Page 72 of Call It What You Want
CHAPTER THIRTY
Jackson
We’ve spent the last several hours lost in each other, our hands mapping old territory, our mouths saying what words can’t. Sleep came in fractured intervals, my arm across her ribs, face buried in the nape of her neck. Even unconscious, I can’t seem to let her go. Then we wake hours later with the same desperate hunger that started all this.
Now, it’s mid-afternoon, and I’m wide awake, watching her sleep. After a while, Ava shifts onto her side, facing me. Her eyes flutter open, hazy with sleep, and when she finds me watching her, her expression softens. A smile stretches across her beautiful face, and it’s so unexpected it hits me like a fist to the sternum. For three years, my chest has been a hollow, echoing cavern. Now, suddenly, something in there remembers how to beat.
“Hello, sunshine,” I say.
“You were watching me sleep.” Her voice is playful despite the accusation.
“Yeah.” I drag my mouth across her jaw, my cock stirring to life all over again. It’s been a couple of hours. I could go another round. “I was.”
She moans. “That’s?—”
“Creepy? Possessive? Unhinged?” I gnaw at her bottom lip, my hand finding her breast under the sheets. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
She laughs and shoves at my arm, trying to push me away. “Not again. I can’t. I’m so sore.”
I chuckle against her mouth, grabbing her waist and rolling us until she’s trapped beneath me. “No worries, baby. I’ll do all the work.”
“I’m hungry,” she says. I open my mouth to respond with something filthy, but she cuts me off. “Foractualfood, Jackson. I haven’t eaten since yesterday.”
I pull back just enough to smile down at her. “You’ve had plenty of protein. I’ve pumped you full of it.”
“Oh, my God, Jackson.” She shoves at me harder this time, and I roll onto my back so she can sit up. The cold air stings my skin. “You’re such a guy.”
With a sigh, I reach for my phone and order food to be delivered. Then I text one of the guys downstairs, asking him to bring it up as soon as it gets here. That done, I reach for her, my fingers brushing down her spine. “The food will be here in twenty.”
“Thank you.”
The words are simple, but hearing her say them while lying in my bed still feels surreal. For three years, I lived with the certainty that I’d destroyed the only good thing in my life. I’d convinced myself she was better off without me. And that the version of us I remembered—sharing a bag of fries after school, laughing in my passenger seat, kissing like we had forever—was gone.
But she’s here. Warm and real and within reach.
She moves to get up, but I grab her hip and pull her back. “Where do you think you’re going? We have twenty minutes to fill.”
“I have to pee,” she laughs, twisting against me. “Is that okay, my Lord and Master?”
“Oh, I like that title. Let’s make it a thing.” I lean in for a kiss, but she turns her head at the last second.
“Nice try.” She pushes against my chest, and I release her, my fingers trailing down her arm as she slides off the bed.
I prop myself up on one elbow and watch her ass as she crosses to the bathroom. While she’s gone, I get up and grab two sports drinks from the mini fridge in my armoire. I drain one and set the other one on the nightstand for her.
But as soon as the bathroom door shuts, the calm slips away. All I can see is that guy’s face—the one who attacked her yesterday. The way he touched her. The panic in her eyes. My jaw tightens, and the bottle in my hand crumples from the pressure. Whoever sent him made a mistake coming after what’s mine. I need answers, and I need them now.
The toilet flushes, then I hear the water run briefly, before she comes back out. She stops short when she sees I’m already dressed.
“Where are you going?”
“There’s something I need to take care of,” I answer.
“Like…the guy who attacked me?”
Shirt on, boots laced, I cross the room and take her jaw in my hand, holding her steady as I press my lips to hers. My thumb traces the curve of her chin. When I pull back, her eyes are closed, lips slightly parted.
“The food will be delivered soon,” I say. “Eat and get some rest. I won’t be too long. Lock the door.”
