by CJ Roberts
Rob smiled and shook his hand. “Yeah, it has been. Too long.” Sara looked at each of them arranged around Jack’s large front porch like it was the fucking OK Corral.
“Stand down for Christ’s sake, and take me inside. I need a shower, and I never want to see these clothes again.” She stomped through the front door as the men stood and watched her before following her inside.
Sara let the water pour over her head, trying to shake off the horrific events of the previous hours, including the scene in Jack’s kitchen. Blake kept eyeballing Jack as if he would just as soon strangle him as stand there and talk. Rob and Jack had carried the conversation, catching up, relaxed and ignoring Blake’s angry stare. He had kept an arm around Sara, unwilling to let her go, after yet another tongue lashing about “bad choices.” She let him hold her. He was a control freak but had always watched out for her. It was soothing to lean against him even though he was staring daggers at Jack.
At one point her body starting shaking so badly she nearly fell. “Excuse me, but I need to get her settled,” Jack said as he took her elbow, guiding out from under her brother’s arm and made her sit, then handed her a healthy pour of bourbon. She would not meet Blake’s eyes, especially after Jack’s pointedly possessive statement. Crouching down to be at her eye level, he ran a finger down her cheek, catching a tear that fell.
“Drink this. Then take a shower.” He stood, his hand on her shoulder. “I’ve gotta go back in there and convince your brother I’m not Ted Bundy, or worse.” She smiled up at him.
“Sorry,” she said and Jack shrugged.
“I’ve got a sister too. I know how he feels. I wouldn’t let her within a country mile of me either.” He leaned down to brush her lips with his. Sara’s heart stuttered in her chest. A sister? There was so much she did not know about him. “Use the shower upstairs, to the left of the steps in the big bedroom. Towels are in the cabinet.”
She’d gulped down the burning liquid and closed her eyes a minute, then headed upstairs. Sara couldn’t help but peek into the other three upstairs rooms. One was an at-home office, with a huge television screen and enormous desk complete with large flat monitor and keyboard. The other two were bedrooms, tastefully minimal. Jack’s room was gigantic, a real man-space with a dark walnut king-sized bed, a closet as big as her bedroom, and a bathroom fit for a resort spa. Sara ran a hand across the marble vanity top before slipping out of her clothes and into a thick robe she found hanging on the door. Pulling the plush fabric to her nose, she took in a huge breath of Jack’s scent before turning all six of the showerheads on full force, full hot.
She could hear the low bass notes of masculine conversation. The occasional laugh made her hope against hope that her brother was thawing a little. She let the hot water rinse the soapy foam off her body, determined to ignore the weird situation she’d found herself in. Images crashed in on her. Flashes of terror and pain, the man’s ugly sneer when he hit her, the sensation of his nasty body pressed against hers. She braced herself on the tiled wall and tried not to panic. The water suddenly stopped.
She whirled around to find Jack holding a huge thick towel, a smile on his face.
She stepped into his embrace and let him dry her off, head to toe. He ended with her hair, rubbing it between the folds of absorbent fabric, his face close to hers, not speaking. She could hear music playing somewhere. Dropping the towel to the floor between them he cradled her face between his hands, kissed her forehead, her nose, and finally her lips, soft at first, then with more intensity, his tongue invading her mouth, owning her, making her gasp for breath.
“Jack,” she started, breaking away. “I should…” He cut her off with another kiss, pulling the robe around her shoulders again.
“You should, and you will, stay here with me, tonight,” he muttered into her wet hair. “Let me take care of you. I don’t want you out of my sight, ever, although I realize the impracticality of that.”
She melted at that and cursed her eyes for leaking even more tears. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she went up on tiptoe to reach his lips. Jack scooped her up, carried her to his bed, and held her until she fell into a deep sleep. Sara had been unaware of just how bone-tired she was until her head was nestled against his shoulder.
Sara jerked awake, a scream on her lips, gasping for breath, unable to process where she was. Jack sat up next to her, soothing, pulling her back down, and covering her face with kisses. She took a deep breath and laid back, as the day came back to her. Jack’s lips distracted her, moving down to her nipples and her stomach. As he positioned himself between her legs the robe she’d been wearing fell open. Jack’s hands travelled down her sides, to her waist and hips, as he moved from one nipple to the other, licking and sucking.
“Jack,” she whispered.
“Hmm?” His mouth never left her flesh.
“Please, I…” Sara was determined to get control of this, she had to tell him how she felt but felt her throat closing up with familiar fear.
“What do you want me to do baby,” he whispered. “Tell me.”
Sara’s heart pounded. This was a twist. The sensation of his hands and lips, his soft words, being here in his bed overwhelmed her.
“I want you to listen to me,” she insisted. His lips continued their journey down her torso, licking and kissing and making her skin break out in goose bumps.
“I’m listening,” he insisted. “I can multi task.”
She sucked in a breath when his hands cupped her ass raising her up to his lips. She threaded her hands in his hair.
“Oh, God.” She gave in to it, to him, words escaping into a whirlwind of pleasure.
He sucked on her hard nub of flesh, and slipped fingers into her, drawing them out slowly, before reinserting, and reaching up beneath her pubic bone, making her cry out.
Jack pulled away as Sara’s body pulsed and shuddered. She opened her eyes and looked at him up on his knees, thick cock in his hand, staring at her, his dark blue eyes unreadable. Sara stretched, her body a blaze of post-orgasmic bliss.
“What was it you wanted to say,” he growled.
“That I think I….” Sara stopped, swallowing the words, rendered speechless by the sight of him, the sheer chemical connection between them undeniable. “I love…how you make me feel.”
He smiled as he rubbed a hand up and down his length. Sara took a deep breath and let the words loose, self-preservation be damned. Her voice was barely a whisper.
“I love you Jack.” He dropped down and tugged her arms over her head, pinning them there, making her whole body sing with response to this small gesture. His lips hovered over hers. She shut her eyes, waiting for the inevitable smart-ass remark or equally flippant response, hating herself for admitting it. “I shouldn’t, but I do, and God help me I probably shouldn’t have said it either.” When he cut her off with another kiss he kept his body separate, their lips and his hands on her wrists the only connection. He broke away, shifting the hand holding her down so that his fingers threaded through hers and gripped hard. The tenderness in his gaze forced her to look away. His words made her want to cry.
“I need this so badly. I need you, here with me. I need to be inside you now.” He gave her hand one last squeeze and reached over for a condom, stretching it down over his shaft, his eyes never leaving hers. She cried out as he entered her in one long glorious stroke, stretching her, making her raise her hips and wrap her legs around his waist.
“Sara,” he said. “I love…” She used her muscles to grip along his thick shaft. He gritted his teeth, and she smiled up at him.
“Tell me Jack. I need to hear it.”
“I want…ahhh, God, woman.” He thrust into her, again and again, making her reach up and grip the smooth wood headboard to match him. She shut her eyes, letting the orgasm take her, as he came, crying out with her. Their bodies stayed connected, and she wrapped her arms around his head. “I love you,” he mumbled into her damp skin. “And God help me just as much.”
He pulled out and collapsed down beside her. She took a deep breath and turned to him.
“Don’t hurt me Jack,” she warned, putting a finger to his lips. “I may love you but I won’t put up with bullshit.” He grinned and put the tip of her finger in his mouth.
“Are you kidding? Your brother scares the living shit of me. Now flip over, we need our beauty sleep.”
Sara grinned, and snuggled into his body, letting him spoon her. Her brain spun so fast she wondered how she’d get to sleep, but her sated body calmed, and finally, truly content she drifted off in Jack’s arms.
The next morning Sara woke, stretched and rolled over to find the bed empty. She rose, wrapping the robe back around her before creeping out into the quiet hallway.
“Jack,” she called down the steps. Silence greeted her. The dim early morning light flooded the hall from a bank of large windows as she descended the stairs. She found the coffee maker, figured out where he kept all the supplies and marveled at the extreme neatness and organization of his kitchen as she assembled a pot.
He’d left his phone on the counter, and it buzzed at least twice while she was standing there, staring out the window, unable to process the fact that Jack Gordon had actually said that he loved her. She was close to admitting that the entire thing terrified her to the point of jumping in her car and escaping until she realized her car wasn’t here.
At the next buzz of the phone, she picked it up, realizing too late her mistake. Three messages from “Heather” popped up.
“Hey, we still on for tonight?”
“I’m getting in the shower, I’ll be thinking about you and our last shower together.”
And finally, the showstopper:
“Call me lover. I miss you. I need you. I love you.”
Sara felt cold and hot all at once. Her natural tendency to compartmentalize, to shove anything resembling real emotion aside in a self-preserving reflex, had failed her. She’d opened up. She had admitted the worst possible thing to the worst possible man on the planet.
Resisting the urge to hurl the phone against the wall, she set it back on the counter. Sun pierced the fog outside, hitting her square in the face. With it came the hard realization that Jack was indeed going to hurt her and she had nothing to blame but her own weakness – her god forsaken, never conquered need to be loved.
She spotted her own phone next to the chair where she’d sat last night, snatched it up and called Blake.
“Come get me,” she spat out. “I’m still…”
“I’ll be there in fifteen,” he cut her off. Running upstairs to find her clothes, she pulled on her skirt and then tossed the ripped shirt into the bin in Jack’s over the top bathroom, tears blinding her as she reached into one of his dresser drawers. She tugged the first T-shirt she found over her head and ran back downstairs just as the door slammed and she heard Jack’s voice.
“Smells good in here,” he said. She scowled at the sound and walked into the kitchen. His shoulders gleamed with a sheen of sweat from his run.
“Hey.” He turned and tried to pull her into an embrace. She ducked to the side.
“Gotta go,” she said, unwilling to engage in any level of conversation with him, unsure what she might say. She glared at his confused look. He stepped back and crossed his arms over his chest still heaving with exertion.
“So soon?” His voice was non-committal.
Infuriated beyond reason, Sara turned to him.
“Yeah, lover,” she spat out. “Sounds like you should rest up…you know, for tonight.”
His brow furrowed in confusion he followed her gaze to the phone at his elbow. Grabbing it, he stared at the screen and rolled his eyes.
“Oh shit, honey, this woman is like a…a stalker.”
Sara held up a hand.
“Don’t bullshit me you ass,” she insisted. “It insults me.”
“I’m not bullshitting you Sara,” he insisted, his eyes darkening. “But I guess since you’re used to being right, you won’t believe me.” He turned and pulled a coffee mug out of the cabinet, his stance nonchalant. She stared at his broad back and resisted the extreme urge to wrap around him, cover him with kisses and forgive. Old Sara held her back, kept her distant, kept her angry.
He sipped his coffee, not speaking. Sara raised her chin at him, about to say something, anything to recover what they’d shared, but when Blake’s horn sounded outside it brought it all back. All the rumors, the innuendo about him, her own stupid thinking she’d had any effect on him beyond physical. When would she learn? Letting her body lead, letting him control her, it was all so lame. She turned on her heel and left without saying another word, slamming the heavy front door behind and flopping into Blake’s car, tears squeezing from her eyes.
“Don’t talk.” She glared at her brother. “Get me to my car and away from here.” She glanced up to see Jack standing in the doorway, coffee still in hand, staring at her.
Her brother pulled out of the long driveway and drove her home, where her car waited, like yesterday and all its extreme drama had never happened. Blake kept a hand on her clenched fist, his touch warming and comforting.
Walking back through her own door had been a relief – more so than she thought it would be. After an hour-long soak in the tub she emerged, revitalized, and reached for her phone anticipating a message from Jack but saw nothing on her screen. Disappointed in her own weak need to hear from him, she fielded a call from Blake. He did his usual big brother fussing over her, scolding her for staying at Jack’s, reminding her she shouldn’t consider him a “boyfriend” in any sense of the word, and invited her over for dinner. She smiled but put him off, wanting some time to herself.
She lay down and slept on the couch for most of the day, her body still processing the extremes of the previous forty-eight hours. When she awoke her mouth dry and empty stomach rumbling, her phone was buzzing with a call.
“Sara?” Craig’s voice was as soft and soothing as she remembered.
“Hey you.” She curled up on the couch.
“You home?”
“Yeah.” She twirled a lock of damp hair around her finger. “I just slept the entire day away. I’m starving.” Talking to her rescuer made some of the residual anger and frustration with Jack fade ever so slightly.
“Funny you should mention that. I happen to have a spare peach pie with me.”
Sara sat up straighter.
“Peach pie? That’s my favorite.” She smiled at the coincidence but had to wonder why the hell a grown single man would have a “spare” peach pie on him.
“Yeah, I know,” he said. “And if you’ll open your door, I can hand it to you.”
She jumped up and pulled the door open to find a smiling blond man, clad in plaid shorts and white plain T-shirt, closing his phone and holding a boxed pie imprinted with Blake and Rob’s restaurant logo. She rolled her eyes and leaned on the doorjamb, appreciating the young, fit and tanned vision in front of her.
“And here I thought you went and baked for me.” She motioned for him to enter.
He shrugged and walked over to her kitchen placing the pie on the counter.
“All I know is I’ve been smelling this thing for the last fifteen minutes and have got to have some or I will kill somebody.” He leaned on the counter and looked at her, his loose-limbed stance sexy and comforting all at the same time. She pushed him aside so she could reach for plates and forks and encountered that just-washed smell on him. It brought Saturday’s drama crashing back to the forefront of her brain.
The kitchen walls closed in on her and she felt the jerk’s hand ripping her shirt, smelled his stink, then, Jack’s words, face and body, owning her, making her admit things she shouldn’t have. She let out a sob.
Craig put an arm around her waist. “Hey, you okay?” She turned to him and he held her close. He ran his hand down to the small of back. She relaxed into his touch and reached out to grasp his shirt with both hands to hold herself upright. He w
as not an exceptionally tall man, and she liked how she could fit herself against him.
His lips grazed her ear. “Shhh, it’s fine, relax.” He continued to knead her lower back, his hands circling her hips and Sara was mortified to feel her nipples harden. Images of Jack rose in her brain and she started to pull away, letting go of the fabric that she’d bunched up between her hands.
But Craig kept her close, and she let herself be held, arms curled between them, head turned to face his neck.
God he smells so…clean.
She closed her eyes then opened them in shock when he tilted her face up to meet his.
She started to pull her head away, but Craig put a hand under her hair and held her in place. His impossibly soft and full lips were firm. As he breached her lips with his tongue, he made a noise down in his throat and pulled away.
“Sara, I’m sorry.” His hoarse voice made her shiver. “I…” He kissed her exposed collarbone and she leaned her head back. Her nipples pressed against the worn felt of her robe. “Oh hell, I didn’t mean to make this more complicated.” He let go of her.
Sara held onto her elbows, suddenly cold and shivering. The doorbell rang, making her nearly jump out of her skin. She took one last look at him standing there, hands on hips, head bent, avoiding her eyes, before she turned to take the few steps to her front door.
She glanced out the peephole to see her friends Val and Cathy, brandishing a pizza and a bottle of wine. She pulled her robe together, took a deep breath and opened the door. They burst in, made their familiar way to her kitchen and stopped dead at the sight of their latest office heartthrob holding a plate of pie and standing well behind the tall counter. She grinned to herself but stopped.
Why the hell are you playing with him, Sara? New Sara chided her. He is not what you want. Don’t use him to cover what you really need – Jack. Back in your arms.
The girls popped open the wine and started pouring everyone a glass but Craig put his plate in the sink and begged off, giving Sara a chaste hug on his way out. She followed him to the door. As he was about to take the single step down to the sidewalk, he turned, walked back up to her, pulled her out onto the tiny front step and planted a firm kiss on her lips, one arm around her waist. He ended the kiss before she could wrap herself around him.
