by Ava Claire
The Sweetest Jerk # 2 (An Alpha Billionaire Romance)
Ava Claire
Copyright © 2017
Cover by RBA Designs
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The Sweetest Jerk Series
The Sweetest Jerk #1
The Sweetest Jerk #2
The Sweetest Jerk #3
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E-book License Edition Notes
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Table of Contents
Copyright Page
CHAPTER NINE: NATALEE
CHAPTER TEN: JASON
CHAPTER ELEVEN: NATALEE
CHAPTER TWELVE: JASON
CHAPTER THIRTEEN: NATALEE
CHAPTER FOURTEEN: JASON
-The Sweetest Jerk Series- | The Sweetest Jerk #1: January 30 | The Sweetest Jerk #2: February 20 | The Sweetest Jerk #3: March 6
About the Author
CHAPTER NINE: NATALEE
“Natalee Jane, you look awful.”
I glared at my phone screen, but managed to plaster a smile on my face despite the dig. I usually regretted answering my mother’s FaceTime requests, but I was glad I rolled the dice and connected.
This was a momentous occasion. A precedent had been set—she hadn’t even bothered with inserting any TLC into her declaration on the state of how crappy I looked to help her brutal observation go down easier. Usually, she dropped little barbed comments among nosy questions about my personal and professional life. Today, there was no beating around the bush. No ‘Has work been busy?’ or ‘How are you feeling?’, giving me a chance to decide just how much I wanted to divulge. There wasn’t even a greeting.
I shouldn’t have been surprised since things like ‘tact’ and ‘gentleness’ weren’t in my mother’s dictionary. And judging from the new nose ring that glittered in her nostril and the half down, half braided hairdo that she’d probably seen in a magazine for the hip and cool, neither was ‘acting my age’.
“Hi Mom,” I said halfheartedly. “How are you and Dad?”
She saw right through my attempts at changing the subject, waving her claw-like nails like the room was suddenly filled with smoke or some foul odor. “Don’t even think about it. I want to know about you.” Before I was silly enough to actually think that she was concerned about my wellbeing, she clarified. “You got your natural beauty from me but sweetheart, would it kill you to use a little foundation? Some concealer to work on those bags beneath your eyes? Some mascara to make those pretty green eyes pop?” She paused, literally taking a big breath and flipping her bleached blonde locks before she finished her evaluation. “And those lips, your daddy’s lips, they were made for lipstick. They are utterly wasted on you.”
It was the same spiel I’d been getting since I was old enough to play dress up and made the tragic mistake of wanting to dress up like G.I. Joe and kick some ass instead of a princess, waiting to be rescued in my LEGO tower. My beauty and my ability to rope a man was paramount to my mother. It wouldn’t be nearly as frustrating if I had another sibling to share the burden of her lofty goals of me slaying the child beauty pageant circuit, but she was stuck with me, and me with her.
I could cook a mean batch of chocolate chip cookies. Walk across a stage in a sequined number, hold my smile, and be charming? Not so much.
I put aside my laptop even though I kinda wanted to pretend I was slammed so I could get out of this obligatory chat ASAP, but I really was worried about Dad. A few months ago he’d had some chest pains, coupled with the doctor insisting he make some dietary changes. While he declared he’d eat red meat until the day he died, I was hoping that day wasn’t anytime soon.
“How’s Dad?” I repeated.
She drew her brows together, her fire engine red lips dipping into her signature pout. “Your dad is the same as he’s always been. Stubborn, overweight, and a pain in the ass.” She paused for dramatic effect and even brought a hand to her chest for some extra oomph. “You’ve been dodging me for weeks-”
“Actually, we talked last Monday, Mom, remember?” I corrected with an eye roll. “I told you about the Mitchell wedding.”
“There’s no, ‘How are you doing, Mom? How are things in your life?’.” she whined, ignoring me. “If it wasn’t for Facebook, you probably wouldn’t even know that I’m doing hair over at Collette’s place.”
I stopped trying to defend myself and just strapped in for the guilt trip. She was right. She was on Facebook more than I was, documenting everything from her Starbucks cup in the morning to the OMG moments from whatever reality show she was addicted to this week. “So you’re at Collette’s now? That’s awesome!”
“It’s alright.” She shrugged her shoulders and her top shifted, boasting a peek of her colorful chest piece. Her tattoos started beneath her collar bone, swept over shoulders and spilled onto her upper back. It was the story of her life in ink; from her favorite food as a child, to pictures of beauty products, quotes from her favorite movies, Dad’s name, my birthdate, and more roses than I could count. “You know that we can’t tolerate each other for more than a few days before I quit or she kicks me out, so we’ll see.” She snatched her phone close, literally zooming me in. Giving me a good look at eyes that were just like mine. “How about you? Work must be keeping you up late.” She pulled me back out to arm’s length, making me wish I had a Dramamine handy. “Or is it a boy?”
My stomach did a twist and roll thing. Jason Cox was far from a boy...and he was absolutely making me lose sleep.
Once I realized that he’d invited me to some private suite so we could have sex, all I kept seeing was me holding back tears after he abandoned me on New Year’s Eve. I decided to take the reins, rock his world, then kick him to the curb before he had the chance to disappoint me a second time.
Give him a taste of his own medicine.
The trouble was, I didn’t expect him to be so delicious.
I’d kissed someone before, lots of someones—and I’d never felt sparks ripple over my body when our lips met—until Jason. I’d never felt playful, delighting when our teeth clanged because we were so hungry, so starved for each other, that things like finesse went out the door.
I couldn’t get enough of him. And because I refused to let my guard down long enough for him to hurt me, I knew that night would be my only chance to try. The only night we’d have. So I let my inner succubus out to play because I knew that unlike the others, who wasted time asking me how I liked it, whispering sweet nothings, Jason Cox would know just what buttons to push. Would know just what I needed.
I’d followed through with walking away despite the fact that my legs didn’t stop shaking until I got home and climbed in the shower. Pretending like I’d wash away my sins when in reality, I wanted to hold tight to the way his hands had felt, fingers piercing my skin as I rode him to bliss. The way he stretched me, exploring me in ways that I never knew were possible.
It had been a week and I still felt a fluttering in my core at the thought of him, which was more times than I could count on two hands. But the thing that had me taking on more orders than Tamara and I could handle, trying to stay busy so I wouldn’t answer his texts or his emails, was the look in his eye before I booked it out of Crave.
He didn’t want me to go, even though he got what he wanted.
; Which meant that maybe I had him wrong and he wanted more than sex.
And that thought had me filling my waste basket with messed up cake designs and display plans. It had me zoning out during appointments, wondering what he was doing. And now that my mother was on the prowl, sniffing around for her future son-in-law and grandbabies, it was making me wonder if maybe I should go back on the grid after all.
There was no harm in saying hello, right?
“Oh my God, you met someone!” Mom squealed and I heard Miley go off the rails, yapping manically. Miley was her chihuahua, a skittish little diva who had taken on her owner’s not so flattering characteristics. Things like snapping at everyone and demanding attention and affection while giving little to none in return.
I sighed and tried to exit the conversation. “First off, I don’t date boys. I date men-”
“Well, you haven’t dated anyone since that khaki wearing pussy Scott.” She elbowed right past my attempts at trying to steer the conversation and dragged me back to my ex fiancé. She seemed to have forgotten all about the way she’d been putting her nose where it didn’t belong. Calling up Scott’s mom, both of them meddling, trying to mend something that was broken from the start.
Scott was safe. Predictable. He’d surprised us all. Never in a million years would I have guessed that the man I was supposed to spend the rest of my life with was playing me for a fool. Falling in love with another woman while I’m daydreaming about cute little houses with an office for him and a garden for me. Imagining what our children would look like while he was burying himself inside another woman.
And instead of comforting me and telling me that I’d find love again, my mother’s first question when I told her the wedding was off was, What did you do?
I blinked at my phone screen, glazing over my face. It was just a tiny blip, since my mother’s well meaning (but often missing the point by a mile) one was taking up most of the space.
Growing up, everyone in our small town would say I was the spitting image of her. The high cheekbones, the big, green eyes, the raven colored hair. Even teachers would sigh if I ever showed any sign of a backbone, groaning that I was just like Juliet.
I never saw it. When I was younger, I’d look at the other moms in the grocery store, sure one of the nicer, less loud, less brash ones would take one look at me, call the police, and take me some place where I could eat chocolate chip cookies without guilt and watch cartoons instead of soap operas.
Now, I couldn’t escape that I was my mother’s daughter.
It was in the stubborn look on her face, her jaw locked and ready to snap if I dared to question her motives or rewriting of history. The dare that flashed in the green. Wondering if I was bold enough to remind her that she was a bit late with the trashing of the man who broke my heart in two.
It was like looking in a mirror because I had that same look whenever I saw Jason’s name in my inbox. Whenever I snuck a peek at celebrity news, sure he’d move on, replacing me with someone more glamorous and willing to bend. Who always said yes and wasn’t so much trouble.
He didn’t.
And I knew that beneath all the bluster and unsolicited commentary about my looks, my mother loved me in her own way.
Or that’s what I kept telling myself anyway.
“Mom, I don’t want to talk about Scott-”
“Oh, get your panties out of the crack of your butt, Natalee,” she scoffed, like it was absurd for me to be a little testy about chatting about a very painful chapter of my life. “Clearly you’re over him because you only get cagey when I’m right on the money.” She sat back and I saw the familiar worn lines of leather, with an indent in the headrest that was a perfect mold of the back of her head. She was in her chair, a leather recliner that no one, Dad included, was allowed to sit in unless they wanted to hear her complain about how she never asks for much (lie) and she wanted this one thing (another lie).
It was her throne. Her happy place. I bet she even had her stories muted, a fact that should make me feel really special, because she didn’t put her stories on mute for just anybody. “So tell me about this new man, for my benefit.”
“Nothing to tell,” I lied, knowing that my cheeks, inflamed and giving it all away in living color, would just make her pick at this thread until it all came unraveled, my sanity included. I’d have to give her something though, or she’d answer in kind.
Like surprise me with a visit, I thought with a shudder.
I licked my lips and gave her the tiniest crumb. “It’s nothing right now, but if it becomes something, I’ll let you know.”
She looked as giddy as if I told her that I could hear wedding bells. All I could hear was silence, because I wasn’t sure I had it in me to risk all the things that came before the bells.
The falling.
The point where there was no turning back, because we said that four letter word that changes everything.
Because now that I was looking at a face that looked so much like mine, I could see the equally giddy reflection in my eyes. I knew it was only a matter of time before I did something really foolish—and let Jason back in.
CHAPTER TEN: JASON
The outreach and acquisitions coordinator for Maximum Tech, Tyler Steade, had clearly pulled out all the stops for the presentation. They invited our team to their sleek, high rise headquarters, everything onyx and marble, screaming that they paid a lot of money to look very cool. The elevator, a chrome bullet that would've made Batman cream his pants, was worth the price of admission alone.
Tyler, a spiky haired, bleached tooth kid who looked fresh out of college, had hinted that we were in for a treat as we zipped toward the elevator on a people mover that was straight up odd outside of an airport setting. I knew I was in for a wasted trip when he tossed a wink over his Armani clad shoulder and asked me if I liked sushi.
He was about as smooth as Scott’s bumbling proxy, Rodney Masterson. At 6’4 and 230 pounds of bulging, I-eat-testosterone-for-breakfast-lunch-and-dinner, muscles twisting in his absurdly defined torso, it was hard to take either of them very seriously. Rodney even held a hand up for a high five like we were cruising for tail on the Jersey Shore instead of headed to a business meeting.
Rodney had at least fifteen years on me, but you’d never know it because there wasn’t a lick of gray in his gelled, frosted tips and he used phrases like YOLO and had his locker at work plastered with pictures of swimsuit clad celebrities. And when I passed on the high five from Tyler, Rodney accepted his gladly, bellowing, “Cali Rolls FTW!’”
And California rolls had been waiting for us—strategically placed on a petite Asian woman who was naked and splayed out on the conference room table.
Appalled, Delia had opted to stick with water and passed on sitting at the table with us, choosing a seat in the far corner. To the rest of the men in the room, she likely disappeared after she introduced herself, but I felt her eyes burning holes in my back. Her glare incinerated the chauvinists who slobbered like they’d never seen a naked woman in their lives. Like this woman had no purpose besides entertaining us. Reduced to a literal serving platter for food that most certainly would have the Health Department losing their shit.
I’d passed on the sushi as well, which had earned an arched eyebrow from everyone in the room. Truth be told, there was only one woman I wanted to see. And not just naked, though I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I’d been fantasizing about those breasts of hers. How her cotton candy nipples melted in my mouth. But the image that kept replaying in my head was when she was fully clothed—and marching out of the room.
And based on her lack of returning my calls, emails, or texts, out of my life.
Tyler cleared his throat, reminding me we were in the throes of a meeting. “What do you think, Mr. Cox? I think our companies could do amazing things together.”
I covered the fact that I was only half listening by casually reclining in my chair. I felt every eye in the room on me and swept over every one—exce
pt the woman who was on the table. Her eyes were closed like she was counting the minutes until this gig was up. Rodney was all but clasping his hands together, his bug eyes silently begging. He was definitely a fan of naked sushi.
I had to close my eyes for a minute and pray that Scott would stop punishing me before the next meeting because if this amateur never accompanied me to another meeting, it would be too soon.
Tyler cleared his throat a second time, solidifying the fact that his patience was about as thin as mine. “Mr. Cox-”
“We’ll take it under advisement,” I said curtly, snapping my laptop shut. I rose to my feet, pointedly eyeballing the man who was supposed to be my right hand guy, who was too busy salivating like an idiot.
“Well, personally...” Rodney reached for a roll that was perched on the woman’s right breast. “I think the partnership would yield amazing-”
“Would you like a doggie bag, Rodney?” I interrupted. “Because we’re leaving.”
Rodney’s dishwater brown eyes registered shock, then narrowed as he exemplified just how annoyed he was. He leapt to his feet, sending the chair flying to the opposite wall. It clanged when it made contact, making everyone in the room flinch except me.
If Scott didn’t have a spot for The Hulk’s little brother, I would have given him something to throw a tantrum about, by firing his ass.
Since he was closest to Tyler and wanted to make it clear that he would have stayed until the janitors came around, he sighed and held out a hand to our host. “Thank you for thinking of Cox Technologies.”
Delia wasted no time exiting, nodding at the Maximum team before promptly vacating the room. I followed suit.
Rodney was hot on my trail, but I booked it down the people mover like I was about to miss my flight. “See you back at the office,” I told him, making it clear that it was the first and last time he was welcome in my car.
I linked up with Delia at the elevator, smiling when she punched the door close button several more times than necessary, shoulders relaxing when the doors closed and it was just she and I.
