Page 17 of Jack's Devotion

"The mafia? What the fuck?"

"My wife is reading again," he grumbles like this is a bad thing.

"So?"

"She thinks audiobooks count as reading, motherfucker. If I have to listen to one more sex scene blaring across this mansion at full volume while she's cleaning…"

"You know she's taunting you, right?" I laugh at him. Maybe he needs to spend more time at the coffee shop if he doesn't know this. I've learned all kinds of useful shit from the book club meetings there. "Take the broom away and recreate whatever the fuck scene she's listening to."

He's quiet for a full five count. "Dinner is at eight tonight, not seven," he growls. "Do not come early."

I hang up, shaking my head. My brother is an idiot.

"Are you nervous?" I glance over at Madison to find her fidgeting with her seat belt as we drive through downtown Midnight Falls.

"What? No," she lies, orange Jack-o-Lanterns dancing across her face from the lights strung up all across town.

"Drake won't bite, baby," I murmur. "He's a cranky asshole most of the time, but he's one of the best men you'll ever meet."

"I've met him."

I arch a brow, surprised.

"He was at your Christmas party. We both hid out in the stairwell for a while." She shrugs. "He doesn't say much."

"Oh, he says plenty," I say dryly, chuckling. "He just wouldn't have said it to you."

"Why not?"

"Drake doesn't talk to most people. He was bullied pretty viciously when he was younger. He dealt by shutting down and shutting everyone out." I sigh, still not entirely over the way all of that shit went down. "It was a long goddamn time ago, but it still bugs the fuck out of me, not even going to lie."

"What happened?" Madison asks and then bites her lip. "Am I allowed to ask that?"

"It's a long story," I mutter. "But he was dared to do something stupid when we were kids, and he got hurt in the process. Everyone forgot the part where he could have died, though. They just remembered him being wheeled out covered in his own urine."

"Oh no," Madison whispers, her face falling.

"It changed the entire trajectory of his life. Hell, it changed mine too. I was expected to play college ball, but after that shit? All I wanted was to get him the fuck out of town, give him a chance to start fresh."

"Is that why you started your first company?"

I jerk my chin in a nod. "A few years after we left, I realized that wasn't helping anything. We made millions, but all he wasdoing was running from his problems. He spent all of his time holed up in his apartment, refusing to interact with anyone. So I dragged him back home. By then, everyone regretted the shit they'd done to him as kids. Drake didn't want to hear their apologies though. He just shut himself up in the mansion and ignored everyone."

"It's easy for people to forget what they said. It's a lot harder to forget the way they made you feel."

"Yeah. Meeting his wife changed things. For once, he's actually living. He leaves his place willingly. He interacts with people on his own. He holds conversations with people. It's night and day to how it used to be." I glance over at her again. "But when you met him, we hadn't been back for long. He didn't talk to anyone back then."

"He wasn't mean to me," she promises quickly. "We just quietly shared the stairwell." Her lips curve into a smile. "He was grumbling about wearing a suit and stupid parties."

"Well, that hasn't changed much."

She laughs quietly. "He looked handsome in his suit at your stupid party."

A growl rumbles from my lips without conscious thought, jealousy pinging through me.

Another peal of laughter erupts from her lips. "Oh my gosh. Are you jealous right now, Jack?"

"No. Yes. No." I narrow my eyes on her as I turn onto Drake's road. "He's an idiot who wears underwear with inappropriate sayings on them. And he probably has a dungeon in the basement. You don't want anything to do with him, baby. Trust me."

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