Page 1 of False Confidence

It had been ten long years since Jasmine Cannon last had an orgasm, and it didn’t look like that was changing anytime soon. Not that it was Liam’s fault—the man was trying his best. And his best felt fucking good.

Her head fell back against the pillows, a gasp falling from her lips as Liam’s fingers skated over her skin, his mustache tickling her neck where his lips had set up shop. That damn mustache. It had lived up to her intrigue, even if she hadn’t been able to come with his tongue on her pussy. Again, not his fault. It was a Jazz problem.

She could sense the orgasm locked away somewhere deep inside her, but she just couldn’t quite reach it. So much time had passed that she’d forgotten how it felt to truly let go. She’d tried—God, she’d tried—but Jazz couldn’t take that last step off the ledge. That hadn’t stopped her from having sex; she just tried to focus more on the journey than the destination. Some journeys felt better than others, and Liam... Well, she wasn’t surprised he knew what he was doing.

Like father, like son, and all that. She’d heard all about how good Liam’s dad, Cal, was in bed, because, as of that afternoon, Cal was married to her best friend. Jazz knew enough from Maggie to know that Daddy Michaelson specialized in multiple orgasms, and she’d hoped it ran in the family. It probably did, given how good Liam was at this, but alas, she wasn’t the right person to test the theory.

Maggie probably wouldn’t approve of Jazz falling into bed with her new stepson, but she was used to Jazz’s poor decision making. And it was hard to worry about it with so much liquor running through her veins, making everything feel a little hazy, like she was three layers deep inside a dream.

Liam nipped at her jaw with his teeth. “Fuck, you feel incredible, Jasmine.”

Jasmine. It was almost enough to tip her over the edge. Jazz squeezed her eyes closed and tried to focus every scrap of her attention on Liam. She breathed in the sweet, spicy scent of him, felt the tingle of his finger as he brushed the tip over her clit, drawing perfect circles. She forced her breathing to match the pace of his cock sliding in and out of her, the perfect mix of soft and rough, slow and desperate. Even as wasted as they both were, he had this down. His cock was big enough that she felt beautifully full, but not so big that she was uncomfortable.

Everything was perfect. The finish line was right. Fucking. There. She just had to reach it. Liam slid his hands under her ass, angling her hips. His next thrust hit her G-spot, and sparkles edged into Jazz’s vision. So close.

“Oh my fucking God,” she fisted the blankets, writhing below him. Holy shit, it was going to happen. Liam pressed his lips to hers with a rough moan, slipping his tongue between them. He tasted warm, like whiskey and orange, and she drank him in greedily.

“Jasmine,” he groaned against her lips, her name even sweeter than the taste of the Old Fashioned he’d had to drink before they came upstairs.

She was a hairsbreadth from the edge, reaching into a long forgotten part of her, and then… nothing. Like a wave crashing over a fire, every flame, every ember was doused in something icy cold. Her body slammed the door closed on the finish line with a firm no, and Jazz turned her head into the pillow to hide the tears of frustration prickling her eyes.

She took a deep breath that caught in her throat, grabbed Liam’s back with a white-knuckled grip, and forced herself to do the one thing in the world that she was best at: faking it.

If you’d told Liam Michaelson three years ago that he’d be single, jobless, and spending more time with his father’s twenty-nine-year-old wife than anyone else, he might have tried a little harder to stop the devastatingly fast downfall of his life.

Maggie, his dad’s wife, sat across from him, weighing the ivory envelope in her hands and wrinkling her nose. “It’s definitely something important.”

“They wouldn’t do that, though. Right?”

She lifted a shoulder in a halfhearted shrug. “You’d hope not, but once upon a time you probably would’ve said they wouldn’t sleep together and they did that.”

They’d definitely done that. Liam had been so sure India was the one—sure enough to have a ring tucked away in his desk. A ring he’d excitedly shown his best friend of twenty years, who had pretended to be happy for him, even though he was already sleeping with India behind his back.

In one night, he’d lost his girlfriend, best friend, and the entire friend group they’d shared. He’d been so sure that was his rock bottom, until he’d gotten too drunk at the VIP party for the Seattle Art Museum’s Spring Exhibit, spotted India’s dad, and lost it. It turned out telling one of the museum’s biggest donors that he should’ve spent more time at home and less with his many mistresses so his daughter wouldn’t grow up to be a cheater was a one-way ticket to losing his job as Head Curator. And there it was: rock bottom.

“I’m just not going to open it. If I don’t open it, I’ll never know.” Liam sat back in his chair, as if he daren’t get too close to the envelope.

“True,” Maggie agreed, but she didn’t put the envelope down.

They shared a weighted look before Liam added, “Of course, you could open it. You wouldn’t have to tell me what it said.”

Maggie raised a brow, but slipped her thumb into the envelope seal anyway and pulled out a matching card. She scanned it, her face betraying nothing.

“Well?” Liam asked, leaning forward on his elbows. So much for never knowing.

Maggie met his eye and her expression said it all. His heart twisted uncomfortably in his chest as she said, “You are invited to celebrate the wedding of Bartholomew Charles Heasman the third and India Beatrice Avery on June twentieth.”

“Christ.” Liam’s head fell into his hands and he rubbed his face. “What kind of people do that?”

“The kind of people named Bartholomew Charles Heasman the third and India Beatrice Avery. What the fuck kind of names are those?” Maggie asked, staring at the invitation with disdain and dropping it on the table between them. Liam snorted and slid it closer. It was exactly the gauche invitation he’d expect India and Bart’s parents to pick out, because fuck knows they would have no say in their special day.

“Honestly, as far as names went at my school, those are pretty tame.” Liam would never blame his parents for sending him to a fancy prep school—they were just trying to do what was best for him—but he’d never quite blended in with the other kids. His moms were both well respected in their fields, owning a successful optometrists practice and teaching criminal psychology at the University of Washington, and his dad was the top business lawyer in the region, but there was a big difference between old money and new money, and Liam had been in the minority among his classmates.

“We had very different upbringings,” Maggie replied with a shake of her head. That was an understatement. Maggie’s family had used her as free labor for most of her life until she’d put her foot down; Liam was pretty sure no one in the world had parents as great as his. They’d taught him the value of hard work, but they’d also given him unconditional love and support every step of the way.

Liam had been a surprise, born when his parents were still in college. Neither of them had known the first thing about raising a kid. He couldn’t remember the early years, when they’d fought and eventually divorced, but it had been the best thing for them. His dad had introduced his mom to Danisha when he was seven, and she’d fit into their little family like she was always meant to be there. Liam had grown up with two moms and a dad who loved him more than anything in the world, and he would never take it for granted. And now he had a stepmom, even if she was seven years younger than him, and glared whenever he jokingly called her mom.

“Are you going to go?” she asked, nodding at the invitation.

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