JASON
I had never been more relieved to get out of a car in my life. If Jess crossed her legs one more time in that ridiculous excuse for a skirt, I was going to lose my mind. Damn, why did she have to be so fucking sexy?
I tried not to look at her as we climbed the steps to the house. The outfit she was wearing was more adventurous than anything I’d ever seen her wear. How the hell she’d walked out of the club alone was beyond me.
I opened the door and she walked inside. The staff was gone for the night since Jax wasn’t in residence. I liked it better alone. Especially now that I had Jess here.
“You wanted to talk,” Jess said, not walking any farther into the house. She seemed nervous now. I wasn’t sure what had changed from the car to here. She had been fine in the Hummer.
“Yeah, uh, not here. We could go outside.” I stopped when she started shaking her head.
“No, let’s not,” she said softly.
The last time we’d been outside was memorable for both of us. She was right. That was a bad idea. I needed to focus. “Uh, yeah. Let’s go . . .” Where the hell to take her? “Downstairs. It’s more comfortable down there. Less formal,” I finally said.
Jess nodded, and I started toward the stairs. Hearing the click of her heels on the marble floor made it difficult not to turn around and look at her legs. Not that I didn’t have a very clear mental image of them.
I started down the stairs and Jess stopped. Glancing back at her, I noticed she was gripping the railing tightly and having some internal battle with herself.
“Jess?”
She looked at me and shook her head. “I can’t. I shouldn’t have come here.”
What the hell? I walked back up to the step underneath her. “Why?”
She took a deep breath. “Because—we will—we will—do stuff, and you’ll leave for Boston and I’ll be here and I’ll be sad and I’ll be alone and I can’t do that again,” she said in one long, rushed sentence, then turned to leave. I reached out and grabbed her before she could get away.
“Don’t leave. That’s why I want to talk. Yeah, I’m gonna have to leave, but I want to come back. Like I’m doing now. Like I did two weeks ago. I want to come see you. And I sure as hell don’t want you to be sad.”
She got very still and stopped trying to move away from me. “What do you mean, you want to come back?”
“Exactly what I said. I want to see you. I miss you.”
She didn’t look at me. “But why? You’re dating Star. Why do you want to come here?”
Those stupid fucking pictures. I shouldn’t have let them take those. I had witnessed firsthand how pictures like those had almost ended Jax and Sadie’s relationship. “She’s a friend.”
“Oh” was all she said.
“Please come downstairs and talk to me,” I pleaded, sliding a hand around her waist.
She tensed at first, then seemed to melt back into me.
“Okay,” she finally said after a moment.
I didn’t take my hand off her this time for fear she’d decide to run again. We made it downstairs and I directed her to the closest sofa to get her comfortable.
She looked around the place. “It’s nice down here,” she said.
It was where Jax and I had hung out when we were younger. He had been limited to our small portion of the beach when we visited, so we had spent a lot of time down here playing video games and pool.
“I haven’t been down here in a while,” I admitted.
She glanced down at her hands, then finally up at me. “So, you want to visit me,” she said slowly, as if trying to understand what I had been saying.
“Yeah, I do. A relationship would be impossible, but that doesn’t mean we can’t still date. I can come visit. I can bring you to visit me if you want to. I just . . . This thing with us not talking sucks. I miss you.”
Chapter Nineteen
JESS
A relationship would be impossible. That’s all I heard. Everything else he said didn’t make sense. What was it he wanted? A booty call?
“So you just want to hook up when you’re available and do what? Have sex?” I asked bitterly.
His eyes went wide and he shook his head. “No! God, no. That’s not what I mean. I meant just . . . date. The sex, well, yeah, it’s amazing, but that isn’t what I came here for. I wanted to see you.”
Just not in a relationship. He wanted to be free to go on dates with Star and whatever A-lister came his way and also come see me. Yes, this pissed me off, but it shouldn’t have. He never promised me anything. Just because I wanted more didn’t mean he had to. He liked me. He wanted to date me. I was used to the possessive-type guys who wouldn’t share, so casually dating wasn’t something I had done much of.