CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR LANA #3
I come with my face pressed into the mattress, sounds muffled against fabric, my entire body shaking with the force of it. He doesn't slow down, keeps thrusting through my orgasm, prolonging it until I'm trembling and oversensitive and reaching for the sheets just to have something to hold onto.
"Fuck, Lana—" He's losing his rhythm now, thrusts becoming erratic, chasing his own release. "You feel so good."
"Come for me," I manage to say, wanting to feel him lose control, wanting evidence that I affect him as much as he affects me.
He does, both hands gripping my hips now, pulling me back onto him as he finishes with my name torn from his throat. I feel him pulsing inside me, feel the way his entire body tenses before he collapses forward, his chest against my back, both of us struggling to remember how breathing works.
We stay like that for a long moment, neither of us moving, just existing in the aftermath of something rawer and more physical than our previous encounters.
Eventually he pulls out, gets up to discard the condom, and returns to pull me against his chest. I go willingly, needing the contact after using sex to channel anger into something productive.
"Better?" he asks after our breathing has normalized.
"Better." And it is better. The anger is still there but it's manageable now, channeled into something productive rather than just corrosive. "Thank you for letting me—"
"You don't need to thank me for that." He's already pulling me closer. "Lana, you also get to decide what happens between us. Always. I'm here making sure you have that choice."
The statement is simple but carries weight I wasn't prepared for. Jax isn't faking concern or pretending to have authority he doesn't have. He's just giving me space to choose while making it clear he's available for whatever I decide I need.
We lie there for a while longer, neither of us speaking, just existing in the aftermath of anger-sex that was more about reclaiming power than actual anger. Eventually I pull back enough to see his face.
"The board can't force me out," I say, returning to the problem I was trying to escape. "Legally, they need cause for removal and refusing to capitulate to Ezra isn't cause."
"They can make your position untenable though. Make leadership so difficult that resignation becomes easier than fighting." He's being pragmatic rather than reassuring. "What do you want to do?"
"I want to survive Wednesday's meeting. Then I want to deal with the board once immediate threats are resolved.
" The strategy is forming even as I speak it.
"If I settle with Ezra on Wednesday, if The Glasshouse decides I'm not worth killing, then the board's concerns become moot.
Organizational stability returns, donors stop asking questions, and Thomas's power play loses justification. "
"So Wednesday becomes even more important. Ezra needs to walk away satisfied, The Glasshouse needs to believe you're not a threat, and you need to emerge with enough credibility that the board can't justify removal." He's processing the interconnected goals. "That's a lot riding on one meeting."
"I know. But it's the only path forward that doesn't involve surrendering something." I sit up, already reaching for clothes because lying in bed feels indulgent when we have twenty-four hours before the most important meeting of my life. "What did Brandon say about apartments?"
"Same three options we talked about. He's ready to schedule showings whenever you are." He's getting dressed too, returning to tactical mode. "After Wednesday, once this is behind us."
"After Wednesday. One crisis at a time." I'm buttoning my blouse, transforming back from thoroughly satisfied to professionally composed.
"Did you tell him about tomorrow? About what we're actually walking into?"
"He knows. He'll be outside Mira's office with two others from Blackwood.
If anything goes wrong, we have immediate backup.
" He's pulling on his shirt, tucking it in with practiced efficiency.
"Lana, we're going to get you through tomorrow.
You play the ignorant widow, convince them you're not worth eliminating, and this ends. "
"And if the performance isn't convincing? If they decide I'm lying?"
"Then we have backup plans and exit strategies and people positioned to intervene." He crosses to me, framing my face with his hands. "But it won't come to that. You've been performing for years. One more performance to stay alive isn't asking too much."
The assessment is accurate even if it's uncomfortable.
I've performed for Gabriel, for the board, for donors and colleagues and everyone who expected me to be something other than what I was.
One more performance to convince dangerous people I'm not dangerous seems almost laughably easy by comparison.
Except the stakes are higher than they've ever been. This isn't performing to maintain marriage or professional credibility. This is performing to stay alive.
"Okay," I say, because there's no other option. "I'll play the part. The frightened widow who just wants this nightmare to end. Make myself seem too broken to be a threat."
"You will." He kisses me once more, brief but meaningful. "And tomorrow, when this is over, you get to stop performing. You get to just be exactly who you are without apology."
I hold onto that promise like a lifeline, like evidence that there's an after to Wednesday's meeting, like proof that survival is actually possible.
Twenty-four hours until I walk into a room with people who might decide I'm more valuable dead than alive.
Twenty-four hours to prepare for the performance of my life.