by Alexa Davis
My chest got a little constricted as I hung out in my booth for a little longer to give Jackson time to sleep more before I started making noise around the apartment. I’d been damaged, and thought I was broken when I’d given myself over to the appraisal of the gamer geeks of the world and asked to join their ranks, starting with only three people who decided to watch my stream, and kept coming back to hang out with me.
They’d accepted me and brought their friends to my stream. Now, two years later, I was grossing what I had at the top of my modeling career, and it felt like my job was to hang out with my friends. Added to what had to be the greatest professional success I could have hoped for, the sexiest man to ever click a mouse now slept in my living room, and I could still feel the sweet ache he left behind whenever he was inside me. I glanced over my equipment one last time before shutting off the light. I had come from nothing, and no one. Only I had been responsible for what I had now. I sure as hell didn’t need to be a damned gold digger to survive. I shut the booth up tight to keep a curious Stiles out, and snuck back into the kitchen to make breakfast.
It was a small disappointment that Jackson was already out of bed and in the bathroom when I looked for him, but I used the opportunity to do what he’d been doing for me all weekend. I put the bed away, did a breakneck dash around the room to tidy up and threw away the beer bottles from the night before. I tied back my hair so it wouldn’t look quite as gross and in need of washing as it was, and by the time he had done his business in the bathroom and came walking out with nothing on but a towel around his waist, breakfast was well on its way to being done.
I watched him dress as I cooked on the stovetop in the island, silently praising the tenant before me who had demanded updates and an upgraded kitchen. The way his muscles rippled as he dried off and started to dress, made me wish I’d not bothered with breakfast, and had just been waiting naked for him when he came out. He looked every inch of his six foot, six-inch height when there was nothing but skin to draw the eye up his body. The only part of him that wasn’t tanned a dark, golden brown was what ended up under the speedo he’d worn as a swimmer on his high school and college teams.
“My God, you are an unusual specimen of man-flesh, aren’t you?” I gasped as I realized I was about to burn the bacon and eggs I was cooking. I cursed and transferred the pans to hot pads and quickly shoved bread into the toaster to cook while I plated the rest.
“And a good morning to you too, Hot stuff,” he replied before burying his head in his towel and rubbing it hard. He was still shirtless, and as he shook out his long hair, I chuckled to myself. He might wear boots and know how to rope and ride, but my cowboy looked like a fit, tan surfer with those shoulder length, sun-touched curls. He was the best of both worlds. Loyal, a gentleman, and fiercely independent, but easy-going and hard to anger. More than any other trait, I appreciated his patience.
“My Lord, you are nice to look at naked. Here, let me feed you fried foods and carbs so you’re less attractive to other girls.” He sauntered over and leaned against the counter, rolling his eyes at me before he sat on a barstool and pointed in front of him. I set a plate and utensils in front of him and turned toward the fridge for something to drink, when I heard a moan of carnal pleasure behind me.
“Jesus Christ. Are you a figment of my imagination?” I grinned into the recesses of the fridge as I dug around for the orange juice. “You are the hottest woman I’ve ever seen, naked or otherwise, even without all the makeup and crap women do to themselves. Now I find out you put crack in your food.”
I laughed out loud at the last. “I did not put drugs in your food.”
“Uh, yeah, you had to. I love bacon. I’m a damned bacon aficionado, and I don’t have the words to describe how amazing this fucking bacon is,” he cursed. I took the bacon off my plate and set it on his with a wink, then handed him a glass of juice to wash the whole thing down.
“If you’re wondering, I’m not telling. You’ll just have to stick around to learn my cooking secrets slowly, over the next few decades,” I teased. “I told you I could cook.”
“You’re right, my bad. I’m never taking you out again. From now on, woman, you get to stay in the kitchen, as my slave-chef.”
“Because I’m female?”
“God no. Because you’re a freaking genius in the kitchen. I’d make you my slave no matter what, you being female only means I have the added benefit of bending you over the counter and ravishing you on occasion. I’m thinking of doing it now. Well, you know, after I finish breakfast.” He grinned and I laughed at him, glad to see him in good spirit after the way his night had ended.
“You ready for Stanford?” I asked as I rinsed pans and put them in the dishwasher.
“Not really. It isn’t a priority in my head anymore. I keep thinking about Tucker, and how stressed he must be. That guy has been giving him hell for a couple years now. It isn’t fair that he has to keep putting up with the bullshit. He’s never done anything to anybody, you know?”
I nodded and chewed my lip. I wanted Jackson to be happy. Stanford would give him that. But, I knew his family came first, and if they needed him, he’d give up Stanford and go back. He’d give up California, and me, and never look back.
“Hey, what are you thinking, Gorgeous? Your eyes just went from sunny skies to depths of the ocean in about two seconds.”
“You’re going to give up Stanford and go back to Texas, aren’t you?” I was proud of how even my voice was, considering the tears stinging my eyelids.
“Maybe. If they need me that bad, then maybe Stanford wasn’t meant to be. It all works out in the end.” He looked puzzled, as if my world crashing down around me wasn’t even a parenthesis in his equation.
“Well, okay then. What do you need from me before you go?” Recognition dawned on his face and he slid off the barstool and crossed the distance between us.
“I need you to pack and book plane tickets for us, C.J. I told you I wanted you with me. Would it be so bad to stream for a few days from the most beautiful location in the continental U.S.? How could you think that all they had to do was call and I’d walk away from all the potential we have here?” He kissed me, then flicked me on the nose, making me yelp.
“Abuse!” I choked out in a half-laugh, as the pain caused my unshed tears to fall.
“That’s for thinking I was going to walk out on you. Brat.” I dropped my eyes and let him hold my head against his chest. His heartbeat was steady and strong against my cheek, and his skin was still warm from his shower. I put my arms around his waist and hugged him back, while my mind raced, panicked and nervous. I’d been dating Jackson a week, and now I was going to fly halfway across the country to meet his large, close-knit, protective family. Grandma had always said, “Be careful what you wish for.” I hugged him tighter and prayed silently that I could somehow miraculously change everything about me, and be the kind of girl they’d approve of. Because hey, why wouldn’t now be the one time life threw me an easy underhanded pitch?
Chapter Thirty-Two
Jackson
C.J. convinced me before I flew out to make the long drive to the campus, rather than a charter flight. So, while she packed, found flights to Texas for after I got back from my interview, and did a good, long stream. We didn’t want her to lose followers from being gone too long. I hopped in the Jeep and started the four-hour drive up the coast. I was grateful she’d woken up extra early, so I could see her before I left, but I was glad to make the drive in quiet, with the radio off and my phone silenced and in the console. The road was always a good place to think, and I didn’t want a frantic call from one of my brothers, or even a text from C.J., to affect my decision.
Stanford represented everything I’d worked for. A program that had connections in the FBI and the CIA, the opportunity to be renowned, instead of infamous, and if I played my cards right, the chance to do what I did best without ever having to look over my shoulder again.
On the other hand, C.
J. had made a good argument for just carving my own path with an innovative technology stream. Aside from live streaming and video clips, I could draw, write articles about what I’d streamed, and maybe even finally draw that comic book I’d dreamed of when I was a kid and that was my imaginary road to fame.
It was a long four hours in the jeep with only my thoughts to keep me company. I didn’t even realize I hadn’t eaten until I stopped for gas. It was late morning, but early for lunch, so I settled for a gas station donut I’d regret later, and finished the last leg of the drive as quickly as possible.
The visitors’ parking lot was packed when I arrived, and I called the Dean of Admissions and left a message with his assistant that I was cruising the parking lot looking for a space and I’d be in as soon as I could find one. When I found parking, an older man was waiting for me by the tall map of the campus.
“Jackson Hargrave?” he queried, holding out his hand. I nodded and shook it a little more vigorously than I’d intended, and he laughed as he took his hand back. “It’s good to meet you, son. I’ve heard some amazing things about you.”
I flinched inwardly. That was the one thing I had hoped wasn’t going to happen. “Well, I do my best to keep on the front edge of new technology and stay ahead of the cyber-learning curve.”
He clapped me on the back and chuckled. “Ahead of the authorities’ learning curve as well, I hear.”
I nodded my head. “I take security very personally, which is why I don’t leave doors open, once I’m out. I’ve also written multiple safe-door programs to provide security well above and beyond anything Norton or McAfee offer, and gave it away for free to people who were subjected to hacking and theft.”
Dean Michaels looked duly impressed. He steered me toward the Quad. The stale donut in my stomach rebelled, but the rest of me agreed that lunch was a good idea.
The Dean pointed out the different buildings as we passed. It was a beautiful campus, completely different from what I was used to at Texas A&M, but reassuringly familiar. School was a safe place. A place where I didn’t have to feel the pressures of being an adult. If I was a student, and a trust-fund baby to boot, the outside world didn’t matter as much.
At the Quad, he took me into the café, instead of the cafeteria. The menu rivaled any city restaurant, and I ordered a burger in the hopes of overcoming the unease in my stomach with some good, greasy protein. As I politely sipped a California-style abomination they called sweet tea, Dean Michaels gave me the rundown of the program, listing a hundred more selling points than anyone should need to convince them to attend, and told me that if I wanted, I could spend the day following Dean Carpenter of the Computer and Math Sciences Department just to get a feel for what I could achieve at Stanford.
“The real question is, Jackson, what do you want to accomplish in your life?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but nothing came out. I closed it, took a deep breath, and stared him in the eyes. The café was filling up now with lunching students and faculty and visitors. The noise was a familiar song that I’d loved for as long as I’d been a student. It was the sound of anonymity. To have people racing around in their little lives, completely unaware of who I was, or what I was capable of.
The sometimes neglect of my family had become my calling card, and I had worked hard to stay invisible for a long time. I tilted my head and smiled at Dean Michaels. What I wanted, was to be Peter Pan. To stay a kid in school who dicked around with computers and trespassed where he wasn’t wanted, but always got away, even though it was sometimes by the skin of his teeth.
“Dean Michaels, I want to be a student forever. I want to hit the pause button before I find myself with responsibilities and people who depend on me.” His eyes opened wide in surprise. “I know, not a noble cause. I hadn’t really thought about it before you asked, I just thought I was doing what any good tech geek should try to do.” I pushed my glass back and forth between my hands and thought some more. “I cannot express how impressed I am with your campus, and your program, and your willingness to give me your time.”
“It sounds like you aren’t interested in attending our school, young man. Are you sure that’s your take-away?”
“No. Not at all, I would love to go to Stanford. But, I’ve found something else worth having that can’t wait another two years. If I must choose between her and LA , and Stanford, I think I might have to forego another graduate degree.”
He nodded and smiled at the server who brought us our food. The burger smelled like heaven, but my stomach churned and heaved, and a cold sweat broke out on my forehead.
“So, you’re turning us down for the big city life, huh?” He quipped, as he speared salad greens on his fork. “And here I thought all the smart kids knew about distance learning. As a matter of fact, I thought you were going to be trying to attend from the middle of Texas.”
The storm raging in my gut began to slow, and I hazarded a French fry. “You’d accept me without my taking a single class on site?” I asked after I successfully swallowed the greasy strip of potato and reached for another.
“Absolutely not.”
I paused midbite. “I’m sorry?”
“How far are you willing to go, to achieve your dreams, Jackson?” He prodded. “How hard are you willing to work?”
I considered his question, my food forgotten and quickly cooling on my plate. “I’m willing to apply and accept the terms needed to get my masters’, but I’m not willing to give up my new work in Los Angeles, or the connections I’ve made there. How much time would you need me here to make this work for you, and for the school?”
“That would be between you and your academic advisor. I can only tell you, that if you apply, you will be accepted. If you choose to be on campus full time, you will have your pick of lodging and will be treated like the asset you are.”
“I drove here thinking I had an all or nothing choice to make. What you’ve given me is so much more that now I have to realign my parameters. I’ll apply, and I will make an appointment to come back and speak with Dean Carpenter.” I looked down at my burger and fries, and realized I was starving. I took a bite of the lukewarm bacon cheeseburger, and my stomach gratefully settled down enough for me to fill it.
The Dean showed me the rest of the campus, and I spent an hour in his office filling out an official application and attaching the essay and biography I had prepared. I considered texting C.J. to let her know that I’d been accepted and even welcomed, if I was willing to make the sacrifice of the budding new life I was considering in LA. It was not a conversation to have via text, or on the phone.
I drove home as fast as I dared, and gave myself a mental high five when I was within an hour of the apartment and it was only half past five. I texted her then, warning her to get rid of the strippers she probably had over, and asked what she wanted for dinner. She sent back a rapid-fire response of multiple texts I’d need to park before I could read, so I gave up and called her to save myself from having to get off the freeway and delay my arrival.
“I just answered you and realized you’d probably die reading them while driving,” she said as she answered the phone. “I just ended my stream, so why don’t you just pull up out front, and we can go out to celebrate?”
“What makes you think we have anything to celebrate?”
“You opened with a joke about male strippers in the apartment. No man jokes about a cheating girlfriend when his day is shit,” she pointed out, and I laughed.
“Well, it’s not a simple, happy-ending situation, but yeah, today went well. I’ll be there in less than twenty minutes. Can you get dressed and ready by then?”
“Are you suggesting I did the stream in my pajamas, like a lazy schmuck?” I stayed silent, not sure how to answer.
“Yes, I’m in sweatpants, and yes, I will be outside waiting for you, in fifteen minutes,” she groused. “Geez. You’d think a girl could go a day without brushing her hair without being judged.”
I laug
hed out loud and told her I was hanging up so she could brush her hair, and maybe her teeth, since those things usually went together on the hygiene schedule. She replied with a colorful string of profanities that had me laughing so hard my side hurt, before she signed off with a quick “I love you.” I wasn’t sure she even knew she’d said it.
My face split in a grin. She didn’t even realize she’d told me what she felt, which meant it was true. I would’ve waited years for her to trust me enough to say it purposefully, and I probably still would. But, she loved me. Enough to brave the lion’s den and go home with me, maybe enough to move north for Stanford. Knowing she was pulling for me gave me a case of lead foot as I hurried back to LA, and to her. If anyone could put my choices in perspective, and help me select an appropriate course, it would be C.J.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Carina
I ran around the apartment like a chicken with its head cut off, putting up my hair and shaving my legs again. He hadn’t told me anything, but his voice had sounded like he was about to explode from everything he wasn’t saying. It wasn’t until I was pulling my hair out of the curlers and dripping them on the floor at my feet while I picked through my closet that my stomach dropped and my brain came to a screeching halt.
Had I ended that call with a casual declaration of love? My heart pounded and my palms dampened. God, only I would be so stupid as to just toss those words out without thinking instead of making sure it was meaningful and would be heard. Then again, he hadn’t said anything in return, and had been humming a country song when he hung up, so maybe he hadn’t heard and I hadn’t ruined what was supposed to be an important moment. Especially after I’d already ruined it for him.