“I never saw any of it. Her second husband took most of it and gambled it away. After she divorced him, she came back, wanting to work things out with my father and me. I was around fifteen at the time, and I was having none of it. Neither was my father.”
The pain of loss washed over me. I knew what it felt like to lose a mother. My mother had been great up until… I shook my head to erase the images that tried to sneak in. I was twelve when my mother killed herself. Marjorie didn’t even remember her.
“I see. So it was the classic ‘choosing the career over the family’ kind of thing.”
Jade nodded. “That about sums it up. She was more interested in being Brooke Bailey than she was in being my mom, until she lost everything.”
“What’s she up to now?”
“I haven’t the foggiest, other than she’s broke and botoxed.” Jade took a sip of her tea. “And I don’t care.”
I nodded. What could I say to that? She had every right to feel the way she did.
“I guess I should get back to bed.” She stood.
But I didn’t want her to leave. I enjoyed talking to her. I really didn’t talk to much of anyone other than Marjorie and my brothers. I found myself wanting to talk to Jade, and that had to stop. The more I talked, the more cracks got into my wall. I could not risk my wall coming down. I would die.
So I had to let her go. I couldn’t let her in, as much as I wanted to.
But I stood anyway, went after her, grabbed her, and turned her to face me.
“What is it?” Her eyes were wide.
“This,” I said and slammed my mouth onto hers.
God, the same strawberry-champagne flavor… She returned my kiss, twirling her tongue against mine. My cock stiffened under my lounge pants. I wasn’t wearing a shirt, and I desperately wanted to feel her breasts against me. Still kissing her, I untied her robe and slipped it over her shoulders until it ended up in a silky puddle on the kitchen floor.
Her beautifully full breasts were bound in a white tank top. Such beauty shouldn’t be bound. It should be free. I broke the kiss and looked down. Her dark areolas were visible through the white cotton, her nipples puckered and hard. I cupped one breast in my left hand and kissed her again.
She groaned into my mouth. I felt the vibration more than heard it. My cock was full-on hard now. I desperately wanted to push her down to her knees, force her mouth onto my erection, and make her suck me into oblivion.
Instead, I kept kissing her, thumbing her erect nipple. When she sighed into my mouth, I gave the nipple a little pinch.
She jerked against me but did not stop me. She continued to kiss me, letting her soft sweet tongue wander into my mouth. I drank from her, quenching a thirst that I hadn’t realized I had. She was so beautiful, so giving, so…everything that I was not. Soft where I was hard.
Whole where I was…broken.
Could she heal me? Could anyone heal all the holes in my soul?
As we kissed, I almost believed that she could.
But I knew better.
I broke the kiss with a loud smack.
No one could heal me. I would forever be broken.
She looked up at me with those steely eyes, her lips puffy and swollen, her nipples still hard through the white tank top. How I ached to hold her close to me, kiss the top of her silky hair, whisper into her ear that everything was all right and would always be all right.
But that would be a lie.
Nothing would ever be all right again.
I walked around her, my cock still hard and aching, left the kitchen, and went back to my bedroom. Roger trailed at my heals, panting. Damn dog was always happy.
Once in bed, I eased my desire with my own hand. Still, Jade’s beautiful face, those eyes that penetrated through all my layers, haunted me well into the night.
I didn’t sleep.
I never slept.
Chapter Five
Jade
He did it. He really just left me standing in the kitchen after giving me a kiss even more amazing than the last one. I didn’t know what to make of it. Should I talk to Marj about it? Would she even want to know? Would she be comfortable with her brother kissing her best friend?
I let out a heavy sigh and took a few more sips of my tea, which had grown lukewarm. I would have to stop these little midnight visits to the kitchen.
I picked up my robe and put it back on, a shiver overtaking me. My nipples were still hard against the fabric of my tank. God…when he touched them, pinched them…I’d nearly shattered right then and there. Two kisses from Talon Steel had affected me more and been more exciting than seven years of kisses with Colin Morse.
Thank God he had left me at the altar, or I’d be married to one man without ever knowing what it felt like to love another.