Jackson: A Sexy Bastard Novel

C
opyright
© 2016 by Eve Jagger

All rights reserved.

Cover Designer: Jennifer Watson, Social Butterfly PR

Cover Model: Rick van den Bosch

Photographer: Max Ellis 

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

“
S
he keeps looking at you
, dude.”

Ryder polishes off the last of his beer and jerks a thumb down the bar. At the end, beneath two bright football-filled TV screens, a young brunette with bottomless eyes is indeed looking our way.

“Maybe she’s looking at you.”

“Don’t be such a pussy.”

Thumping his beer mug on the counter, Ryder motions to the bartender for another round. I sip my half-full beer and glance back down the bar, then snort.

“Nah, dude. I don’t know that I can afford that chick. She’s carrying Kate Spade.”

“What the fuck’s a ‘Kate Spade’?” Ryder asks, frowning.

“Type of purse.”

“How do you even know that?” Ryder’s look is a mixture of admiration and disgust.

“My sister’s obsessed with fashion,” I shrug. “You have one, you wind up learning more about fashion than you ever wanted to know about shoes and bags and shit.”

The bartender brings our drinks and Ryder tells him to put it on his tab.

“I can pay,” I say, but he waves away my twenty.

“Save it for Kate Spade.”

I snort again, but when I look back down the bar, I have to admit that he’s right: she’s definitely looking at me.

“Fine.”

I put the twenty down on the counter and push it across.

“That girl at the end? I’m buying whatever she’s drinking.”

The bartender grins and, moments later, he’s sliding a martini glass up to her. I see his lips move, and she instantly looks up at me. Then, very slowly, she picks up the toothpick of olives balanced on the rim of the glass and deliberately sucks one off of the toothpick.

Damn.

“Guess that’s my cue,” I tell Ryder, standing. I down the rest of the beer and start to press my way through the crowd when my phone starts buzzing. I pull it out of my pocket. It’s a number I don’t recognize.

“Hello?”

There’s a pause, then a woman clears her throat. “Is this Jackson Masters?”

“It is.”

As I lower back onto my stool, Ryder gives me a quizzical look.

“This is Hillside Medical Center. We’re calling about your parents.”

“My parents?” I feel my heart stutter to a stop, then pick up again— beating double-time. “What about them? Are they there?”

“They’ve been in a car crash. You need to come to the hospital immediately. Your mother is in critical condition.”

“My mother is . . . .”

Images flash through my head: blood, bone, everything I’ve seen at Ryder’s underground fight club superimposed on my mother’s delicate body.

My mother.

Suddenly my heart starts to race.

“Wait, what about—”

“Sir, it would be best if we hung up now so that you can get here as quickly and safely as possible. The hospital is located at—”

I hang up before she can complete the sentence.

My parents. Car crash.

It’s barely computing, and yet I feel like my head’s about to explode. She wouldn’t talk about my father. Why wouldn’t she talk about my father?

Ryder taps the counter in front of me. His brow is creased with worry.

“Dude—what’s wrong? Who was that?”

“I have to go.”

I can’t get images of my mom’s broken, bloody body out of my head. She’s in the hospital. She needs me. And my dad . . . I can’t complete the thought. Shoving my phone in my pocket, I propel myself off my barstool.

“Jackson, what—”

“I’ll call you later.” I throw some cash on the counter, and I’m out the door before he can say anything else.

* * *

H
e’s dead
. My father is fucking dead.

The man I idolized my entire life, who bought me my first baseball glove and taught me to build a fire from scratch—I’ll never speak to him again. I’ll never share a beer or a laugh or a joke with my first real hero. He’s dead.

Now, a nurse is taking me to see my mom. She’s in “critical condition.” I have no idea what that means, except that she’s not dead. The hallway is long, generic, white. It smells like ammonia and cafeteria food.

Midway down, the nurse stops at a room on the left.

“In here.”

When I enter the room, I see her immediately—my mother is lying motionless on the hospital bed in the center of the room. A stiff white sheet covers her body all the way up to her shoulders, so all I can see is her face: a face so swollen, so bandaged, I barely recognize her. The skin not covered by bandages is an angry reddish-purple color, and her mouth and nose are covered by a clear plastic oxygen mask.

“She’s hooked up to a respirator,” the nurse explains. “Her lungs were punctured in the crash.”

I can’t stop staring at my mom’s face. That’s not her. It can’t be her. My mom has smooth skin, a sweet smile. She’s strong and capable. She would never look so small and helpless.

“Your parents have a living will on file here with us,” the nurse continues. “They requested no life support.”

My mind is spinning. “But that means . . . .”

“In order to legally comply, we need to take your mother off the respirator within the next hour.” She places a hand on my arm and looks at me with tired eyes. “Please, use this time to say goodbye.”

I stare at her. She has to be fucking kidding. But her dour, serious expression proves that she couldn’t be more serious. She walks away without another glance back at me.

When the door closes, I stare around the room. Machines are beeping. Lights are blinking out of numerous displays. All meaningless. All useless.

As I pull a chair up to the bed, I see my mom’s hand peeking out from the sheet. Pushing back the cloth, I take her hand in both of mine. Her skin is warm—it’s alive. Then, something hard touches my palm and I look down. Her wedding ring.

The pressure behind my eyes is so strong, I can barely see. The rising lump of rage and emotion in my throat makes me want to yell at the top of my lungs. I want to cry, to scream—anything to release this feeling. But I can’t. Instead, I just grip my mother’s warm hand and slowly turn her wedding ring until the three tiny diamonds come back into view.

There isn’t enough time in the history of the universe for me to say goodbye. This woman gave me life. She drove me to school in our minivan and cut the crusts off of my peanut butter and banana sandwiches. She hand-sewed our Halloween costumes every year until I was ten: superheroes for me, cat costumes for Shelby.

Fuck. Shelby.

My stomach drops. Releasing my mother’s hand, I pull out my cell phone and stare at the blank screen, feeling sick. I know what I have to do. But how do I do it?

I unlock the phone and scroll to the “S” in contacts. S for sister. S for Shelby.

How will I begin? What will I say?

I have no answers, but as I hit “call” and raise the phone to my ear, I know one undeniable truth: our lives are never, ever going to be the same.

T
his guy makes
me want to smash my fist right through the plate glass door of his overly chromed-out office. Or better yet, smash my fist right through his face, then his face through the plate glass door.

Instead, I sit across his football field of a desk, feeling as though my tie has become a noose pulling tighter and tighter around my neck. Meanwhile, Halford’s cheeks are growing redder by the moment. He’s spent the last half hour spewing gibberish about exotic ferns, multi-story waterfalls, gold-plated steps, and all sorts of other architectural monstrosities that I have no intention of incorporating into our design.

My
design.

“And I want one of those flat, swirly modernist roofs. This thing should look like a spaceship! Only welcoming. And more expensive. And what about Grecian columns? They’d lend it some gravitas, you know? This has to be high class. You got that, right? Real high class.”

“Absolutely, Mr. Halford. We’re completely on board with that vision, and I think you’re going to like the revised plans.”

I glance at the petite Asian woman sitting to my right, scribbling frantically on her notepad.

“Lucy’s getting all of your ideas down so we can go through everything back at the office. Right Lucy?”

Bright almond-shaped eyes look up at me reassuringly, and once again I feel a wash of gratitude for this woman. She’s my scribe, my filing system, my calendar, my confidant and, perhaps most importantly, my coffee maker, all rolled into one. So basically, she’s my better half—if you’d even consider me whole in the first place.

“You’ve got nice handwriting, right, missy?” Halford leans forward and squints toward her tablet. “You’ve gotta be able to read that when y’all get back to the office.”

“Of course, Mr. Halford.”

Lucy stiffens ever so slightly, and I press my lips together into a hard line. The way this man treats her makes me want to sock him right in his smug mouth, but I refrain. Not a good idea, not after I worked so hard to win his business.

He’s just a stepping stone
, I remind myself. Designing the new Alpharetta Shopping Plaza is a dream gig for any architect, and never mind for an independent one like me. So as long as I can keep this idiot happy without sacrificing too much of my architectural integrity, I’ll be sitting pretty for future contracts to come.

Plus, if I keep him happy, he’ll hopefully be willing to write me that check for—

“So?”

Halford’s voice snaps me out of my reverie, and I realize I haven’t heard a word he’s said in the last few minutes.
Fuck.
I send him a reassuring nod as I lean back in my chair. When I look at Lucy, her lip curls in the faintest hint of amusement, and she snaps her notebook shut.

“It all sounds great, Mr. Halford.” She gives the notebook a pat. “I have everything right here, and if you like, I’m happy to type it up and send it over to you or one of your assistants to review.”

“Yeah, do that. ‘Cause I know your ladies’ handwriting gets all loopy with curlicues and shit, and I ain’t trying to read no hieroglyphics.”

Man, this guy’s a dick. Lucy’s handwriting is completely legible—far more than most computer fonts. Not that this asshole would know.

“Well.” I stand up, indicating that the meeting is over.

Halford stands, as well, and takes his sweet time coming all the way around his desk. I extend my hand, but before I know what’s happening, his meaty arm is around my shoulders.

“Why don’t you send this one home?” he whispers, jerking his head in Lucy’s direction while pressing my face ever-closer to his armpit. “And then you and I and some of the guys can go out and have ourselves a real fun night. You know, celebrate this fantastic partnership of ours.”

I try not to breathe too heavily, but the effort is in vain; his sour, sweaty scent permeates the air around us both.

“That’s a kind offer, sir, but—”

“I know just the place.” Halford waggles his bushy eyebrows suggestively. And this is my opening.

“I appreciate the invite. I’m actually really swamped with fundraising for the hospital ward.”

Fuck it. I said it. And now, the moment of truth. This old bastard can either put up … or not.

When I put in a bid to design a new hospital wing for Hillside Medical Center, it didn’t occur to me that I’d be chosen. I may be rising through the ranks of architects in the city, but this was a huge project—an expansion to the ICU, a part of the hospital with which I became intimately acquainted a few years ago.

The board of directors ultimately picked my designs, which was kick-ass, but then they hit me with the not-so-great news: as the lead architect on the project, I was also responsible for heading the fundraising charge. So now, I have the option of either soliciting fuckers like Halford for a quarter-million-dollar donation he’ll never miss, or I can spend the next several months writing letters to beg friends, family members, former coworkers if they can spare a few hundred bucks.

Not exactly how I want to fund my parents’ legacy, if I can help it. Although, if Halford writes me a check, I’ll be even more fucking beholden to the asshole.

But, as they say, beggars can’t be choosers.

“Hillside Medical Center, right?” Halford raises an eyebrow. “They still looking for donors?”

I nod. “Sure are.”

“Hmm. They name the wing yet?”

“They sure haven’t.”

I try on a smarmy, rich-as-fuck smile and rock back on my heels, trying to look less than concerned about the money this motherfucker could be shoving toward my project. Halford strokes his chin thoughtfully.

“I wouldn’t mind stamping my name on another building.” He pauses, narrowing his eyes. “You know, as a favor to a
friend
.”

“The Halford name would look great on the new wing, sir,” I say, glancing at my wristwatch. “How about I buy you that drink and we can chat more about it?”

“That’s the spirit, Masters!” He slaps me on the back and I force myself to return the gesture, despite the disturbing thought of having just agreed to spend an indefinite number of hours with this man and his equally seedy friends at a venue of his choosing.

“Why don’t you hang out in the lobby while I round up the boys?” He presses the intercom button on his desk. “Kendra, get me Johnson on the line.”

As Halford picks up his phone, I stride out of his office behind Lucy, straightening my jacket and taking deep breaths of fresh air that doesn’t reek of stale, old bastards and their horrible taste in metallic office interiors.

“Fucking hell,” I mutter to myself.

“You know,” Lucy murmurs, touching the cuff of my jacket, “you don’t
have
to go to this thing tonight. I can always schedule an ‘urgent meeting’ and call you away.”

“No,” I tell her. “I have to do this. Halford knows he’s my most high profile client, so any emergency would be his emergency . . . and god knows we don’t want any emergencies.” I sigh again and rake a hand through my hair. “Plus, the hospital wing is well worth whatever he puts me through tonight. One check from him, and we’re set.”

“If you say so.” She looks at me quizzically. “Any idea where he’s dragging you off to?”

“Hell no. Probably some sort of overpriced steakhouse, and—”

“You ever been to Lace, Masters?”

Lucy and I turn to find Halford standing behind us, a lascivious grin spread across his surgically-altered face. I haven’t been to Lace, but I know what’s there. Lace teddies. Lace thongs. And all the soft accompanying flesh that slips right in between. If I were with Ryder and the guys, I’d be all fucking for it. With this old dude and his business buddies—yeah, not so fucking much.

“Oh,” he says, seeing Lucy and then turning back to me. “She’s still here.”

“I was just leaving.” Lucy shoots me a
you’re in for it now
look and then smiles demurely at Halford. “It was a pleasure meeting you. I’ll see that you get these notes by tomorrow morning.”

“Send ‘em to Kendra” Halford has clearly already dismissed her. He’s coming for me, and only now do I notice the tumblers of amber liquid in his hand. I should have pegged him for a whiskey man. I force a smile onto my face.

“Bottom’s up, Jackson. This is just the beginning—and you’re buying the next round.”