Chapter 3
MINE!
WESLEY
Grinding my teeth, I fight the urge to walk across the room and kiss the woman who has been haunting me for the last week. I can’t get her out of my head no matter how many times I kick my own ass all over the place. I still want her when I know I shouldn’t. She’s made it perfectly clear by taking off on me twice without looking back that she doesn’t want anything more from me. Unfortunately, my dick hasn’t gotten that memo.
Pulling my eyes from her, I try to focus on what Aiden is saying. Aiden, who also happens to be her dad. Fuck . . . How the hell did I end up in this situation?
I try to think by running my hand through my hair. I obviously had no idea when my partner, Levi, invited me over for Thanksgiving that I would be spending the day with Mackenzie’s family. If I had known that, I wouldn’t have shown.
Who the hell am I kidding? Of course I would have come—because I’m a fucking idiot who enjoys self-inflicted torture. There is something about Mackenzie, or Mac, as her family calls her, that I can’t get out of my head. It’s not that she’s beautiful, even though she is. No, it’s something else. She’s a mystery I want to solve. I want to find out what kind of woman she really is. Is she the sex kitten I met the first night, or the sporty girl standing a few feet away from me now, wearing worn jeans that fit her like a second skin and a long-sleeve top with the Mets logo on the front of it?
Taking a swig from my beer, I lock eyes with her. Her cheeks get pink across the room before she looks away. When her sister Fawn introduced us earlier, I could tell she was shocked to see me—and worried I’d disclose that we had met before, which annoys me since that’s exactly what I wanted to do.
I wanted to kiss her, to touch her in some way. But I had to hold myself back from doing just that. I have never felt a connection to another woman like the one I feel with her. Yes, the sex was unbelievable. The best I’ve ever had, but that’s not why I want her.
There’s something vulnerable about her, and that vulnerability calls to the protector in me. From the first moment I saw her in the bar, looking alone and lost, I gravitated to her. Then, after spending two hours talking and laughing with her, I knew I wanted more. More of her laughter, more of her wit, and more of her time. A hell of a lot more time. Which is why I chased after her when I woke up alone after the night we shared.
Feeling her eyes on me once more, I look at her again. I see a hint of arousal that she tries to hide, but it’s too late. I see it there, calling to me like a beacon. I don’t understand her at all. One minute she’s looking at me like she wants to rip off my clothes. The next she’s trying to get away from me as quickly as possible. Another mystery I need to solve.
“So what do you think?” Aiden asks.
I take a pull from my beer like I’m pondering his question. In reality, all my brain cells have gone south.
“Don’t tell me you’re a Republican?” He shakes his head, grinning.
“A man never tells,” I say.
He laughs at my response. Thank fuck, because I have no idea what we were talking about—or more to the point, what he was talking about.
“What’s going on over here?” Mackenzie’s mom, Katie, asks as she takes a seat next to her husband on the couch, across from me.
“Just talking. How long until the food’s ready?” Aiden asks, wrapping his arm around her shoulder and fitting her into his side.
“The girls just finished setting up, so dinner shouldn’t be much longer,” she says.
Then her eyes land on me. I see them turn, calculating. She leans in, placing her elbows on top of her thighs.
“So . . . tell me about yourself, Wesley. Are you single?” she asks bluntly, catching me off guard.
I laugh.
“Katie . . .” Aiden sighs while she looks at him with mock innocence.
“What? I’m just curious.”
“You’re never just curious.” He shakes his head at her.
“Well, this time I am just curious,” she states before looking at me again. “So? Are you single, Wesley?”
I answer immediately in the affirmative, and her hands rub together like a villain who’s plotting her next move to take over the world.
“Do you like baseball?” she continues, eyes twinkling.
“Yeah, I like baseball. But I’m more of a football man.”
“Our daughter Mackenzie loves baseball.”
“Does she?” I ask, tucking that tidbit of information away.
“Oh yeah. She has season tickets for the Mets. She never misses a game,” she says. She looks past my shoulder and shouts across the room, “Mac! Come over here, honey!”
Turning my head, I watch a wide-eyed Mackenzie walk our way, looking like she wants the ground to open up and swallow her.
“Mom . . . ?” Mackenzie says once she’s close.
I notice the drink in her hand and wonder if it’s got alcohol in it. Then I move my eyes to her flat stomach. I’ve never once in my thirty-three years not worn a condom, but with her I didn’t even think about it. My only thought was to get inside her as quickly as possible. Now this woman whom I barely know, whom I can’t get off my mind, could be carrying my child. That idea fills me with something I don’t understand . . . all I know is it isn’t a bad something.
“I was just telling Wesley here that you have season tickets to the Mets. Maybe you can take him to a game sometime?” Katie suggests.
Mackenzie’s body jolts at her mother’s statement.
“I . . .” Mackenzie skates her eyes past me, and she quickly shakes her head. “It’s not baseball season, Mom.”
“Oh.” Katie frowns, apparently unhappy with her plan being shot down. “Well, when does it start back up?”
“Not until April.”
“Right. Then you will just have to take him to a game in April.” She smiles at Mackenzie, then tips her head to the side. She looks at me as I roll my shoulder subconsciously. “Are you okay?”
“Old wound. It acts up from time to time,” I say.
Her eyes soften before she looks up at her daughter with pride.
“Mac is a massage therapist. Maybe you can go see her at her office sometime. People say she has magic hands,” Katie says.
Mac coughs and Aiden sighs.
I feel my lips twitch. Of course it’s on the tip of my tongue to say that I know exactly how magical her hands are—from experience—but I hold the comment in.
“I might just do that.” I take another pull from my beer as Mackenzie’s eyes bore a hole into the side of my head.
I tip my head back and watch her swallow as heat flares between us.
“Where’s your office?”
Seeing her lick her bottom lip, I wonder if she’s even going to tell me. I feel myself relax when she gives me the address. Tucking that information away in a box marked with her name in my head, a plan starts to formulate in my mind. There is obviously some serious chemistry between us. I know that from the looks she’s been giving me. She feels it, too, so why the hell is she fighting it?
“That’s great.” Katie stands up, having no idea that she’s just given me another chance with her daughter.
I promise myself then and there that if she runs the next time, I’ll let her go. I know I’m lying to myself.
“Mom . . . ,” Mackenzie says, but Katie ignores her while wrapping an arm through hers.
“Come on, honey. Let’s go finish putting everything out on the table so we can feed these guys.” She leads Mackenzie away, talking quietly.
I can’t hear what they’re saying, but I see Mackenzie’s shoulders tense as her mom leads her to the door—and out of Levi’s apartment. Probably to her sister’s, across the hall.
“My wife is a nut. She means well, but she’s a nut.” Aiden shakes his head. Grinning at his comment, I take another pull from my beer. “I’m going to head on over to Fawn’s place and see if they need any help.” He stands, and I stand along with him.
“I’ll join you.”
Smiling, he pats my shoulder before leading the way across the hall. Most everyone has already gathered around the table when we get there, so I take a seat next to Levi—and directly across from Mackenzie, who is doing her best to avoid looking at me. While I study her, my hand clenches into a fist. I have to work to keep myself from touching her. To keep myself from forcing her to look at me. To make her acknowledge that there is something between us.
“You good, man?” Levi questions.
I pull my eyes from Mackenzie to look at him. “Yeah.”
“Good.”
He nudges my shoulder with his before leaning over to Fawn, who is sitting next to him. He whispers something in her ear that makes her smile. Pulling my eyes from them, I look at Mackenzie and find her eyes already on me. There are a million emotions playing behind her gaze. The moment is broken when her little sister takes a seat next to her and says something that makes her laugh. Seeing her smile, I know I want to see that smile again—only directed at me.
Parking down the block from Mackenzie’s office four days later, I get out and pay the meter before heading toward the building. When I looked up Soothe Your Soul, the name of her practice, I found out that it was actually in an apartment building with a few other small businesses—all located on the first floor.
The rest of Thanksgiving dinner was interesting, to say the least. Levi’s sister-in-law kept bringing up his ex, which in turn pissed everyone off. Fawn, who I could tell was hurt by the conversation, got up in the middle of dinner. She took her sisters with her, and they didn’t come back for a long time. So long that I wondered if they’d come back at all. When they did return, Fawn wasn’t with them, so Levi left in search of her. After he left, I decided that I would head home, too.
I swear I saw disappointment in Mackenzie’s eyes when I told her and her family goodbye, but I knew not to get my hopes up. That doesn’t mean they weren’t. The need to see her again has been clawing at my gut since then.
I press the button next to the nameplate for her office, and the door buzzes. The lock clicks. I pull the door open and look around to see if there is a camera that will announce to her who has arrived. I don’t see one—and that bothers me more than it probably should. The idea of her being alone and just letting anyone inside causes the caveman who’s taken residence in me since meeting her to rear his ugly head.
Until I met her, I had never experienced possessiveness before. I had never understood the need to claim someone, to mark or brand them. Yet that is exactly what I want to do with her.
When I reach her office, I find the door open. She’s sitting at her desk with her hair up in a ponytail, and her face is makeup-free. She has a Chinese-takeout container in front of her, and her eyes are on the computer. She looks beautiful. More beautiful than the night I met her, when she was dressed up and wearing makeup.
“Hey,” I say.
Her head whirls around, and her eyes widen when she hears my voice.
“You . . . you’re here.”
“I was in the neighborhood.” I shrug, knowing she’ll catch on to the fact that I’m using the same lame excuse she did when I found her outside my door attempting to leave me a note. “Do you have any openings?”
For a long moment, she does nothing but stare at me like she can’t believe that I’m standing in front of her.
“Mackenzie?” I take a step toward her, and she blinks.
“You . . .” She wiggles her head, causing her ponytail to move from side to side and to slide along her neck. “You want a massage?”
“Your mom suggested it might help me,” I remind her.
She rolls her eyes as her lips lift into a small smile. “My mom is insane.”
“A little,” I agree. I ask my question again. “Do you have any time available today?”
She nibbles her bottom lip, studying me before answering. “My next client isn’t scheduled to be here for another hour and a half.”
“I’m sure we can make that work,” I reply, feeling satisfaction when her eyes flash with desire and her nipples pebble under the thin top she has on.
“I . . . um . . .” She looks around. “You just need to fill out this paperwork.” She picks up a clipboard and shoves it my way without looking at me. “I’ll get everything set up, then come back out to get you.”
I don’t get a chance to reply before she takes off. I sit and fill out the paperwork as I was told. She comes back out a few minutes later and takes the clipboard from me. Tucking my hands into the front pockets of my jeans, I watch as she reads over everything quickly.
She sets the clipboard on top of the desk, then shuts and locks the door.
“Do you always lock the door when you have a client?” I ask as she looks up at me.
“Yes. If I’m with a client, the door is always locked. That way no one can just walk in while I’m working,” she states.
I want to ask her about the fact that she buzzed me in without knowing who I was, but I can tell by the shortness in her tone that she wouldn’t appreciate me questioning her right now.
“If you’ll follow me.” She scoots around me, and I follow her down a very short hall and into a dimly lit room where soft music is playing in the background.
The walls are a light blue, almost white. The color goes well with the pictures of the ocean she has hung on the walls. Pulling in a lungful of air, I realize the room smells like her—like lavender and vanilla.
“I’ll give you a few minutes to get undressed and under the covers.” She points at the massage bed in the middle of the room. It’s covered in white sheets. “Just shout when you’re ready for me.”
“Don’t leave on my account.” I smile and toss my jacket on the chair in the corner of the room.
“This is my job.” The words are breathy, giving away the desire she’s feeling.
I use that to my advantage as I strip off my shirt.
“I take my job seriously.”
“As you should.” I nod in agreement, then kick off my sneakers and strip out of my jeans. “Should I leave them on, or lose them?” I question with my thumbs in the waistband of my boxers.
Her tongue wets her bottom lip, causing it to glisten—and my cock to throb.
“Leave them on.”
“All right.” I remove my fingers. “How do you want me?”
At my question, her eyes flare. She quickly schools her features and crosses her arms over her chest.
“On your stomach,” she instructs.
Turning my back to her, I get onto the table and lie down on my stomach, cursing my hard-on when my weight presses it into the unyielding mattress. Resting my face in the cradle at the top of the bed, a million fantasies play out in my mind as I wait for the first touch from her hands.
When I hear her feet pad across the carpet and get closer, my body fills with anticipation. I hear her sharp inhale as her finger touches one of my scars.
“What are these from?”
“Gunshot,” I say quietly, knowing she’s looking at the three small scars on my right shoulder. I was shot during a drug bust gone bad.
“I didn’t notice them before.”
“You were a little preoccupied,” I remind her, trying to lighten the mood.
She doesn’t laugh or reply at all.
Feeling a drop of wet hit my back a moment later, my eyes tighten. Fuck.
I sit up and take her into my arms without thinking. I hold her against me as she cries, overwhelmed that she’s upset over me.
“I’m sorry.” She pulls away before I’m ready to let her go, ducking her head and wiping the wet from her cheeks. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“I’m not going to complain that you let me hold you,” I say.
Her eyes meet mine.
“How did it happen?” she asks.
I ignore the question, just like I’ve been ignoring the constant pain in my chest since I moved away from Seattle and to New York City.
“It’s not important. Let’s get started,” I say, trying to keep the bite out of my tone. I know I don’t succeed in that endeavor, because she flinches. “Sorr—”
“You’re right.” She cuts me off and looks away from me, making me want to kick my own ass around the room. “We should get started. My next client will be here soon.”
Without a word, I move back to my stomach and close my eyes. Feeling her oil-covered hands slip across my back makes it almost impossible to relax. I want to apologize for being harsh and for shutting her down when she was obviously only concerned for me, but I can’t get the words out. I’ve never opened up to anyone. I can’t imagine that Mackenzie wants my burdens dragging her down.
“I was arrested once,” she says out of the blue minutes later.
All the muscles that had started to relax tighten again, but she ignores my reaction and continues talking while gliding her hands across my skin.
“It was stupid, really. I skipped school one day and went to the park to hang out with a group of friends. We were all just being kids, not doing anything bad, but we were having fun. So much fun that I thought the moment should be recorded for history’s sake. Like an idiot, I carved my full name and the date plus ‘Peace, love, and happiness’ into the top of one of the wooden tables in the park.”
She laughs softly, and I smile at the sound.
“Two cops showed up at my house a few weeks later, asking where I was on that date. At first, I had no idea what date they were referring to, but that didn’t last long. They had photos of my handiwork. Those made it perfectly clear that they knew where I had been. My dad, as you can imagine, was not impressed that his daughter had skipped school to deface public property. So he told the officers to arrest me.”
“Your dad had you arrested?” I ask, incredulous, through a smile.
She laughs. “Yes, and that day I had the privilege of sitting in a jail cell for a few hours before my mom found out what happened and came to get me out.”
“Was she pissed?”
“Pissed isn’t even close to what she was. The minute I saw how mad she was, I begged one of the officers to keep me locked up. I had never heard her screech so loud in my life. Thankfully, I haven’t heard that god-awful noise since then.”
I can hear the smile in her voice, so I tip my head to the side to get a look at her face. Christ, she’s beautiful. Seeing the smile she’s wearing causes my breath to freeze in my lungs and my chest to ache.
“Needless to say, I never skipped school again—or defaced public property.”
“Was that the only time you’ve been in trouble with the law?”
“No . . . that’s just the only time I was arrested.” She smirks, and my stomach muscles tighten while my cock starts to come back to life.
“Tell me.” I roll to my back so that I can see her face as she talks.
Her hands lift away; then she makes some kind of internal decision and puts them on me again, beginning to massage my pecs and shoulders.
“On my twenty-first birthday, my friends thought it would be smart for me to start drinking at a legal age by ingesting tequila.”
“Christ.”
“Yeah, that about sums it up. That night, I ended up shirtless in Times Square, singing ‘I’m a Little Teapot,’” she says.
My hands flex at my sides at the idea of anyone seeing her the way I have. God, what the hell is she doing to me?
“Thankfully, the officer who got the call about a girl singing and running around topless in Times Square took pity on me when I puked all over him. Instead of arresting me like he could have, he made my friends take me home. He followed us all the way there, then gave us a warning that the next time we wouldn’t get off so easy.”
“You got lucky.”
“Believe me, I know. That is also the last time I ever drank tequila. Now if I even get a whiff of the stuff, my stomach turns and I find myself running for the nearest bathroom.”
“I hate hot dogs,” I tell her, wanting to share something about myself. I feel the need to, even if it’s about something stupid.
“You hate hot dogs?”
“I can’t stand them. When I was six, my parents got divorced.”
“I’m sorry.” Her hands go still and her soft eyes meet mine, causing something in my chest to get tight.
“Don’t be. Some people are better apart. Believe me, my parents are those people.”
“Is that why you hate hot dogs?”
“No,” I laugh. “My dad took me for the summer the first year after they divorced, and he had no idea how to cook. So we had hot dogs at every meal. Hot dogs and eggs, hot dogs and mac and cheese, hot dogs in spaghetti. I swear, if someone would have drawn my blood after that summer, my cholesterol at six years old would have been through the roof.”
“Poor kid.”
“Yeah. Since then, I can’t even look at a hot dog without wanting to get sick.”
“That sucks. There is nothing better than sitting out under the sun at Mets stadium, drinking a beer, and eating a hot dog while watching a game.”
“I’ll have to take your word for that, gorgeous. I might drink a beer, but you will never see me eating a hot dog.”
I notice how her pupils dilate when I say the word gorgeous.
Just when I think I’m getting somewhere, she quickly looks away.
“You should flip back to your stomach so I can finish working on your back.”
“All right.” I roll to my stomach, and for the next half hour we are both completely silent. She works my muscles from my shoulders to my calves. I don’t fall asleep even though my eyes get heavy. I want to stay awake the whole time so I can soak in the feeling of her touch, the way her hands glide over my body. I try to memorize every single second since I’m not sure when her hands will be on me again.
“All done,” she says softly when a chime sounds in the room.
I lean up on an elbow.
“I’ll let you get dressed. Just come out when you’re ready.”
Even though a part of me knows that the smart thing to do would be to let her walk away and come to me if that’s what she wants, I know I can’t do it. I want her, and I want to figure out why she keeps acting like she doesn’t want me, too. I can see it in her eyes and by the way her body reacts to me. She does.
Taking her hand before she’s out of reach, I sit up on the side of the bed. “Go out with me tonight.” I hate how vulnerable I sound to my own ears.
“Go out with you?” she repeats.
I wonder why the hell she can’t seem to believe that I want to spend time with her.
“Have dinner with me.” I pull her a step closer.
Her bottom lip disappears between her teeth before she releases it and gives me a nod.
“If that’s a yes, I’m going to need to hear you say the word . . .”
“Yes.”
“Good.” I rub my thumb over the pulse at her wrist and feel it beating hard. “I’ll pick you up at your place at six.”
“I’ll meet you at the restaurant.”
I want to insist on picking her up, but I can tell by the look in her eyes that she won’t give in. Knowing I need to pick my battles right now, I don’t fight her to get my way.
“All right, we’ll meet at the restaurant,” I agree. I give her the name of the place I have in mind before she leaves the room.
Once I’m dressed, I head out into the main part of the office and find her laughing with a guy—not just any guy, a good-looking guy who is standing way too damn close.
I clear my throat and watch as her head swings my way. My instinct is to puff up my chest when the guy looks me over, sizing me up.
“Wesley, this is my friend Edward. Edward, this is Wesley.”
I take the guy in. He’s tall, with the body of an athlete. His hair is short and his jaw is clean, which fits with the suit he has on. He looks like a sleazy banker.
“Nice to meet you.”
Edward lifts his chin, and I do the same in return before looking at Mackenzie. I move toward her with purpose, needing and wanting to stake my claim on her in some way.
“See you tonight,” I tell her as I drop a kiss on her cheek.
I feel her breath come out in a puff across my ear. I lean back, searching her gaze and feeling self-satisfied when I see that her eyelids have lowered and her face has gotten soft.
“Yeah, I’ll see you tonight,” she whispers.
I swear it takes everything in me to leave her there with another man. It kills me a little when I hear her office door shut and lock behind me once I’m in the hall. Then I remind myself that she’s not mine. That still doesn’t stop the caveman in my head from growling. Mine.