Page 43 of Inevitable Love
I drift in and out of awareness, noting the changes in thelightness of the room, but unable to wake up enough to actually get up and go to bed. There’s a vague rattle of the doorknob and voices that seem familiar but not urgent.
Then the soft cushions beneath me move. And I float upward.
“Shh, I’ve got you.” Jackson’s velvet voice washes over me, and I relax into him, nestling my face into his neck with a hum.
“Is she…?” That’s someone else.
Weird.
There’s something I’m forgetting. Some reason I needed to stay awake. Something I was going to do. Someone I needed to see.
But those thoughts float away as I drift further, surrendering to the sleep my exhausted body so desperately craves.
I wake with a jolt. Disoriented and swimmy-headed. The other side of the bed is empty.
Jackson. Couch. He moved me to bed.
Frantically, I pat around the covers, looking for my phone to check the time. It’s still dark out, so at least I haven’t slept through opening my store. After a frantic search, I find my phone on the bedside table, plugged in and fully charged.Jackson.
He’d be such a great boyfriend, the way he always seems to remember the little things. That is, he’d be great if he weren’t leaving in the near future.
I glance at the time, and the panic flares again. Normally, I’m leaving at this time. I jump out of bed and change out of yesterday’s clothes.
Oh shit. Alice.
Yesterday comes back in a flood, and I am suddenly wide awake. Alice is here. Jackson carried me to bed. And I totally slept through getting to see either of them last night.
I sneak through the quiet house, leave Alice a quick note that I’m leaving my car for her, and run out the door. My shop is only a couple of blocks away, not a big deal. But as I leave my driveway, I get an eerie sense that I shouldn’t be out in the predawn hours like this. Plenty of people jog early in the morning, though. And it’s not far. I’m just being a scaredy-cat who’s clearly read too many thriller novels and listened to too many true crime podcasts.
I’m halfway to the shop and already sweating—September in Georgia is no joke. It’s humid even at four a.m.—when thunder rolls in the distance. I double down on my power walk.
A pair of headlights flash over me when a car turns onto my street. I hunch my shoulders and avert my face, trying to make myself as small and unnoticeable as possible. Maybe they’ll just cruise on by. But they don’t. My heartbeat pounds in my head as the vehicle draws near and slows.
“What the hell, Mags.”
A nearby streetlight illuminates the block ahead of me. I shield my eyes from the bright glow so I can confirm what I already know. “Jax? What are you doing here?”
“I said I’d give you a ride this morning.”
“I… don’t remember that.” But I’m freaking grateful, so I rush around the front of the Jeep and climb in. “Thanks, I hate walking in the dark, but I didn’t want to leave Alice without a car.”
“So let me get this straight. You’ll inconvenience yourself, do something you hate, so someone else will have an easier time of it?”
“Well, I didn’t want her to be stranded.”
He whips the Jeep around and heads to the bakery. Once parked, he slides an arm across the back of my seat and gets in my face. We are nose to nose in the confines of the vehicle. His fingers grip my chin as he plants a kiss on my lips.
“I don’t want you putting yourself in danger. I need you to be careful.”
I huff a laugh. “Jackson, I regularly put myself in danger, and all of those times, I’ve been with you.”
“That’s different. Don’t put yourself in danger when I can’t be there to protect you.”
He doesn’t give me a chance to reply. Instead, he takes my mouth like he needs this kiss to breathe. No one has ever kissed me the way he does, and once he leaves, I don’t know that anyone will ever be able to take his place.
I am so screwed.
Chapter Sixteen
