Chapter 27

Jax

The woman still hadn’t called me. She still hadn’t damn well called, and I wasn’t the man who sat around with a thumb up his ass for someone else to make a move. It’d been three fucking days since we’d last spoken, and I’d caught myself glancing at my phone too many times.

This would end now.

I forced myself up from behind my chromed-out desk and charged toward the misted glass door that let out of my office.

Fuck, for the first time since Bane had bought the damn building, this felt like my office. I’d never spent as much time in it as I had since Riley had left my apartment. The place was empty to me without her there. And walking into the guest room was out of the question.

Her smell was on everything. It was a lavender-and-vanilla-scented hell in there, peppered with memories of her naked body supple and willing beneath my fingertips. I’d have her again. I’d have her all fucking night.

I reached for the door handle and froze mid-grab.

A shape appeared on the other side of that misted glass.

It can’t be her.

I turned the handle, my pulse racing for the first time in my life—hadn’t done that out of nerves since I’d picked a fight with Jimmy No-Hands out on the streets after the first time I’d run from home. The fucker had gotten the nickname for breaking hands, not because he didn’t have any.

The door swung inward, and all the hope or excitement disappeared as quickly as it’d come on. Frustration replaced it. I flexed my fingers, raised an eyebrow. “What the fuck do you want?”

“Cole.” Veronica stood on the threshold of my office, arms across her chest, her blue eyes nearly identical to mine, blonde hair the same shade. She was a mess. She had a rip in her T-shirt and a look on her face that would’ve terrified a hardened criminal.

“Where’s your kid?” I asked and peered past her.

“Nessy’s with a babysitter,” she replied. “Not that you’ve ever given a shit about your niece.”

“As far as I can recall, no one told me I had a niece until a month ago.”

Veronica hissed. “Well, there sure were plenty of things you didn’t tell me.” She was insistent I’d never made an effort to reconnect with her, and sure, I probably could’ve done more than a few voice messages and missed calls, but at least I’d fucking tried. It took a lot for me to try for anyone, least of all a sister who clearly had a stick rammed so far up her ass it’d become her spine.

“What do you want?” I asked.

“To come in,” she replied, then licked her lips. “Please, Cole.”

“Jax,” I replied. “My name’s not Cole anymore, Veronica. Cole was a person who wound up on the street, who got lost in the prison system. That facet of me was learned from, it was absorbed. This is who I am.” I stepped back and let her into the office then shut the door. I walked around to the windows and leaned my forearm against one, looked down on Miami, again. “Where’s Riley?” I asked.

“I think you know where she is,” Veronica replied. “At my apartment.”

“How would I know that?”

“Oh, come on, I wasn’t born yesterday. I know what kind of man you are. You’ve got your fingers in every pie and your ear to the ground, and that tells me one thing.”

“And what’s that?”

“That you don’t want her. That you’re using her. Why else would you have let her move out? Or rather, why else would you have kicked her out? Why else would you not have come to see her by now?” Veronica was on a roll now. I eyed my sister askance. She was puffed up, trembling, and red as a fucking tomato. “You don’t care about her. You used her to get what you wanted and threw her out. I’m surprised you haven’t bought her studio yet and—”

“I did buy her studio,” I replied evenly.

“I knew it.”

“And I didn’t kick her out.” Why the hell would she even say that? “Riley was insistent on distancing herself from me for no good reason other than that she was scared of what being with me would entail.”

“Being with you? Being with—?” She cut off, shaking her head. “I don’t understand. You’re that guy. The one who fucks women and leaves them in the dirt of their regret. You don’t want to be with anyone, and that’s exactly why this thing with Riley is a disaster.”

“What thing?”

“I know you know,” she whispered and opened her purse, a ratty tote bag practically glued to her side by her elbow. She reached inside and brought out what looked like a stick with a blue cap. “Don’t tell me you don’t know.”

“What the fuck are you talking about, Veronica? Have you come unglued? Look, I know you’re having trouble dealing with the fact that I supposedly fucking abandoned you when you were five, but all that is utter bullshit. We’re adults. Behave like one.”

“You behave like one,” she snapped, missing the point entirely. She tossed the stick thing onto my desk and it landed with a plink.

I frowned at it, then stepped closer, tilted my head to one side. Well, damn. What the fuck? “OK,” I said. “A pregnancy test. I’m happy for you Veronica, I really am. I just think this announcement is bizarre to say the least.”

Her jaw dropped, and she swallowed, her tongue working back and forth. “You—you really don’t know. You actually don’t know. You didn’t kick her out.”

I watched her, puzzlement and concern creeping through me alongside the frustration. She needed to have her damn head checked. That or pregnancy hormones had driven her insane. “What do you want from me?” I asked. “Do you need money? You can have some if you need it for doctor’s appointments or—”

“It’s not my pregnancy test,” Veronica snapped. “It’s Riley’s. Riley’s pregnant with your baby.”

The world shuddered from left to right. My view of Veronica zoomed in and out. I leaned my palm on the desk, next to that stick, and swallowed convulsively. Pregnant. Pregnant with my baby. How is this possible? We were careful—I saw her take the Plan B.

The baby, the pregnancy, it wasn’t bad news. I’d made the choice to blow my load inside her, and I’d fucked the consequences then. But this was…this was unexpected.

“I shouldn’t have come here,” Veronica said, softly. “I thought Riley was lying. I thought you kicked her out after she told you, and that was why she cried herself to sleep the first week after she moved in with me.”

“She cried herself to sleep.” I focused on my sister’s piteous expression. “She cried herself to sleep.” I balled my free hand into a fist.

“I didn’t know she hadn’t told you yet,” Veronica whispered. “Oh god, this is bad. She’s going to shit on my head. Like she’s going to kill me. Oh god, Co—Jax, is there any chance you can forget I told you this until she’s ready to tell you?”

“No,” I replied and pushed off from the desk.

I marched toward the exit, but Veronica reached me first and clung to my arm, dug her heels in, and let out a muted shriek. “Wait!”

“I’ve got to see her,” I said.

“She’s not at my apartment.” Veronica squealed it. “She’s not there.”

“Where is she?” I growled and grabbed my sister by the upper arms. I lifted her into the air and set her down in front of me, white hot with rage now. “Where the fuck is she, Veronica? Tell me, now. No more bullshit.”

“I—I don’t know. She left. We had a fight, and she left. I was sure that she would come here or that you were—I don’t know. I was just sure she was making a mistake by wanting you.”

“It wasn’t for you to decide,” I snapped. “It doesn’t matter what you think of me or I of you. It’s not your choice. It’s hers, you idiot.”

“I’m not an idiot! I’m trying to do what’s best for my friend. I don’t want her to wind up like me, struggling to make ends meet because some loser asshole decided that a family wasn’t what he wanted!” The words erupted from Veronica and silenced me for a second. So, that was it. She was afraid of Riley winding up abandoned by some scumbag.

“You had the option to contact me,” I said, slowly. “It was always on the table. If you needed help, you should have fucking told me.”

“The last time I saw you, you were behind bars. How was I supposed to trust you after that? You own strip clubs. You—”

“Where is she?” I repeated, barely restraining my temper. Christ, she couldn’t keep me from the woman I loved. If no one could keep me from owning half of the fucking real estate in Miami, then no one would keep me from the one person who made me feel more than just a man. More than just a “strip club owner.”

“Are you going to leave her?” Veronica asked, fire in her eyes. “Are you going to pay her off and leave her? Because if that’s what you want to do, then I’ll never tell you what you want to know, no matter how much you growl.”

“Stop being a twat, Veronica,” I snapped. “I want to fucking love her. I want to marry her. I want our baby. I want it all, dipshit. Now, tell me where the hell she is, or I’ll destroy half of fucking Miami looking for her.”

“She left in a rush,” my sister said. “I’m not sure where she went.”

“Find out before I do.” I released her.

Veronica squished her cell phone out of her tote and unlocked the screen. She dialed and pressed the phone to her ear, stood frozen in front of me, shock still tugging at her features. We were similar in so many ways, but she had our mother’s fine nose, her high cheekbones.

It was a pity she hated me. It would’ve been nice to have a healthy family relationship for once in my damn life. Riley would be that. Riley and my baby. Christ, that finally hit me, right between the eyes.

My baby. Our baby. We’d have a child together. We’d raise it and teach it right from wrong.

How? You’re not exactly a paragon of fucking virtue.

Veronica tapped her foot again and again. “No answer,” she whispered, then cleared her throat. “Riley, it’s me. I’m so sorry for the way I acted. I panicked. I was a total dickhead, girl, please forgive me. Please, call me back.” She hung up, tried again. “Nothing,” she said. “Nothing. Oh god, I’m such a terrible person.”

“Have a backbone,” I replied. “You acted like a shitheel, but it’s never too late to start making smart decisions.”

Veronica tucked her cell back into her tote, brow wrinkling up. She misted over for a second, shut her eyes. They snapped open again in a classic eureka moment. “I’ve got it!” She raised her index finger. “Whenever Riley’s stressed out, she dances. She has to do it. It’s the way she gets her brain and her body to work together. That’s what she calls it anyway. I—she’s probably gone to the studio. She’ll break in if she has to.”

“Jesus H. Christ in a bucket of wine,” I said. “Of course she will.” That was Riley.

I walked for the door and, once again, Veronica caught my arm. “Jax,” she said. “I—we need to talk about this. About family.”

I gave her the most genuine smile in my possession and patted the back of her hand. “We’re good, kid. Keep your head out of your ass, and we’re good.” I made for the exit then, burning for Riley. For the future we had to have.