Chapter 30
JAMIE
We fell asleep sometime after midnight and woke up before the sun rose.
I pack our bags in the back of the Mustang, knowing Blaire wants to be at the manor early enough to shower before her roommates wake up.
When she walks past me in the living room, making sure she grabbed everything, I pull her into me.
“No sulking,” I remind her, kissing her. “Leaving was your decision.”
“I just don’t know if I’m ready for this,” she admits.
“I’ll stay here with you in this cabin until Halloween. Just say the words.”
“I can’t hide. It’s not what Wardwells do.”
“Okay. I’m following your lead.” I take her coat off the hook by the door and hold it open for her.
She puts one arm in the sleeve and stops. “What’s my lead?”
“I think we need to decide before we’re back in Pine Haven. Figure it out now without an audience.”
“We already denied it.”
“You’re right.” I help her with the other arm. “And no one believed a word of it. So, our other options are to deflect or confirm.”
“I don’t want to confirm anything. In a few weeks, you’ll be gone, and I’ll still be dealing with the consequences of being another fling of Jameson Cross.”
“If it makes you feel any better”—I laugh—“you’ve been the best fling.”
“Oh, sure. I’m sure you tell all your hookups that.” She rolls her eyes.
“Nope,” I say, holding her close to me. “I’ll make sure to tell the paparazzi that when I’m asked.”
She turns around and wraps her arms around me. “Why is this so hard?”
“I have my theories,” I singsong.
“I don’t want to know,” she says, pulling away from me, but I don’t let her get far.
“We say nothing. Not to a camera or a reporter or even a random tourist in your shop who asks you sweetly about your relationship while she’s buying candles for her grandkids. We don’t correct or confirm anything. No one deserves an explanation. As far as I’m concerned, it’s speculation.”
She’s quiet. “I don’t want to pretend like I don’t know you. That’s my boundary.”
“Ah.” I give her a half-grin. “Friends?”
“In public. Fuck buddies behind the scenes. I want to be able to have coffee. Or dinner. Maybe even a drink at High Spirits. Even if there’s a mountain of space between us, we play the friend card. I’ll be your bro.”
I don’t mean to laugh, but having her choose not to hide us completely is a step in the right direction. It’s joy that I feel.
“Fuck, I agree.”
She smiles, and I love to see her happy.
“One more thing.” She somewhat hesitates. “My friends won’t sell me out, even if they’re pissed I didn’t tell them. There will come a point though when you’re back in New York and I’m still here. I’ll ask them to never mention you.”
That’s a dagger in my heart. “Sure.”
“It’s just … I don’t want them to continue to hook us up when this is over. Makes things awkward.” She pulls her hair out from under her collar. “Please don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you’re disappointed,” she says.
“Know that when I speak to anyone from here, my first question will always be about you,” I say without holding back. “Fling or not, I care. We’re friends.”
She looks away from me; the moment growing too intense. We both turn around and look at the tiny little space. Sheets are cleaned, and the wood is stacked for the next time Blaire visits. The trash is going back with us.
“Ready?” she asks.
“As much as I’ll ever be,” I tell her, leading the way.
Five days ago, we came up to this cabin in the afternoon. She had her window down, and she was catching the wind between her fingers. So much has changed since then.
She locks the door behind her and tries the handle twice. The key goes into her coat pocket instead of her bag, and her other hand reaches for mine. We take our time walking to the car, gravel crunching under our boots. It’s chilly, and our breath comes out in puffs.
“Want to ride with the top down?”
She shivers. “Hell no.”
“Joking,” I say, opening the door for her.
We’re quiet on the way down, listening to some progressive rock station on satellite radio. My mind is running a million miles per hour as I take the switchbacks. When we’re close to the bottom, my phone starts dinging with notifications. I reach for it and silence it.
My phone keeps ringing, and I stop at the turnoff at the bottom of the road.
“Answer it,” she says. “They keep calling over and over.”
I put it in park and answer on speaker.
“Where are you?” David, the chair of my board, asks before I can say hello. He spent eleven years standing up for me in rooms when nobody else bothered.
“Good morning, David and everyone else listening.”
Somebody else clears their throat, so there are at least a few of them in the room at seven in the morning, New York time.
“This is out of hand, Jamie.”
“What is? Me being friends with someone?” I glance at Blaire, who sits back, wearing a devilish grin, as I lie.
“You’re not just friends,” Bart says.
“Excuse me. We are just friends. The pictures prove there was a slip of judgment. That is it.”
“That’s what your PR statement should’ve said. The gossip sites and what’s being said is too much. A rumor is spreading about a Cross curse. Are you aware of this?”
That makes my heart race.
“Her bewitching you. Putting love spells on you,” David says.
Blaire shrugs.
“That’s nonsense. We are friends. I’m allowed to have them. I will see you in November.”
“We need to put this fire out,” David says.
“Then be firemen and do what you have to,” I tell them, then hang up.
Her brow lifts. “Be firemen?”
“Fuck them,” I tell her, leaning over to kiss her.
She grabs my shirt as our tongues slide together. It gets heated way too fast. I’m insatiable for her.
“Shit, I want you so bad,” she whispers. “Take a shower with me at the manor. Give me something to think about all day.”
“Don’t have to ask me twice.”
I pull out onto the road. Everything that surrounds us is brown: the trees, the grass, the building. Pumpkins are everywhere, and so are the tourists. I reach over for her hand. It’s an invitation, and she takes it. We’re carefree in ways I’ve only wished for.
“I could never just be your friend,” I admit as I take the back roads to the manor.
“Sure you could,” she says confidently. “I’m friends with a lot of guys who want to fuck me.”
“Not anymore,” I say.
“Aw, don’t get jealous. There’s only one man in Pine Haven I want.”
She squeezes my fingers, and I grin.
“Keep it that way,” I state, parking on the street behind her house.
“You’re coming with me?” she asks.
“Abso-fucking-lutely,” I tell her.
We get out of the car and run down the sidewalk and through the gate. She unlocks the door and pulls me inside before pushing me against the door to steal a kiss. My heart slams in my chest as I wrap my arms around her waist.
“There are the lovebirds,” Josie says behind us, and Blaire screams.
“Fuck, you’re up early.” Blaire turns toward her as I move my hands away.
“Don’t worry. The jig is up. Your secret is safe with me,” she says, moving into the kitchen.
Charles prances toward me, and I pick him up, kissing his head. The purrs are instant.
“You’re such a big boy,” I whisper. “Been good?”
She watches me love on Sir Charles, who pushes up into my chin.
“He really likes you.”
“Because he knows what’s good.”
She starts down the hallway. “You can put him down.”
“Not until he wants me to.”
I follow her up the stairs to her bedroom. Charlie’s done with me the second we cross the threshold, so I let him go. The door clicks closed, and then it’s just us. I’ve never been in her room in daylight. It’s different, calm.
There’s the black robe she wore for me on a hook on the bathroom door and a stack of books on the floor beside the bed. It looks like random receipts mark her spots. A pair of boots is lined up under the window, with the toes pointed out.
She catches me studying her space and doesn’t ask what I’m thinking. I wouldn’t have an answer for her anyway. Every inch of this room is her.
“Where’d you go?”
“To the place where I store memories of you,” I admit.
I think I see her blush. But instead of mentioning it, she leads me into the bathroom. We remove each other’s clothes, then step into the shower. Leaving early was worth every fucking second.
The water is barely warm when she leads me under the stream. She kisses my jaw and the hollow under it. Blaire washes me. This morning, her hands touch every inch of me, driving me fucking wild. Soap suds run down my chest and stomach.
“I like the control you give me,” she says.
Then she goes down onto her knees.
“Sweetheart.”
Water runs over her shoulders, and her dark hair sticks to her back.
She keeps eye contact as she takes me into her mouth.
My breathing doesn’t stay steady as she completely ruins me.
She’s unhurried as she licks and sucks each inch of me.
Every so often, she hums around me like she’s pleased with herself.
“Blaire.” I fist her hair as my eyes roll into the back of my head.
She keeps going, taking me even deeper, and holds me at the edge until I’m ready to burst.
Both my legs begin to shake, and she places her palms on my thighs. She works me through every second of it and doesn’t let go. She swallows me down, not wasting a single drop.
“Mmm,” she says, satisfied with herself.
Her nipples are hard, and if I placed my fingers between her thighs, I know she’d be wet.
I move her hair off her face with both hands.
“I want you just how you are,” I say. “I don’t want you to be anyone other than yourself when you’re with me.”
“I always am,” she whispers. “That’s how I know …” Blaire doesn’t finish her sentence, but whatever she was thinking makes her smile.
My thumb brushes across her cheek.
“I want the same from you,” she says.
“I’ve never pretended when we’re together,” I admit. “I don’t have to.”
The truth earns me a kiss. I get a hand under her thigh and lift her up.
“Jamie, we don’t have time.”
“Then I’ll hurry.” I turn her around. “Palms on the wall for me, sweetheart.”
She does what I said and arches her ass, giving me the perfect angle to slide into her wet hole.
I don’t rush, even if she thinks we don’t have time. She’s earned this.
The hot water is infinite as I reach around and rub circles on her clit.
“Oh my,” she whispers.
“Shh.” I laugh against the back of her head just as she loses the war.
Her forehead drops between her hands on the tiles, and she keeps quiet. I fuck her through it as water runs down her back.
Seconds later, she’s turning, back against the dark tiles, watching me.
“You’re good at this,” she says.
Her alarm goes off on her phone in her bedroom, and she rushes out of the shower. “Shit. That’s my I need to be out the door alarm.”
She rushes to get dressed, and I sit on the edge of the bed, watching her, taking my time putting on the clothes I arrived in.
“I have a candle shipment coming today, and they usually show up around nine, so if I miss them, I’ll be screwed for the rest of the month,” she explains.
She talks the entire time, even while she quickly puts on some lipstick. Halfway through it, I realize she’s telling me about her day. This is her life she’s sharing with me, and I don’t take it for granted.
At five to nine, she’s leading me down the stairs. “Go out the back.”
“This is where we part ways?” I ask.
“Yeah,” she tells me. “Will I see you later?”
“Fuck yeah,” I say, kissing her quickly.
She stands there with her hand on the knob, like she’s contemplating.
“Go get ’em, tiger,” I whisper.
“Thank you.” She opens the door.
Blaire steps out of her house with her head held high. A small crowd of people waits for her on the sidewalk. She greets them with a smile before moving past them. I watch her until she’s out of view, and then I escape out the back door.