Page 111 of Badd B*tch

I buttoned the shorts, washed my hands, and then braced my hands on the sink, facing my reflection.

I was ready for this; I was more than ready. I'd been a simmering mess of need for Jax all fucking day. It had started days ago, when I finally understood that he wasn't humoring me as he held me through my tears, or putting up with me. He rarely said a word, knowing there wasn’t much to say, but I still felt his love, his compassion, and his understanding so clearly. Knowing my deepest, darkest, most painful memories and the attendant emotions were safe with him had somehow opened something in me, and I hadn’t been able to stop the tide.

It was as if accepting and embracing Jax’s understanding and love had broken open the floodgates in me somewhere, and once that happened, there was no putting the shit back in the horse, as Granddad liked to say. It all just came out willy-nilly, and I couldn't stop it. He'd taken my breakdowns with complete grace, even when they'd happened in the middle of the night and woken him out of a dead sleep he'd needed in order to heal.

But then today, watching him with his family? Such a turn-on.

He was sweet and patient with the younger ones, playful, funny, always ready with a joke, and affectionate with everyone. Jax and his mom together, especially, was a sight that had poured jet fuel on the pilot light of my desire. I don't know if that's weird, but it's what happened.

He'd snuck up behind her, scared her so badly that she’d leaped a foot in the air and then chased him with an empty two-liter bottle, thunk-thunk-thunking him about the head and shoulders with it. She'd actually managed to corner him on the deck, and he’d surrendered, only to be held down by his father and brothers and tickled until he’d genuinely had to ask them to stop so he could catch his breath. He'd then spent a good thirty minutes hanging with his mom, talking to her, fiddling with her long blond hair as they sat hip to hip, chatting in low, easy tones about who knew what.

It made me miss my own mother so badly I nearly started crying right there, but it had also just…done something to me. He loved his mother deeply and respectfully, and there’s something incredibly sexy about a man who loves his mother unashamedly. In an independent, not-tied-to-her-apron-strings kind of way.

The whole rest of the day had been like that. Watching him play Goldeneye, even when he lost and was genuinely upset, but still being a good sport and taking the ribbing, teasing, and needling with grace. The way he was with Harry, in particular, had gotten to me. For a good hour, she'd decided he was her ride around the party, and he'd carried her on his shoulders everywhere, handing up snacks that she crunched all over the top of his head, once even spilling a mouthful of apple juice down the back of his neck. Delia had embarrassed him by wiping him down with baby wipes from her purse.

He'd even managed a short but friendly conversation with Emerson and her husband, Hayden. And Emerson? Boy, I could really see the lure there. She was breathtakingly beautiful, and as I watched her flit about the place, I'd seen her easy humor, the way she teased and ribbed right back with everyone, and was generally just charming and wonderful. I could definitely understand how seeing her day in and day out, wanting her, and never knowing the warmth of her returned affection would have been downright excruciating.

It had only made me want him all the more.

By the time I'd found the courage to tell him I was ready to leave, I was a raging storm of hormones. Desire for him was an inferno inside me, first lit back in the woods, then banked into hot coals over the next week and a half or two.

Now, he was out there, waiting for me. Wanting me.

I searched myself honestly, and found no hesitation, no part of me wanting to hold back. I wanted to give myself to him, fully and completely, heart, mind, body, and soul. I wanted him to be mine, just the same.

It was time.

I tugged my hair out of the braid and pulled my compact, foldable brush from my purse, then dragged it through my thick black kinky waves until they were as straight as they could get, a loose, wild cloud of black around my face and shoulders. I adjusted the sit of my breasts in the bra, a match to the racy, lacy thong under my shorts—a pair I'd picked this morning with this moment in mind.

I heard music from somewhere nearby, something soft and faint and slow and romantic, and my heart twisted again at that gesture.

As ready as I could be, I exited the bathroom and turned off the light behind me—

And stopped, breathless.

The house was dark; the lights we’d turned on in the kitchen and living room were now off. A gentle yellow glow flickered on my left—candles. I followed the light into the primary bedroom, where the lights were also off. The glow came from dozens of lit tealights he'd spread around the room. The bed was a king covered in a thick white duvet, the headboard and footboard brass bars. On the white duvet, he'd arranged roses in a heart that took up most of the bed. A small speaker sat on the bureau opposite the bed, his phone face-down beside it, playing gentle, romantic classical music.

My throat went hot and tight. “Jax," I whispered.

He stood at the foot of the bed, shirtless and huge and heavily muscled, hands at his sides clenching and unclenching nervously. "I know, I know," he said, as if continuing a conversation we’d already begun “Tealights everywhere and roses on the bed—so cliché, but I…I wanted to do something to make this special." God, he was so nervous.

So was I, and seeing his nerves on display eased mine.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and closed the space between us, flattening my hands on his chest. "Jax, honey." I nipped his lower lip. "If I hadn't already cried all the tears in the whole world over the last week, this would make me cry. But I'm not gonna cry, because that's not what I'm feeling right now."

"No?" His voice was low and husky and thick, and he wrapped his big hands around my waist. "What are you feeling, then?"

"Grateful," I whispered, and kissed the corner of his jaw. "Amazed." I kissed his chin. "In love." I kissed his Adam's apple. "Turned on."

"Hey, that's funny. I'm feeling all the same things."

"That is a funny coincidence," I whispered. "You should show me."

"You have all the best ideas," he answered, and then decided to use his mouth for something other than talking.

Namely, kissing me.

My mouth, at first. Deeply, passionately, hungrily. All tongue, no chill. I gave as good as I got, showing him how much I needed him and wanted him and craved him with my lips, my tongue…and my hands. I roamed the hot expanse of his shoulders, his hard chest and broad back. I explored his stomach, the grooves and ridges of his abs, the angles of his V-cut disappearing under his waistband.