I follow Jake up a set of stairs and inside his room. He sets my bag on the big bed and scrambles to collect random clothes that are strewn about the floor. Sheets are spread across the mattress in a haphazard fashion and empty bottles litter the bedside tables. Jake tosses the clothes in the corner and scratches the back of his neck, shrugging.
“It’s a bit of a mess. Wasn’t expecting company, you know?”
“I don’t care about the mess.”
Jake straightens and gives me a look I can’t decipher. “Well, it’s just for one night, right?”
“One night?”
“You’re going home tomorrow, Mac. You can’t stay here. I mean…” he waves his hand about “…look at the people I live with. You don’t belong here.” My nostrils flare as he grabs another shirt from the floor. The reason I’m here is because I don’t like being told how to live my life, and now Jake is trying to do the same thing. “You need to go—”
“Not this again, Jake. I belong wherever the hell I choose.”
Jake pauses in his attempt to fold the tee shirt. He bunches it in his hands and sighs deeply, his eyes fixing on the open window. “Why with me? I’m not anyone special. I don’t have anything to offer you. You have so many opportunities to live a crazy and exciting life. Who would throw all that away for some guy they used to know a long time ago?”
My eyes burn. Since when did Jake become so defeatist? I move toward him and take the shirt from his hands, tossing it to the floor. With his hands free, I take them in mine. “I’m not throwing anything away. I want to live a crazy and exciting life. I just want to do it with you.”
I push up on my toes and press my mouth to his. He responds, his touch heartbreakingly tender. It sends my pulse rocketing clear through the roof. “This is a bad idea,” he mutters against my lips. Then his arms snake around me in a fierce hold and lift me until my feet leave the ground. “But I don’t know how to be smart when it comes to you, Princess. You make me stupid.”
A smile pulls at the corners of my mouth. “Then we can be stupid together.”
He laughs and the sound is beautiful and light. “I can’t argue with you. You have an answer for everything.”
“So don’t argue.”
His expression darkens. “We can talk about it tomorrow.”
“There’ll be no talking tomorrow…” my eyes drop to his lips “…and you know it.”
Heat replaces the dark, and he tosses me on the bed. I know then that I have him and giddiness consumes me. Laughter spills out as I bounce on the mattress. Jake jumps on the bed above me, hair falling in his face as he grins down at me. “You’ll always be mine, Mackenzie Valentine, won’t you?”
“Yours,” I confirm.
His smile sobers as his eyes search my face, serious in an instant. He tucks wayward strands of blonde hair behind my right ear with care. My lungs constrict at the intimate gesture. Literally. I can’t get any air. “I don’t deserve you.”
I wake the next morning with Jake wrapped around me. His body is warm and heavy. I love it. Happiness settles in my gut. I was right coming here. Jake is the man for me. No distance, time, or age, will change that.
A knock comes at the door. It opens without invitation.
“School, fuckface!” Dark brown eyes settle on me. “Well, well. The rumours I heard downstairs at the breakfast table were true.”
I pull the sheet high from prying eyes as Jake stirs behind me. “And who are you?”
The guy grins, hand resting on the door handle as he gives me the once-over. “I’m Rowan, sweetheart. Lead singer and stud for hire, if you’re interested.”
My eyes frost over. “Do I look interested?”
“Not yet, but I can change that.”
“I’m with Jake in case that escaped your attention,” I snap.
“I can change that too.”
Jake groans from behind me. “Get lost, Rowan. It’s school holidays.”
Rowan gives a mock pout as he throws up his hands and turns to leave. “Fine. I get it. I’m not wanted.”
I roll and face Jake. His eyes are a little puffy and stubble lines his jaw. He’s sexy and all mine. My lips curve. “Good morning.”
His eyes light with warmth. “Morning, babe.”
“Oh, I’m babe now?”
I poke his naked chest.
“Yeah.” Jake laughs and wraps his arms around my head. My face gets stuck in his armpit and the hair tickles my face. His grip tightens when I try squirming free. “You don’t wanna be my babe anymore, babe?” The big dork chuckles at his own joke. “Didn’t realise you were so fickle.”
I’m slowly suffocating in a haze of man smell and warm skin. I manage to rip my head free and sit back on my knees, dragging air inside my lungs. “Oh, you wanna fight?”
Jake grins. The sight sends my heart into jackhammer mode. “Give it your best shot, babe.”
Before he can do anything more, I have him flipped over, his right forearm pinned behind his back while I reach for the left. “Holy fuck,” he mutters into the pillow where his face is now mashed. “I’m so hard right now.”
I laugh. My hold loosens enough that he gets free and rolls beneath me. “Jesus, Mac.” Jake’s expression sobers as my hands rest flat on his chest. His heart is pounding an erratic beat beneath my fingers. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like I hung the goddamn moon.”
“It feels like you did, Jake, because I love you.”
Jake swallows and his eyes shift somewhere over my right shoulder. “You might think you do, but you don’t.”
I pull back, hurt welling in my chest at the rejection. “You’re going to tell me how I feel now?”
I roll off him, scoot my way from the bed, and reach for my clothes.
“Stop being so prickly.”
“Oh my god!” I yell, spinning around as I yank on my underwear. “Would you just stop telling me what to do!”
Jake sits up in bed, the sheet pooling at his waist. Frustration lines his forehead. My body gives a jolt of longing. It would be easier to be mad at him if he didn’t look so good.
“Damn you,” I hiss. “Don’t you have school like Rowan whomever said anyway? Go do that. And who is he anyway, lead singer of what? The Muppets?”
“He sings in my band.”
Half-dressed, I pause. “Your band?”
“The band I’m in,” Jake corrects.
“You are in a band? Since when?”
“Since a year ago,” he tells me, moving off the bed and getting to his feet, naked. He yawns and stretches. Meanwhile my gaze lowers until it reaches what my hands itch to wrap their fingers around.
It begins a slow rise as though saying hello.
“That’s quite the greeting,” I manage to get out, utterly fascinated and impressed all at the same time.
“It’s because you’re staring at it.”
My gaze flies up. “You got hard because I looked at your dick?”
“Um, yeah?” he says, his tone sardonic as if it’s something I should already know. “Feel free to touch it.”
Jake mustn’t have been expecting me to actually do it … because when I wrap a warm, slender palm around it and squeeze, it gives an almighty jerk. Jake groans and tips his head back, his eyes closing.
“What do you play?”
“Play?” he hisses when I give a firm stroke.
“In your so-called band, The Muppets.”
“We’re not The…” His breath catches when I stroke again. I like his body’s response. “The Muppets.”
“Well …?”
“The drums,” Jake manages to say through his heavy breathing. “I’m the drummer.”