“Jesus Christ, this is a nightmare. Please tell me you didn’t hurt her, I cannot deal with that shit right now.”
He lifted his eyes to Jaxson, and for a moment he was angry that he’d even suggested it. “You really think I’m capable of that?”
Jaxson ran a hand through his hair, pacing away from him to take a drink before he turned around again. “Look, you said you lost it, which I understand, but I’ve been dealing with a lot lately when it comes to friends making stupid choices when they’re angry.”
“I have never hit a woman,” Thomas growled, taking a few steps towards Jaxson, but his friend didn’t even shift a foot.
“Non-consensually.” Chase’s voice floated over and both he and Jaxson turned to stare at him. “I just think that’s an important distinction to make in this conversation, because you have used things on women consensually. Hit them with crops and floggers and stuff, but not to really hurt them. I just mean that it’s probably a good thing to clarify. You’ve never non-consensually hit a woman.”
Thomas turned his eyes back to Jaxson, but instead of the annoyance he felt, he saw humor in the tilt of Jaxson’s mouth. “Seriously?” Thomas asked.
“Chase has a point, and for the record, Thomas, I’m glad you didn’t do anything to her, but I’ll handle it from here.”
“Wait, what are you going to do?” Some fractured part of him still felt the urge to protect her, to put himself between Jaxson and Maddie. Fool.
“Talk to her. Scare her a little. Remind her that we do have her signed NDA on file, and a lot of lawyers that will make her life hell if she breathes a word about the club, or you.” Jaxson shrugged. “If I have to approach the Post, I’ll have my lawyers handle that. They won’t want to fuck with a legally operating entity, especially when their only source is in violation of a contract. Don’t worry, I’ll make her regret the day she met you.”
“Right.” Thomas nodded, knowing he should have been comforted by the words, by Jaxson’s commitment to helping clean this mess up – but none of this felt good. Chase approached him, swapping the empty glass of scotch in his hand for a fresh one.
“I know you liked her, Thomas. I’m sorry this happened.” The blond dropped a hand on his shoulder and squeezed, staying beside him for a moment before he walked over to Jaxson. Chase whispered something too low to hear, and then took Jaxson’s unfinished scotch and left both glasses on the wet bar.
His friend looked up at him, taking control of the situation. “We need her address, Thomas.”
“I’ve got it in my phone.” His stomach twisted as he brushed his thumb across Maddie’s contact information, remembering the way she’d stood dazed in front of him after their first night at Black Light, still coming back from subspace as she’d told him her number. Clenching his jaw, he pushed away the image of her blush, and sent her info to Jaxson. “There. You should have it.”
His friend slid an iPhone from his pocket, stared at it for a moment, and then nodded. “I do. Don’t worry about this, we’ll handle it.”
“Just –” Thomas swallowed the first set of words, and chased them with some scotch. “I’m sorry, Jaxson. This was my fault.”
“You’re right,” he agreed, but then he shrugged. “If it helps at all, I thought she was a different person too. At least, based on what I’d heard.”
“What had you heard?”
His old friend waved it off, moving towards the doorway. “It doesn’t matter now.”
“Tell me,” Thomas demanded, and Jaxson turned to face him, pity etched into his expression for a moment.
“I’d heard you two were well-matched. That she was a submissive with a penchant for pain, but whether or not she could handle a crop –”
“ – or nipple clamps,” Chase added.
“She wasn’t who she pretended to be, Thomas. No matter what she did, no matter what you did with her, it doesn’t matter.” Adjusting the coat on his shoulders, he waited for Chase to come stand beside him. “We’ll handle it,” Jaxson assured him.
“Thank you.” Thomas’ throat felt tight as he spoke, and he self-medicated with more alcohol.
“I’ll call you later.”
He nodded in reply, but the sound of the front door opening and closing seemed to sap the rest of his energy and he sunk into the nearest chair. A behemoth leather thing that was large enough to swallow him, even at his height.
She wasn’t who she pretended to be.
Right. It was all a bunch of lies. None of it had been true. Not her submission, not her moans, and not her smiles or the peals of laughter that he’d heard in this very house.
I’m all yours.
No. It was all a mirage, and he just needed to wash it away. He needed more scotch. Enough of it to make him stop picturing her biting her lower lip, staring up at him with blue eyes that he’d thought held something good within them.
“You don’t need to come with me,” Jaxson muttered as the elevator rose towards the sixth floor, but Chase didn’t even react. He just stood beside him, quietly, which was weird. “I’m just going to talk to her.”
“Mmhmm.” Chase made a sound of agreement, but even that sounded doubting, and it was making him defensive.
“She deserves to get scared a little. She lied her way into Black Light, she’s planning to expose everyone. Everything.”
“I know.” The elevator dinged, and Chase waited for him to step out of the doors first.
“She lied to Thomas, too.” Jaxson continued, checking his phone again for her apartment number.
“Yep.”
Muttering under his breath he scanned the doors, looking for the right one. Thomas was one of his oldest friends, one of the few people who had understood the crap he went through growing up, and seeing him that morning had been a shock. The man was normally perfectly put together, pristine like most politicians, but he’d looked completely destroyed. All thanks to Hurricane Maddie. His anger flared to life again. This bitch had used Thomas, just like so many women had done to him, for her own selfish purposes. Without even a second thought about what would happen when she wrote her fucking article.
Six, two, seven. This was her apartment.
Raising his fist he banged on the door, rattling the thing on its hinges. He waited a few seconds, and then banged again even louder.
“She may not be home, we can –” Before Chase could finish speaking the sound of the deadbolt turning silenced him. Then the door creaked open and the redhead peeked through the opening.
“We need to have a fucking conversation, Ms. O’Neill.” Placing his foot against the door so she couldn’t shut it, he leaned forward. “Now.”
“You’re Jaxson Davidson.” Her voice was quiet, shocked, but he didn’t have time for her to play the star-struck female.
“Yes, I am, and for the discussion we’re about to have I don’t want to be in the hallway.”
Maddie just let go of the door and took a few steps back into the apartment, so Jaxson pushed it the rest of the way open, letting Chase follow him in to shut it. He didn’t waste any time before he started talking, “I want to make something very clear – if you have turned in that article, I am about to make your life a living hell. You signed a non-disclosure agreement when you tricked your way into Black Light, and whether or not Thomas paid for you, I can promise you that you are the only one my lawyers are going to tear apart.”
She nodded, her arms coming up to cross just under her breasts, but she didn’t speak. Instead, she was chewing her lip so hard he wouldn’t have been surprised if it started bleeding.
“You need to listen to me. There’s nothing illegal about Black Light, everything that happens there is consensual, and I don’t really care what you fucking think about it, but if you breathe a word about it to anyone, much less the fucking Post, I will destroy you. And I won’t be pulling any punches after what you did to my friend.”
Maddie’s blue eyes went wide, and then he watched as her face collapsed. Tears came, an
d then she was sobbing, and Jaxson was so taken aback as she bent at the waist, hugging herself, that he couldn’t think straight.
“I didn’t – I wasn’t –” Her words were getting caught by the gasps of air she was pulling in between raw sobs.
Shit, either she was the best actress he’d ever met, or she was actually upset.
“If you think this is going to help you –”
“I don’t want your fucking help!” she screamed at him, sniffling hard and wiping at her cheeks as she turned away from them. Maddie started stacking things on her desk, ripping cords out of her laptop, and the wall, piling them up. “You can have it all, it doesn’t fucking matter. None of it fucking matters.”
“Maddie,” Chase spoke up, but she didn’t even react as she picked up the messy pile of papers and technology.
Stomping back towards him she shoved the pile at Jaxson’s chest, and he raised his arms on instinct. “Just take it, take all of it. None of it matters. I wasn’t going to turn it in! I wasn’t going to turn it in…” her fingers were still touching the pile in his arms for a moment, and then she broke down, folding over again as the sobs returned.
Jaxson turned to look at Chase who had an I told you so look on his face, and then they both watched as Maddie stumbled to her bed and sat down on the edge, hiccupping as she tried to breathe through the tears.
Well, fuck.
With his prepared threats delivered, he finally took a moment to look around the tiny space. Everything was in one room, and the place was a wreck. Her kitchen was against one end of the room, her bed in front of it, facing the windows. She must have eaten, and done everything else, at her desk because it was the only real surface in the apartment. The opposite corner had a dresser, a clothes rack, and a laundry basket full of more, and then there were little shelving units on the wall closest to the front door. It was small, too small for an experienced reporter at the Post.
Chase approached her slowly, easing to his knees in front of her, and Jaxson knew why his lover had insisted on coming. He’d somehow expected this.
Maddie lifted her eyes to look at him, and for the first time that day he really saw her. Her red hair was a tangled, frizzy mess down to her shoulders. Nose raw and red from crying, skin ghostly pale other than the smattering of freckles, which only served to make the contrast sharper. If he had thought Thomas looked bad, this was a whole new level of disaster.
“Just talk to me, I’m here. I’m listening.” Chase was whispering to her, using that soft voice that he always did when someone was in pain – a skill Jaxson was still trying to develop for Emma.
The girl shook her head, another round of sobs making her shake, and he found himself standing awkwardly with an armful of stuff, across from the woman he’d planned to ruin just fifteen minutes before. Time for a new tactic. He may not be good at the emotional side of things, but he did have one thing he’d always been good at. Jaxson turned on his Dom voice, authoritative and clear, “Explain. Now.”
Maddie stilled instantly, a sniffle the only sound she made for a moment as she looked up at him with effervescent blue, bloodshot eyes. “Why? He doesn’t care.”
Debatable. And that was one of the main reasons he was still standing in the room.
“You said you weren’t going to turn it in, so what were you going to do?”
“Nothing. I turned down the job at the Post.”
“You don’t work for them?” he asked, confused.
She shook her head. “My contact there said I had to bring him an article, something that would wow them, before they’d hire me.” Maddie hugged herself a little tighter, dropping her head for a moment as more tears fell… and then she told them both her story. How she’d shown up at Runway looking for a story, any story, and then noticed the D.C. elite arriving – but she wasn’t able to find them once inside and it piqued her interest. The rest flowed fast. Her discovery of the secret entrance, her sneaking in, Thomas choosing to pay for her guest pass.
It was a mess. A really big mess that pointed out some weaknesses in his security he needed to tighten up, along with some new directives to members about how to enter Black Light – but when it came to her tears, her breakdown over Thomas, he still wasn’t sure what to believe.
“I chose him, I don’t care about the rest of it. Any of it. Everything was going to be perfect, I was his, but it doesn’t matter now. I ruined it, I ruined the best thing I’ve ever had, and there’s no point to anything because he doesn’t care about me anymore.”
“How about some water instead?” Chase was talking to her again, easing a bottle of vodka out of her hands, and then he was in her kitchen opening cabinets to find a glass.
“Is this everything?” Jaxson asked, jostling his armful of papers, cords, and technology that included her laptop and what looked like an external hard drive.
“You can have this too, it doesn’t matter. I’m not going to talk.” She grabbed her iPhone off the little folding table that sat at her bedside. “The passcode is four, two, eight, eight.”
“Drink this,” Chase demanded, employing his Dom voice with her as he gave her the water, and then he took the phone from her hands, looking down at it for a moment as he stood before her.
Maddie sat on the edge of the bed, mostly limp as she took a small sip of water and then held it between her knees. The nice green sweater looked strange with the pink, plaid pajama pants, but Jaxson didn’t comment.
“Well?” Chase whispered as he moved close and offered Jaxson the phone, open to her home screen with a backdrop of a starry sky. They shifted the pile of stuff between them so he could look at it.
“I’m not sure,” Jaxson answered quietly, trying to decide what to do next. He raised his voice when he spoke to Maddie, “Look, I’m not taking your only phone, but I need to be sure you’ve removed everything from it.”
“Feel free,” she answered, wiping at her face with her sleeve. “I took some pictures of the guest stamp, I’ve got a note in there, just wipe it all. Smash it. Throw it away, I don’t care.”
Jaxson sighed, her defeated tone tugging at him as he focused back on the device. He deleted the note first, a collection of names and details that never needed to see the light of day. Then he opened her photos and started swiping through. Chase almost choked next to him as an image of what had to be Maddie’s ass appeared on the screen. He swiped past, seeing a few more images that he instantly tried to erase from his memory. Then he found photos of the stamp, and others of Runway, and cars in front. He deleted them all before he walked over to her. “Is that everything?”
She sat back, staring up at him as he towered over her and offered her the phone. “Yes.”
“No more back-ups? Other things?”
“No.” Her sniffle was almost cute, and he could see what Thomas had seen in the girl. She was probably gorgeous when she was crying for different reasons.
“If there’s anything you’re holding back, you’re going to regret it.” The threat was probably not necessary, but he felt like he had to leave no doubt in her mind. “And you’re not welcome back at Runway or Black Light.”
“Right.” She nodded and her breath shook as she sighed.
“I’ll have my people go through your equipment and return it once we’ve cleaned it, but the NDA is still in effect. If you suddenly change your mind and –”
“I won’t change my mind.”
“Okay. Then, we’re going to go.” Jaxson stepped back from her, but she was already staring at her lap.
Chase was still looking at the girl, concern plastered all over his face, as he passed him to move to the door. Jaxson could tell that his lover wanted to stay, wanted to comfort the girl, but he wasn’t sure she deserved that kindness. Without another word they left her apartment, Jaxson making sure the door was pulled tight, and then Chase spoke up, “She seems sincere.”
“Yeah, but whether the tears are for getting caught, or for something else, I’m not sure yet.”
As
they walked towards the elevator, Chase scoffed. “You know as well as I do why she’s so upset, and it has nothing to do with the article.”
“First things first, we need to go through this shit and see what she was able to write about. I’m going to have someone dig into what the Post knows – because if she gave them too much they might be trying to look at Black Light even if she pulled her story.” Jaxson sighed as he pressed the call button. “Then, and only then, am I going to even think about what else might need to happen.”
“Good.”
“It may not even matter, Chase.” He glanced at him as they stepped inside the elevator and headed back downstairs.
“I think it will,” the blond smiled at him, full of unbeatable optimism.
Jaxson huffed. “We’ll see.”
Chapter Fourteen
Thursday
“Whoa, Ginger, you really don’t look good.” Jamar sat the cup of coffee on her desk, pale and milky, just like she liked it, but she wasn’t even interested.
“I know.”
“What was it? Food poisoning?” He looked around the office, which was buzzing with chatter, a burst of laughter off to one side. “I don’t think anyone else got sick, and I’m pretty sure Cruella had the lasagna too.”
“Who?” Maddie looked up at him in confusion.
“Tammy in IT, she’s got the blonde hair with the black streak underneath? They called her – nevermind. Look, I’m worried about you. You still feel sick?”
She shrugged. It would be so much easier if what she felt was food poisoning, but instead it was worse. So much worse. “I’ll be fine.”
“Okay, well, if you need anything all you have to do is ask.” Jamar started to turn towards his desk, but Maddie stopped him.
“Actually, I think I want to go see my parents next week. They’ve been on a cruise and I haven’t told them about the promotion yet, it would be nice to surprise them.” And get the fuck out of the District for a while.
“Are you saying I’m going to have to handle the queues by myself for a whole week?” He sighed as he asked the question, but she knew he wasn’t upset.
Black Light: Exposed (Black Light Series Book 2) Page 17
