Page 44 of Amor Prohibido

I shot Lozza a look that implied she needed to shut up and shut upnow.

Jace’s eyes narrowed and flicked between us. “What do you know about my dick?”

“Well—” Loz started.

I loudly cut her off with a nondescript yell while shoving Jace from the room. “Nothing! Time to go. Here’s your jacket and put these on.” I threw the jacket at him, then kicked his boots closer.

His bewildered expression cut between me and Loz. “Jesus woman! It’s one thing to be gossiping about my dick, but it’s another to not let me hear what you two hens have been saying. It’s my right to know.”

“It involved the wordsbigandGodlike,” Lozza called.

“You’re a fucking dead woman, Loz. Not another fucking word!” I hissed, mortified beyond belief. “Jason, it’s time to leave.”

He shoved his boots on and laughed hard at Lozza being the bane of my existence. “Oh, my beanie is on your bed,” he said after a pat-down of his pockets.

“I’ll grab it since your boots are on,” I offered, mostly because my face was beet red—and that’s sayinga lotfor a brown girl.

I found it where he said it would be and met him at the door. He smiled gratefully while tugging it on, instantly transforming himself from looking kinda tough and scary, to hip.

He smirked wickedly, his pretty eyes dancing with amusement. “See you later, fiancée.”

“Shhh, these walls have ears,” I whisper-shouted and darted my eyes to Lozza’s room.

“Fiancée?”the mother of all banshees screeched directly behind my back, causing my heart to burst painfully in my chest from the fright.

A dimple depth, shit-eating grin accompanied his deep belly laugh. Opening the door, I tried to hold in my own laughter while I shoved Jace outside.

“Night you two,” he chuckled.

Giving him a quick wave with my middle finger, I clicked the door shut and flicked the lock, then turned to find Lozza looking me up and down.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake!”I stared her down while stalking past, heading for my room.

Behind me, my best friend followed in my wake screaming,“Oh my god. Oh my god. OH. MY. GOD!”

Dammit, Jason Malone!

SIXTEEN

JACE

It had been almost a week since my unorthodox proposal to Jax. What was even more unconventional was she insisted on not having a ring. She called it a fraud ring; a symbol of our agreement, not the unconditional love between two people like it should be. I argued the point until I was blue in the face. Iwantedher to have an engagement ring, but she argued back just as savagely, then flat out refused to budge. Her word was final. Reluctantly, I reneged on the condition that if she ever changed her mind; she had to tell me right away.

I relaxed into the lounge chair with a relieved exhale. “There ain’t nothin’ better than a cold brew on the couch at the end of a long day.”

Dad uttered an “Amen,” without looking up from the newspaper.

I hadn’t left the shop until after eight tonight since a new custom piece I was working on needed to be finished by next week. Creating beautiful furniture from native timber was my speciality, and it gave me a huge kick of pride and satisfaction, even with the hours of overtime.

I’d just brought the beer to my lips when my phone started blaring in my pocket. Annoyance cut through me until I pulled it out and saw Jax’s name on the screen. It was pushing nine thirty and she usually would have been in bed by now.

Her panicked voice cut off my greeting when I answered the call. “Jason! Oh God! I need you to take me to A&E!” she screamed down the line, frightfully breathless.

I was up and moving before I could think, ignoring the concerned looks from my parents. “What’s going on?”

“I’ve had bleeding and I’m freaking out.” She panted hard, trying to calm down. “Lozza has already moved out so I can’t ask her to take me.”

“I’m already on my way.” My voice remained calm, though inside, I was anything but. My heart damn near beat out of my chest.

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