Page 64 of AJ’s Fire

“That’s what this is, isn’t it? A blip, a pit stop on your way back into the fold.”

“AJ.”

“No, no. I understand.” I hated it, my heart was breaking, but I understood. Jackson had a life to get back to, and I couldn’t, I wouldn’t get in the way.

“It’s what you’ve said all along.” I shook my head no even as understanding doused the fire that resided in my stomach. “You can’t have this. We can’t have this. I, of all people, understand putting family first. It’s …” It was time to put all my cards on the table. “Your loyalty is one of the things I love about you. If you feel you owe it to them …”

He looked at me but, once again, he didn’t respond as I had hoped when I let my sentence trail off.

I stood and swiped up the pair of shorts I found on the floor. They were the pair he had been wearing, but I dropped the towel and pulled them on anyway. I left Jackson sitting on the edge of the bed, his head in his hands as I dressed in the living room.

When I was back in my own clothes, I swiped my coat, clomping into my boots and shoving it on before I stormed out the door. I turned to look down the empty hallway, then turned back to look at Jackson’s penthouse door.

Come for me, I thought. Fight for me, please. I waited with my hand on the knob until it was clear he wasn’t going to follow me.

I’d left my fucking phone. I could picture it on the kitchen counter; I’d set it down after sending a text to check in with Jamie, like I’d promised Nat I would do. But then I’d forgotten the stupid thing completely once Jackson and I started talking about taking a bath together. And it wasn’t top of mind as I was storming out of Jackson’s apartment, having lost my best friend and the man I wanted to have a relationship with all in one fell swoop. All of the burning excitement I’d been feeling turned to sharp pins and weighed me down as I exited his building and took the subway back to mine.

I felt lost without the fucking thing, but stubborn asshole that I am, I didn’t go back for it the next day. We were supposed to have drinks with Emily, Ruth, and Jamie that night. I wasn’t hopeful that Jackson would even show up. If he did, I’d have my fucking phone back, along with a horrible evening, pretending everything was fine with my best friend. If he didn’t show, which seemed more likely, I was confident he’d bring it to the station the next night.

Lost as I was without it, I showed up unannounced at Jamie’s house. Vera was out of town with her maternal aunt and would be arriving the next day. I pulled my head out of my ass long enough to remember that this evening was, at least in part, about Jamie making some new friends.

I knocked on Jamie’s door, and it took a minute for him to answer. I was about to fish out my key, cursing myself for my phoneless state, when a very flushed-looking Jamie answered the door.

“I thought we’d meet you at O’Doyle’s?” he began before I could even get out a hi.

“It’s nice to see you too.” Jamie was standing in the door, not letting me in. I craned to look over his shoulder.

He followed my gaze, then turned back. “Huh?”

“You gonna let me in?”

“Of course, yeah.”

“Where’ve you been all week? You doing okay without Vera here?”

“She’s having the time of her life with Rose and her grandparents. I miss her, but she’s fine. It’s fine. What are you doing here?”

My brother really was acting strange.

“I left my phone at Jackson’s, so I figured this was the easiest way to coordinate the trip to O’Doyle’s.”

“Great, cool. Devon should be just a second. Then we’re ready to go.” Jamie started patting himself down like he was looking for his own phone. Smart man. “You know, let me run and get a sweater. I’ll be right down.”

“Wait, Devon’s coming with us?...”

I think I heard an, “Uh-huh,” as Jamie bounded up the stairs.

My poor brother; he was lost without his little princess around to dote on. I was glad he’d be spending the morning at the airport the next day to collect her and bring her home.

I took a seat on the bench in the entrance to Jamie’s home, a piece of furniture with baskets under it for shoes and hooks above my head for jackets.

I waited for my brother, and apparently Devon, to join me. For the millionth time that day, I ran my talk with Jackson over in my brain, trying to figure out a way I could be with Jackson, and he could be who he needed to be. It seemed impossible. It was impossible, and I realized that Jax was right and it was likely the reason he’d stayed in the closet for so long.

I tried to think of our encounters as just sex. I had been the king of “just sex” for many years, but when I thought about my time in Jackson’s arms, it felt like so much more. It felt like everything. Those Perennial Synergies my dad had written about, every fucking love song ever composed, and every time some British guy ran in the rain because he just had to tell her right then how he felt.

I’d felt it all, for longer than I’d even understood, but with certainty the day Jackson opened a cabin door on a snowy night. How could he not feel the same? Why wouldn’t he fight for it? For us? Maybe it had just been sex and exploration for him. Maybe he was using his parents as an excuse to let me down easy. It wasn’t like Jackson to play games like that, but then again, Jackson and I were definitely in uncharted territory.

I had to resign myself to reality. Jackson knew me, and he didn’t want me. I thought about those differences that would concern the great Riley and Mandy Dorso. I couldn’t change being a firefighter, and I knew deep down that Jackson wouldn’t want me to. Hell, he was one too. Maybe I wasn’t a one percenter, but it’s right there in the title: not many of us are. And I come from a securely upper-middle-class home, two of them, actually, if you count my mom and her husband in England. Maybe I wasn’t “future head of the Dorso dynasty” material. But what would that matter if Jackson was happy?