Jackson: A Sexy Bastard Novel (11 page)

I
f I didn’t know better
, I’d think someone had opened a vein and let all of my blood leak out onto the floor—that’s how empty I feel.

But I also feel unburdened. I’ve never told anyone about Cory, because he’s tied to the cancer, and cancer isn’t something you just casually mention in conversation. But now Jackson knows. Every last gory detail. And somehow he’s still sitting here, holding my hand. I don’t want to look at him, I don’t want his pity, but when I finally force myself to meet his eyes, his expression holds something I was not expecting at all: admiration.

“Skylar, you are beautiful, whether you have all of your hair or none of it, whether you weigh eighty pounds or two hundred and eighty. You’re gorgeous and smart and fun, and so incredibly full of life. If Cory thought some dumb cancer would beat you, and that’s really what scared him off, then he’s a moron.”

Jackson turns my hand over and uncurls my fingers one at a time. Lowering his lips, he kisses the center of my palm. My insides shiver.

“Cory’s loss is going to be some other guy’s gain,” Jackson continues, “and that guy is going to love you, and cherish you, and never ever let you go. If Cory wasn’t man enough to do that, then he didn’t deserve you.”

No one has ever spoken to me this way before. The cold emptiness inside me has turned into a fuzzy warmth in the pit of my stomach, and I want more. I want to be on fire.

Holding back the tears that have started to build again behind my eyes, I lean in and kiss him. It’s a tender kiss, and I can taste my own tears, but he doesn’t pull away. Instead, he takes me in his arms and kisses me back gently, tenderly. I have never felt so safe as I feel in his arms, never so precious as when he touches me: like I’m something expensive and rare. He kisses my eyelids and my temples, my cheeks, the corners of my mouth. I keep my eyes closed, savoring every sensation. It’s like he’s touching my very nerve endings. This man cares so much about me. And I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t beginning to care about him.

His hands are tentative on my body, careful. Yet when I reach under his shirt, his abs tense against my fingers. He won’t take advantage of me when I’m so emotionally . . . raw. But he wants me. I know he does. And it’s this rawness that makes me want him even more.

My nerves are electric; every sensation is amplified. Taking his hands, I move them to the hem of my shirt. He hesitates, so I grip his hands more firmly in mine and look directly into his eyes.
I want this.

“Touch me, Jackson,” I whisper. “I just want to feel you right now.”

We peel my shirt over my head, and Jackson bends and kisses the space between my breasts, trailing his lips up my breastbone to my neck. When our lips meet, he loses all pretense of self-control; his tongue thrusts its way into my mouth, hands pushing me back on the bed. I bite his bottom lip and pull it into my mouth, sucking gently. I want to devour him, to be devoured by him.

“God, Sky,” he groans, the sounds almost guttural with desire.

Releasing my mouth, he trails his fingers back down between my breasts, circling each pert nipple before lowering his mouth and giving a nip. I feel electric.

“You are so fucking beautiful,” he breathes, moving lower, gliding his lips down over my ribcage, across my stomach. At my hips, he lifts the fabric of the sweatpants and sucks the crevice between my hip and my leg. My back arches involuntarily. Pressing my palms flat into the bed sheets, I try to memorize this: every second of contact with his hands, his lips. I want to feel like this forever.

“I could spend the rest of my life touching you and never get bored,” Jackson whispers against my skin.

Finally, he releases me and the next thing I know, he’s whisked my pants off. It takes him no more than ten seconds to remove his own clothing, and then, he’s back on top of me, shimmying up the length of my body. The heat in his eyes is undeniable, but still he’s moving carefully, overtly aware of how I feel, what I want.

“I want you,” I whisper, reaching for him. “I want to feel you inside of me.”

“Not yet,” he responds, reaching between my legs. The moment they part, his finger slips inside me. He adds a second finger, and I suck in a breath.

“You’re so wet,” he murmurs. “Am I the one turning you on like this?”

I mean to respond, I really do, but I can’t form the words. The slow circling of his fingers around my clit has me senseless but for that singular sensation building at my core.

“Please,” I manage when the tips of his fingers finally make contact with my clit. I’m seeing stars. “Fuck me.”

His finger is the center of my whole universe, dipping, circling, teasing. I reach for him, but he grabs my hand and holds it away from my body.

“Soon,” he says, lowering his mouth to my nipples.

“Now.” I wrench my hand out of his grasp and find his cock, thick and swollen—ready for me. When I tighten my grip, he rears back and effortlessly flips me over onto my stomach. Then he yanks my ass against him, running a finger down my slit. My body shivers and I rock against him.

“I don’t want your finger,” I mutter, reaching around and batting his hand away.

“Okay. Is this what you want?” Gripping my thighs, he slides into me slowly, filling me inch by inch until I’m about to burst. My whole body shudders, already at the brink of climax, and he pulls back.

“Not yet, Sky. Not yet.”

He glides in and out of me, slowly now, building the inferno already raging at my core. The sensation is surging, looking for release. I grip the bed sheets in my fists.

“Harder.”

In response, he turns me over onto my back. Instinctively, I wrap my legs around him, but he pries them off and instead props them up on each of his shoulders. He watches me as he does it, his jaw clenched, eyes burning. When he plunges into me, my whole body convulses, the heat inside me at fever pitch. I reach out to grasp something, anything, and my hands close around a pillow. Quickly, I press it over my mouth to stifle the cries of ecstasy coming out of me as he plungers harder, deeper.

Oh God. Oh my fucking God.

I’m somewhere between falling and flying, dizzy with the scent of his sweat. My body lowers through every dip and crests every wave of sensation. With one final stroke, everything inside me explodes, sparks pouring through my body like an avalanche of falling stars.

When I come back to myself, his face is hungry, eyes still dark with need.

“Do it again,” I pant, sliding my legs off of his shoulders and wrapping them around his back. “Make me come again.”

I pull him into me and thrust my hips, forcing his breath out in a gust. His whole body tenses against me, and my breathing quickens in turn. Then, he’s driving into me, harder, faster, deeper, until I can’t tell where my body ends and his begins. We’re one being, teetering on the brink of ecstasy, and then we fall. Everything in me shatters as I come: every emotion, memory sensation. He shudders along with me, jaw clenched, eyes squeezed tight until finally, gradually, our bodies become still.

With a long exhale, he lowers himself onto his forearms and dips to kiss me.

“This is what you deserve, all the time, every day. To feel like this.” He strokes a hand across my cheek. “To smile. To be loved. I can’t change any of what happened, Skylar. But I can be here, with you, right now. And I promise I won’t leave.”

He curls his body around mine, and I nestle into him. He’s warm, stable, secure. An amazing lover. Yet, as incredible as I felt just moments ago, I can already feel myself pulling away. I can’t do this. I won’t. I don’t want his promises. Cory made promises, too, and I believed we’d be together forever.

But there is no forever.

Not for me, not for anyone.

No matter how much I’m starting to want it again—with someone else this time.

T
he conference room
is uncomfortably hot. I would really like to loosen my tie and undo the collar of my shirt, but as they say, appearances are everything, and I need to appear every bit the hotshot architect Halford believes me to be. So the tie stays on.

“I really think the fountain ought to be a waterfall.”

As Halford speaks, his lackeys beside him furiously scribble down every word. Lucy, meanwhile, taps a few keys on her iPad and looks at me expectantly.

“The waterfall would be great, Halford, really striking, but in order to construct one, we’d need to build a wall, and that’s going to obstruct the view of the flagship Louis Vuitton store we chose as the centerpiece of the plaza.”

And by “we” I mean “he.” Personally, I would have put a high end store out front, to draw in a wider swath of shoppers. But he’s the boss; I’m just the one who makes his dreams into reality . . . except any dreams that might ruin the whole thing. Like this goddamned waterfall.

My phone buzzes. It’s Skylar.

What should I wear?

Why is she asking me this? I know she’s never been to fight night before, but I told her it was basically the equivalent of an underground boxing match, so she should dress like she was going to sit ringside. Because Ryder owns this joint, so that’s exactly where we will be sitting.

“Fountains are so passé, though,” Halford argues. “This needs to really make a statement. It’s the centerpiece of the whole complex.”

“I realize that, and it absolutely will.” God I hate pandering to this man. “The fountain we designed is one-of-a-kind. Remember, we brought on WET to collaborate?”

“WET designed the Bellagio fountains,” Lucy chimes in.

“Right, right.” Halford raps his knuckles against the table. “Well okay, let’s see that drawing again.”

My phone buzzes twice, and the message
How about this?
comes up, along with a photo of a dress laid out on Skylar’s bed. It’s lipstick red, with sequins layered like chainmail up and down the sleeves. The neckline plunges straight through the center, with the dress held together by a narrow strip of sheer fabric. She would look incredible in it.

“Jackson?”

Glancing up, I find Lucy staring at me with concern.

“Sorry,” I mutter, typing a quick
Sure
and slipping my phone safely back into my pocket.

Raising her eyebrows, Lucy slides her iPad over to me. According to her notes, Halford is harping on the retractable roof again. And here I thought we had moved past that.

“You can’t have the whole thing be open-air
and
have a retractable roof,” I sigh, for what seems like the hundredth time.

Everyone freezes, and Lucy shoots me a look of horror.
Shit. I realize I just used the word Halford hates most:
can’t.

“What I mean,” I backpedal, “is that there’s no way to build a roof that connects to the tops of the buildings we’ve already designed. The gradients are too variable for that. We’d have to build the roof as a dome right over top of the whole complex, and that’s going to look a little too space-agey for your demographic, don’t you think?”

“Well, I want it to look modern. Space-age is modern.”

What is it with Halford and this damn word ‘modern’? How does he not understand that ‘modern’ is not synonymous with ‘classy’?

My phone vibrates again, and I know I shouldn’t look, but I just can’t help it. Mouthing “Sorry” to Lucy, I slip my phone out and hold it under the table, waiting until Halford is off on another rant before I take a quick peek.

You’re in a meeting right?

Yeah.
I text quickly.

Then you probably shouldn’t be thinking about this.

The picture looks out over the flat plane of her stomach. I immediately think of pressing my hand to it, gliding my fingers along her smooth skin.

Or this.
The next shot is of her hip, following her thigh straight down to the shadowy v where her legs meet
.
The saliva in my mouth thickens.

Or . . .

I push back my chair. “Excuse me, I’m really sorry, but I have to take this. Personal stuff.”

Very personal.

Holding my phone out like a badge, I exit the room and hurry down the hall. Turning a corner, I duck into an alcove containing a dried out palm tree and a water fountain, and press “call.”

“What are you doing?” I demand when she picks up.

“Look who wants to talk all of a sudden.”

“You’re killing me in there, and I can’t afford to fuck this up.”

“So why are you calling me, then?”

I reach out and snap the brown tips off of a few palm fronds. “I just . . . tell me what you’re doing. Are you lying in bed?”

“Yes, in fact, I am.”

“Are you wearing anything?”

“Did it look like I was wearing anything?”

I can see her: sprawled on her bed, spreading those two creamy thighs to reveal her pink, glistening center. She’s licking her lips and sucking on a fingertip, two, and—

“. . . reaching down between my legs,” she fills in, “thinking about when you touch me, and all the nasty things you do with your tongue. It makes me so wet. Look at these fingers, they’re glistening.”

Holy fuck. It’s like she’s right here, in this hallway, right in front of me. Her hands move between her legs, one kneading the flesh of her thigh as the other plunges in and out, faster and faster . . . .

She moans and I press my hand against the cold metal base of the water fountain, trying to ground myself in reality. Then my phone gives a quick buzz, and then another. With more instinct than conscious thought, I regretfully pull it away from my ear. Lucy’s texts come in all caps.

JACKSON! WHERE ARE YOU????

I bring the phone back to my mouth. “Sky,” I whisper.

“Hmm?” Her tone sounds distant. “This would be so much better if you were here. You could push your cock deep inside me and I’d already be so close to coming . . . .”

“Sky, I have to go.” Taking my hand off of the fountain, I adjust my pants, willing the image of her out of my head and hoping that by the time I get back to the conference room, my cock will lower itself to a more acceptable height. “I’ll see you in a few hours. Did you, uh, did you decide on what to wear?”

“I’m busy.” Her voice is low and throaty. “Guess you’ll just have to wait and see.”

The call cuts off.

Fuck.

After splashing a little water from the fountain on my face and taking a long drink, I start the long trek back to Halford’s conference room. It is taking literally every ounce of self-discipline I have not to turn and sprint to my car, drive 100mph to Skylar’s apartment, and finish everything she just started. And then some.

But I have to remember that right now is not about Skylar. Right now is about Halford. I’ll see Sky tonight, in whatever sexy-as-hell getup she finally chooses. And when I do see her, there will be hell to pay. Because we might have hung up, but this is not over. Not by a long shot.