Page 62 of Miss Understood

I straddle him with my legs and wrap my arms around his broad shoulders. His deep brown eyes are dark and half-asleep. I might love when he’s clean-cut and in a suit, but I can’t deny him like this either. An evening’s worth of scruff on his jaw, shirtless, hooded eyes aiming to devour me.

“You and your sister are so different,” I tell him, planting a soft kiss on his jaw.

Jesse lets out a moan as his hands trail up my legs. “We’re really going to talk about my sister while you sit on my lap with no underwear?”

I pull back and smile at him. “You don’t talk about your family much. And when I’m naked, I find you much more agreeable.”

“Vicious.” Jesse laughs, and it rattles all the way through me.

I shrug and shoot him a smile.

“We are different,” Jesse says. “We had very different childhoods for having the same parents.”

“How’s that?”

His hands move off my thighs and wrap around my waist. He’s still holding me tightly against him, but no longer exploring.

“Growing up, my parents struggled financially. We spent most of my childhood living off food stamps and living in low-income housing. It wasn’t easy for them, but they worked hard, did what they could. When I was old enough, I started taking on jobs outside of school, helping pay the bills however I could. It was the least I could do.” Jesse sighs deeply enough that I feel the weight in it. “They’re good people. They showed me a lot of love, but they were stuck in a financial hole they couldn’t dig themselves out of. My grandparents never had any money, and neither did their parents. Generations just barely getting by.”

Jesse leans in and plants a kiss on my collarbone before looking back up at me. “My parents were determined to break the cycle. They made sure I went to the best school, even if it meant an hour bus ride each way. They helped me apply for financial aid. They pushed me—hard. And I’m thankful for that every day. The minute I started making money—real money—I made sure I paid them back. They don’t struggle anymore.”

“You’re a good man, Jesse Davis,” I say to him.

For a man I once thought was cold and calculated, he’s hiding the warmest heart I’ve ever known.

“I do what I can,” Jesse says. “Serena is twelve years younger than me; she doesn’t remember the struggle the same way, because I was helping them out by the time she was older.”

“That’s why you’re so protective of her.” I squeeze his neck.

Jesse nods. “She doesn’t need to fight for it like they did, or like I did. We broke the pattern so she wouldn’t have to.”

“The man has a heart beating in there after all,” I say, patting him on the chest as a smile shows up on his lips.

He pulls me against his bare chest, and we’re skin to skin where the buttons of his shirt are undone.

Just when I think I’ve figured Jesse out, I learn something new about him. That he was closed off as a means of protection, that he’s careful because he knows the potential of what can happen if he isn’t. He’s worked hard, and not just for him, but for his family. He protects those he cares about. It’s something we have in common, even if our childhoods looked different.

After losing my mother, my father and brothers were in pieces. And even if I was young and grappling myself, I had to learn quick how to be strong and hold those around me together. I had to fill the holes her death left behind.

I had to be strong.

But even if I’m used to fighting my own battles, in Jesse’s arms, I can’t help but want to be a woman worthy of someone else’s care and protection for once.

Jesse’s eyes pinch with a thought.

“What?” I tease him with a kiss on the nose.

His arms wrap tighter. “You make me better.”

Before I can ask what he means by it, his lips find mine, soaking up the last of my thoughts. His hands move down my back and under the edge of his dress shirt to find my bare ass.

Jesse pulls my hips against him, and I work the band of his underwear to find his hard cock underneath. But even as he sinks inside me, I don’t feel close enough. The distance is infinite in a man like Jesse. I’ll hold him, touch him, feel him. I’ll get lost in his vastness. Exploring every inch as it drags me deeper, but never quite deep enough.

I could be his if he wanted. If I’d let myself.

23

Luce

---