Page 53 of Unofficial

Kade drives by Jess's house, hoping to find her home to talk to her. He's itching to see her, but the moment he approaches the house, he sees Landry's SUV in the driveway. She said she had to work late, but he didn't think she had afterwork plans with Landry. Not after the way he spoke to her and took some other girl out.

"Damn it!" Kade shouts and hits his steering wheel with his fist.

Pulling out his phone, he calls Drew, breathing heavily. He knows it's about bedtime, but if he doesn't have someone talk him off the ledge, he's bound to burst through that door and beat the man to a pulp.

"Kade-"

"She's with him, Drew!" he nearly shouts.

"Who?"

Taking a deep breath, he tries to calm down enough to make his statements as coherent as possible while his brain feels as though it’s on the fritz. "Jess is inside her house with Landry."

"And you know this because you decided to stalk her?" Drew asks. "Kade, that's a problem. You and I both know that."

"I needed to see her. I want to see her. But this asshole is here. I want to beat his ass, Drew. I want to make him regret ever looking at her."

His cousin sighs into the phone. "Kade, you let her go, remember?"

"He already waited sixty days. He's got a leg up on me, and he's in there, making love to my girl."

"Sixty days? What are you talking about? Are you drunk?"

The punch to his gut makes it difficult to speak. The sixty-day rule is because of him. What he did to her. "Never mind."

"Drive away, Kade. Drive back to your house, okay? On the drive to your house, explain what you mean because I have no idea what's happening, and you have me a little worried about you right now."

Listening to his cousin, he guns it and drives out of her neighborhood. "She has a rule where she waits sixty days before she considers taking a man to bed. Because of what happened with her and me. Basically, she needs to take that time to make sure the guy really wants her and has good intentions, not just wants sex."

"You can't really blame her."

"Thanks."

"Look, Kade, I get it. You think you're in love with Jess, but you knew she was seeing someone. This isn't a surprise like you gave her."

He'll never live down his mistake with anyone. "I don't think I'm in love with her, I am in love with her. But Drew-"

"She has a right to do what she feels she needs to in order to protect her heart."

"But he already passed the sixty days. He has an opportunity to show her love that I can't."

Drew pauses a beat. "Wait... did you say you're in love with her?"

"Yes, but that's not the point here, Drew. He's in there, with her, and he already put in the time. She said she hadn't heard from him since the night we had our confrontation in her house, which I thought kind of fell in my favor, and then he was at the same restaurant we went to with another girl. I don’t know if she lied or what."

"He's cheating, too?"

I didn't cheat. "I don't know."

"Poor Jess."

"Poor Jess? You know what, never mind. I shouldn't have bothered you during bedtime," he says and hangs up the phone.

Staring at the black device in his hand as he sits in his garage, he decides to call Jess. She answers after three rings, and he finds that to be a good sign. She wouldn’t answer while in bed with Landry, right?

"Hey," Jess's voice comes through his speakerphone, and she sounds weird.

"Hey, baby. Are you okay?" Kade asks.

---