Page 80 of Jax
That ruined me more than it should’ve. I stayed anyway, tethered by something that wasn’t force or fear. I didn’t know what came next, but for the first time in a long while, I wasn’t bracing for it. I wasn’t running, or shrinking, or apologizing. I was just here, in the middle of it, with a man who saw the fire beneath the wreckage and didn’t look away.
And somewhere between his silence and mine, I started to believe that maybe I was still worth melting for.
By the timethe fire burned low and the marshmallows had been reduced to sticky fingers and torn wrappers, the chaos had softened. It didn’t vanish, but it blurred at the edges.
Maddy sprawled on her stomach across a towel, humming the Jurassic Park theme while dragging a marshmallow stick through the ash in a tragic portrait of Sully. He lay passed out beside her, clutching a half-empty marshmallow bag like a safety blanket. Bellamy braided wildflowers into Carrick’s hair while he pretended not to care. Niko muttered about mildew with a beer in hand and his feet propped up like a dad who had lost the war but claimed the recliner.
Jax hadn’t moved. Still close. Still quiet. Still there, with that steady presence that felt like safety.
Deacon, somehow now holding a wine glass I was sure hadn’t existed minutes ago, swirled something red with deliberate calm. Whether Maddy summoned it or he conjured it was unclear.
He took a sip, set the glass on his knee, and delivered the line with absolute composure. “This may be the most chaotic nonsexual orgy I’ve ever attended.”
There was a pause long enough to hold a laugh.
Then Bellamy, dry as a bone, said it without blinking. “It’s called community, Deacon.”
Maddy rolled onto her back and flung her arms out like she was presenting a magic trick. “It’s called foreplay.”
Carrick didn’t even glance up. “It’s callednormalwhen you live with Maddy.”
Niko groaned like a man enduring a migraine in a kindergarten classroom. “I miss when we were dangerous and quiet.”
Sully, eyes still closed, one arm flopped over his forehead like a tragic Victorian widow, replied with a happy sigh. “I don’t.”
I snorted. Loudly. Didn’t bother to hide it. Something about the cadence of their weird little family made the sound rip out of me, real and unfiltered.
Jax looked over, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth like it didn’t quite want to commit to existing yet. “You laughingatus orwithus?”
I lifted an eyebrow. “You think there’s a difference?”
His laugh came low and rasping, the kind that rolls through the chest and rises slowly, like bourbon heat and secrets you don’t realize you’re telling.
God, he was trouble.
But not the reckless kind. Trouble with firelight in his eyes and hands that didn’t try to mend what wasn’t his to fix. Troublewith a voice that reached into hollow places and made me forget how long it had been since I felt like someone worth holding onto.
Around us, the others were still arguing about whether marshmallow toasting counted as foreplay when Chauncey the frog reappeared, vaulting off Maddy’s discarded towel and landing squarely on Deacon’s shin like a soldier reporting for duty.
Deacon glanced down, unbothered. “Welcome back, General. The mission continues.”
Bellamy whispered like she meant it, “We need a documentary crew.”
Carrick groaned. “We need a therapist.”
“I am the therapist,” Jax offered mildly.
I leaned into him, just enough for our shoulders to brush. “And yet here we are.”
He didn’t pull away. Didn’t lean in either. Just stayed, anchored and unassuming, a quiet weight beside me that made the wanting feel possible again. Not extravagant. Not dangerous. Just real.
And all around us, the fire cracked, the frog leapt, the fools bickered, and the world spun steady as ever—even as mine, at last, began to turn.
19
Jax
Trust doesn’t erase nerves.It just gives them somewhere safe to land.
