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“I’m not running, Jax.”
“You’ve been running since the moment I met you, Emma. I’m not. I’m standing here, asking you to do this, whatever the fuck this is, with me, despite the fact that you’re a damn Knight. My brother isdeadbecause of the Knights. I know it. I feel it in every part of me and yet I’m right here, with you. If that means nothing to you, then go. If that offends you, then go. I’m going to take my damn shower.” He turns to walk away.
My heart squeezes with the intensity of his emotions, with the depth of his emotions. And in that moment, him letting me go is him giving me a choice and I make it. I launch myself at him, catching his arm. “Jax. I’m not running. I want—”
He rotates to face me, and his hand slides under my hair, settling on my neck, dragging my lips a breath from his. “You want what, Emma?”
“You,” I whisper. “I wantyou.” His mouth closes down on mine and with the first long stroke of his tongue I’m lost, so very lost.
I lean into his hard body, into the kiss, and just that easily we’re all over each other. I know nothing but his hands, his body, his mouth. And yet, I want to know more, so much more. I grab his shirt and tug. He snags the hem of my hoodie and pulls it over my head. It’s barely hit the ground when his mouth is back on my mouth and he’s attempting to tug down my sweats.
I catch his hand. “You take your pants off or we don’t do this. I’m not going to be naked alone this time.”
He kisses me again and reaches for his shirt, pulling it over his head even as I shove my pants down, taking care of my shoes while I’m at it. Jax reaches for his pants, and I pull my shirt over my head. We watch each other undress, heat radiating between us and then he’s naked—holy wow, he’s naked. I don’t know how I’ve forgotten in a few short hours how gorgeous he is, but I’m reminded now and reminded well. He stands before me, long, lean and muscular, his cock thickly veined and jutting forward. The man is perfection, sporting the kind of ripped body that comes from good genes and hard work. He’s sin, satisfaction, and temptation. A man who could be my enemy who is now stepping toward me and this is my last chance to walk away. I feel that deep inside me. If I move forward, if I stay, I’m with Jax, and I will live with every consequence that will follow, and therewillbe consequences.
To hell with consequences.
Jax steps to me and folds me close, his mouth on my mouth, one of his hands squeezing the delicate skin of my backside while the other is raising my leg, and then he’s inside me, pressing deep, filling me, stretching me. He lifts me, and my legs wrap around his hips. He turns, his body settling against the wall beneath the windows, our anchor, and I grind into the thrust of his hips, the jut of his cock driving into me.
My fingers wrap long blond strands of his hair, my lips at his ear, on his neck. I can’t get enough of him, as if he fills a need I have long had and finally, only he can satisfy what is missing in me. He seems to know. “Lean back, Emma,” he says, his fingers splaying between my shoulder blades.
I inch back to look at him and our eyes lock and hold. “I won’t let you fall,” he promises. “I won’t let you get hurt.”
I know forced trust during sex. I know it well, but this is about so much more than sex. And this is Jax, not York. I trust Jax, at least in this intimate way. I trust this man I have only knowna few days, a man who has reason to hurt me, more than I did my fiancé. That means something, and later, later, maybe I’ll tell myself not to make it mean too much, but it does. Right now, it does. I lean back, and I push against him as I do. He grips my hip and thrusts, his heated gaze raking over my breasts as they sway with our bodies. And it takes nothing, nothing to push me to the edge. I shatter.
“Jax,” I breathe out, and he folds me into him again, holding me close, my breasts to his chest, my body quaking. And then his body is shuddering.
We hold each other, ride out the wave of pleasure and then we still hold each other. Jax doesn’t put me down right there. He walks and doesn’t stop until we’re at a shower door. Only then does he ease me to the ground, parting our bodies and opening the door to turn on the water. I grab a towel and clean up, but my mind is all over the place. No, really, one place: why would Jax’s brother kill himself? I have questions about this, about him. So many questions and so many thoughts. Maybe Jax didn’t really know him. Maybe Jax doesn’t want to admit he wasn’t stable. Maybe my family pushed him until he could be pushed no more.
Jax catches my arm and I toss the towel down, letting him turn me to him. “Come,” he says, guiding me into the shower, and once we’re there, warm water streaming over us, he folds me close. He feels safe. He feels right when there is so much wrong about how we came together. I tilt my chin up and I meet his stare, his blue eyes piercing. I want to ask him if he’s my enemy, but I don’t. I don’t ask. He’ll tell me that we’re not. He’ll mean it too if he says it, I believe that. Jax told me the truth out there in the living room, but truth or not, my family has a way of taking people and turning them inside out. I wonder if that’s what they did to his brother. I wonder if we’re next.
Chapter twenty-five
Emma
We laugh.
Out of nowhere.
In the intensity of all that has passed between us the past half hour, Jax and I stand there under that water, jagged emotions cutting left and right, and we laugh. “Why are you laughing?” I ask.
“Because you’re laughing.” His lips, those beautiful lips that I know can be both brutal and tender, curve and he brushes my hair from my face. “Why areyoulaughing?”
“Because you’re laughing.” My stomach chooses that moment to growl, and we laugh all over again.
“I’m all about satisfying your hunger, sweetheart,” he whispers. “Let’s get finished up and grab some food on the way to your place. Or better yet, let’s order delivery to meet us there. Then I have you to myself the rest of the day and night.”
This is the second time he’s made that statement and I find it pleases me just as much this time as last. I don’t mean to compare him to York, but it’s hard not to, when York consumedmy life. A Sunday with York was about York. This doesn’t feel like it’s about Jax. It feels like it’s about us.
“I like that idea,” I say, shoving aside all the niggling warnings about enemies destined to burn and hurt each other. We were burned and hurt when we found each other, which is exactly why I think—I think we need each other.
The remainder of our shower is short, but we spend it smiling and laughing, setting aside families and tragedies. It’s like the breath we both need to take and so we do, now, here, together. A few minutes later I’m dressed in black jeans and a hot pink T-shirt, putting on make-up, when Jax steps to my side in faded jeans and a brown North Whiskey T-shirt. He proceeds to watch me do my make-up.
“Don’t you need to shave or something?”
He runs his hands over his thick stubble. “I like it this way.” He catches my arm and pulls me to him. “And I like you like this.”
“Like this?”
