Chapter 16
Jett
In the morning, Bryson pulls up with today’s special request. A box of black lab puppies, he had somehow managed to snag from a breeder.
I don’t know why, but I feel like it’s important that when I have this conversation with Max, we’re covered in puppies like we were the first time that we met.
They were my good luck charm then and hopefully now, too.
It feels equally lucky to have Baby open the door for me this time and escort me straight up the stairs to her dad’s office.
“This one’s mine,” she says and grins, kissing me on the cheek before scooping the runt out the box and heading down to the living room for a cuddle. I want to follow her so badly, but it's time to man the fuck up.
My exhausted, strung-out body starts to shake when I see Max holding the door to his office for me. The one that’s all mahogany and leather and ancient weapons. He has an emerald-encrusted dagger he flips absent-mindedly in his hand as I enter.
“What do you plan on doing with that, Max?”
“Oh, now don’t you Max me!” He eyes the puppies.
“Cheeky fucker, you know how to soften me, eh?” He takes the box and sets it on the floor between the leather chairs angled towards each other in front of his massive desk, handing a puppy to me and hugging another to his chest. “Take a seat, son. Yesterday, I watched my pride and joy, my darling youngest daughter, blubber like a baby watching footage of our front door. Now, why do you think that is?”
Is that a freaking trick question?
“Well, hopefully because she really fancies me, Max, and I said some pretty sweet shit that maybe got her emotional.”
“Pretty sweet shit,” he echoes, “indeed. Shit like you’ve always said, so you can get anyone with a pulse to shag you.”
“No.” I protest. “I’ve never said anything of the sort! I’ve never promised a girl’s family members monogamy and commitment like that, and certainly not offered grandchildren, for Christ's sake. Never!”
“That wasn’t just a line to get Jewels to agree to whatever the fuck this is you want me to agree to?”
“Hell no! I’ve never even said that word aloud, Max, you gotta believe me!”
“I wanna,” he says, sighing, “but I don’t gotta. Why Baby? Why now? Your life is about to absolutely explode, Jett.”
“Max, I knew Baby was perfect for me the moment we met. It’s not my fault she wanted nothing to do with my kind.
I did the right thing. I let her be who she was.
I didn’t waste time convincing her to date me; I thought she’d look at me like scum under her feet just for asking.
And why wouldn’t I want to be with her now?
Think about times in your life where your career exploded. Who was by your side?”
He nods thoughtfully. “It wasn’t always Jewels. And things only went smoothly when it was. I couldn’t handle my life, my career, anything before her. She’s the only thing that keeps me sane.”
“And I don’t deserve that sanity, Max?”
His voice grows gruff, and he points the pup at me.
“I didn’t say that! But you haven’t convinced me that your dick can stay in your pants, and since it sounds like you want more than a quick shag, thank fuck, you’re going to have to convince me that you can.
” He drags his iPad from the corner of his desk and presents it to me.
“Exhibit A. What would you do in this situation, Jett? Hmm?”
Max takes his tablet and turns it so that I can see the screen, and I try not to start laughing my arse off.
I silently curse Jude because he’s probably the one who taught him how to do this.
A picture of me wearing nothing but my pants has been pasted into the middle of his screen, where he has surrounded me with four of the world’s fittest supermodels.
He’s used his stylus to make a crudely drawn, red pen diagram of ‘supermodels plus Jett plus empty hotel room plus 3:00 in the morning equals cheating on Baby.’ In the corner he has pasted an actual picture of Baby crying from an episode of ‘Palace.’ You can’t make this shit up.
I give every last drop of my effort not to laugh at his creation. “Pops, you know how booze and sex are me self-medicating, so I don’t need pills! Like, that sleeping pill they’re always telling me to take when I get worked up! That’s what I’ve always done and—”
“I know all of this, Jett, even more reason for you to answer the fucking question. If sex is your medication, what the bloody hell would you do if you promised yourself to Baby but she’s on set somewhere and you’re here?
You’re telling me you’d take the triazolam, kick the models out, and go to sleep? ”
“Yeah,” I say uselessly.
“Uh-huh.” He sighs. “Jett, give me a legit plan or I’m kicking your arse out of here right now!”
“I’d pawn them off on my single bandmates and go hang with the crew on their bus.”
“You really believe that?”
“Yeah, I do, because I am so sick of sleeping with strangers, Max! I want to be with someone I care about, and that person is Baby, all right? If you just let me prove it to you—”
“You will. Now, Exhibit B. You’re filming a video with this bird and you’re hitting it off, she’s asking you to join her for a drink in her dressing room. Well? What do you do?”
He swipes to a shirtless me cut and pasted into a convertible with another supermodel, this time one I know. That Alessandra Olina, who has great legs, but couldn’t slam whiskey from a teacup the way my dreamgirl could. She’s fit, yeah, but can’t hold a damn candle to Baby.
“Could’ve shagged her years ago, wasn’t interested. If she invited me for a drink, I’d tell her my Baby can shoot whiskey better than she ever could.”
“Good answer. Now, have you had enough dick in your life yet?” I snort as his finger hovers over a ridiculous Exhibit C which has me surrounded by the boy band of the moment, The Notorious Five, all shirtless and glistening.
I don't want to explain that I've already shagged two of them.
Been there, done that. Too much drama. Not that Max would be shocked by that or anything I say, which is why he's my best mate on the planet - the only one who truly understands me.
Nothing can shock the man that bloody electrocuted himself on stage, on purpose.
“Those blokes don't interest me. I’ve had my fill of willies. Unless you're saying Baby has one?” This is so fucking funny, I'm proper proud of myself for not laughing yet. Max sighs.
“Everyone ‘round here has changed that one's nappies and can confirm she doesn't.”
I nod. “Then I'm done with ‘em.”
He shakes his head, swiping until he lands on a somewhat official-looking contract that is, of course, ’cause nothing is bloody normal ’round here, a literal blood oath compact.
“Smart move, honestly, proud of you for playing the long game, waiting until it was her idea. She won’t do shit unless it’s her bloody idea. ”
“Oh, I know.”
“Never thought you had that kind of patience, lad.”
The pup wiggles against my chest, but my eyes are saucer-sized looking at this looming document in front of me. “I’m a fuckin’ well of patience. Now, what the hell is this?”
“It’s a blood oath, what the fuck you think?”
My eyes scan the contract with ‘I solemnly swear not to have sexual relations of any kind with anyone except Matilda Rose Morningstar’ on it, seriously.
There are plenty more promises on here, and honestly, I can do them all.
Treat her right, communicate daily, no matter where I’m at, spoil her, but don’t suffocate her.
Easy. I reach for his stylus and write my name with the wonky thing all over it while the dog falls back to sleep, blissfully unaware I’m signing my literal life away.
“Did you read the fine print, son?”
I squint my eyes and read it aloud, “breaking this contract in any way will lead to a crushed larynx and two broken femurs as a best-case scenario. Jesus, Max!”
He smirks at his handiwork. “Still want your name all over this?”
“Fuck it, yes, I can do it all, no problem.”
“Good.” He grins and sets the dogs back in the box. I hear the printer going off, and he grabs a paper copy of the contract while it’s still warm. He picks up the dagger and flips it through the air. “Palm up,” he demands.
“You’re fucking mental, man.”
“And so are you, and that’s why we’re here, now, you might want that.
” He points to a glass of scotch on the edge of his desk.
I shake my head and down it as Max slices an inch-long cut in the middle of my palm.
I release a painful gasp into the glass as he tilts my hand over the paper, dripping my blood straight onto that oath.
He looks at it, pleased, and starts bandaging me up.
“Worth it, right?” He swipes the tablet, and my eyebrows arch at the ideas laid out before me.
Everything on here is like the key to unlocking Baby’s heart, all on the first date.
“You’re gonna help me with all this?”
“Well, now that I’ve got you signed, sealed, and delivered, got to make her happy. My daughters aren’t exactly easy to impress.”
Shit, now my eyes are wet. “Thanks, Dad. I won’t let you down.”
“I hope not. You’d never sing again if I had’ta smash your larynx.” He crushes me in a tight embrace. “Oh, and, son?”
“Yeah?”
“Gentleman, right? No shagging on the first date. Promise?”
I nod. “You got my word, Dad.”
“Good.” He smiles. “And I’m keeping these fuckin’ dogs! See you tomorrow, son.”
Downstairs, Baby beams at me. She cuddles the dog up to her cheek. “Can I keep him, Jett?”
“You can keep him, and you can keep me.”
“Really?” Her eyes spark.
“Absolutely, Baby.” I hold up my hand. “I swore to treat you right, Dad insisted I sign in blood.”
“Jesus! What the hell?” she says, inspecting the bandage. She tries to sound shocked but she’s fuckin’ grinning. “Sorry, why do I love that?”
“Because you’re mental like I am, now kiss me, please.”
She sets down the pup on a soft chair and jumps on me like she did in the pool house that day; my last bit of self-control folding like a house of cards.
I don’t give a shit how much my hand stings, I grasp her as if my life depends on it, and the feeling of ownership over her perfect peach of an arse in my hands makes me forget I have a cut at all.
“Tight little arse, perfect fit for my hands,” I drawl against her lips. “Wonder if that fanny will be soaked for me this time, too.”
She pulls her face from mine with her cute nose all scrunched. “Jett, no, uh uh.”
My brows raise. “What?”
“No arse, no fanny! Just…” She lowers her voice. “Ass and pussy only. Please?” She turns pink.
“You serious?” She nods and I get it now, her eyes tell me everything.
That’s what fuckwit Archer must’ve called them, and the last thing I want is to remind her of him.
“You got it, Baby,” I say, forcing my tongue to take the r out of the word, “I’ve never wanted to own an ass and pussy the way I want to own yours, princess. ”
Now her cheeks are scarlet, and my lips devour hers, moaning in her sweet mouth as her glossy, vanilla lips part for me, and I feel her desire soaking through her shorts where my shirt rises up at my beltline.
I can't bloody believe it took most of a damn decade to get her wet.
I don't know how, either, but I better pay my trainer a hefty freakin’ bonus, just in case.
She clings to me the way I’ve dreamed she might for longer than I can remember, walking her towards the grand staircase that leads to her room like a man possessed.
All I want is to throw her down on that pink bed and feast on her until she’s lost her voice and all that’s left is a hoarse croak still trying to scream my name.
The toe of my boot taps the first step, and then we hit a wall of Morningstars, literally guarding the staircase with their arms crossed and all.
“Tomorrow, Jett!” they holler in unison and kick me out on yeah, my arse.
I stumble to where Bry is waiting in a daze and fall into the car like it’s a cloud and bloody Cupid has struck me. I feel ready to finish the damn album today because there’s no way I’m sleeping tonight anyway. Not when I’m finally hers, signed in blood.