12. Chapter Twelve
Chapter Twelve
Griffin’s Beach Undertaker
J amie hasn’t left Undertaker’s mind since she showed up crying and confessed her inexperience. He can’t stop thinking about her, and he hates how much time he spends on her. About the girl who’s off-limits. The woman he’s no good for.
He walks into the main room from his apartment for a bottle of some type of liquor to try and drown out thoughts of her when he stops dead in his tracks. As though he brought her here with his mind, there Jamie sits at the bar with Felicity and Melanie.
Concern fills him, and he worries someone else hurt her. She seems to attract assholes, and he’d love nothing more than to take them all out one by one.
“What happened?”
“Nothing,” Jamie says. “I wanted to talk to you, and I don’t have your number. Felicity and Melanie offered to keep me company while I waited.”
Jamie definitely stands out compared to rest of the women, but Undertaker loves it. A beauty all her own, and he fights his smile. “Is that right?”
“And we couldn’t let her sit outside until you decided to join the party,” Felicity says, a smirk on her face.
Lex must’ve said something. Damn it.
Jamie’s hair lays in curls almost exactly the same way it had that day at the deli. The way she wore it for a day date. Her clothes aren’t overly dressy, but dressier than her typical jeans and T-shirt that he knows because he’s low-key stalked her.
“You need to talk to me?”
“Want to, but yeah,” she says and smiles.
There’s a different look about her tonight. Nervous but relaxed. What a fucking contradiction only she can pull off. “Let’s go talk,” he says and nods towards the front door.
“Have fun!” Melanie’s sing-song voice calls after them, and he rolls his eyes.
Outside, Jamie points a thumb over her shoulder. “Her tits are fake, right? She’s too skinny to have them that big and perky.”
He laughs. “Yeah, they’re fake. She’d show ‘em to you if you wanted. Probably let you feel her up, too.”
“She swings both ways?”
“I don’t know that she’s defined by a label. She’s a free spirit, and I think she’s into anything that gets her off.” Her interest in Melanie has him a bit perplexed, and he needs to know why she’s here. “So, what’s up?”
Her cool demeanor slips, and she fidgets with her nails. “Look, I know you said I’m too young for you, and that you’re super scary or something with your obsessive whatever, but I can’t stop thinking about you.”
Same, baby doll. Same. “You can’t?”
“I want to see what it’s like to be with someone who wants to make me his entire world. Who wants to be mine, too. I’m not sure how that feels, but I want it so badly that I can’t stop thinking about it.”
“Jamie—”
“I’ve never had anyone care about where I am or who I’m with. Not even growing up. I could have been abducted or joined the circus, and I don’t know that my parents would have even noticed.”
The sadness in her tone hits Undertaker deep in his chest, and he hates how neglected she’s been. “It’s not as glamorous as you seem to think.”
“I want someone who doesn’t care that I can eat a medium sub and a bag of chips. Someone who doesn’t look disgusted when I order a burger instead of a salad for dinner, and who doesn’t mind that I have zero desire to run on a treadmill for hours a day to achieve some perfect figure.”
Shaking his head, he rubs a hand down his face. “You’re barely legal to drink. I’m thirty-eight. Do you realize I was sixteen the year you were born?”
“And I’ve basically been on my own since I was eight. Trust me, I don’t have much in common with people my own age.”
“Jamie—”
“You don’t find me attractive enough to date,” she says and backs up. “That’s okay if that’s what it is. I just thought that… Never mind. You were really kind, and I think I may have mistook your kindness to mean something more.”
He reaches out to take her hand, but she moves out of his grasp. He doesn’t know what to say.
“Don’t worry about it,” she answers as though he voiced the thought aloud. “It happens enough that I can bounce back pretty easily. Just… Maybe we can pretend I didn’t say anything?”
Fuck! “It’s not that,” he calls as she walks towards her car. The car he knows she has because he’s kept tabs on her.
“You like skinnier girls, don’t you? You think I’m pretty enough, but I’m not someone you want to take to bed. I get it.”
“It has nothing to do with you. You’re sexy, and if things were different, I’d pursue this. You. But you don’t understand what being with me means. A relationship with me isn’t glamorous. It’s not always fun.”
Jamie turns and tilts her head. “What do you mean?”
Running his tongue over his lips, he sighs and walks closer to her so he’s not shouting.
“I mean it when I say I’m a possessive, obsessed asshole in relationships.
There’s this whole psychological thing that the army shrink told me about, but basically, there’s no changing me. I’m not adaptable in a relationship.”
Smirking, she looks up at him with big, doe eyes. “I want to know what you mean. I have this idea, but I would like to learn it firsthand.”
“You say that now—”
“I want to know what being someone’s entire world feels like,” she says. “I’ve been invisible for so long, and when you look at me, it feels different. I’ve waited my whole life for someone to just glance at me the way you look at me.”
He snorts. “Your whole life? Baby doll, you’re only twenty-two. You have plenty more life to experience.”
“I got myself to and from school, making my own lunches, when my dad left. I did my own laundry, got my own groceries from the corner store, and cooked my own meals. Every night, I came home to an empty house, made myself dinner, did my homework, brushed my teeth, and put myself to bed. I’m basically a forty-year-old at this point. ”
Laughing at her comment, Undertaker reaches out and runs his hand over her hair before he can stop himself. “Before you think you’re ready for this, I think I should explain a few things. Others have thought it sounded great, too, but it quickly changes when it becomes real.”
“Explain it to me.”
Her hand reaches out and rests along his side, and he sucks in a breath at the touch. She’s so close to the area of his body he’d love her touch, but he can’t let her. Not yet.
“You’ll basically lose your independence. If I call, I need you to answer or call back within five minutes. I get to pick your friends. When you’re my world, I expect to be yours as well. There’s just us and the club. No one else.”
“I don’t really have a lot of friends, so that’s not quite the threat you think it is.”
“Books and TV make it sound sexy, but the truth is, it’s a compulsive need for me to be in control. To know where you are because I have to know you’re okay and not with anyone you shouldn’t be. I’m what many would call a walking red flag.”
Her tongue slips out and runs along her bottom lip as she steps even closer to him.
“I don’t think it’s a red flag for me. I think I can handle it.
And the reason I believe that is because I know that I’ve never felt the way I do when I’m near you.
It’s intense and new. Something no one has ever made me feel before. ”
“And what’s that?”
“Safe,” she whispers.
Just like that, she found his weakness, and he pulls her to him, kissing her. Hands on her face, he deepens the kiss and toys with the tongue that taunted him just seconds before. He tastes her, and he fucking loves it. Jamie and gin.
Her arms wrap around his neck, and he lifts her up, moaning as she wraps her legs around his waist.
“No one’s picked me up like this since I was, like, ten,” Jamie says and giggles. “Is it weird I find it sexy?”
Undertaker smirks. “Baby doll, you’re as light as a feather to me.”
“Please tell me this means you’re willing to give this a shot. Because no one has ever kissed me like this before, either.”
“On one condition. You have to promise me that when it becomes too much for you to handle that you’ll tell me,” he says, his eyes locking with her. “Because I’m pretty sure you’re going to find out what I do and how I act to be difficult to handle like the few others before you.”
“I’ll be honest. I swear. But I think I may surprise you.”
They all think that until they say they can’t do it anymore.
Carrying her to the backdoor, he walks to his apartment. “I fucking hope so, baby doll.”
He sets her on the bed, and she reaches for the hem of her shirt, but he stops her. She looks up with a mixture of hurt and confusion in her eyes, and he aches to see just what she has to offer underneath the clothes.
“I’m not fucking you tonight,” he says.
“You’re not?”
The disappointment sets him on fire, and he knows she can see how hard he is through his jeans.
It’s been so long since he was last inside a woman, and he wants to plunge so deep inside her that he worries they’ll become one entity.
It doesn’t hurt knowing he’ll be the first. The first to take her but also show her what pleasure really is.
“No, I’m not. A clubhouse isn’t where you should give someone your virginity.”
Looking around, she sighs. “Then what are we doing?”
He climbs onto the bed with her and pulls her into his arms, laying them down together. “Well, I plan to kiss you a little more because you taste pretty damn good, and I haven’t had nearly enough.”
“Really?”
The pure joy in her voice makes him throb even more. “Really. I might feel you up, assuming you’re okay with that. Then, because I’m already having an issue being this close to you, I’ll excuse myself to the bathroom to take care of the raging hard-on you’ve given me.”
A flush washes across her cheeks. “Or—”
“Nope, this will be taken relatively slow. As much as it’ll kill me, you’re young. You’re inexperienced, and I need to make sure you’re comfortable and sure you really want this before going beyond the point of no return.”
“I’m sure. Trust me, I’m sure.”
He smirks as she nods her head. “Regardless, we’re waiting. At least a week. So, after I jack myself off in the bathroom, I’m going to give you a T-shirt to sleep in, and we’re going to sleep.”
Eyebrows high, she looks surprised. “Just sleep? In the same bed? For a week?”
“After the kissing and playing with myself like a goddamned teenager, yes.”
“I could help.”
Shaking his head, Undertaker pushes the thoughts of the various ways Jamie could help relieve the ache below his waist. “Maybe tomorrow or the next day, assuming you’re still coming to sleep over, I’ll let you watch.
I want to make sure you’re comfortable with what I have to offer, but there’s nothing beyond second base—for me—for a week. ”
“Okay.”
“And every night, you have to be here to sleep with me. Just sleep.”
“After the kissing and getting yourself off.”
He smirks. “Exactly.”
“What if I need to get off?” Her fingers gently tickle his chest, but she never breaks eye contact. “Do I need to hang out in here alone and do what I need to while you’re in the bathroom doing what you need to?”
Oh, she’s good. She’s really good.
“If you need help getting off, I’m more than willing to assist.”
“But I can’t assist you?”
Shaking his head, he smirks at her pout. “Nope.”
“That doesn’t seem fair.”
“Tell me about it, but these are the rules. Can you follow rules? Because that’s what this relationship will be, Jamie. Rules that need to be followed, and breaking them isn’t an option.”
Her lips touch his softly before she nods. “I’ve always been pretty good about following rules. Never been much of a rebel.”
“Fuck,” he moans.
He tangles his fingers in her hair as he once again explores her mouth with his tongue, his cock pressing painfully against his fly.
This is going to be one long fucking week.