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I would have expected it.
I wouldn’t have reacted so violently.
“Why are you here?” I whisper.
12
Jackson
Why am I here? I can’t believe she’s asking me that question when the answer is so fucking obvious and standing right in front of me. I’m not here because I wanted to spend my night listening to her curious roommate’s questions or learn from Wendy’s boyfriend that Flick’s ex is interested in getting back together. I’m here because I’ve missed Felicity. Because I’ve tried to give her space and enough time to clear her head before I marched back into her life to take what’s mine. No other man—not her ex or some lovesick motherfucker she meets at York’s—will claim her. Not while I’m still breathing.
“Why are you here, Jackson?” she repeats.
“You weren’t there. With me. You belong with me, Felicity, and nowhere else.” I extend my hand to her and hold out the phone she’d returned to me. Receiving it this morning had pissed me off, and my plan to give her time had immediately changed. Instead of space, now she gets me. Unfiltered and telling her the truth. She creeps over to me, her brow furrowing when she recognizes the phone. “This is yours,” I say roughly.
She shakes her head. “It’s—”
“Where’s the painting?” I nod to the empty spot on the wall where the watercolor I bought her had hung.
“I wanted to give it back too.” Felicity squares her slim shoulders and lifts her chin. She’s so goddamn proud and stubborn. I don’t know whether I want to spank her perfect ass or fall to her feet, but I know she affects me. That not being around her has been fucking hell. “I sent the painting back this morning on the way to work, so you should have it sometime this week.”
“Did you?” I demand in a low voice, slamming the phone on her coffee table. She can throw it off her balcony for all I care, but I’m not taking it back with me. “They were gifts, Flick, not loaners,” I growl.
She crosses her arms over her chest and avoids my gaze. “I’d feel bad accepting anything from you.” Her response, though innocent, comes out a little too sarcastic for my taste. Before she can get out another word, I’m out of my seat and hauling her into my arms. I’d missed this—the scent of innocence and goodness, the feel of her soft curves molding against my hands—and I draw her in like she’s my last meal. She opens her mouth to protest.
I cover her lips and give her a warning glare because I’m not in the mood for her arguments tonight.
“Shut up and listen, Felicity,” I order, dropping her on the couch. Just like that first night when I claimed her cunt with my tongue and made her come until she was hoarse, I trap her in place, placing one hand on either side of her body. She swallows hard, then holds her breath. Being this close to me is torture for her—I can tell it in her pinched expression—but I’m about to make things right.
“I don’t like not having you in my life.” Her nostrils flare when I move so close our noses touch. “I could remind you that you agreed to spend thirty days with me, but that doesn’t even matter anymore. What matters is that you thought I was such a shitty person you hit me and ran away before you gave me a chance to explain.”
“I’m sorry for hitting you, Jackson—”
“I’m not finished, sweet.” At my command, she presses her lips into a thin line and hollows in her cheeks. “Does it look like I give a shit that you hit me? Yes, it bruised my ego, but I deserved a chance to speak. So, I’m doing it now.”
I reach behind me on the coffee table for the large envelope I brought with me tonight and drop it on her lap. Hesitantly, her small fingers close around the yellow edges. “What is this?” she asks.
“It’s yours.”
“I don’t—”
“If you opened it, sweet, you’d understand.”
Her hands tremble as she opens the envelope to slide out the documents. Biting the inside of her cheek, she reads over the top page and makes a confused noise in the back of her throat. “It’s a letter to my attorney, Felicity. Requesting that ownership of the building housing York’s be transferred to your name. Only your name.”
She looks up at me. “But the date on this…”
I move my head up and down, and she touches a fisted hand to her mouth, breathing heavily against her palm. The document is dated a day before my vice-CFO’s retirement party. Realizing I’d never intended on fucking her over, she hangs her head low. I cup her chin, raising it to force her to meet my expression.
“I was going to tell you. I’d started to tell you but then my father and Jessica showed up, so I figured I’d let your father explain what he had done. I knew from the second he stepped foot in my office that I wasn’t going to take that restaurant away from you. You worked too hard and cared too much for me to do that.”
