I admitted, “I’m not very good with people.”
Her lips curved up. “You are when you want to be.”
Again she’d surprised me. Was that a compliment?
I turned my attention back to the road, because looking at her was dangerous. I couldn’t trust myself not to say something stupid when our eyes held.
I asked, “Where am I going?”
“Tremé. Saint Ann Street.”
We drove in silence for several minutes, long enough for it to be uncomfortable, almost long enough for it to be weird. Then she broke the silence with another surprise.
“I want to thank you.”
“For what?”
“For overpaying me. It came at exactly the right time.”
I couldn’t help myself. I looked at her again. “You weren’t overpaid. You saved my ass. No one else could’ve pulled tonight off on such short notice. And the food was incredible. You were right, people opened their wallets. It looks like the auction will be the most successful the Project has had.”
She looked out the window at the passing night and slowly shook her head. “Well, anyway. Thank you.”
She sounded so melancholy. It brought me out of the pity party I was throwing for myself, and suddenly all I could focus on was her. I said, “What do you mean it came at the right time?”
She lifted a shoulder. “Nothing, just . . . it’s appreciated. You were very generous. It really helped.”
My mind went a million miles an hour, trying to figure out what she could mean. She’d mentioned her mother before . . .
“Is this about your mother?”
Her head snapped around. She stared at me with big, shocked eyes. “How did you know about my mother?”
So my guess was correct. “You mentioned her earlier. You said it had been a rough few weeks.”
Bianca turned stiffly away.
I asked gently, “Is she sick?”
She inhaled a slow breath, then blew it out silently. “She would literally kill me if she knew I told you, so I’m not telling you. But yes. But you didn’t hear that from me, and please don’t share it with anyone.”
She looked over at me again, her eyes pleading, and I nearly drove off the road from the explosion of emotion in my chest.
I said gruffly, “You have my word I won’t tell a soul.”
She nodded, swallowing hard, then whispered, “Thank you. It’s been really hard not having anyone to talk to about it.”
I stared at her, my heart starting to pound, amazed how easily she could make me feel like I was melting and flying and having a heart attack, all at once.
Holy fucking yellow submarines, this woman is my kryptonite.
I looked back at the road, gripped my hands around the steering wheel, and tried to breathe. I said, “My mother’s been sick for a long time.”
Bianca sucked in a breath. “Really? Oh, no! Is it . . . is it bad?”
Why yes it is, I didn’t say, and it’s all my fault. “She had a stroke several years ago. She mainly stays in bed now. Has trouble speaking, needs constant care.”
That’s pretty much all I got out before my throat closed and I stopped talking.
“Oh, Jackson,” said Bianca. “I’m so sorry to hear that. How hard it must be for you!”
When I didn’t respond to that, she said hesitantly, “Or are you two not close?”
I briefly closed my eyes. This was something I hadn’t spoken about to anyone, ever, but Bianca had just shared something very personal with me, and it felt like the right thing to do to share in kind.
“We used to be. But that was before I became such a disappointment.”
“A disappointment? You? But you’re so . . .”
Expecting a nasty joke about my character, I looked over sharply. But Bianca was looking back at me seriously with her brows pulled together, searching for a word.
Finally she declared, “Well I don’t know what the right word is, but anyone who adopts a special-needs child and raises money for charity and keeps his end of the deals he makes isn’t a disappointment in my book.” With a smile she added, “Even if you are stuck-up higher than a light pole.”
“Stuck up! I am not stuck up!” I exclaimed, pleased as fuck by what she’d said, even if it did end with a jab.
Bianca waved a hand in the air. “Oh please, Jackson, you’re so highfalutin, you think your shit tastes like sherbet.”
Then she slapped her hand over her mouth and stared at me in horror.
I threw my head back and laughed.
“Oh my goodness, I’m so sorry,” she breathed. “That was just classless and rude.”
I kept on laughing, so hard tears formed in my eyes. Her expression was classic. Had anyone else said that to me, I’d have exploded in fury.
She begged, “Please tell me you’re not going to put a retroactive stop payment on your check!”
“That’s not even a thing,” I said between gasps of air.
She buried her face in her hands and groaned. “If my mother knew I’d said something like that, she’d knock me into next week.”
Unthinking, grinning like a lunatic, I reached out and squeezed her shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. You’ve been giving me grief since the minute we met. I think I’m starting to like it.”
She raised her head and looked at me. Then she looked at my hand on her shoulder.
I snatched my hand away so fast it was a blur. “Sorry,” I said gruffly, my face reddening again.
After a minute of excruciating silence, she said, “Turn here.”
Wishing for a time machine so I could undo my colossal mistake of touching a woman who hadn’t invited me to do so, I turned the corner into Bianca’s neighborhood. A few more turns and I found her street.
“The white one on the left with the red door,” she said, pointing to a house.
As I pulled to a stop at the curb, Bianca cried softly, “Oh!”
I followed her gaze out the window. A man sat in a chair on the front porch of her house. When he saw her, he rose and stood next to the door, waiting.
At one o’clock in the morning, there was a man waiting for her to come home. A young, handsome man by the looks of it. Though the porch light was dim, it was bright enough to see that.
Shit.
Crushed by disappointment and an irrational, unwarranted jealousy, I said stiffly, “Your boyfriend?”
Bianca’s head shake was violent. She recoiled from the window. “Ex-boyfriend. So very, very ex.”
Her disgusted tone revealed exactly how she felt about the man on the porch. Obviously whatever had happened between them had left her angry, bitter, and with zero desire to see him again. My jealousy was replaced by outrage and a need to protect her that was so strong I almost snapped the steering wheel in half.
“I’ll get rid of him,” I growled. I reached for the door, but Bianca stopped me.
“No.” She turned to me with an intensity I’d never seen in her before. She laid her hand on my forearm. “I have a better idea.”
Then her gaze dropped to my mouth, she leaned toward me, and my heart stopped dead in my chest.
FOURTEEN
BIANCA
Before you judge me, let me just say in my defense that my brain wasn’t firing on all cylinders on account of the sexual tension between Jackson and me in the kitchen, fright over how erratically he’d been driving, making him laugh (a beautiful, unexpected sound), having his big, warm hand settle on my shoulder in a gentle yet distinctly possessive grip, and seeing Trace standing on my front porch in the middle of the night.
So yes. I kissed Jackson.
Hard.
That wasn’t the bad part. His lips were soft, his face was smooth, and he smelled even better up close. The bad part was that he didn’t kiss me back.
When it became clear after several long moments that he wasn’t opening his mouth, and had in fact frozen stiff as a corpse left out in the snow, I withdrew a few inches and sheepishly looked at hi
m.
He said, “Did you just kiss me to try to make him jealous?”
I said, “Um.”
We stared at each other. I felt like every one of my nerve endings had been dipped in lighter fluid and set on fire.
He lifted his hand and slowly brushed his thumb over my lower lip. His voice an octave lower, he said, “You caught me off guard. Let’s try it again. And this time put your hand on my chest so it looks more authentic.”
I grumbled, “Lord, you’re bossy—”
But then I shut up because Jackson took my mouth and I couldn’t think, let alone speak.
He tasted like bourbon and secrets and frustrated desire and kissed like he was starving. It started out slow, his tongue gently parting my lips, his big hands cradling my head, but quickly turned hot and greedy. When I curled my hand into his hair and pulled him closer, he made a low, masculine sound deep in his throat that might have been the sexiest noise I’d heard in my entire life.
After what felt like forever, he pulled away first. We were both breathing hard.
I opened my eyes and looked at him and became concerned that my panties might spontaneously combust from the look he was giving me.
He whispered, “God, I hope you have a lot of exes you want to make jealous.”
Intensely aroused and equally shocked by my behavior—I don’t have a habit of randomly attack-kissing men—I sat back and smoothed my hands over my hair. I said, “Only the one, unfortunately.”
He jumped on that faster than a hot knife goes through butter. “Unfortunately?”
Face flaming, I groaned.
Then there was a sharp knock on my window.
Trace leaned over and looked into the car. “Uh, Bianca? You gonna sit out here all night or are you coming in?”
I should’ve guessed Trace wouldn’t be threatened by the sight of me kissing another man. His ego was bigger than the state of Louisiana. I said, “It’s none of your business what I do, Trace Adams!”
Trace pouted. “I need to talk to you, bumble bee.”
Jackson asked me, “Do you want to talk to him, Bianca?”
“No! Not now, not ever!”
Trace said, “Of course you do. You’re just being stubborn.”
Jackson growled, opened his door, and exited the car.
I said to no one in particular, “Uh-oh.”
Across the top of the car, Jackson said to Trace, “You have ten seconds to get the fuck away from that window before I make you a fist sandwich and shove it down your throat, my friend.”
Slowly Trace straightened. All I could see on either side of me was half a man’s body, torsos and legs and muscular arms, hands curled to fists.
Trace said to Jackson, “I don’t know who you are, asshole, but nobody talks to me like that.”
Jackson said, “And nobody calls me ‘asshole.’”
“Oh,” said Trace, “ain’t you an asshole? Because from where I’m standing, you sure look like one.”
Deadly soft, Jackson replied, “And from where I’m standing, you’re looking like you’re one dumb remark away from a visit to the emergency room.”
Okay, I thought. Time to intervene before we’re on the morning news.
I unlocked my door and popped out of the car, missing Trace’s crotch by a hair as I swung the door open. I looked up at him and said crossly, “Excuse me, person who claims to have found God, but your ratty old soul is showing!”
Trace said cajolingly, “Bumble bee—”
“Don’t you ‘bumble bee’ me! I told you the last time I saw you to leave me alone! I never want to see you again!”
Trace folded his arms across his chest and looked down at me with a smug expression. Before he even said it, I knew what was going to come out of his mouth.
He drawled, “Your mama told me different.”
I’m not a violent person, but my palm sure did itch to make contact with the side of his pretty, self-satisfied face. I said, “Just because trash can be recycled doesn’t mean you deserve another chance.”
Behind me, Jackson snorted.
Trace flicked his gaze to Jackson, glared at him for a moment, then turned his attention back to me. “Fine,” he said. “I can see you’re not going to be reasonable in front the asshole. So why don’t you give me a call when he isn’t around.”
Then he dismissively jerked his chin at Jackson and turned around and sauntered away down the sidewalk.
Jackson watched him go with a tense, coiled readiness, dangerous as a cobra about to strike.
Trace hopped on a motorcycle parked at the curb two houses down, gunned it to life, then burned rubber and roared off down the street.
“Ooh,” I said, watching him go. “How manly.” I made a retching noise and headed for the house.
I retrieved my spare key from the hide-a-key that looked like a rock hidden under a shrub next to the patio, then climbed the steps and unlocked the front door. When I turned around, Jackson was slowly climbing the porch steps, flexing his hands like he was trying to release tension from them.
I said, “I’m sorry. That was embarrassing.”
Jackson stopped a few feet from the open door. He looked down the street in the direction Trace had gone, his gaze dark. “Don’t apologize. You have nothing to be sorry for. Do you want me to sit out here awhile, make sure he doesn’t come back?”
That threw me for a loop. Jackson Boudreaux was willing to sit on my front porch in the middle of the night like my own personal watchdog?
Maybe he liked that kiss as much as I did.
“Thank you for offering, but Trace won’t come back tonight. He’ll need to go lick his wounds in some woman’s bed for a night or two before he works up the nerve to show his face to me again.”
I sighed, suddenly bone-tired. “Believe me, I’ve seen it a million times. It’s just too bad I didn’t bring my pocketbook with me today, because I’ve got a little present for him in it that will definitely keep him away longer.”
Jackson leaned against the doorjamb and looked down at me. “A present?”
“Pepper spray.”
A shade of tension eased from Jackson’s body. He even managed a small smile. “Remind me never to get on your bad side.”
I rubbed my temples. I had a nasty headache coming on. “I don’t know about a bad side, but I do know that a man has to choose me or lose me. I’m not a backup plan.”
Jackson was silent. When I glanced at him, he was giving me that burning look again, the one that made me feel like I might ignite.
He murmured, “He’s an idiot. But he’s a lucky idiot.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because for a while, he had you.”
Heat rose in my cheeks. Flustered by the unexpected compliment, I changed the subject. “Can I ask a personal question?”
Without hesitating, he said, “Yes.”
I gestured to his arm. “Why do you have a semicolon tattooed on your wrist? I noticed it when we were in the kitchen.”
Jackson turned his left hand up and gazed down at the simple black tattoo on the inside of his wrist. He was silent for a long time, then looked up and met my eyes.
He said, “You’re an avid reader. You know the meaning of a semicolon.”
I frowned. “It’s when the author could have ended a sentence but chose not to.”
“Exactly.”
“I don’t understand.”
Jackson looked deep into my eyes. His smile might have been the saddest thing I’d ever seen. He said softly, “I’m the author, and the sentence is my life.”
Oh my God.
My heart fell at my feet. I whispered, “Jackson . . .”
He pushed away from the doorframe, dragged a hand through his hair, then looked at his car. “It’s been a long day. I’ll let you get some rest.”
He seemed distant now. Depressed, too, like my question had brought back all kinds of bad memories and now he couldn’t wait to get away from me, and them.
; Feeling like a fool and not knowing how to erase this new awkwardness, I said, “Thank you for the Heritage Thirty Year. That was a treat.”
The sad little smile still hovered around the corners of Jackson’s lips. I didn’t know what he was thinking, and he didn’t enlighten me. All he did was tip his head and turn to leave.
When he got to the curb I called out, “Jackson?”
He turned to look at me.
I said, “I’m sorry about the kiss.”
He stared at me with a look of such longing and loneliness it took my breath away. He said, “I’m not. It’s going to get me through the next four years.”
Then he got in his Porsche and drove away, leaving me standing in my open front door wondering why he’d put an emphasis on the word next.
And what had made him get that semicolon tattoo.
And why I suddenly wanted to know everything about him.
I didn’t sleep a wink that night. I didn’t toss and turn, either. I just lay on my back in the dark staring up at my bedroom ceiling, my mind a merry-go-round that wouldn’t stop spinning.
Who was the real Jackson Boudreaux? The Beast that snarled and snapped? The suave sophisticate at ease in front of crowds? Or the sad, lonely man with a mysterious tattoo and eyes full of bad memories?
He was a puzzle. A puzzle I ached to figure out, but the charity benefit was over. And with all that had happened last night, I doubted Jackson had any desire to see me again.
I wanted to kick myself for using him to try to make Trace jealous. It was a selfish, childish thing to do. Though it seemed we’d both enjoyed that kiss, if the tables were turned and I’d been the one being used for revenge, I wouldn’t have been happy about it.
Whatever Jackson’s opinion of me had been before, after last night it must be lower than a snake’s belly in a wagon rut.
In the morning, I stopped by Mama’s as usual. I found her in bed, drenched in sweat, miserable with nausea.
Her pillow was covered in hair, which had started to fall out of her head in clumps.
“How did the event go, chère?” she whispered, wincing when I turned on the bedroom light.
Burn for You (Slow Burn Book 1) Page 13
