"Stop, or we won't help Vince because I'll be too busy dragging you back upstairs."
Brianna laughed. "Fair enough."
Since she seemed to have everything in hand, Jackson retreated to the kitchen table to watch her. Shaking off his thoughts before his dick took more of an interest, Jackson shifted his hard-on. He should've put on underwear. Shifting it again, he sighed. It was no use. He had to think of something else.
Just then, Brianna came over with a large cup of coffee and set it in front of Jackson. Her slender fingers ran lightly over the skin of his shoulder and down his back before she went back to the counter.
Jackson lifted the coffee to his lips to keep from grabbing her and took in his surroundings. The kitchen fit Brianna. At least the Brianna he knew. Soft yellows and blues with a large pane glass window overlooking the fields. Vibrant sunlight streamed into the homey room.
The gorgeous plank wood table captured his attention while Brianna bustled around the stove humming. Running his fingers over the smooth surface, he plunked his mug down.
"Is this Amish?"
Brianna's gaze tangled with his, a hint of pink tinged her cheeks again. But whether from embarrassment or from the heat of the stove, he wasn't sure. "Yes."
"It's beautiful."
"Thanks. Frank, Callie, Derrick, and I took our college graduation trip through Lancaster to buy things for mine and Callie's homes." Brianna turned back to the stove. Her practiced movements as she worked the six-burner range top. The more he uncovered of Brianna, the more he wanted to know. She was nothing like what he thought a socialite should be.
"You explored Amish country after graduation? Don't most people in your tax bracket go to … I don't know, Europe or Asia?"
A frustrated huff passed Brianna's lips as she abruptly flipped bacon into the pan. "I did that when I graduated high school. It was expected, and as my parents didn't allow me to be … " she scrubbed her cheek on her shoulder before finishing. "They had all that planned for Briony—"
"And as you're playing your sister for them, you had to make the trip."
When she turned to face him again, he panicked. Her eyes were overly bright as if filled with tears and the sadness mixed with frustration stamped across her face had him standing. He wanted to offer her comfort, especially since he was the reason she was upset in the first place.
She sighed. "Sit back down, Jackson."
He plopped back into the heavy chair that matched the table. Obeying, but feeling no satisfaction in doing it.
"Anyway, Callie and Derrick were engaged a month before we graduated. Derrick and I already talked to Dr. Evanston about taking over his clinic. And as you know, the farm was mine because of the contract."
Bacon popped and sizzled in one pan while she prepped four slices of bread for the toaster.
"Needless to say, my taste and my parents' tastes are nothing alike. The second I saw the furniture Callie's mother brought back from her trip to Lancaster, I knew that was what I wanted. So, my friends and I rented a large trailer and did a whole tour up through there."
He smiled, picked up his coffee cup again, and tipped it towards her. "It fits you to a tee. Simple and elegant with hidden strength."
Her lips parted into a brilliant smile, glowing happiness replaced the tears. "Thank you."
"No need to thank me for the truth."
"Even so." She turned back to the eggs she'd been cracking against a white bowl. He watched as she added various chopped ingredients. After whipping it all together, she tipped the contents of the bowl into a pan next to the bacon.
The heady scent of onions, peppers, and eggs mixed with herbs made his mouth water.
This was the life. He took another sip of coffee and looked through the big window. The various animals frolicked in the fields, some had their heads buried in the grass while others were climbing on structures set up in their sections. A large pond sparkled in the distance with a few cows lying near it. It was a perfect morning after an amazing night.
"Where's Callie?" And he was waiting with bated breath for Callie to interrupt this quiet pocket of time. Especially today. "I thought she would be here to celebrate that it's your last day as Briony."
Brianna did a happy skip as she deftly cracked the egg on the side of the bowl.
Laughing at her antics, he propped an elbow on the table. Placing his cheek in the palm of his hand, he watched her.
"Callie is at a family weekend retreat."
"Good."
"Good?" Brianna asked with a raised brow.
"Yep, means the second the chores are done, I'm taking you back to bed for the day."
Another blush stole over her face, but before she could respond, there was a clatter at the front door.
"YOU!"
The unholy screech made Jackson jump, sloshing hot liquid over his fingers. Turning with a growl, he froze at the sight before him. Anger stamped across Callie's face; her feral green eyes landed on Brianna, who was also frozen in place.
"Did you know?" The snarling words sounded like a hound from hell, guttural, and demonic.
"Better watch out, Brianna, she looks like she's about to bite your ankles," Jackson said, goading Callie further.
"Shut up, Jolly Green."
"Jolly Green?" he asked, lost as to where that nickname came from. "I'm not green, and I sure as hell am not jolly."
Callie huffed as she gestured at him. "He's a giant and huge like you."
"It's too early for this shit," he mumbled.
Callie pinned Brianna with a squinty-eyed stare.
Brianna coughed, but it did little to cover the chuckles, which broke into a roaring laugh. She grasped the counter as Derrick skirted around his crazy wife and went to plate the food from the stove. Brianna and Derrick were both looking at Callie and laughing harder, Jackson didn't know who was more insane, them or Callie.
"You knew." The anger faded to a look of betrayal.
"Callie, of course, I knew. It was all over your family's Facebook posts." Brianna's eyes widened. "Oh crap, you didn't read them? Please tell me you at least responded to the email. You needed to in order to choose the room—"
"I didn't, though," she wailed, falling into the chair next to Jackson.
He finished wiping up the spilled coffee with the napkins that decorated the center of the table. He'd hoped for breakfast and maybe a bit more time in bed with Brianna. However, with Callie sobbing next to him, and Derrick cracking more eggs in the pan to cook. It didn't look like he'd be able to lure Brianna back upstairs.
Standing, he took his almost empty mug and poured himself another cup of coffee, and then rejoined the group.
"What could be so bad about a bedroom? I can't believe you'd be that squeamish, Callie. Hell, growing up and being a cop in Chicago knocked that out of me," Jackson said, sitting back into his chair.
Jackson loaded his plate from the platters of food Derrick and Brianna set on the table.
A sarcastic snort from Callie had Jackson turning to meet her gaze. "Really, so you wouldn't have any problems sleeping on a cum-soaked porn mattress?"
The eggs he'd been about to spoon onto his plate, plopped back in the bowl. "Come again?"
"Oh God, that's probably what the director said," Callie wailed, her face falling into her hands.
Seeing he'd get no answers from Callie, he looked at Derrick and Brianna on the other side of the table to see them guffawing.
"What the hell?" Jackson asked. Glad that the heavy conversation from earlier was forgotten by Brianna. He loved hearing her laughter. "What kind of party did you go to that you had a director?"
"It was her family's WOW party," Brianna replied between chuckles.
"WOW? Like that game?"
"No, WOW like Women's Only Weekend," Derrick helpfully filled in for Jackson. Now that their laughter subsided to chuckles, Derrick and Brianna began dishing up their own food.
"And they have directors there?"
"No, Jolly, the dire
ctor is probably dead by now … I mean, it was the seventies." Callie snarked from next to him, filling her own plate with healthy portions.
"You all are insane. What's that even mean?" Jackson felt like three or four conversations were going on, and he was lost.
Brianna flapped a hand to draw his attention.
"No." She lifted her cell from the table. "Okay, see, Callie's cousin Georgina has gone on a decorating frenzy the past year. She wanted her guest rooms to have a theme. So she started with the fifties and had pictures of her grandparents at various dances framed for the wall. Then she did the next room in the sixties and had pictures of her parents done for that room. Since she has five rooms, each has an era, so the last three were set from the nineties, eighties and the seventies—"
"Which is the porn room," Callie whimpered.
Derrick nodded dramatically but didn't add anything. Smart move with how traumatized his wife was at the moment. Still confused, he looked at Brianna with an arched brow. "So she did up the room to look like a seventies porn set?"
Derrick snorted and shook his head, then coughed to cover what Jackson knew was another snort of amusement.
"Not exactly," Brianna whooped in triumph, passing her cell over the Jackson. "Her decorator took Georgina all over the place, and one of them was in Atlanta, where they were auctioning off things from various well-known porn sets."
"Holy crap," Jackson flipped through the pictures and shivered. "Is that a round bed?"
"Yes," Callie lifted her head. "It vibrates too."
"How'd they get that through the tiny doorway? Did she have it built in there?"
"No," Brianna snickered. "It's the actual bed equipped with the original mattress from the set. And I've no idea how she got it in there."
It was then Jackson saw the comments left below the entire album and started laughing.
~ Georgie, you better tell me right now that's not a porno set
Uncle Willie
~ Of course it's a porno set, Unc' can't you see the pictures in the background? I mean, the bed gave it away for me, but the pictures prove it.
Steven
~Relax, the decorator said the mattress is perfectly sanitary since they had to clean it before they could auction it.
Georgina
~Oh my good Lord, you better have that thing covered in rubber sheets, or none of us are sleeping on it.
Aunt Agatha
~I don't care if she's soaked it in bleach, covered it in rubber and gives me a hazmat suit, I'm not sleeping on that thing!
Aunt Babs
~Did they even use rubbers in the seventies?
Derrick
"Damn, Derrick, you had to ask that?" Jackson roared with laughter at seeing the debate on condoms ensue. Flipping the phone to face Callie, Jackson pointed to the sign-up sheet. "Seems you really did have to sign up for the room you wanted, Callie."
Green eyes narrowed on all of them. "Just remember, boys and girl, pay back's a bitch."
With that, she shoved a fork full of eggs into her mouth while Brianna and Derrick wondered aloud who else was assigned to the room that Callie ran from. From what Jackson could gather, listening to the three of them talk, Callie had walked into the house, heard about the room. Then she found out she was assigned to sleep there and had promptly snuck out without ever unloading her car.
It was crazy, insane, and it turned into the best breakfast Jackson had since Chase died. His eyes tangled with Brianna's, and they shared a smile. His gut clenched as he realized he wanted this. He wanted to eat breakfast with Brianna every morning, wanted Callie, and Derrick with their crazy shenanigans joining them. Especially wanted the sense of family, a family that they included him into.
It terrified him how much he wanted this because he knew how quickly life could change. Jackson would need to be on guard to protect this group because they were his family now. Somewhere along the way, the mischievous pair had wormed their way into his heart. Along with the woman who had been forced to live her life in a tangled web of lies.
If someone had told Jackson this was where his heart would lead him, he would have laughed at them while suggesting they get mental help. But now, he couldn't see his life without Brianna in the center of it.
* * * *
Jackson ripped the plastic that held his newly dry-cleaned tux. Thankful Ray had insisted he purchase it. Jackson had been reluctant as the elegant costume brought to mind his parents' schemes. But he had used the tux several times throughout the years and was especially glad to have it for this event.
As he donned each piece of the tailor-made tux, he worked to get into the headspace he would need for tonight's event with the social elite. He would not be the reason Brianna … Briony, he corrected himself, lost her dream.
The headspace came easily, and Briony was rolling from his tongue in no time. Jackson hated it, but he knew the ease was due to so many events crammed into the last week. If there had been any other way, he wouldn't have attended. But he was glad he had when at the first engagement not only was Christopher there, his seating card had him at Briony's table. If Jackson and Evelynn hadn't bracketed Briony between them, Christopher would have been right next to her.
Grabbing his keys and wallet from the bowl on his dresser, he slipped his cell into his breast pocket and headed down the stairs to wait for Briony.
Briony descended the stairs in a black dress that made Jackson long to slide it from her shoulders and let it pool around her feet. It hugged her curves and stopped just above her knees, leaving her shapely legs bare. Red polish tipped each of her toes, and when she slipped on the high-heeled strappy black shoes, he groaned.
She smiled and handed him her keys. "We'll take the Audi, and I've seen you petting it, so you drive us."
Oh, hell yeah. He grabbed the keys and led Briony to the passenger side door. After settling her in, he hurried to the driver's side.
It felt like only seconds before he was pulling into her parents' home even though the clock said a half-hour had passed. Falling in behind the line of cars, Jackson tugged on his bow tie and took in his surroundings.
The mansion was lit outside with soft golden lamps. Valets moved back and forth as they took keys, passed tickets, and parked cars.
"Go around to the side. It's easier to park by the staff entrance in case we need to leave early," Briony said, directing him to the same parking lot he's been the first time he ever came here.
The servants' parking area allowed them to slip in through a side door and join the throng of guests. Packed didn't come close to describing how crammed the hallway felt. Claustrophobic was a better word that came to Jackson's mind as he mingled, Briony searching for her parents as Jackson followed in her wake.
There was nothing as gaudy as a champagne fountain at this event. Men and women dressed in black vests, white starched shirts, and black slacks wove between guests carrying silver trays filled with champagne flutes, hors d'oeuvre, and other delicacies. There were even cigar men and women offering their wares to the guests.
Needing a bit of air, Jackson leaned in. "I'm going to head outside, I'll wait for you out there."
"Okay, I'll give my congratulations and come find you."
He took a quick kiss before they split off, with the crowd Jackson knew Christopher wouldn't pull any stunts.
Stepping through the back door, he froze at the elaborate scene before him.
A sprawling buffet took up the entire left side of the patio. He hadn't been out here before as it was separated from the garden by a stone wall. This area had been built strictly for socializing. Multi-tiered concrete and stone patios rose in three levels with shallow steps winding between them. A small orchestra, with a makeshift dance floor next to them, played on the tier below the buffet.
White-clothed tables took up the patio that held the buffet. Wrought-iron chairs surrounding each table.
The house had been bustling with guests. So full the excess spilled across the patio laughing, talkin
g, eating, and drinking. Music ebbed and flowed around them, lending a more lavish ambiance. If his parents could see him now, they would be salivating. He knew how to carry himself in this world because of them.
Where he knew his parents were con artists looking around, he figured most of the guests could be slotted into the same category. Oh, they didn't con for money … not really. But he heard several men discussing business. Buying and selling. Discussing potential investments. And even heard one man tell a woman to meet him in the upstairs bathroom. The woman was not his wife as she joined him seconds later with a glass of champagne.
Jackson wove through the buffet and fixed a large plate, grabbing enough for him and Briony. Just as he sat down to wait, Briony rushed to his side, her blue eyes dark and turbulent with panic. Standing, Jackson went on alert his head on a swivel as he searched for Christopher, but he didn't see the man anywhere.
Instead, Briony laced their fingers together and tugged. "We have to leave."
Confused, Jackson let her drag him around the side of the house. "Leave?"
"Yes."
"Why? We just got here." His gut churned. "Did Christopher do something to you?"
He knew that asshole would make an appearance, but he really thought Christopher wouldn't confront Briony inside. They had confirmed that the loan was paid off, and Evelynn and Willoughby, Evelynn's attorney, had everything together for Reginald to void the contract tonight.
However, Reginald wanted to wait until the day after the anniversary party before they blew Bianca's world apart. Brianna, with her tender heart, had agreed.
If Jackson had been there when Brianna received the phone call, he would have put his foot down. Someone needed to think of Brianna first instead of Bianca. Since no one else was stepping up, Jackson was determined to do it. But as this was the absolute last event, he had kept this to himself.
"Won't this screw up the deal? You're supposed to stay until the end."
Reginald had been adamant about that piece.
The Twin Contract (The Contract Series Book 1) Page 24