“So, Poppy”—Deb starts in while passing the salad—“a little birdie told me that you and my JJ had a good old-fashioned slumber party.” She bites down on that devil-may-care-that-her-children are in the room smile and engages in an odd little side-to-side swivel.
Good God, is she doing the happy dance?
“Oh, right.” I give a nervous laugh over to Jules who’s glaring at me while sawing at her steak as if it were a tree branch. “Actually”—I glance to Jaxson for help, but he’s too busy loading up on the goods to even notice the conversation—“we were—um, there were chicken soup and a dragon.” I nod as if the word salad I just espoused was completely lucid. “The pancake breakfast had blueberries!”
“Of course, it did.” She lifts her fork as if to toast me. “They’re Jaxy’s favorite.”
Jaxy. I touch my knee to his. I’ve always thought it was a bit comical that Deb continues to call Jaxson by his childhood moniker. Jaxy this, Jaxy that. Good Lord, Jaxy could do no wrong in this woman’s eyes.
“Your mother says she saved the sheets.”
“The what?” Good God, is that why my bed was mysteriously made later that day? I didn’t notice new sheets, but this would not surprise me. I can just picture my mother and Deb cutting up the sheets Jax and I committed coitus on to cover those fluffy little scrapbooks they’ve been working on for decades.
“The sheets,” she practically mouths it this time. “There was no blood.” She shakes her head as if this were a pity. “That’s how you proved virginity back in the day. It was a frame-worthy piece of art, I tell you.”
What the hell?
“Shit,” Jax hisses under his breath.
“Wait”—Kali looks as if she’s about to be sick—“Slumber party? Pancake breakfast? Are you sleeping with my brother? I thought we were like, related!”
Crap. “Technically, we’re not related. It only feels that way. And why would you call me a ho if you didn’t think I was sleeping with him?”
Jax knocks his knee into mine. I’m pretty sure he’s not finding the ho banter I’m currently engaged in with his sister all too comical. It’s more of a don’t-entertain-crazy knock to the knee. No offense to Kali, but she is going off the rails a bit. I glance over to Deb because clearly the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
Kali scoffs as if the answer were clear. “Because that’s a loving term of endearment for all of my brother’s one-hit wonders—you told me so yourself.”
So she does remember me. I offer a tight smile her way. Who knew words spoken half a decade ago would come back to bite me in the ass?
Jax cuts his sister a quick look. “Drop it, Kal. Poppy is our guest, and we should treat her with the utmost respect.”
“Yeah,” Jules quips. “You wait until she leaves the room before you start calling her names.” She gives a greasy wink my way, and just like that, my appetite for the gargantuan portion of salad I just heaped onto my plate up and disappears.
“Jules,” Jax reprimands, low and tired. “Poppy is a top designer back in L.A. Maybe she can help you with the guesthouse?”
“I’d love to!” I straighten with a touch of pride. I’m not even close to being a top designer, but I like that Jax knows which side his titillating toast is buttered on. “In fact, I can drop by anytime this week. We can come up with an entire theme for the guesthouse, and, of course, I’d love to do Jensen’s room as well. Free of charge!”
Every Stade in the house looks at me as if I’ve just emitted a foul odor. It’s easy to forget that the Stades can afford the best that their billions can buy. Even so, they’re awfully convincing with their just like us persona.
“We shall see.” Jules tips her glass to me with a threat in her eyes.
Holy mother-loving terror. You’d think I knifed her puppy in the night the way she’s acting.
I look to Jax, but he’s pretty oblivious to the crap attack his sister is shooting my way.
“So, Poppy”—Jules pushes out a manufactured smile—“a little birdie told me, you’ll be hopping back on your broomstick and heading back to your coven at the end of the week.”
I’m really starting to hate that damn little birdie.
“Shit, Jules.” Jax tosses his utensils to his plate with a rattle—like a man, might I add—good and pissed just for me. “Do you mind? Maybe you should hop back on your broomstick and hightail it back to the guesthouse. What in the hell do you have against her, anyway?”
Just as I’m about to knock my knee into Jaxson’s in a show of my appreciation, a roll flies by and pings Jaxson in the forehead. Deb sits at the other end of the table rather proud of her middle school lunch period antic, and I’m frozen with shock at what’s just transpired. I’ll bet all of the meager money I have that my mother doesn’t know Deb partakes in the tossing of the buns at dinner. Food is practically sacred in my house, and here it’s used for communication purposes.
“I won’t have foul language in this house.” She nods as she indulges in a bite of the food on her plate that she’s yet to toss at her son.
Kali chucks her dinner roll in her brother’s direction, but this time he catches it midflight.
Dear God, is this what’s been taking place at the Stade’s house all these years? Maybe they’re not just like us after all. The large majority of us still prefer to masticate our food rather than utilize it as a missile.
“I agree with non-use of foul language.” Jax glowers at his sisters. “Now, if either of you can’t find something nice to say, then please don’t say anything at all.”
“Fine.” Jules reaches over and cuts Jensen’s food into microscopic pieces. “I’d love to engage in light dinner conversation, but I can’t say a word,” she spits it out like rusted nails.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” The words tumble out of me without meaning to, and I slap my hand over my mouth.
“For fuck’s sake!” Jensen shouts and laughs his hardest.
“Oh no!” My adrenaline spikes. Who knew Jensen was a parrot in training?
Deb groans and waves her hands as if she’s trying to land a seven forty-seven, and Jules lets out a wild cry of a scream with a look that says I’ll skin you alive with your splintered broomstick.
“I’m done.” She bolts up and plucks her tiny son out of his high chair.
“For fuck’s sake!” He giggles up a storm, and I shrink in my seat because I’m pretty sure that little phrase is going to be a problem tomorrow in daycare.
“Jensen”—Jax groans at his nephew—“don’t say that. Only bad people say that.”
“Bad people!” Jensen points to me and laughs. “Bad people!”
Dear God, can someone evict the kid already? Or better yet, me.
Jules all but gives me the finger as she races for the door, and Deb runs after her, threatening to toss the entire left side of the table into a Ziploc bag.
Kali loses herself in her phone a minute. “Gotta go.” She jumps up. “A bunch of us are going to see a movie tonight, and Cole is going to be there!” she squeals as if Cole were the equivalent of a nineties boy band all rolled up into one ball of testosterone and good hair. “God, I never have anything to wear,” she lambasts her meager wardrobe choices as she speeds up the stairs. On second thought, maybe they are just like us.
Deb comes back and tsks away at the sad state of her dinner party. “Why don’t you kids finish up, and I’ll be back to take care of the dishes?” She takes a step forward with an unnatural level of concern written on her face. “Poppy, you’re not really leaving in a week, are you?”
“Well, actually”— I glance to Jaxson who seems equally interested in my answer—“I have this new job I’m starting.”
“Of course, she’s leaving.” Jax gives my shoulder a quick squeeze. “She’s got a life she’s building, a budding career, and probably a boatload of friends just waiting for her to get back.”
My roommate and her less than sunny disposition come to mind. Honestly, she’s my only friend out
there, if you can call someone who’s basically using you for half the utilities a true friend. We don’t exactly say much outside of accusing one another of breaking into our coveted stash of Greek yogurt—as if I would settle for plain. Then, of course, there was the sexual advance from my old boss. That was very friendly in nature if I don’t say so myself. But those two hardly qualify as a boatload. Heck, I don’t even have a boatload of people waiting for me in Oak Grove.
“Is that true?” Deb looks honestly perplexed by my plans to once again ditch this subtropical oasis otherwise known as God’s icebox.
“It’s true,” I assure her. “I’m more or less a limited time deal.”
“Oh,” she muses as she looks from Jax to me. “That must be why Jaxy is lapping it up while he can. He never was one to pass up a good deal.” She gives a rather sad attempt at a wink. “I’ll leave you kids alone, but before I go, I have to tell you how happy seeing the two of you together makes your mother and me. It’s as if the stars aligned, and the two of you have finally come to your senses.”
“We sure have.” I wrap my arms around him seemingly for show, but a very real part of me craves to hold him.
She cackles up a storm from down the hall. “It’s still not too late for a June wedding, you know!”
“Nice. I’ve somehow morphed into public enemy number one in your sister’s eyes, and your mother thinks I’d make a great long distance daughter-in-law.”
He offers a tired smile. “She doesn’t get the fact we’ve got lives.”
“Right.” As in separate lives. “I have a mountain of things waiting for me back in L.A.” A mountain of lies.
Jax cocks his head just a touch. “And I’ve got to get back to work. Stade Steel doesn’t run itself, unless it’s into the ground.”
“That would be pretty terrible.”
He offers a slow nod, his eyes steadying into mine. “It is pretty terrible.” He glances to the ode to Bugs Bunny on my plate. “You still hungry?”
“Nope.” The wicked witch of the guesthouse and the battleax killed my masticating mojo. Okay, so Deb isn’t your traditional battleax, but collectively, our mothers have landed me between Los Angeles and a hard penis, so in that regard, they both qualify.
Jax flashes that dimpled grin. “You wanna see my room?”
So dinner was a disaster, and I’m not so sure anyone really got more than a few bites in, but I refuse to believe that the end result of that catastrophe had anything to do with me. It couldn’t have. I’ve known those women all my life. My presence couldn’t possibly warrant abandoning a meal over. Kali clearly would have rather been chasing her new boy toy around a movie theater. And Jules, well—okay, so if I hadn’t accidently trained Jensen to cuss like a sailor she might have stuck it out. Who knew the kid would take up a sudden interest in Pardon-My-French? Besides, Jules already looked like she had an ax to grind—into my forehead. I had no clue that neither of Jaxson’s sisters would want me near him. His mother, though…gleefully pointing out my slumber party? I bet she and Mom are beside themselves with glee—rolling around on the bed sheet Jax and I made love on, mining it for pubic hairs to press into a locket. Made love. I wrinkle my nose at the thought.
“Do you remember your way?”
“Of course, I do,” I say, leading us to the left toward a hall of closed doors, each solemnly keeping its secret of what lies behind.
“Close, but no cigar.”
“Well, good thing because I don’t smoke.”
He gives a deep hearty laugh while navigating me by the shoulders down to the second hall instead.
Darn it. I’ve always confused the two, but that’s to be expected when you find yourself in what essentially amounts to a labyrinth.
Last door on the left still has the height marker we once etched into his molding, and I run my finger over it. Jax lays his hand over mine and gently spins me into him. There’s a pained look in his eyes, but a dull smile resonates just for me.
“You’ve grown into a beautiful woman, Eight Ball.”
“I bet that’s what you tell all the ladies before they cross your threshold. You can save the adulation. No need to pander to my ego.” I give a sly wink. “You’re already set to get laid.”
“Ooh.” He winces as his head blows back an inch. Jax swings the door open. “Welcome to my middle grade chamber of horrors. Not much has changed in fifteen years.” He heads over to the dresser and lights a fat white candle sitting near his bed. “A touch of romance just for you.”
“That candle looks as if it’s been lit a time or two. It’s nice to know you have a routine, though.”
I step in to the ode to navy and oak. As a child, I always thought that Jaxson’s room was cavernous, and as an adult, I can confirm that this is very much true. The walls still hold that dark serious hue. His bed is the same oversized stately piece tucked under the window in the back. There’s a desk unit that looks as if it could house a call center for telemarketers, it’s that big—and a television the size of the wall tucked in an entertainment unit.
“I see you’ve made some technological upgrades since we last converged in your den of depravity. Did you know there was actually a club in high school comprised solely of girls you bedded in your coital chambers? Did your mother come in for nightly sheet inspections then, too?”
He thunders out a laugh and wraps his arms around my waist. Jaxson lands a soft kiss to the nape of my neck, and I spin into him. That cologne of his alone could qualify as my undoing, but it’s that heaven-kissed face, those dark brows that frame those high beams he calls eyes, that kissable mouth, and don’t even get me started on the scruff. I run my nails through it lightly as his fingers press into my back.
My eyes snag on the vast collection of model airplanes behind him, and my heart crashes and burns.
“You saved them.” I sigh as he turns to see what I’m so riveted by. Jax used to rush home after school just to work with those tiny meticulous pieces.
“Each and every one.” He pushes out a controlled breath at the sight. “My dad used to sit right beside me and we’d work on them together. Every time I look at them, I think of him.” His chin dips a moment. “Do you ever miss someone so much it’s like a knife to the heart?”
Yes, you.
“What am I saying?” He turns his attention back to me. “You probably miss your entire family seeing that you’re so far away.”
“That or I’m enjoying the buffer,” I tease.
His chest pumps as he examines my features. There is nothing as intense as having Jaxson’s white-hot spotlight over you. Having Jax look at me this way makes me feel seen like never before. It’s as if his eyes have the power to strip away the layers of who you’re pretending to be and get down to the raw, hardly recognizable person that you truly are. He sees the real you no matter how many masks you wear. Jax always knew me better than I knew myself. For so long I relegated to him the role as my conscious. He’s brilliant and beautiful, and I wish to God he were mine. Of all the things not to know, how can he not know that?
“Conner says you’re building a life-sized replica of the White House somewhere on the grounds.” I clear my throat as I change the subject. Although I’m not sure my brother is much of an improvement. “I suppose it’s never really going to get lonely over in the West Wing.” His dimple inverts, and my finger presses into it. “Old habits die hard. But better them than you.” I glance down to this crotch, and we share a dull laugh.
“Come see the house.” His hands swivel over my back and warm me. Being held in Jaxson’s strong arms makes me never want to set foot outside that door. His eyes bear hard into mine as if he’s trying to tell me something telepathically. He should know by now I’m not any better at reading between the lines as I am minds. “I want you to decorate it. I know you have to get back to L.A., but at least this way you can look at it and maybe we can work something out. I can get a designer from Denver to work with you, and you can boss them around while you’re in L.A. I
want your hand in this. What do you say?”
My heart drops for a moment. Jaxson seems pretty content with the fact I’ll be gone soon enough. Of course, I will. That’s just reality, but a part of me was hoping he’d grovel a little to try to make me stay. Or in the least drop a hint of what will become of us once I’m gone. Will we be gone, too? For some reason, I thought the words we said that night in my bedroom were gospel. It’s becoming painfully clear I’ve blown things out of proportion in my own mind. I don’t know why this surprises me. I’m a pro at it.
“Yes!” I gather all of the mock enthusiasm I can muster. “Are you kidding? I’d love to see it, and, of course, I’ll work with whomever. If I’m good at anything, I’m good at telling people what to do.” My lips twitch as I inch my face toward his. “Lock your door.” I swallow hard. “I’d hate to have history repeat herself.”
“Already done. You, my friend, are an amateur.”
“You got me there.” I run a line over his lips with my finger. “Are you ready for your next command?”
He ticks his head to the side, amused. “Just let me know if you need a whip and a chair.”
“You are a dirty, dirty boy, aren’t you?”
“Only upon request.” The wicked gleam in his eyes flickers to life.
“Take off your clothes. I want to see you.” What I meant was, that I want to see Jax the way he sees me, to the marrow, but I’m not sure that’s possible. I’ve never held his superpowers.
“Naked, party of one coming right up.” He pulls off his flannel, and before long his T-shirt goes flying.
A breath gets locked in my throat. There is something about a bare-chested man in jeans that makes me heady.
“Time out.” My hands find a home over his wall of a chest as my fingers drift down and appreciate every hard ridge that makes up his six-pack. “How in the hell do you even have this body? Are you lifting steel in that factory of yours in your spare time? If you tell me that you’re bench pressing blondes, I might have to disown you.”
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