Page 58 of Jax

The faint flash of red caught my eyes, and just over one of the empty stalls hung my damp shirt. My free hand grasped at the nearest steady object, which just happened to be Jax’s shoulder. I surprised him as I used him as leverage to shove my body up, holding my breath as I forced my side to stretch, reaching forward for my shirt.

I need to cover them up.

No matter what, he can’t see them.

He can’t kno—

I was flat on my back, spikes of hay protruding into my bare back and side, and a dark looming, damp shadow was over me.

“I know, Ronnie.” Jax’s voice was stern. His body even more stern as it pinned me in place, holding me down with his overwhelming body weight, but it wasn’t the thing that stopped me fighting. It wasn’t even his words.

It was his eyes. The faint crack of moonlight broke through a gap in the barn wall, and by chance or fate, they crested over his golden pupils, casting an eerily pale shine over the deep brown eyes I was used to. They were like frosted amber, but the feelings pouring out of them was anything but cold.

It was gentle. It was warm. It was honest.

“I know it was you, Ronnie,” he breathed, the warmth rolling over my skin. “I know you were the rider.”

“I wasn’t….” The taste of dry oats and wet fur pressed against my tongue as his hand muffled my words.

“You don’t need to lie to me anymore, Ronnie,” Jax whispered, his body relaxing against my uninjured side. He pulled his hand away from my lips, flipping over his palm and his calloused skin brushed down the side of my cheek, his eyes wandering across my face.

Silently traveling softly over my jaw, down the edge of my throat, and trailing the valley of my breasts, leaving a trail of goose bumps in his wake. My focus was on my quickening heartbeat and caught breaths as he moved lower down across my navel. He paid no attention to my ugly skin, moving down to where his fingers met the hem of my jeans.

“I’ve noticed everything about you for as long as I’ve known you, Ronnie,” Jax confessed, voice sounding miles away. His eyes followed his own movements while my own watched his calm, relaxed face. “I noticed the way you used to tie your ponytail lopsided on purpose, so your mother would fix it for you. I noticed the way you used to duck under the fence, not because you couldn’t jump off it, but because you always got muddy if you did before coming to see me.” His hand traveled over the wet denim, and I became aware of how warm my skin was growing under his touch. His back arched and face pulled away and his body moved down mine. The hay shifted and bristled as he edged his torso next to my hips. His hot, clouded breaths burned into the skin of my thigh. Both hands now wrapped around each side of my knees, then trailed up. “I noticed the way you limp slightly when you’ve been working,” he whispered, pressing a soft, gentle kiss against my ankle causing my breath to hitch.

“Jax….” My voice quivered, but Jax didn’t listen.

“I noticed the way you were reluctant to go near the saddles and stirrups in the barn.” He raised himself higher, his lips now pressing softly against the hem of my jeans, my stomach flinching. A faint hiss escaped my lips. Jax ignored it, moving higher until he hovered over my thick, ropey scars. All three that were spaced equally apart, starting off thin before going thicker in the middle and then back to thin. “I noticed the way you’d pace because of the storms. The way you drifted into a world of your own and how you cry out at night. The way you jump at the sounds of the night animals.” His kiss weighed less than a feather against my bruised, gross skin, pressing on each of the scars. He worked his way farther and farther up past the claw marks, traveling up my sternum, my collarbone, and jaw until his face was hovering, only millimeters above mine.

His cool, honest eyes looked down into mine.

“I’ve known it all this time. Known everything.”

The first tear, the second that fell after, and every other one that followed, poured over my quivering skin. Without missing one, Jax pressed a kiss to them softly, and not a single drop reached the hay behind my head.

I didn’t bawl. I didn’t break down. But I cried. It felt as if it was the first time since the attack that I had cried despite having shed a thousand tears before. But unlike before, with every drop that fell, some of the burden weighing on my chest, the guilt for Max’s injury, the trauma of being helpless, and the fear that I had come close to death, it didn’t hurt as much.

When the last of my tears dried up, and I was staring up at the dark roof, it felt as if a lifetime of pain had washed out of me. I listened to the sounds of Max’s breathing further in the barn, feeling Jax’s gentle hand running up and down my side, his eyes watching me quietly.

“Thank you,” Jax whispered, drawing me from my mind.

I shifted my head, the movement of hay loud in our moment. “For what?” My voice was hoarse and sore, the slight gruffness of it not feminine in the slightest. For once, I couldn’t bring myself to care.

“For not dying,” he whispered. “If you had, I wouldn’t have had this chance to make everything up to you. I didn’t admit it but after I left, I regretted the way I treated you. I shouldn’t have blamed you for not coming with me. You stayed for the horses. You were braver than I was.”

His face fell away from mine, eyes looking down. It could have been interpreted as ogling my breasts, but I knew better. The pain and guilt on his face made my hand move without thought, running through the long dark curls on the top of his head, their soft, heavy sensation almost hypnotizing.

The longer my fingers danced across his scalp, the more I felt his chin rise, away from the place that he buried himself in. His eyes searched for mine, but my gaze stayed on his hair until he’d moved so close I couldn’t look away. My hand stopped, my lips parted, and only a small breath escaped as he leaned and gently melded my lips with his.

Savoring the smooth feel of his lips over mine, his rough hands kept me still beneath him, taking his time to taste me. The kiss lasted a millennium. All the while, a slow burn grew, and my back arched. His hands slid up my spine, their heat rubbing away the goose bumps he left on my skin and moved to the weak clasp on my bra.

He kept my mind occupied as he dipped his tongue underneath my lips, running it across the front of my teeth, first the top row, then the bottom, flicking the roof of my mouth.

Soft groans tugged from the depth of my chest as Jax took his time letting his hands roam up and across my arms. His fingers dipped under the white cotton straps and he pulled them down my arms an inch at a time. He leaned over just enough to let his own chest pin my loosened bra to my breasts, as not to release them too soon.

I wanted to call his name, wanted to urge him to move faster, to take me quicker, but something about him kept me passive, kept me waiting on the verge of excitement. The timelessness he created kept me balanced on an edge that allowed him to pull me along at his pace.

It was completely different from the last time he had taken me, without hesitation, without asking for permission. To such a beast, I had handed myself over in one bite. Now it was as if Jax didn’t want me whole. He wanted to take a little piece at a time, learn every detail, nook and crevice that he could taste on his lips. The smooth pair tasting, nipping, sucking, following the line of my jaw, tongue running along the edge of the bone and up to the lobe of my ear. He sucked lightly, a breath catching along my lips.

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