Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Landon
“Do you have any Jacks?”
Jett shakes his head. “Go fish.”
I reach into the pile of cards, picking one up and adding it to my hand.
I am having the hardest time focusing right now.
It takes all of my self control not to push my face into the blanket around my shoulders and sniff it until Jett’s scent is completely gone.
His scent is all around me, sinking into my skin. It’s driving me up the fucking wall.
Obviously, I caught his scent the moment I put his clothes on but the moment I was allowed to scent him straight from his wrist, I feel like my brain was completely rewired.
Jett smells like the ocean, but there’s more to it than that.
Weirdly, there’s a warmth to his scent, like that feeling of your toes touching sunkissed sand.
My chest feels all tingly and weird every time I breathe it in.
I feel like I’m growing obsessed, addicted to catching it just a little bit more.
Jett sits on the floor across from me, his brow wrinkled in concentration as we play Go-Fish.
It’s adorable, how serious he takes the game.
Or maybe he’s just serious in general. I don’t know him well enough to know what sort of personality he has but so far, he seems like a serious type of person, an introvert who’s being forced to have a guest in their house against their will.
I’m thankful he was here to save me, but I can’t stop feeling bad that I’ve put him into this position.
“Do you have any threes?”
I toss the card over to him and he adds it to his pile. “I feel like you’re cheating.”
“I assure you, I am not. I simply have better luck than you it would seem.”
I like the way he talks. It’s always very straightforward and to the point. His voice is deeper than my own and soothing. I think I could listen to him list the ingredients on the back of a shampoo bottle and wouldn’t get bored.
“Maybe you’re seeing my cards in the reflection of my glasses or something,” I murmur, looking through my hand. “Do you have any sevens?”
“Go fish.”
“Damnnit.”
Jett’s face lightens and I find him smiling at me. “Do you have any twos?”
I let out a long sigh, tossing the card I just picked up over to him.
“What do you do for a living?”
Jett looks surprised. “You know the Greys?” They’re the neighbors who live on the other side of Jett. I say the word neighbor very loosely. Just like I live miles away, so do the Greys. “I take care of their farm.”
Ah, that would explain the farmer’s tan when I saw him in the river. He must always wear a T-shirt while he’s outside working. It also explains the muscles. Gods, I can’t stop thinking about what he looked like shirtless and the smell of him all around me isn’t helping!
“That’s really cool,” I tell him. “It must keep you in great shape.”
“It does. I take care of their animals and potato farm. We sell most of the crops we produce at the farmer’s market in town. I get to keep some of them myself.”
“I love potatoes.”
“Who doesn’t?”
I grin at him before looking down at my cards. “Do you have any Queens?”
He finally tosses me a card and I make a happy little noise as I take it. He has a strange look in his eyes when I look back up that quickly disappears.
“What about you?”
“I work from home, which as you know is nice because the trip into town is a long one,” I say with a chuckle. “I’m a freelance editor. Do you know what a monster fucker is?”
Jett chokes on his drink, sputtering. I can’t help but chuckle, finding his flusteredness adorable. He’s such a big guy. Who would have thought something like monster fucking would get him blushing?
“What?”
“You know, the genre? Monsterfucking romance?”
“Okay,” he says, waving me off. “I get it. You edit books about humans fucking monsters?”
“Exactly! And it’s not what you think, these are actually really sweet books.”
“Sweet monsters?”
“Yes! There’s this one I edited recently, it was actually two vampires who’ve been best friends for centuries.
They visit a museum and one of them realizes one of their diaries was found and added to the museum.
Not wanting anyone to read his secret entries featuring his feelings for his best friend, they decide to do a heist to get the diary back.
During the heist, the other vampire reads the diary and realizes his best friend has been in love with him for centuries. It’s incredibly adorable!”
Jett blinks at me, taking this all in. “Where’s the monsterfucking part?”
“Oh, once they’re on the same page they suck a bad guy dry and fuck in the blood. It’s awesome!”
Jett opens his mouth to respond before he snaps it closed again. He stares at me for a long time before finally responding. “Send me the link.”
This is not what I was expecting. I’m so surprised that I can’t help but laugh, feeling it come straight from my chest. I grin over at him. “You got it. I’ll need your number for that.”
Jett lists off his number and I add it to my phone. Once that’s done, I check my phone for the first time, realizing my dad has tried to call me three times.
“Fuck,” I murmur, pulling up his number and hitting call. “I’m so sorry, my dad’s trying to call me.”
“You’re fine,” Jett says, setting down his cards. He walks into the kitchen, giving me a moment of privacy.
“Dad? Hey, what’s up?”
“Landon! Are you okay? Why didn’t you answer or text?”
I look out the window, watching the sheets of white continue to fall. It hasn’t let up since I stumbled into Jett’s home. I still have no idea how I didn’t realize this storm was coming, but at the back of my mind, a tiny voice whispers that maybe it was destiny pushing me here.
“I’m so sorry! I’m actually visiting my neighbor. It’s a long story but I promise I’m safe and fine. There’s a snowstorm though.”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to call you about,” my dad explains. “Our flight got cancelled because of the storm.”
“Oh shit! It’s really that bad?”
“It’s awful. No planes going in or out. They said we could reschedule our flight but it wouldn’t be until at least Friday.”
An entire week. Shit, this storm really is no joke!
“Okay, keep me updated!”
“Are you sure you’re okay? I don’t understand how you’re visiting your neighbor like this, Landon. How will you get home?”
“I think I’ll be staying here until it’s safe to get back home.”
“Who is this neighbor anyway? You never told me about meeting them.”
“It’s a really long story, one that I promise I will tell you when you’re here, okay?”
My dad lets out a long sigh that makes me smile. He’s such a gossip, needing to know every little detail he can get his hands on.
“Tell Dad that I say hi and that I love him. I’m sorry our plans got turned upside down.”
“That’s okay, Landon, we don’t mind. Hopefully everything will clear up and our plans won’t have to change again.”
“I hope so too,” I tell him, letting out a deep sigh. “Keep me posted, okay?”
“You do the same.”
I tell my dad goodbye and hang up the phone.
I lean my head against the couch. This is such a mess and I have no one to blame but myself.
I was so busy thinking about everything I needed to do that I forgot to double check what was happening around me.
I do that a lot, get lost inside my head, thinking about everything except for what’s right in front of me.
I’m startled when Jett speaks, not even realizing he’s sat down across from me again. Once again, lost in thought.
“What’s that look for? Bad call?”
I shake my head, rubbing at my eyes under my glasses, hoping it’ll rub all these awful feelings away. “It was my dad. He was just checking in on me.”
“Does he live around here?”
“Nope. My dads were planning on flying in on Monday for a visit but their flight got cancelled. They won’t be able to come until Friday and that’s only if things clear up.”
“I’m glad they haven’t left yet. It’ll be much safer now that they have to wait.”
That’s an excellent way of looking at the situation. I like that Jett does that, sees the good in bad situations. Or at least, that’s what he’s been doing since I arrived today.
“What about you? Are your parents around here?”
Jett shakes his head, looking away. “My parents were quite old when they had me. I have thirteen siblings and they were the ones who raised me.”
“Thirteen?” I ask, my voice rising. “Really? Holy shit, I cannot imagine that.”
Jett cracks a small smile. “There was never a dull moment, I will tell you that. My oldest sister, Himari, was like my mother. She’s a triplet.”
“A triplet?”
“Yes, Landon. This would go much more smoothly if you didn’t repeat everything I say,” he says but he chuckles, letting me know he’s just teasing me.
“I’m sorry! Your family sounds really rare, that’s all. What’s the likelihood of being from a big family and having triplets. That’s wild.”
“Most of my siblings are not solo births,” he explains. “I was one of the only ones. Triplets, twins, and even a set of four.” When my eyes bug out he goes on, “it’s an octopus thing.”
“Oh! Okay, yeah. I guess that makes sense. Still, that must have been hard, being raised in such a big family.”
“It had its ups and downs, just as any family,” Jett says with a shrug. “I know one thing for certain, I don’t plan on having as big of a family if I ever find a mate. It was chaotic and I don’t particularly like chaos in my life.”
“That’s so fair,” I say, nodding my head.
“My family is like the opposite of yours. My parents were really young when they had me. They were neighbors growing up and when my omega father had his first heat, my alpha dad was there. They scented that they were true mates and as you can imagine, one thing led to another. They never had any more kids after that. I always wondered what it would be like to have siblings but I wasn’t one of those kids desperate for a baby sibling.
I did ask for one for a long time but that desire faded as I got older.
I liked that I had my dads’ full attention. ”
“That sounds really nice.”
“It was,” I say with a soft smile. “Does your sister live nearby?”
“She’s the only one who lives in town,” Jett explains softly.
“She lives with her mate, a human man named Pierce. The rest of my siblings have scattered. A few of them have even moved overseas. We do our best to stay in contact but mostly we just throw updates into a group chat whenever we can. Growing up with Japanese parents meant that we were all expected to be extraordinary and I can say with full certainty that we’ve managed to accomplish that, each in our own ways. ”
The way that Jett talks about his siblings makes my chest warm.
He sounds so proud of all of them. It must have been difficult, growing up as the last sibling in such a large family and losing his parents at such a young age, yet Jett has grown into a well adjusted man.
He’s successful and kind enough to help a stranger.
The more I get to know Jett, the more I like him.
Sure, he’s handsome as fuck. From the moment I saw him in that river, I’ve found him attractive and I’ll admit, he’s played a role in some very steamy daydreams. Now that I’m getting to know him with his shirt on, I still want to fuck him but I also just want to sit beside him and listen to him talk.
I want to keep pulling these layers away and learn more about how he is.
The more I learn about Jett, the more I like him. Like actually maybe like him like him. I’m developing a real, actual, serious crush on the man.
Surely that won’t make my stay here awkward.