Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
JACE
How do you get rid of an erection?
Yep, I’ve looked it up.
When you’re a teenager, they’re a joke. Everyone laughs them off.
When you’re a man, with a full, throbbing erection for a hot-as-hell woman who’s supposed to be “just your friend.”
It’s the ultimate test.
And I’m a giant loser.
Grabbing a deep breath, I flex my quads and biceps, trying to redirect my blood flow.
Think of taxes. Of math. Of two plus two equals… Vivian’s hard little nipples under her T-shirt.
Goddamn, they make my mouth water.
I’m thirsty to suck them, moaning with them in my mouth until we both release this tension that’s built so high between us, the Hoover Dam shrinks in comparison.
“Jace?” I wince at her sweet voice. “Jace, I…” Her soft touch on my shoulder makes it worse. She makes my dick throb before a knock on the door jolts my thrumming pulse.
“Vivian? And fuckface? Got a minute?”
It’s Nash.
It’s confusing my dick.
On rare, lonely occasions, it responds to him with Vale. It wants a love like they have, and it needs it with Vivian.
But right now, this is business. I force my next exhale to deflate my desire.
“Yeah?” I call out, still with my back to her.
“We need to meet.”
Nash is following up on where we left off last night. We’re going to help Vivian. It instantly refocuses me as I turn around to find her gazing up at me, a storm of worry and want.
I skip right past my ebbing erection and answer her stare. “He’s going to help us with your ex. Nash is one of us. Okay?”
Boldly, she nods. I can’t get over how unafraid she is of what I’ve told her so far.
Sometimes we mistake a woman under duress as a damsel in distress. That’s not Vivian. She’s not passive. She’s not giving up. She’s doing everything she can to stay smart and stay safe. That’s strength and survival.
And if anyone should know about surviving, it’s the kings and queens. We know you can’t do it alone; we do it together.
Silently, I take her hand, because I finally can, and lead her to the door.
Swinging it open, I lower my brows at Nash. “Ready.”
I’m ready to free Vivian. Ready to kill her ex. Ready to make her my queen. But there are a hundred perilous steps between where we are, walking down the hallway, and where we will be one day, on our thrones.
I won’t stop until we get there.
Vivian’s hand squeezes mine once we step into the front parlor of the store. I could be a fucking mess of feelings about the first touch of her soft hand held in mine, but kings and queens surround us, and I need to be careful.
This is already a dance of rush and wait.
“Hope you don’t mind.” Nash sits on the corner of Vale’s desk. “But I assembled a team because we’re going to need it.”
I nod at half of us gathered and make the introductions.
“Vivian Tate.” Reluctantly, I drop her hand.
This is professional and personal as fuck.
“You already know Grant Moultrie, my brother: huge hacker extraordinaire. And this is his lovely wife, Delphine Laurent. You’ve probably seen her around, but your ex won’t see her.
Delphine’s a private investigator who’s tailing him. ”
Vivian politely nods. There are too many in the room to bother with individual pleasantries.
“This is Michael Cummings,” I continue, “a renowned lawyer, and his prized paralegal, Ruby Jones. He’ll help us on legal maneuvers, and Ruby will help Delphine stalk your ex-husband’s every move. Trust me, she’s good.”
Actually, Michael is Axel, and Ruby is Axel’s wife. He stalked her, so she stalked him back. It’s how Ruby honed her skills, and how Axel fell in love with her.
But Vivian isn’t my queen—yet—and she can’t know their true identities and past. Axel is too covert in local circles.
“And of course, you know Vale Monroe, our colleague, and Nash Allen, our accountant. Vale can infiltrate your ex-husband’s world, and Nash can infiltrate his bank accounts.”
“Thank you, everyone.” Vivian lifts her chin. “I’ll return your kindness one day, I promise.”
The poise Vivian was raised with is obvious. So is the pride. Now that Vivian knows she’s not alone, it’s clear she’s ready to fight back.
“What do you need from me?” she asks.
“His bank accounts.” Nash crosses his arms.
She nods. “You can have all the files from my divorce. We went through his accounts during discovery.”
Axel probes, “Who was your divorce attorney?”
“Harlow Sutton,” she answers, and Axel laughs. “Is something funny?” Vivian tenses, ready to defend her friend.
“About Harlow?” Axel replies. “No, nothing’s funny. She’s a viper lawyer in lace. I’m sure she went after your ex.”
“She did.” Vivian regards Axel with suspicion.
Understandably. He could intimidate the angel of death.
“But David, my ex, is contesting my father’s trust. When my father died, I took over as the trustee, but David filed a lawsuit saying he was like a son to my father, that he should be a trustee too. ”
Axel shakes his head. “But once your father passed, his trust became irrevocable and yours.”
“I know,” Vivian replies stoically. “That’s how irredeemable my ex is.
We’re at a stalemate. I won’t sign over my father’s trust, and if David tries to make me by releasing the video, I’ll have nothing left to lose.
It’ll be public, and I’ll file charges against him for the unlawful disclosure of intimate images.
So he’s trying to take my father’s money through the courts while all I want to do is protect my father’s legacy.
Because either way, that video will destroy my father’s name. ”
“That’s fucking rich,” Vale scoffs. She stands beside Nash, casually fondling his ass. No one balks. “So not only is your ex threatening to assassinate your character, he’s threatening to take your father’s money? God, I wanna stab his testicles.”
Nash mutters, “Holster your blades around my balls, Poison.”
Ruby narrows her violet eyes. “Yeah, as much as I want to take a hammer to his dick like Donkey Kong, and—”
“Damn, ladies.” I wince. “Can we discuss this without dick mutilation?”
Delphine flits her hand. “If men want power, they must accept the peril. Even to their precious penis.”
Grant snorts proudly. “Fuck, I love you, woman. Just be precious with my penis, please.”
Vivian stifles her chuckle. It’s cute and starting to warm my heart; she’s fitting right in.
“As I was saying,” Ruby resumes, focused on Vivian. “Let’s hammer his dick and twist this around. If we can’t stop that video, what if you say it’s a deepfake? That it’s AI and a lie?”
“Fuck that!” I interject. “I want him and that video buried.”
Holding Vivian in my arms last night, in our first hug, as her tears soaked my shirt, made me want to end this. No spin. No exceptions. No breath remaining.
“Jace.” Vivian must sense my rage. She touches my arm. “It’s okay. It’s a good idea in case we can’t—”
“Oh, but we fucking will, Viv.” I cup her cheek. Suddenly, I’m feeling more and more possessive over her, and she’s letting me. “You have no idea what we can do. Together. Trust me.”
“Trust us,” Grant adds. “Just give us intel and time, and we’ll nail him.”
“And his dick,” Ruby gloats.
She makes Axel proud. I can tell he’s twitching to wrap his arms around Ruby, but we’re wading into these waters with Vivian.
I don’t want to drown her with our bonds.
“Just promise me one thing.” Vivian addresses the room, “Please help me nail him, but I want to be the one to tell him. I want to relish the look on his face when he realizes I’ve won.”
A sudden image crosses my mind, stirring my cock. Imagining exactly how Vivian can show her ex how much she’s won, while I show him how much he’s lost.
Fuck, I can be a dark man when it comes to protecting her.
Vivian writes a list for Delphine and Ruby of every place her ex frequents and may be hiding those servers. She emails her friend, the attorney, asking her to share files with Nash and Axel.
She watches intently as Grant shows her how to download a dummy app he’s developed onto David’s phone or laptop if she gets the chance. It’ll give Grant secret access if she can do it undetected.
It makes me so damn proud of her.
Hours later, after her client leaves, I can tell today has been a lot. I offer to take a rain check on the darkroom if I can escort her home.
The power of our proximity, the promise of what we can be together, and the peril she’s in leave me quiet as we near her house.
“I have to go home every night.” She pierces the silence, explaining. “He checks the security cameras at my house. And—”
“I understand.” I clench my jaw.
“Even when I travel for work, I feel like he’s watching me. Guess that’s paranoia, or—”
“It’s not. It’s smart.”
Walking side by side, our arms brush, but I don’t hold her hand again. Not in public. The little fucker or one of his poser friends could be tailing us.
I know better.
As much as I want to bomb that fucker’s face with my fist, this is a stealth mission, and we’re used to them. Hiding from our father. Hunting traffickers. Ending this war.
I can feel everything coming to a head, while mine swims with thoughts of holding Vivian again.
“Thank you.” She softly sighs into the night. “I never felt that before.”
My pulse climbs, not sure what she’s referring to because I felt everything today. Love. Lust. Blood lust. Blood brothers. Fierce women. Fierce bonds.
“Felt what?” I risk the question.
“Felt like I had a family or something like it. It was always my mom and me, or my dad and me. And for years, it’s been just me. I mean, I have Harlow and my mom, but they don’t know what’s going on.”
“Not even Harlow? She’s your best friend, right?”
“Yeah, so I want to keep her on the right side of the law, because if I tell her, she’d break them for me. And my mom?” she laments. “She’d give up her dream career to come home for me, but I’ll be okay.”
We turn the corner toward her house, kicking through a carpet of pink magnolia petals on the sidewalk.
A soft touch grazes my pinky, and my soul ignites. It’s Vivian, sneaking a touch. “You’re my best friend too,” she murmurs. “You feel it, right?”
We stop in front of her iron gate, and for the first time, being best friends isn’t enough. It’s not enough to contain everything I feel for her. I thought I could hold this in, but it’s been a year and forever, and the links in my chain are breaking free, one by one.
I can barely speak, holding back the beast. “Yeah.”
She blinks up at me with warm, expectant eyes. “Good night, Jace.” Before they dart to her left in an obvious gesture.
The camera above her gate is aimed at me, its red light blinking.
Goddamn, I want to kiss her right here in front of it. I want him to see how she should be loved. I want him to watch me pound my dick so hard inside her, I’ll leave no doubt she’s mine now. I’ll make her come with a scream for me and his camera.
Fuck him.
Instead, we’ll hack the camera. We’ll load dummy footage of an empty sidewalk for him to watch, while I take Vivian inside and empty my aching balls so deep inside her. I’ll watch it drip from her pussy before I lick it up, making her come before I do it all over again.
“Good night, Vivian. And for the record…” I shove my hands into my pockets, drawing her attention to how hard I love her. She softly gasps at it before I add, “Smokeshow, you’re my best everything.”
I turn and walk into the night.