I was so starved for attention that I clung to them like they were the only good thing in my life. Sometimes they were.
The high school relationships were easy enough to brush off. The college boyfriend was the one that really messed with my head. It’d made me feel stupid, too, because I knew better. I’d seen the side effects for myself, yet I still popped that love pill.
The rumbling of an engine dragged me out of the past.
I put the picture frame back in the pile, taped up the boxes of clothes that were still in good shape, and scribbled goodwill across them in black Sharpie.
Jackson knocked before opening the unlocked door and striding inside.
He had on a button-down, a sports jacket, and black slacks, and he looked good enough to lick. Er, sha
ke hands with. My gaze snagged on the long fingers that would be rough and warm against my skin, and on second thought, maybe I should just keep my hands to myself.
I lifted my hair off my neck and pulled it up to help cool myself down. “How was Sunday dinner?”
In response, he let out the longest exhale ever. I wanted to ask if that meant a certain brunette had been there—the sweet one his family adored and his sister wanted him to give a real chance—or if the big sigh was because she hadn’t attended, and he wished she had. But I’d already said too much yesterday.
Is he “having fun” with her? Was it hard for him to leave because they were having so much damn fun?
Not that I care.
I’m really working on not caring.
“Look, we’ve been putting in long hours, and obviously you’re tired and could use a night off,” I said. “I’m just sorting old boxes, and we can totally haul them to Goodwill later. Go home and get some sleep so that you’ll have energy tomorrow.”
“Don’t you go worrying about my stamina.” He flashed me a smile, but it was tight, like he had to work for it.
“Did something happen with your family?”
“You wanna talk families?”
I opened my mouth and then snapped it closed. Not only did it break a lot of my rules, my bittersweet memories were still swirling in the air, making me far too emotional as it was. “No.”
“Me neither. It was just a long day, and I’m trying to… But I can’t stop…” He shook his head and took a step closer, his eyes meeting mine. “I just want to forget about everything for a while.”
“I could use a little forgetting myself.” My lungs tightened. It seemed like an admission of weakness, even though he’d already said he wanted the same thing. Of all the places he could go to forget, I was surprised he’d choose here. Even more surprised he’d choose me. Although I supposed it just so happened he was here and so was I.
There was something in the air tonight, something that made everything feel different. Jackson was giving off an intense vibe, too, one I couldn’t quite nail down but made my nerve endings stand on end. Instead of questioning everything, I wanted to relax and get swept up in the buzz of it all, just for a little while.
Jackson picked up a deck of cards I’d unearthed among the junk and tapped them against his palm. “How’s your poker game?”
“I can hold my own,” I said, excitement tingling across my skin. What can I say? My competitive nature needed feeding now and then. It often felt like Jackson and I were in our own sort of poker game, strategizing and bluffing and smothering every emotion so we wouldn’t give away our hands. Might as well add cards into the mix so we could declare an official winner for the night.
Luckily I’d picked up some beer and chips at the grocery store earlier, too.
We decided on Texas Hold’em and set up on the tiny, barely-fits-three table that always looked out of place in the spacious dining room. Then we got to shuffling and dealing.
Jackson won the first round by getting lucky last minute with the queen he needed for his full house. I won the next with pocket aces. We went back and forth as we made our way through most of a six pack, our inhibitions a little looser each round.
Jackson leveled his gaze on me, his cards fanned out in one hand. “I think it’s time to up the stakes.”
“You feel like losing money tonight?”
“Not money…” He leaned back in his chair, the perfect image of casual, cool, and collected. “I was thinking we could make it a little more interesting and switch to strip poker. First person to end up naked or call uncle loses.” He gave it a beat to sink in. “Unless you’re scared.”
The challenging gleam in his eye made my heart pick up speed. Judging from his smug expression, he thought I was going to back down.
Well, he was dead wrong.
Chapter Ten
Thanks to the tiny table, my knees brushed Jackson’s bare ones every time I shifted. Not that I could feel they were bare per se, but I knew, and that made me more aware of every time it happened. A pile of clothes pooled on the floor next to us. His shoes, jacket, slacks, and shirt. My socks, shoes, and shirt.
The next card would reveal whether my pants or his socks would join the pile. Unless he went balls out—literally—and lost his boxers before the socks.
It wasn’t like I hadn’t seen him naked before, but it’d been long enough that I’d forgotten what it did to me. How the sight of his carved pecs and abs sent heat pooling low in my stomach. I was plenty confident in what I had going on, and it didn’t escape my attention that his eyes grew darker with every item of clothing I lost, his breathing more shallow.
We were playing a dangerous game, and I hadn’t had this much fun in weeks. Months, even.
I held my breath and leaned in as he placed his hand over the deck of cards to draw the river.
Two kings sat in front of me, a heart and a club.
Jackson had an ace of clubs and a two of diamonds.
The pot consisted of a three of spades, a ten of diamonds, a seven of clubs, and a jack of hearts.
Basically, the odds were in my favor.
With dramatic flair, Jackson flipped the card and threw it in the middle of the table with the others, then let out a holler loud enough to scare Black Widow into the other room.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said as I stared at the ace of hearts. Fifty-two cards—minus the nine on the table—and only three could screw me over.
And he’d drawn one of them.
I shook my head. “You had to have cheated.”
Jackson held up his hands, displaying his bare arms and showing off all those muscles. “Where would I hide the cards? Clearly I don’t have any up my sleeves.”
He had a point there, I’d give him that, but that was all I’d give him. Besides a show. I stood, undid the button and zipper on my jeans, and shimmied out of them. I tossed them on top of the clothes pile and settled back into my chair, crossing one leg over the other. “I think I’m at a disadvantage. For one, my thong hardly even counts as underwear—”
“I’m pretty sure that’s working to your advantage.” His voice came out husky and sent a cascade of tingles down my spine. “I can hardly focus on anything besides the fact that you have a thong on.” He dared a peek around the side of the table.
I slowly uncrossed my legs and then re-crossed them in the other direction, watching his Adam’s apple bob in his throat. Admittedly, it made me feel powerful and more in control, but the heat in his eyes only sent my heart hammering that much harder, which spun me right back out of control.
The only thing I could think about was all the ways he could relieve the pressure building between my thighs. There’d be no going home alone unsatisfied tonight…
I fought back the urge to clear my throat so I wouldn’t give my shaky resolve away and renewed arguing my case. “But with your jacket, you also started with more clothes than I did.”
“You’ve got a bra and panties. I’ve just got boxers. So as I see it, we’re even.”
I wanted to have the strength to say then maybe we should quit while we were ahead. Before we crossed more lines.
Basically, we were both one more win or loss away from winning big. Or losing big. I couldn’t decide, and part of me just wanted to let it happen and think about the consequences later.
But we were only in the beginning stages of the renovation process, which meant another five weeks in tight quarters, not to mention he was my best friend’s brother and she’d made it pretty clear that unless I was open to long term, her brother was off-limits. Hadn’t I just been thinking about how stupid my mom and Dixie were to let a guy come between them?
Savannah wouldn’t like me messing with her brother’s head, especially if he had a real shot at a future with Miss Brunette Debutante. I’d be the temporary distraction, the one holding him back from a relationship that could go somewhere if he just “gave it a real chance.”
&n
bsp; Plus, I wasn’t some broken doll for him to fix.
“I’m okay with who I am,” I said.
Jackson’s eyebrows drew together. Then he leaned forward and placed his hand on my knee as his eyes locked on to mine. I’d been right about the warm and rough fingertips, and my blood zinged through my veins, racing to where we were connected. “Good. I like who you are.”
“You do not.”
“Don’t get me wrong, you drive me crazy, but it’s an addictive kind of crazy.” His fingers dug into my skin, and my stomach dipped and soared back up.
“You drive me completely insane, too,” I said, feeling the need to one-up him even now, although my voice came out shakier than I would’ve preferred. “So what are we doing, then?”
Jackson’s hand slid up the inside of my thigh, and I nearly let out a moan. He dragged his fingertips back and forth, his touch and the desire coursing through me torturous and exquisite all at the same time. “Just having some fun and relieving some tension after a long week. But we can stop if you want.”
Holy shit, I so did not want to stop, even as my brain flashed bad idea, bad idea, bad idea.
His eyebrows arched in question, his hand frozen in place as he waited for the answer. My heart attempted to beat right out of my chest, and my internal temperature was rising faster and hotter by the second.
My phone rang, “Run the World” by Beyoncé blasting out, which meant Savannah. “That’s your sister.”
Jackson sat up in his chair and ran a hand through his hair. “Of course it is.”
Whatever moment we’d had evaporated. We could get it back in all of two seconds, but now my brain was overtaking my hormones, reminding me that last time we’d had some fun it ended up turning more serious than that, and he knew too much about me, and I was best friends with his sister. Savannah was one of the most important people in my life, and while she might forgive one slip, hurting her brother again—accidental or not—would be much harder to overlook. Especially after our talk at the bar the other night.