by Eden Finley
“What did Damon want to talk to you about?” Jet asks.
I’ve been waiting for it but wasn’t sure if he’d ask. “He wanted to lecture me about my game. With the way preseason’s going, the contract extension’s not going to happen.”
“You’ve still got the whole season ahead of you.”
“I know.”
“But you’re worried.”
“I’m struggling to get my head in the game, but it’ll come to me. It always does. Don’t you ever get in a funk and it looks like there’s no end in sight, but then something clicks and you’re back at the top of your game … uh stage game … is that even a thing for musicians?”
“For writing songs, I go through those phases. Especially when the label breathes down my neck to force out songs for an album. But the only time I’ve been kinda absent onstage was in Ottawa. The night before…”
“The night before I left.”
Jet buries his head on my chest and nods.
I don’t want to think about what that means because my initial thought is we’re great at messing each other up professionally, and I don’t want to open that can of worms.
“This distance thing is gonna suck,” he says.
“Yeah. It will.”
Jet groans. “So will working with Harley.”
“Because you still … I mean …”
Jet leans up on his elbow. “Still what, Caleb?”
“I mean, why will it suck?” I almost accused him of still having feelings for the guy, and I think he knows that’s what was about to come out.
“Because he’s so particular about his music. He never wanted to do the boy band thing. It’s the label who threw those guys together, and he says the other guys don’t care how they’re famous, just that they are. Harley’s obsessive. I reckon it’ll take longer to record his one song than our entire album. He’s particular and—”
“And that’s why you fell for him.”
Jet grimaces. “What?”
“Because you’re exactly the same with your music.”
He lifts one shoulder. “I guess, but there’s a difference between being able to relate to it and having to work with it.”
“It’ll be worth it, though. I’m assuming.”
“Harley’s the only one strong-willed enough to make it on his own. Ryder has the most talent, but Harley wants it the most. I don’t know the other three too well. Being on Harley’s album will definitely give the band more exposure.”
“Then you have to do it. Even if the thought of you two in a recording studio, spending hours writing and playing music, makes me uneasy.”
“Because you think something will happen? I have to admit, if Bryce up and joined the NHL and you had to work with him, I wouldn’t be as cool as you right now.”
I pull Jet down on top of me. “Please don’t mistake my composure as an I don’t care attitude. I do care. A lot. And not because I think something will happen. I trust you. Like you said, it’s not something I’m comfortable with, but I know you have to do it, so there’s no point in fighting about it because it has to be done.”
I hate it, but sometimes hard choices need to be made, and turning down an amazing opportunity for his band isn’t something I’d want him to do just because I’m a little … okay, a lot insecure.
“Wow. You’re so … like … levelheaded.”
“If you say it’s because I’m old, I will spank you.”
Jet cracks up laughing. “Sure thing, Big Daddy.”
“Oh, really. That’s how you want to play it?” Without warning, I tackle him and roll us over so I’m on top.
“I have to say, if this is supposed to be a punishment, you suck at it.”
“Yeah? What if I was to do this …” I reach between us and take his cock in my hand and stroke slowly.
“Still not seeing the punishment.” Jet throws his head back, exposing his slim neck, and I have to lean in and kiss it.
Jet lets out a moan.
And that’s when I pull away. I sit up, straddling him, and stare at his anguished face.
He whines. “Oh my God, no, you did not just do that.”
“More of a punishment yet?”
“Yes! Fine. Just come back.” He tries to reach for my hands, but I widen my knees and use my legs to pin his arms to the bed. “You’re evil.”
“Evil is better than old, I guess.” My hand takes hold of my cock. “And now you get to watch while I come all over you, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
Jet licks his lips. “We’re back to you not knowing what a punishment is.”
“Did I mention you can’t touch yourself or get off?”
“I hate you.”
“That’s not what you said an hour ago when I was balls deep inside your cute little ass.”
“My ass is not cute. It’s, like, ass-tastic.”
“That too.”
Jet’s glance falls to where my hand is slowly stroking my dick, and he bites his plump bottom lip.
“Stay just like that,” I rasp.
Jet’s light skin practically glows in the dark, giving him this ethereal quality that encompasses everything that’s so him. But in this light, underneath me, he’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
It doesn’t take much for me to be on the edge of coming. All I have to do is look into Jet’s big doe eyes, look at his shaggy hair across his forehead and small curls around his neck, and think about being deep inside him like I was earlier, and I’m achingly hard.
I can’t get enough of Jet.
Never will.
Ever.
His chest rises and falls, and his own, untouched cock points upward, the tip glistening with precum.
Leaning over him, I put one hand on his pillow next to his head and stroke myself harder and faster.
His breathing matches mine as he watches. Jet’s smaller body wriggles underneath me, trying for friction, trying to get his arms free, but it’s the pleading coming from his mouth that pushes me over the edge. “Caleb …”
My body tenses. My load hits his skin. I can’t catch my breath, and I collapse on top of him.
Jet’s hard cock digs into my stomach, but I’m too busy basking in the aftershocks of my orgasm.
A callused hand moves down my back and up to my shoulder again.
“Soren?”
Oh, I’m back to Soren now. Someone’s sucking up. I smile but don’t lift my head so he can’t see it. “Uh-huh?”
“Can I ask you to do something?”
“Yes, I’ll take care of you.” I roll my hips. “I’m not that much of an asshole.”
Jet shakes his head. “No, that’s not it. I …”
I lift up to look into his eyes. “What is it?”
“Can we, like, promise not to let us get in the way of what we have to do these next few months?”
I hesitate to ask for clarity, but that’s what got us in trouble before. “What do you mean?”
“Missing you is gonna suck. Being away from you is gonna suck. But I don’t want your game to suffer because you’re too busy missing me.”
“Jet—”
“I can’t afford timewise to jump on a plane every time we have a misunderstanding to yell at you.”
I snort. “Yeah, that might’ve been extreme.”
“I reckon we should make our careers our priority for the next few months.”
Wait … is he … trying to break up with me?
My face must fall or something because he’s quick to keep talking.
“Maybe I’m not explaining this right. I love you and want to talk with you and Skype and do all those things we’ve promised. I still want to be a couple even though we’re apart. Every day I’m in that recording studio, I’m going to be missing you and thinking about you—it’ll make for some good songs on the next album—but even though I’ll be hopelessly grumpy as fuck without you, I’m not going to let that get in between me and the album.”
“I wouldn
’t expect it to.”
“Just like I don’t want it to mess with hockey.”
I can’t help smiling. “You’re worried you’re bad for my game? Baby, no. I have no idea if my disconnect on the ice has anything to do with us or not, but even if it does, I wouldn’t change us or what we have.”
“Just promise me something.”
“Anything.”
“Make this your best season ever.”
That’s a big ask. “I promise I’ll try. If my knees get on board, I’m all for it.”
Jet gets that mischievous glint in his eye I’m coming to love. “Now that’s settled, you can get me off.”
“So demanding.” I move my way down his body and get to work.
I’ll do what he asks. I’m going to make this my best season ever because I’m pretty sure it’s going to be my last.
Chapter Thirty
JET
I finish Radioactive’s set on the last show of the tour three days later and don’t bother sticking around for Eleven’s big announcement or the nightmare of an after-party because it’s going to be ugly.
How the label thought it would be a good idea to announce the band breaking up where riots and stampeding teenagers could happen is beyond me.
I’ll be landing in Chicago by the time that happens.
I have twenty-four hours to meet my niece and hang out with my brothers, and then it’s straight into the recording studio. Harley’s determined to get his track out first, so while the others are all doing media appearances, he’ll be working.
That’s how Harley is.
Matt and Wade are waiting for me at the airport in Chicago, and seeing them together, the oldest of us Jackson kids and the youngest, one tall and wide, the other taller but skinnier, I can’t help thinking that we survived it—our childhood.
If CPS found out how often we were left alone, I don’t know if we would’ve made it through without being put in the system.
Matt protected us from that, and now he’s taken in our fifteen-year-old brother so he can have the best education his genius mind deserves.
He’s going to an Ivy League, Matt’s in the NFL, and I’m a rock star with fans and a headlining stadium tour coming up.
We not only survived our childhood, but we’re succeeding. And I know most of my success belongs to Matt because without his support, I wouldn’t even be here.
I make a note to thank him one day, but I can’t pass up an opportunity to mock him. Especially when he looks like he could fall asleep standing up.
“You look like shit.”
Wade laughs.
Matt grumbles. “Jackie screamed all last night and most of today.”
Thank God, I can only stay twenty-four hours. “Is that normal?” I ask.
“It’s normal,” Wade says.
“And you would know how?”
“I got bored and read all the parenting books Matt and Noah bought.”
“The first night she was so good,” Matt says. “Then, I dunno what happened. Whose idea was this baby thing? Because I can’t remember. Memory function is all but gone with how little sleep I’ve had.”
Wade leans in. “He’s complaining now, but wait until you see them with her. They’re so sickeningly in love with her already.” He turns to Matt. “I told you. She’s cluster feeding.”
“The books say that only happens with breast-fed babies.”
My brothers argue all the way to the car about the behaviors of breast-fed babies versus bottle-fed babies, and I don’t know when I entered an alternate universe, only that I need to get used to it.
Matt is a father.
I take out my phone and text Soren.
Me: Landed in Chicago. Have fallen into a world of breastfeeding and screaming babies, and I haven’t even met the kidlet yet. It has scarred me for life. Just FYI.
Soren: I seriously hope Matt and Noah aren’t breastfeeding that poor baby.
Me: LOL. Miss you already.
“How’s Soren?” Matt asks from the driver’s seat, eyeing me.
I put my phone away. “Good.”
“That’s all you’re gonna give me?”
“Yup.” Because I don’t want to hear lectures about how long-distance relationships don’t work. He and Noah couldn’t even make Chicago to New York work before deciding they needed to be in one city. Noah moved for Matt, but he’s also a billionaire with basically no ties to anything and can do what he wants.
Both Soren and I are under contracts we can’t get out of, and even if we found a way out, we’d be sacrificing at least one of our careers.
I fill the drive from O’Hare to Matt and Noah’s penthouse apartment by asking Wade questions about school so they can’t ask me about Soren.
We enter the apartment to a frantic Noah slashing at his throat with his hand and then putting a finger to his lips.
“She’s asleep,” he whispers.
“Good. Because I’m exhausted and need to sleep too,” I say back. “I’ll meet her in the morning.”
It’s a short three hours later when I meet my niece, thanks to the munchkin’s lungs.
I stumble into Matt and Noah’s kitchen, grumbling about kids coming with a mute button. And speaking of buttons, I flick the coffee machine on. I’m up now. I’m gonna be up the rest of the night most likely.
“Hey, it’s only one night for you.” Noah moves about, preparing a bottle for the baby. “Apparently, we’re going to be living with this for the rest of our lives.”
“This is your daughter, and she has a name,” Matt hisses while he holds Jackie close and kinda bounces her up and down. She quiets, but the second he slows down, she starts wailing again.
I wait impatiently for the coffee and speak through a yawn. “About that. Jackson Huntington? You gave her a boy name.”
Noah folds his arms. “We didn’t realize names had genitals.”
I throw my hands up in surrender and turn back to the coffee machine. “How is Wade sleeping through this?”
“Noise-canceling headphones,” Matt says.
“Wow, baby bro really is a genius.”
Jackie won’t take the bottle and keeps screaming her little head off.
“Okay, give my niece to me.” I have absolutely no experience with kids, but what the hell, I’ll give it a whirl because my head already hurts from how hard the thing is crying.
“Support her head,” Matt says as he passes her over delicately.
She looks up at me with big, wet eyes and a pouty bottom lip. It trembles, her chin shaking, and it’s as if she’s waiting to decide if she likes me or not.
The main thing is, she’s stopped crying.
“Hi, baby Jackson. I’m your Uncle Jet, but just like your daddy, you can call me JJ.” I start walking around the apartment, trying to replicate the bounce thing Matt was doing.
He passes me a bottle. “Keep talking to her. I think it’s working.”
“Umm … okay.”
Matt shows me how to hold the bottle properly, and she starts drinking like a champ.
“Hmm, what to talk about. Well, you’re gonna have to know that I’m going to be your favorite uncle. Wade may be a genius, but I can get you awesome concert tickets. And hockey tickets. I know, I know, don’t roll your eyes at me. Hockey is not football, but I have a secret to tell you. Hockey players are hotter than football players.”
“Hey,” Matt whines.
I shush him. “I’m having a moment with my niece here.” I turn back to her and talk her ears off about what a great family she has, how much support she’ll have from not only her daddies and uncles but the whole gay brigade too.
When I run out of random things to say, I start singing.
My songs. Eleven songs. And then I move onto the classics like Queen.
Her little eyes get droopy, and she stops sucking on the bottle.
“She needs to burp,” Matt says.
I look up to find him lying on the couch and Noah nowhere to be seen. “Where
’s Noah?”
“You lost him around the time you started singing boy band songs.”
I give him the finger.
“I told him to get some sleep while he can.” He stands. “Here. Hold her upright so it’s easy for her to burp. Oh, and she’ll probably spew on you.”
I shrug. “I’ve had worse on me.”
“Don’t want to know.”
“You know, I don’t know what you’re complaining about. This baby thing is easy.”
“If I wasn’t so tired and thankful she’s being quiet right now, I’d totally tell you to fuck off, but I won’t because I’m seriously questioning if I’ve gone deaf.”
“Do you think if I sit down, she’ll start screaming again?” I ask.
“Give it a try. She only weighs eight pounds but she sure gets heavy after a while.”
I sit in the recliner and wait for the crying to come back. Jackie looks up at me with warm, brown eyes. “Are you sure you adopted her and didn’t accidentally impregnate someone? I swear she has the Jackson family brown eyes.”
Matt laughs and takes a seat on the couch. He continues to watch us, and while I’d put it down to being an overprotective father, I know something else is bothering him.
“What’s up?” My tone is exasperated, and he can tell.
“Are you and Soren good? For real?”
“Ah. Nice time to bring this up because I can’t yell.”
“I’m just askin’. I know I didn’t react … umm …”
“Sanely. The word you’re looking for is you didn’t react sanely when you found out about us.”
“I just didn’t see you two together, but I know when to admit I’m wrong. I wanted to talk to you while you’re here because I know you guys are doing long distance, and—”
“If this is going to be a lecture on how it won’t work—”
“It’s not. Look at Talon and Miller. They did long distance for the first six months of their relationship. They’re one of the strongest couples we know. I have faith you guys can pull it off, but you might need help to do it. So, we’re offering you the Gulfstream to use whenever you want.”
I try not to break into laughter, but it slips out. I worry about disturbing Jackie, but when I look down, she’s sound asleep on me.
