Bad Girl

by Piper Lawson

  I know I’m being an asshole about this, but I can’t seem to let it go.

  Haley lifts her chin, and the light catches her hair. The hair she put up in some kind of style, maybe for her, but maybe—just a little—for me. “Jax. I was going to tell you about that. It just came up,” she says under her breath. “But I’m not turning my back on Wicked just because you have.”

  She looks like she’s about to say more, but in the end, she walks out of the kitchen without another word.

  17

  Haley

  Jax’s stubble comes in redder than the rest of his hair.

  I never noticed since we’ve only shared a bed a handful of times. But when I wake up in the four-poster bed next to him, it catches the light.

  I take a second to enjoy looking at him. Not only because he looks gorgeous lying on the king mattress, the covers drifting down around his abs in a way that’s completely distracting, but because he looks peaceful.

  As if, for once, he’s not fighting the world.

  We can forgive a child who is afraid of the dark. The tragedy is when men are afraid of the light.

  The quote comes back to me. I think it’s Plato, but I’m not sure.

  I feel closer to Jax than I’ve ever felt to another person. Since Mace’s hospital visit, it’s as if his walls have come down even more. I feel it in the way he talks to me, the way he looks at me.

  But I’m not sure what to do with what I find on the other side of those walls. Jax seems to be in a tug-of-war with the world. I feel it even when he smiles. Even when we’re together.

  Serena asked me on the plane yesterday if I’m falling in love with Jax.

  I told her no because in some ways, I’ve always loved him. When I knew every word to every song he wrote, I loved him.

  But that’s fan love, the way you love anything that’s too perfect.

  He’s not perfect. He’s strong and flawed and beautiful and wrong. He hates me working at Wicked, and it’s driving a wedge between us.

  But I love the way his amber eyes glow when he’s thinking dirty thoughts or laughing at me when I nerd out on him. I love his obsession with reality TV, especially the home reno shows, and the fact that he can name every kind of power tool known to man even though he’s never used one. I love how responsible he feels for his family, his friends, even when it strains him.

  I shift out of bed and grab one of the two robes on the back of the door.

  The smaller one is so soft and fluffy I suck in a breath.

  It fits me perfectly.

  That’s what reminds me good things take time. When he does something like that.

  The huge house is quiet except for Kyle’s snoring coming through an open door. I make my way downstairs, my feet sinking into the plush carpet.

  My phone’s in my purse, where I left it last night. There’s a missed call from Cross’s assistant, but the battery’s nearly dead and it’s a Sunday. Rather than calling her back, I move the phone to the wireless charging pad in the kitchen.

  Maybe she was returning my call about the “after school program.”

  I tried to arrange a meeting with Cross, but she told me he was out of the office for the rest of the week.

  So I pieced some of it together myself from cryptic notations on studio calendars.

  The nearest I can figure is Cross makes the studio’s time, his time, available as some kind of charitable act. The strange part is there’s no PR, no media or public announcements.

  Which means he doesn’t want anyone to know.

  Because he’s doing something wrong, or because he doesn’t want to be rewarded for doing something right?

  It’s confusing, and as much as I’d like to tell someone, I can’t talk to Jax about this. He wouldn’t believe Cross would do anything for someone other than himself.

  I don’t feel much like eating, thanks to the big meal last night. But the coffee maker beckons in all its chrome glory.

  It’s way more advanced than what’s at the café, but I figure it out in no time. I press a few of the buttons, and it starts whirring, grinding beans at a deafening volume that’s sure to wake everyone in this house.

  I yank the cord from the wall until the quiet resumes.

  Later.

  I go to the back patio and watch the sun rising over the distant hills.

  I feel him behind me before his hands find my shoulders.

  “You’re up early.” Jax’s voice at my ear is a low rumble, as sexy as the first time I heard it.

  My smile starts inside me, unfolding like a flower. The fact that I don’t jump when I feel him close, even when he surprises me, shows how much has changed. “I heard a sound. Maybe the house spawned another bedroom overnight.”

  His chuckle tickles my skin. “Come back to bed.”

  I place a hand over his and turn toward him. He’s wearing pajama pants slung low on his hips, and his chest is a delicious map of muscle and ink and beautiful skin. “Anyone else awake?”

  Jax shakes his head, his hand caressing my cheek.

  I can tell the moment affection slides into more.

  He slips a hand inside the front of my robe as he kisses me, lightly at first. Then he pulls me back with him toward the house. Turns and presses me against it. My breath catches. He hitches my leg up around his hip, and the pajama pants do nothing to hide the growing hardness between us.

  I want to resist, because it shouldn’t be this easy. But on some level, I crave it.

  His mouth grazes mine. Lazy and assured. His fingers brush my breast, teasing my nipple in the cold morning air until it’s even harder.

  “What are you doing?” I manage.

  “Saying good morning.”

  Even if my head wanted to stop him, my body craves him.

  His hand strokes lower, fighting with the tie on my robe. Winning, like he usually does.

  “Mmm. Good mornings start with coffee.”

  “I promise this will wake you up.”

  He brushes between my legs. My head falls back against the side of the house, my hair catching on the brick.

  He’s patient and insistent, as though this is an inevitability.

  Maybe it is.

  Jax touches me, a few deliberate strokes as he watches my expression, then presses inside. He swallows my moan, soothes my tension with his tongue and spirals it tighter at once.

  I tear my lips from his, scraping my teeth along his jaw.

  It takes a few minutes, a few strokes, until I come, moaning his name into the tendons of his neck.

  After, we go inside and he turns on the coffee, oblivious to the deafening noise.

  I cross to his fridge.

  “Nice calendar,” I call over the sound.

  “I like it. I like paper. Not having everything online.”

  The whirring stops, and the brew cycle, mercifully, starts. My gaze scans the rows of days. “What’s that?” I point at an entry.

  “Car commercial.”

  “For real?”

  He shoots me a quelling look. “Got to keep the money flowing.”

  I know firsthand what it’s like to be worried about cash, but I can’t imagine Jax having that same concern.

  Maybe it never goes away.

  “You ever think you’d have more fun doing something musical?”

  He raises a brow.

  “When was the last time you picked up a guitar? You could go on YouTube again, do more acoustic sessions. Or teach kids who are into music.”

  “You sound like my agent. He keeps feeding me shit about my brand.” Jax pulls the coffee cup from under the machine, holding it out to me. I smell it.

  “Whoa. That’s good.”

  “I’ve got some skills, Hales.” His gaze twinkles.

  “I’m serious. But you don’t have to do it for your brand. Or anyone. Do it for you.”

  He reaches for a water glass, fills and drains it without breaking eye contact. “I need to show you something.”

  He walk
s me through the halls, flicking on lights as we go to the garage at the side of the house.

  He hits a master switch that illuminates the cavernous space.

  My jaw drops.

  It’s filled with guitars, boxes, bagged clothes, and posters stacked ten deep.

  “Jax, this is a fortune worth of equipment and memorabilia…”

  “Trust me, I remember all of it.” His face hardens as he points at a framed poster. “This was New Orleans. From our second tour. Mace overdosed, and I held him in the streets until the ambulance came and brought him back.” He lifts a guitar. “Wicked bought me this when I refused to sign the contract. It’s signed by Springsteen. When I got the guitar and picked it up for the first time, Annie’s mother left her with Grace.”

  In the corner is a gold statue, and Jax lifts it. “This is a Grammy. For the first album I cut, about the life I left behind.” He straightens, his gaze hard on mine. “I meant what I said last night. That chapter is closed.”

  “But it’s not a chapter, Jax. It’s a limb. How can you cut that part of you off?” I think of the kids I watched recording with Cross. If he was anything like them, I can understand how Cross was drawn to him. “You’re so bright. You matter so much to so many people.”

  “I never asked to,” he says softly. “Some people think fame’s one-sided. It’s not. It’s a give and take because without fans, you have nothing. I’m grateful for them. They’ve given me a chance to make music. To see the world. To do things my parents would’ve never dreamed.

  “But sometimes the pull is so strong. What they want exceeds what you can give.

  “I need to get my family back together, Hales, and if I need to fight for them, I will. I’m not waiting until Annie’s grown up. Until she’s obsessed with makeup and boys and has the option to ignore me.”

  I’ve never heard Jax talk this way before, and I can’t help but be affected.

  “I get it. At least, I think I do. Though I don’t know many twenty-nine-year-old guys who’d turn their backs on being famous to fight for their daughter.”

  He takes hold of my hips, and I dig my fingers into his forearms. “I hope you don’t know many twenty-nine-year-old guys. I like having you to myself.”

  His eyes darken, and already I’m breathless just being near him. The sound of his voice and the feel of his hands wrapping around me like silk.

  “Move in with me.”

  I’m having trouble hearing. And as a side effect, breathing.

  “Wait, what?”

  “I’m serious, Hales.” A ghost of a smile flickers across his handsome face. “You’re out of school. My roommate situation is temporary. I don’t know what life looks like after music, but I’ll figure it out.”

  Apparently my hearing is fine. It’s my processing that’s fucked up. Because I can’t make sense of the words he’s uttering.

  “I’m happy when you’re with me,” he goes on, his amber gaze running over my face. “It’s simple. The simplest thing I’ve ever known. I love how I can tell you anything and you don’t judge me. You don’t want anything from me. You don’t care if my house has four bedrooms or forty, but it’s not because you don’t know my world. You’ve seen it firsthand. You get it. Hell, you’ve been on that stage, Hales. And after all of it, you want me.”

  Stringing words together coherently is impossible, so I just stare at him. His hair is falling over his face at the front, and I do the one thing I can in this moment and reach up to brush it away.

  The idea of living in this house is beyond insane, but getting to be with Jax every day, touching him, waking up next to him, laughing with him? It’s a damned fantasy.

  Because you’re so in love with him you can’t think of anything else.

  It’s true. I realize it’s true even as he says, “You’re hesitating. Why?”

  The easy confidence he always projects wavers for the first time.

  “I feel the same way,” I manage. “With the happy and the simple… And I can’t believe I’m saying this, because part of me just wants to say yes and kiss you, but the biggest thing is sometimes I feel like you’re humoring me.”

  “How so?”

  “You’re older, experienced. I can’t even get oral sex without freaking out.” I raise a brow. “Unless maybe that’s the plan. You’ve been secretly looking for a woman you can avoid going down on for all time. In which case, you’ve definitely found her.”

  His look of shock dissolves into an admiring grin. “That’s not why I like you, Hales. I like how you care about people. I like that you speak your mind. I like that you take things at face value instead of looking for darkness in the world. And as for me going down on you? I’m thinking of that as a long-term project.” He leans in, his lips grazing my jaw and making me arch into his kiss. “One I will work at for as long as it takes to get the job done.”

  Oh, God. I’m ready to sign away my life to be hammered, nailed, and screwed by this man for all time.

  I squeeze my eyes shut. A million thoughts bubble up inside me, all of them saying different things. Reasons for and against, questions, and more.

  When I blink, taking in the sight of Jax Jamieson in front of me, every other thought falls away.

  This is the man who makes the songs I live my life by. Who loves his daughter more than any father I know. Who I can’t imagine being without.

  Jax clears his throat. “I understand if you need time to—”

  “No,” I interrupt.

  “No.”

  “I mean, yes,” I say, and his face goes blank. “Yes, I want to.”

  His expression dissolves into a grin, and I don’t know which one of us looks happier in this moment.

  Scratch that. It has to be me. Because I can’t imagine feeling any more joy than what’s coursing through my body.

  I shift onto my toes, grabbing him to press a kiss to his mouth. His arms band around me as he returns the kiss, groaning against my mouth in a way that has me wet again.

  “Haley! Jax!”

  We groan in unison. But the panicked voices don’t stop calling, and we go back inside.

  The kitchen is full of somber faces.

  “What is it?” Jax asks.

  I’m already grabbing the phone from Lita’s hand.

  The headline on the news article has my smile and laughter falling away.

  * * *

  “Pioneering Music Executive Shannon Cross Dead at Fifty-Five”

  * * *

  Ice fills my body. My chest, my stomach, my lungs, my legs. “No.”

  “Haley.”

  I grab my phone and return the assistant’s call, putting it on speaker. “What happened?”

  “Haley. He passed last night. He had brain cancer, a quick-moving kind. He learned six months ago. He didn’t want to treat it.”

  Disbelief tints everything, turning the room fuzzy. “It’s not possible. I saw him last week, and…”

  “He’s been struggling for some time but didn’t want to let on. I want to give you time, but we also need to plan.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “He didn’t want to burden you, so arrangements have been made. But as his next of kin, you should review his plans for the funeral.”

  “Review his…” I can’t think.

  “We’ll call you back,” Jax interrupts, his voice cutting short any argument. “We need a minute.”

  “Mr. Jamieson? Of course. Please don’t wait too long. The hospital—”

  “We won’t.”

  18

  “We nearly done here?” I shoot a look at my agent, who looks up from his phone.

  The director nods. “Just a few more takes.”

  I swallow my frustration, reminding myself what I’m getting paid for this photo shoot.

  I tried to convince Haley to stay until the funeral, but she said she needed to go back and help. The shock of Cross’s death has hit everyone hard. My agent’s getting calls every day from media, and for once, it’s not to talk abou
t me.

  I turn them all down.

  The only person who matters is her.

  I asked her to move in with me last weekend, and she said yes. But we haven’t talked about it since.

  Still, I’m hoping it’s the change she needs after all this shit with Wicked. She can start fresh here. Build her own computer company if she wants to. If she doesn’t, that’s fine too.

  My phone rings, and the number on the call display has my stomach hardening.

  “You have some nerve, Jax Jamieson,” Grace snaps in my ear.

  “I told you I want her back.”

  “So you’re suing for custody?” She’s livid, and I get why. “We could work through access issues. But you don’t just want to see her. You want a court to say you get her half the time.”

  I want her all the time, but saying that won’t help. For now, I don’t want to take any chance of Grace packing Annie up and taking her away from me. And I want Grace’s prick of a husband to know I’m watching and I have recourse if he fucks up.

  Her heavy breathing fills my ear. “When we were kids and someone picked on me at school, you told him not to fuck with us. But what you meant was don’t fuck with you. You can’t stand someone telling you you can’t have what you want. Can’t do what you want. You never got over that, did you, big brother?” She curses. “I can’t believe you’re doing this to her.”

  I think of Haley, without a father her whole life, and now that she finds him, he’s gone. “I’m not doing this to her. I’m doing it for her.”

  I hit End before she can respond.

  19

  Haley

  There are a lot of moving parts to a funeral. But the funeral of Shannon Cross is on a whole other scale.

  First, lots of people knew my father.

  My father.

  Two, no one knew he was sick.

  Now everyone wants to talk, and since the juicy bit of info that I’m his daughter seems to have leaked? The person they want to talk to is me.