Page 34 of Jax

“Thanks, man.” I gave him a slap on his shoulder, and he nodded back at me. Fuck, Mint was a good man, and from the looks of it, turning into a hell of a MC brother. Not just anyone would hand over the keys to bike so willingly. And it wasn’t because he didn’t care about it.

The bike was similar size to mine and fired her up and took her back onto the road, heading down the path I took every single day.

If they had been following me when I went out to pick up the girls from the club, then there was a high chance they had been following me elsewhere.

I couldn’t just shrug it off, not tonight. I had to do the one thing I had been avoiding doing all day.

I went back to Ronnie.

Chapter Eight

Ronnie

Ididn’t scream.

I don’t know how I got away with not doing so either, because when I heard the rustling and groaning coming from the sitting room, I was only seconds away from swinging the old, iron kettle from off the stove at the head of the perpetrator. It was only when I saw the black leather cut draped across the back of the cushion and the black motorcycle boots at the foot of the couch that I managed to hold off on giving Jax a concussion with the kitchenware.

It took me a few seconds to correct my breathing and heart rate before I placed the kettle back on the stove and headed into the sitting room. I didn’t enter past the doorframe, leaning up against the hardwood. When my glare of irritation at the sleeping man softened into an observational gaze, I couldn’t believe that this calm, passed-out man was the same one that had hightailed it out of the farm eighteen hours earlier, acting like an eight-year-old boy who I’d infected with my cooties.

I had wanted to be pissed at him, but I just ended up feeling hurt instead. Nobody liked rejection, and nobody did it quite like Jax.

As I looked at him longer, the morning sunlight creeping through the thin curtains, I realized that with a face so at peace as it was in his sleep, he looked like he couldn’t harm a soul. Once upon a time, he would never have dreamed of it. He had bent this way and that trying to make everyone happy until one day, his family had bent him too far and he’d snapped.

I hadn’t blamed him for it. No matter how hard I pushed for him to do what he loved, he had proved just how stubborn he was. Just like I was. Except, when he had forsaken his own for himself and not out of selfishness or greed but survival… I wasn’t able to do the same.

Which one of us was the coward and which one was brave was a question I had never been able to answer. Even now.

“What are you looking at?” A deep, worn and rumbling voice said from the still body on the couch.

“There’s a strange man sleeping on my couch,” I grunted in reply, not surprised he’d been awake this whole time. He was probably witness to my creeping around with the kettle at arms. I wouldn’t put it past him to let me hit him with a kettle, so he could bitch about it.

“You should probably do something about that,” he huffed.

“I’m tempted.”

WhatI’d do to him on the other hand was another question. Other things than clubbing him came to mind. Jax, covered head to toe in tattoos like a dark matrix wrapped around his perfect southern tan, tight body, and disciplined muscles. Who could blame me?

A few seconds passed before he began to move, the tattoos rippling across his skin the way water shimmers on a lake as the muscles beneath him lifted his body from the couch and up to a sitting position in one smooth motion. He outstretched his legs, nearly covering half the floor and raised his hands above his head. I heard a few clicks and pops of his joints and had to force myself not to gag in response.

A scoff came out of Jax’s mouth as his dark eyes turned to me, dark brown irises relaxed and gentled as they looked me over. “Get over that already, Ronnie.” He smirked.

The calm, almost drowsy look on his face had my body wanting to creep back upstairs. Not because I didn’t like the way he was looking at me but because I did. He was still half asleep, and I knew that any moment, Jax would come back to reality and our past would be thrown between us again.

“It’s disgusting.” I shook my head at him, my brown hair loose around my shoulders, soft as it touched the bare skin exposed by my tank. I had brushed it before coming downstairs, as I did every morning. It was routine if I wanted to keep my hair at its length without having it end up in a tangled mess after a day of riding. I would always brush Max’s mane before we went out, as well. It was a beautiful dark black that, under the light of the sun, glowed a warm brown. It reminded me of Jackson’s eyes back in the day; a thought I had but would never tell him.

“What are you thinking about?” Jax’s voice cut through my thoughts. His voice was close, and I jumped at the sudden presence at my side. Like a ghost, he moved from the couch to my side without my notice and without a sound.

I tried to turn away, but he was too close. The raw smell of his body, the faint stench of sweat and the crisp scent of dry, dusty hay was a hit straight to my heart. I stared up the few inches to his face, my eyes unable to help themselves as I looked beneath the rough and dark skin and saw the familiar sharp jaw, high cheekbones, and dark brows that Jackson had defined even better in his leather future self.

“I was wondering why you were here.”

“Got chased by a guy in a car yesterday while I was picking the girls up from the club,” Jax answered, and I almost staggered back at the sudden honesty. I tried not to wince at the way he casually skipped over the mention of the “girls,” probably including his hot topic of the week. People in Fellpeak hadn’t been afraid to share with me the highlights of Jax’s reputation in this town, some even introduced themselves. Although that pissed me off, I was more focused on the “chased by some random guy” part.

“Were you all okay?”

“Yeah,” he grunted. “We’re fine.”

He continued to stare at me, brows furrowed together. I thought of the time I caught him overlooking the land and wanted to smile at the similar expression. I looked into his eyes, seeing the same shadow of the past casting over his face. I waited for a moment before speaking.

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