I didn’t know the woman, but according to Connor, people weren’t too receptive to the pretty, dark-skinned single mom with a biracial child. She struggled to put food on the table and keep clothes on his back.
When he got old enough, he did what he could to help. First by helping neighbors with menial tasks and then by learning the hustle from some of the local thugs. Connor was smuggling drugs, guns, and fenced jewels through the bayou by the time he was ten. He never told me what happened, or why he had to leave but his mother shipped him to his father in Las Vegas to save his life. In all the years that I’ve known him, he’s never lost that edge, that I wish you would try me that comes from making your bones in the harshest ways possible.
“You can try.” He chucks a napkin in my direction. “But seriously, Jake, don’t get amnesia now. Don’t pretend like you don’t know what we have to do. On that note, stop it with the, ‘Why doesn’t Sinclair James want me’ question. You know damn well why she doesn’t want to touch your ass with a ten-foot pole. You got caught slipping. Now you’re starting at less than zero. I myself like to sample a variety of woman, but if you want to stick with one flavor, vanilla or chocolate as the case may be, that’s your bag. All I’m saying is make a decision and get it done because distractions can get us both killed.”
“I already said we’re fine, Connor. Let it drop. And as far as Sin goes—”
“I don’t really care two squirts of piss what you do with Sinclair James—”
“Sin, Connor. You don’t have to say her full name every single time.”
“Nah, brah, I don’t know Sin. I know the headliner of my hotel that created a media shit storm because of history with you. Ms. James and I ain’t on friendly terms, and if she keeps distracting the one person I depend on to help me keep shit afloat, we never will be.”
He carefully closes his now empty food container. “I didn’t get the whole thing with you and her until I saw y’all at the party opening night. As much as I like you. I’m not willing to die because you’re distracted by some repeat pussy.” Without thinking I chucked a fork across the counter and hit something on the left side of his body. Connor presses both palms against the counter top and stands.
“You headed out?” I ask, surprised relief filling my chest.
“Nah, I gotta hit the head, but when I get back, I’m done. No more talk about the woman in your life unless you’re giving me gritty details that I can add to the spank bank.” He jacks his hand in front of his slacks. Asshole.
I stay silent as he walks out the kitchen toward the bathroom. There is no need to mention me on my knees with my face buried between her legs a couple of feet away from him a month ago. That little video plays in a loop in my mind and is the cornerstone of my personal me time.
When he comes back, we finish our food in silence, but it’s comfortable, unweighted with the earlier irritation. Miraculously, I stay on track for the rest of his visit. When he finally leaves I unwind with a tumbler of bourbon and let my mind drift back to those sweet seconds when Sin was back in my arms, pulling me closer, trusting me to take her body over the edge of sweet oblivion, and then the cold reality of her shutting me out again.
I understand Sin even when she’s hiding behind a mountain of hurt and anger. I get her because she’s the same girl I fell in love with all those years ago. The same one who turns my stomach into knots and makes me afraid to blink for fear I’ll miss something.
In my guilt, I let Sin runaway the last time, hide behind her career and her pain, and convince herself she couldn’t love me. I’m done letting her hide. It’s all still there, deep under the surface but I felt it. Now I need to remind her of what we had and coax her into thinking about what we could have again.
NOW
Sinclair
My flight just landed in Vegas and, like every other time I’ve returned, my eyes stay riveted on the lights and the sights of the Strip. No matter how many times I’ve seen it, the view never gets old. I don’t know if it’s that beautiful or if I’m reacting with a sense of nostalgia to the only place I’ve ever called home. Either way I love it.
The weather has finally cooled down, but even on the tail end of fall, it’s still warm or at least warm enough to wear sandals and a light jacket versus a coat.
As soon as the airplane wheels hit the tarmac and the door opens, the entire band disperses, leaving me to my own devices for the rest of the night.
I could catch a movie or go shopping, but my bed is calling my name. I don’t know what it is about flying, even short trips, that make me tired, a bone-deep weariness that’s hard to shake for hours.
I stall at the airport because the idea of walking through the hotel makes my skin feel tight and itchy. I should have already been in my own place, but the villa is nicer than most places I’d find on the market, and honestly it feels like home with one major exception. A certain CFO keeps popping up. Almost like he receives a notification every time I step foot into the elevator leading to the casino floor.
If I got something off property, I wouldn’t have to worry about that shit. I wouldn’t have to find ways to blend into the scenery or sneak onto the crowded casino floor.
When I first realized Jake worked for The Hotel, I thought, “He’s a finance guy. He’ll be working eight to four or whatever normal business hours are for a hotel. Why would I see him?” Then I left the villa at ten in the morning and found him leaning against a slot machine. His hazel eyes studying each face exiting the elevator until they landed on mine. I hurried up and pressed the close door button before he could get on which worked that time, but I swear every time I hit the casino floor, he’s somewhere in the vicinity.
This time I make it into my villa without a sighting, and it’s a relief. I immediately get in the shower to wash away the long hours of travel. I unwind as the steam and warm water relax my muscles one group at a time. When I finally turn off the water and make my way back into the bedroom, I grab body cream and slather myself from head to toe. Just as I’m about to get clothes the phone rings.
No one knows I’m staying in this villa, and the few who do would use my cell. Please don’t let this be a situation where someone has sold my information to TMZ or some other sleazy mag. I love the music, but I loathe celebrity. It’s like people don’t see me as a real person. I lost any vestiges of privacy when Exquisitely Broken released.
“Hello?” I say into the receiver, guarded and ready for whatever the person on the other end of the line is going to throw at me.
“Sin?” Except that. I know that voice. Remember all too well. “Hey, it’s Jake. Are you busy right now?”
Am I busy? Why is Jacob Johnson on my phone once again, conveniently aware of my comings and goings? I really need to reach out to our new manager and make getting a rental my priority.
“You still there?” he asks.
I could just hang up. I should hang up but… I can’t make myself do it. I flop down on the bed and wait for the flood of anger that generally hits me when anything Jake related comes up.
But I got nothing.
Maybe seeing him over the last couple of months has been a type of desensitization therapy? Or I’m tired and don’t care about much right now. Either way we’re apparently having a conversation.
I blow a noisy breath into the silent line. “I just got in. What’s up?”
“Oh… I didn’t know. I just thought since you didn’t have a show tonight—”
“I had a festival in Chicago,” I answer, cutting him off.
“Right, you’re only here like two weekends a month,” he mumbles almost to himself.
“Mmm-hmm. So, you called for…?” I say at the same time, a loud knock echoes through the villa.
“Open up,” his voice says in my ear and I jerk upright into a sitting position. He did not show up here. Uninvited. But the second knock echoing through the villa confirms that he absolutely did show up without a request or invitation from me!
“Guess you waste
d your time,” I snap into the phone because what the hell? Who does he think he is? Before I finish the thought, I already know the answer. He’s here because he can be, because I’m probably the only person in his entire life that has said no, and he doesn’t understand that word. I’m not letting him in. Not for a repeat of the other night or to rehash a history I’d rather forget.
We happened.
Now we’re over. End of story.
“Just give me a couple of minutes. I promise you won’t regret it,” his deep voice coos in my ear and rolls through me, tightening things low in my belly. My pulse kicks up just at the sound. How silly can I be? I took that gamble, years ago, and it didn’t end well for either of us. The word calamitous comes to mind.
“Not a good idea, Jake.”
“The best ones never are, Sin,” he says, and a startled laugh leaves my mouth because the statement is so simple, and so Jake, and makes little sense in this context but it’s perfect.
“Can we not and say that we did?”
“Where’s the fun in that?”
He knocks on the door again. Much lighter than the last time. “Open up.”
Then I hear a click in my ear. I stare blankly at the phone. My mind is working overtime to convince me to stay in my bed and ignore the man outside my door. Jake is a risk I shouldn’t take, not now or ever again.
But I want to.
I want to know what brought him to my door at, looking at the clock hanging on the wall, it’s ten. I should be over him. Done. But as I walk the short distance to open the door and see him there, wearing a light gray three-piece suit, hands tucked into his pockets and hazel eyes looking bluer today, I know we’re so far from done.
We stare at each other for longer than is polite and in those few seconds, the air is heavy with the history of us. Not just the other night but all of it, the heartbreak and anger, the desire and fun. The remnants of our yesterlife live in the shadows of his expressive eyes and the tensed-up muscles of his shoulders.
“You letting me in?” he asks, his eyes dipping down my body to take in the oversized white fluffy robe and bare feet before coming back to meet my steady gaze. I step to the side and give him space, but he leans to the side to snatch something off the wall.
Jake strides past me holding a guitar case I recognize all too well. He gave me the 1958 Fender Stratocast for my twenty-first birthday. It’s all scratched up around the edges with grooves in the handle from years of use, but I loved that guitar something fierce. Leaving it was almost as hard as leaving him. I can’t believe he’s kept it after all these years.
“Is this a regular thing for you now? Showing up uninvited to a woman’s house, carrying a guitar instead of roses.” I tilt my head toward the case.
“Nah, not regular but desperate times call for desperate measures.” He sets the case down, leaning it against the arm of the couch.
“I can’t believe you kept it all this time.”
“I always thought you’d come back for it. I knew you weren’t coming back for me. But this”—he pats the case—“had your heart in a way I never did.”
Wow, there are so many things wrong with the comment, I don’t know where to start. What does it say about me that my ex believed or maybe still believes that I’d pick an inanimate object over him?
“So, you just got in?” he asks. His eyes move around my space, stopping on the open suitcase to the pile of clothes I left in the middle of the floor just before I got in the shower.
“Ah… yeah.”
Jake takes a seat on the sofa, unbuttoning his suit coat as he sits.
“Have a seat. Make yourself comfortable,” I say sarcastically.
“I wasn’t trying to overstep.” He immediately stands and grips the back of his neck. “Why do I feel like I’m always apologizing to you?”
“Because since I got here, you have been.” There’s a second of silence, but then we both start to chuckle at the same time, and just that quickly the mood shifts to something a little lighter. He once again makes himself comfortable on the sofa and I sit on the arm next to him.
“So, you brought a bribe?” I nod to the guitar case.
“I was thinking of more of a peace offering.” He bumps me with his shoulder, a smile playing around the edge of his lips.
“A bribe by any other name.”
“Is it working?”
“Maybe a little.”
“Go ahead, take it out. You know you want to.” His words are subtle, seductive. Probably because since our moment on the balcony, thoughts of Jake and sex with Jake have been one in the same.
He grabs the guitar case and unsnaps the locks, pulling the guitar out by the handle. My hand immediately reaches out to stroke the smooth wood.
“Play something for me?” I can feel his eyes roving my face.
“This is an electric guitar. We were together long enough that you know it needs an amp for you to hear it.”
“I was also with you long enough to know you have one somewhere around here.”
I roll my eyes because we both know that he’s right. Any musician worth their salt has an array of instruments at their disposal at any given time. I don’t do digital. I need to feel the vibration or keys under the tips of my fingers, and an electric blues guitar with its warm sound has always come first, second to my piano. I usually compose using a keyboard because the sound combinations are almost limitless versus a six-string guitar. In the privacy of my home when I sing for me, and a long time ago Jake, it was always the guitar. This guitar in particular. My fingers brush against strings, and I can’t stop the smile that breaks across my face.
“There she is,” he says. A smirk pulls at one side of his full mouth.
“Was I lost and didn’t know it?”
“To me, you have been,” he says, his voice is a decibel above a whisper.
I pull the guitar into my body, settling it on my lap. I tweak a couple of chords.
“You still using the pocket studio?”
“When I travel. It’s somewhere in my suitcase. If you want to wade through that mess be my guest.”
He stands and walks to my bag. I hear the metal teeth of the zipper, and in the blink of an eye, he’s back with a small portable amp. He hands it to me, sitting so close I can feel the heat coming off his skin. I shiver as I plug it in. This time when I brush my fingers against the strings, the sound reverberates around the space, bouncing off the walls to surround us.
“Sing for me.”
My fingers move of their own accord, and at first, I hum. Then I’m singing. Not one of my songs because I can’t look Jake in the eye while I sing about us. Us when we were happy or us as the hot mess that we’re right now. It doesn’t matter. I opt for Rhianna’s “Kiss it Better” before I can think wiser of it. The guitar dominates that song in a slow sexy rhythm, which isn’t the atmosphere I’m trying to create. In truth, I don’t know what I’m doing. Singing in such close physical proximity in this small of a space is more intimate than the act of sex. Whether I’m singing my songs or someone else’s, it’s still a mining of the soul.
If I feel it, I can make the person next to me feel it too.
And I feel this. Every damn word of this song is at once a taunt and a plea.
As the words pour out of my mouth his eyes drift up to mine. He doesn’t blink. I’m not even sure if he breathes. When my fingers stop moving, the silence between us is pregnant with emotions that should’ve died when our relationship did. My desire so strong it propels me to my feet.
I place the guitar back into the case, taking great care to lock the top in place. When I straighten up Jake mirrors my position on the opposite side of the coffee table.
“Sin.” His voice cracks.
“I’m gonna go throw something on. Give me a sec or are you heading out?” I’m already walking into the bedroom before he can answer. I feel raw like I’ve just exposed every single vulnerability I have to the only person that can destroy me. I know he can because he a
lready did.
NOW
Sinclair
I don’t bother with the lights. The curtains are open, so the bright neon twinkling in the skyline is bright enough that I have no problem moving about the space. I open the only drawer that has items inside. My hand is on the belt of the robe when a sense of recognition zings down my spine. I know Jake is behind me before I see his reflection in the large mirror hanging above the dresser. It’s like we’re magnets, our attraction a force that pulls us past common hurts and common sense.
I watch his approach with an almost trancelike fascination and jump when he kisses the tender spot behind my ear. Staring at his reflection I didn’t realize he was so close.
Our gazes stay locked in the reflection. Jake’s arms wrap around me, clutching my back to his front. We’re close, pressed so tight that his pulse is a heady metronome.
Steady. Strong. Melodic.
Even with our sordid history and our uncertain future, at this moment we’re perfect.
“Sin, don’t say no… Not tonight.” As if I could.
His softly whispered plea leaves me undone. I turn in his arms, sliding my hands up his muscled chest to his head, and I pull him down to meet my mouth. The kiss is no more than a brush of lips and an exchange of air, but Jake responds with a groan, pinning my body against the dresser. For a couple of seconds, we both still, and then his mouth fuses with mine and it’s better than the sweetest love song. His hands move between us, untying the belt of the robe as he strips the material off my nude body.
Jake leans back. His eyes rove over my body from the top of my head to the bottom of my feet.
“If you don’t want to do this tell me now, Sin. Because once we start, we’re not stopping.”
Jake
“Strip,” Sin demands.
Her dark gaze is feral as I shed my clothes. When she looks at me like that, like I’m everything that she’s ever wanted, I want to give her the world, or at the very least, multiple orgasms. When I stand nude before her, she attacks my mouth. Her taste is something I crave, but this kiss is almost manic with her urgency.
Exquisitely Broken (A Sin City Tale Book 1) Page 15
