Spark: A Bad Boy Romance

by Michelle Amy

  I looked down at myself. I was wearing a matching gray track suit. The sweater was a bit too short for me so some of my stomach was showing. The pants were also exceptionally low. “Maybe I like this sweat suit-”

  “It’s horrible,” Brooke interjected. “We both know it. It’s your ‘self pity’ outfit. Take it off, and put something better on. Literally anything. Then pick up your phone and call Jack.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me. Call the guy. He’s probably sitting at home beating himself up about this whole mess. He scared you off, there’s no way he’s not sulking around just like you are. Not to mention, he’s injured. You’re fine with just letting him be all by himself after he fought to defend you?”

  “He fought because he wanted to fight.”

  “So what?”

  I moaned and buried my face in my hands. “I don’t know what to do, Brooke. This is so messed up.”

  “I’m telling you what to do. Call him. You’ll feel better.”

  When Brooke left I lounged around in my ugly sweat suit for another forty five minutes before I finally came to the conclusion that she was right. I was miserable, and the solution was right in front of me. I had to reach out to him. He hadn’t done such a terrible thing. He didn’t deserve to be shut out. So I called him.

  And of course, with my luck, he didn’t answer.

  His voicemail tone buzzed in my ear and I had to force my tongue to move. “Hey, Jack. It’s Alice. I just wanted to call and see how you were doing... and tell you that I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have freaked out the way I did. I just... I just didn’t know what to think. Can you call me, when you get the chance? I’d love to talk to you. Bye.”

  I continued to wallow for the rest of the afternoon. I remained in my gray matching suit and watched Netflix- at least, Netflix was on in the background while I perused Pinterest. By the time it was nearly three in the afternoon I hadn’t had a bite to eat. My stomach was growling and a headache had crept up on me that made my eyes feel like they were going to pop out of my head.

  When I stood from the couch I was greeted with a slap of dizziness. I sat back down, waited for it to pass, and then shuffled to the kitchen, where I desperately began searching for something to eat. I was too lazy to invest any time in preparing food. I wanted something with a quick payoff. So I settled for a cup of yogurt.

  As I settled back down on the couch, prepared to continue indulging myself in my own self pity while armed with the television remote and my yogurt, the doorbell rang. I rolled off the couch with a loud moan that catered to no one but myself. I slapped barefoot down the hall to the door, and with my yogurt still in my hand, wrenched the door open.

  Jack was standing there. One hand was buried in his jacket pocket, and the other was holding a cardboard box that was slightly smaller than a shoebox. He was looking at me with his chin dipped down, casting his eyes into a light shadow beneath his brow. He looked rough. He was bruised and battered, the knuckles on the hand I could see had been wrapped in white bandages.

  He held the box out to me. “I got your voicemail,” he said, stuffing his hand into his other pocket once I relieved him of the box. He was dressed casually; jeans, a white shirt, and a black loose jacket that hung off his shoulders. “I wanted to call you earlier... I just didn’t know if you’d want to hear from me.”

  I was acutely aware of how much of a disaster I was. My hair was an air-dried, tangle mess looped around a hair tie and secured on the tip top of my head. My sweat suit was extremely unappealing, as Brooke had pointed out before she left for work. I felt a surge of regret for not taking her word and changing into something more presentable. I had no clue what to say to him. In my somewhat alarmed state, all I managed to say was, “Uhh...”.

  Jack dipped his head lower and offered me a weak smile. “I wanted to say I was sorry, before anything else. I’m not sorry that I hurt those guys. They deserved it. But I know it scared you, and I don’t like that. I don’t want you to be afraid of me.”

  I bit my lip.

  “In hindsight I could have taken it outside, so that it didn’t happen at your work. But that piece of shit treated you like a doormat. He needed to be put in his place, and I’m not afraid to be that guy. If you can’t see yourself with someone like me then-”

  “Jack, stop.” I interrupted. “It’s okay.”

  “What?” He straightened up and blinked at me.

  “It’s okay.”

  He shrugged his shoulders and adjusted his jacket. He seemed to relax a little bit, and his smug smile was tugging the corners of his lips. “You’re sure?”

  “I’m positive,” I grinned.

  He grinned back at me before stepping through the open door, wrapping an arm around my lower back, and drawing me to him. “Does this mean you’ve forgiven the fool who made an ass out of himself last night?”

  “There’s nothing to be forgiven,” I said, pressing my lips to his. He kissed me back eagerly, and the terrible heaviness that had been sitting on my chest since he dropped me off last night suddenly evaporated. It was chased away by his touch and kept at bay by his presence. His lips on mine were warm and reassuring, and that giddiness that I had felt before returned to me. He was who I was supposed to be with right now. He was right.

  When he drew away from me his eyes flicked to the yogurt which was still balanced in my right hand. I led him into the kitchen and put it on the counter. “I’ve had a bit of a rough morning,” I confessed.

  “Is that all you’ve eaten?”

  “Maybe.”

  He plucked his phone from his pocket. “Thai or Indian? I know two great places close by that deliver.”

  “Thai.” While I watched him dial the number and begin ordering an array of food, I was reassured that I was making the right choice. He wanted to make sure I ate. He wanted to make sure I was okay.

  When he hung up the phone he looked over at the television. “Netflix, hey?”

  “There’s no better way for a girl to drown her sorrows than Netflix.”

  “Netflix and yogurt?”

  I shrugged. “Could have been better, but it was all I had at hand.”

  Jack chuckled. “Well, the food will be here soon. Forty five minutes, or so.”

  “You don’t say?”

  Jack’s right eyebrow arched and he crossed his arms across his chest. “You look like you have an idea. I don’t know if I like this.”

  I laughed and grabbed his hand, pulling him behind me down the hall and to Brooke’s bedroom. We cut through her room and went into the master bathroom. I pointed at the massive Jacuzzi tub tucked against the far wall. It was surrounded with candles. “There’s more than enough room for two.” I turned back to him and rested both of my hands on his chest.

  “What are we waiting for?”

  Jack took my clothes off, starting with my sweater. He unzipped it and pulled it off my shoulders, letting it fall to the tiles behind me. Then he shimmied the sweats off my hips and down my legs, where I stepped out of them. I was wearing my comfortable panties and bra. My underwear had a picture of a cartoon-sleeping owl on it.

  Jack’s eyes lingered on the owl for a moment. I tugged his jacket off. “Don’t judge me,” I snickered.

  “I like them,” he laughed. “I didn’t expect it, but I like them.”

  I rolled my eyes and lifted the hem of his shirt. He raised his arms over his head to make my job easier, then he winced. I remembered his injuries. I pulled the shirt off slowly, mindful of his ribs. When his shirt was off I couldn’t help but stare at the damage. A big purple bruise coloured his right side. It was outlined in greenish-yellow skin; the kind of bruising I was used to seeing. “Are they broken?” I asked.

  Jack shook his head. “No, it looks worse than it is.”

  I wanted to ask more questions. I wanted to examine all of him and make sure he was as fine as he said he was. I knew he wouldn’t let me. He was a big boy, and he could take care of himself, but I couldn’t fight the
nurturing impulse that was surging through me.

  When we were both naked I started the bath. I poured in some lavender oil and bath salts and set to lighting the array of candles around the tiled edge of the tub. Jack watched me as I went, his eyes following the line of my legs and the arch of my back as I reached across the bath to light the candles on the other side.

  He came up behind me as I lit the last candle. The steam from the hot water in the tub wafted up and filled my nose with the soothing smell of lavender and mint. Jack put his hands on my hips, and then squeezed my butt. I giggled. He pulled my hips towards him.

  I could feel his manhood against me, teasing me, testing me. He leaned over and gathered my hair off of my back, pulling it up and twisting it once in his hand. He used my hair to pull me back to him until my shoulder blades rested against his chest. Then he pressed his lips to my shoulder, and slowly made his way up my neck, along my jaw, and to my mouth.

  As he kissed me his fingers traced my spine from the middle of my back and down. Down, down, until they rested between my legs. He tapped the inside of my thigh to demand I spread my legs. I did.

  His touch made me shiver. As he began a slow circular motion between my legs his fist tightened its grip in my hair. He forced my head back further and kissed my throat. As soon as a whisper of pleasure escaped my lips he pressed a finger into me, and within moments made me quiver in ecstasy. My knees shook and a smile I couldn’t control washed over me. Jack released my hair and stepped over the edge of the tub.

  As he stood there I held out my hands to him. He gave me both hands and I slowly unwrapped the bandages from his knuckles and placed them on the counter. His hands were bruised, and the middle and index knuckle on each hand were split open. “Will the water burn?” I asked.

  He sank down into the water and looked up at me. “Not enough to keep me out.”

  I followed him in. I turned off the tap as we sank down into it. Jack grimaced at the temperature. “Hot enough for you?” He asked.

  My smile was still stretching my cheeks. “I like hot baths.”

  “Jesus Christ.”

  I laughed. He watched me. I liked when he watched me. I liked feeling like I was the only thing in the room that could ever hold his attention. He rested his head back in his corner of the Jacuzzi and closed his eyes. “This is what heaven must feel like,” he whispered.

  “It’s definitely what it looks like,” I said, drawing up close to him in the water so that I was straddling him. I traced his jaw with one finger and his green eyes fluttered open. “Definitely what it looks like,” I repeated, becoming lost in his intense stare.

  His eyes flicked back and forth between mine, before they lowered at settled on my lips. One of his hands came up from the water and he pressed his thumb to my bottom lip. He dragged it across my mouth gently, then cupped my cheek in his warm wet hand.

  And I became consumed with him again. His lips were on mine and my body was working of its own volition. I moved my hips upward until I felt him between my legs, and then I placed myself above him. As I lowered down he entered me, and the two of us became entwined in the sensation of each other and the smell of the lavender, mint, and cinnamon candles.

  Chapter Eleven

  I was wrapped in my pink silk robe when the buzzer announced the arrival of our Thai food. Jack was draped lazily across the sofa. One arm hung off the edge and the opposite leg was lifted over the back of the couch. I had never seen a man so capable of taking up so much space with a reckless sprawl. His eyes were closed, and I had been watching the steady rise and fall of his chest beneath his white shirt.

  I buzzed the delivery guy up and Jack slowly rose, stretching as he went. When the doorbell rang he opened it, paid the guy, and brought a massive brown paper bag back into the living room. My mouth started to water as we settled down on the couch together. My stomach growled noisily.

  “Hungry?” Jack asked, suppressing his laughter.

  I nodded. “Very.”

  “That’s what happens when you don’t eat and participate in strenuous activity.” His tone was matter of fact and reminded me of Brooke’s when she was chastising me.

  “Strenuous activity?”

  “You know,” he winked and nudged me with his elbow.

  “Oooh,” I said, feigning recollection, “right. I had already forgotten.”

  He gave me a quizzical stare. “Nobody forgets how I make love to them. Come on.”

  “Make love, hey?” It was my turn to raise an eyebrow. I tried my best not to laugh when I saw his cheeks flush. He distracted himself by pulling plastic containers of food out of the paper bag. I rested my cheek on his shoulder. He handed me a plastic knife and fork.

  The food was delicious. My stomach sang with gratitude as I ate and stopped its incessant and somewhat embarrassing growling. Jack finished eating before me. Once he was done he leaned back on the couch and draped each arm across the back on either side of him. “So,” he said, “what does your roommate think of all this?”

  I glanced at him. “Brooke? She’s cool with it.”

  “Really? I thought she was an overprotective helicopter parent.”

  I laughed. “She is. But she also trusts my judgement. She’s the one who suggested I call you today in the first place. And I’m glad I did. She just has a sixth sense for these kinds of things. She’s not the kind to make mistakes or give bad advice, you know?”

  He nodded. “Sounds like the perfect person to have in your corner.”

  “You have no idea.”

  He rubbed my back when I put down my utensils. “I’d like to meet her, one of these times. I bet she’s quite the character.”

  “She’ll be home soon. Less than two hours. She’d be happy to meet you, too.”

  “Even looking like this?” He gestured at himself and I realized he was referring to his bruises and cut eyebrow.

  “She won’t care.”

  Jack stood and gathered all of our garbage and plastic dishes. I told him to leave them, but he insisted he clean up before Brooke came home. “I don’t want to give her any more reason to hate me,” he justified.

  “She won’t hate you. Trust me.”

  He chuckled as he came back in to the living room and dropped back down on the couch beside me. “I guess only time will tell.”

  I shimmied down the side of the couch and used the armrest as a pillow. Then I put my legs in Jack’s lap. He began running a finger up and down my shin. I stared at the ceiling and was acutely aware of his eyes on me. He cleared his throat. “Something is bothering you.”

  It isn’t that something was bothering me. Not necessarily. It was more that I had questions for him that I was simply too afraid to ask. I glanced down at him. “Nothing is bothering me. But I can’t help but wonder about certain things?”

  “Like?”

  “Like... why do you like to fight so much?”

  “Like it?” He asked, his forehead creasing and his chin tilting slightly to the left. “Who said I liked it?”

  “Claire, at the bar. She had warned me about it long before last night. I knew what I was getting into with you. At least, I thought I did. I guess I didn’t really understand what she meant.”

  Jack wouldn’t look at me. Instead he devoted his attention to my legs and continued running his hands along them. I was grateful that I had decided to shave this morning. Finally he spoke. “I’ve never thought of it in the sense that I liked it. It’s always just been something I’ve been good at.”

  “So you don’t enjoy it?”

  He thought about it before he answered. “I don’t not enjoy it.” He glanced at me to see if this answer would suffice.

  “I’m not going to think any less of you because of it. I just wonder why... why is it something that has such a hold on you? I wouldn’t have been able to stop you last night no matter what I did. I knew it just by looking at you.”

  “No, you wouldn’t have.”

  “When did it start? Have you always
been that way?”

  His hands stopped their graceful stroking of my shin and settled on my ankles. “It’s not something I’m keen on talking about.” His honesty felt like he had punched me in the stomach. He didn’t want to tell me. He wanted to keep it locked up inside, safe from prying eyes and judgement. I could understand that, but I had been open and honest with him about Christopher. Him denying me an answer felt like him rejecting me.

  He seemed to recognize the disappointment and sadness I was feeling. He patted my ankle lightly. “I’m not keen on it... but if it is important for you to know, I will tell you.”

  Did I want to force him to open up? Was I going to be that girl? I searched his eyes. He wasn’t bluffing. If I wanted to know he would tell me. I straightened myself up a bit. I deserved to know. There was nothing wrong with asking him to trust me. “I want to know,” I said, choosing my words carefully. “But it doesn’t have to be right now. I can wait until you’re ready to talk about it. So long as you promise that one day, you will be ready.”

  He looked down at his hands. “I know when it all started- when I became this way.”

  I sat up, crossed my legs, and inched closer to him.

  He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye and gave me a sad smile; a smile that showed so much vulnerability I wanted to comfort him. I resisted. He wouldn’t look me in the eye as he continued to talk. “You remember that I told you I spent a night in juvie?”

  I nodded. “Yes.”

  “Well, that was kind of a turning point for me. I deserved to be punished for what I did. I was being a smart ass teenager. I was seventeen and I was driving way too fast on a back road. I had borrowed my dad’s car to go pick up some buddies. I never made it there. I was pulled over. The cop was a dick. So, naturally, I gave him attitude. I resisted. It got somewhat violent.”

  “You assaulted an officer?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “Sort of. Nothing too serious.”

  “How can assaulting a police officer not be serious?”