The day that Jax saw Callie for the first time changed everything. What had felt so difficult or even impossible between us, became eclipsed by the fact that we had this child together. Our old wounds might have still been there but acknowledging that neither of us had been responsible for inflicting them altered the way we saw one another.
Other than the fact that his parents didn’t like me, and that my mother was about as constant as the Louisiana weather, we didn’t know the full extent of the circumstances that had pushed us apart. But right now, those circumstances didn’t matter. What mattered was that Jax and I needed to get along well enough so that we could both be parents to Callie.
Not that I had any plans for us to rekindle what we’d lost. That ship had sailed long ago. But if we could become friends, it’d make our daughter’s upbringing easier. All I wanted was for her to be as content as possible and to know she was supported. And I’d do anything to make that happen.
The weeks passed, and before I knew it, Halloween had come and gone. New Orleans loved that season, loved the ghosts and ghouls, loved its ties to voodooism and the occult. Jax and I had taken Callie trick or treating together. When I asked her what she wanted to be this year, we’d been in Target looking through their costumes. I’d expected her to choose one like she had for the past two years, but this time, she didn’t.
“I want to be a spooky flutterby,” she declared.
“Do you mean butterfly?”
“Yes, a flutterby.”
Okie dokie. One problem, though. I didn’t see any spooky butterfly costumes. I’d shared this concern with her father.
“Can one be made?” Jax asked me, as we watched her play on the living room floor with her two favorite dolls. She changed their diapers, burped them and cradled them, rocking them simultaneously in her skinny arms.
“I don’t have very good seamstress skills.”
“We could always hire it done.”
Unfortunately, this was Jax’s answer all too often. Something’s wrong? Let’s buy a solution. It felt like some weird game show. Would you like to buy a vowel and solve the puzzle? Why yes, yes I would. It frustrated me to no end and had led to frequent arguments between the two of us. Mainly because I didn’t have the funds to produce that kind of result.
But he did.
When we were a couple, the difference in our economic statuses hadn’t been an issue. He’d actually concealed his affluent background as much as he could in order to not be ostracized in school. He hadn’t hidden his wealth from me, but he also didn’t parade it in front of me like he seemed to be doing now.
All our time together in high school had been about how we felt, the majority of those feelings getting expressed physically. We were two horny teenagers with limited responsibilities rather than adults. Now, we kept running into circumstances that caused friction between us, and only after the first few weeks did I understand why.
Not only did him being around all the time remind me of what we’d had, it also drew attention to the fact that we didn’t have it now.
He could offer me a single look, say something in a certain tone of voice, or laugh out loud, and my mind plummeted straight into the gutter. Whether due to his long absence, my own loneliness or the stress of the situation, I found myself wanting him. Aching for him. Even though we couldn’t go there.
Too much had altered in our lives. He was this big important CEO while I was this lowly bartender, hostess, escort and student. We weren’t kids anymore, and I’d learned the hard way that childhood romances almost never become long-term relationships. Those who did try wound up divorced as often as not, usually because they grew apart.
He’d already broken my heart once. I didn’t have any need to put myself through that again.
I could control how my interactions with Jax went in the light of day, but night was another matter. My subconscious had seen fit to send me dream after dream about Jax, each more erotic and mind-blowing than the last. It might not have been so bad if we hadn’t had a history – and the baggage to go with it – but we did. I knew exactly what it felt like to be kissed by him, to wake up beside him, to be lifted to the highest of heights by him. It messed with my psyche.
Our arguments hadn’t yet become as vitriolic as they’d been in the beginning when we’d each believed the other to be out-and-out lying, but I kept finding myself sniping at him. And he sniped right back.
“Hiring it done is cheating,” I’d told Jax about our daughter’s Halloween costume.
He’d scrunched his features incredulously. “How is it cheating?”
“It just is. I guess I’ll try to patch something together myself.”
“That’s silly, Roxy. You’re too busy for that, and you know I can afford to provide her with whatever she wants.”
And there it was again, our bone of contention. He had plenty of funds and resources while I didn’t. Quietly, and without my permission, Jaxson had gone through and paid off every one of the medical bills I’d been paying since her birth. Everything to do with my cesarean and her time in the NICU. Every baby checkup and visit to the pediatrician. In one fell swoop, he’d relieved me of that debt, and I should have been grateful. I should. But I wasn’t.
I didn’t even know why.
“You resent him,” Raina provided her take on the situation.
“Why would I resent him? I now know that what happened wasn’t his fault. He’s gone out of his way to get to know Callie, to get to know me again, too. What’s there to resent?”
She frowned. Despite not saying so much aloud, I got the impression that Raina didn’t care for Jax. “He has this cushy lifestyle where all his needs are met with the flick of his wrist. Meanwhile, you spent over four years killing yourself to scrape out the most meager of livings. He doesn’t understand what that’s like and probably never will.”
“I don’t think that’s fair, Raina. I feel like he’s doing his best.”
I did, too. So what was my major malfunction?
Ultimately, Jax had found this amazing company that created one-of-a-kind children’s costumes. He’d spoken to Callie, then commissioned the outfit. It fit on our daughter perfectly, and she’d been ecstatic, refusing to take it off for two days. I should have been thrilled. Relieved. Happy. And I was. Sort of. Still, something in the back of my mind rankled, and I couldn’t seem to let it go.
It took me another week to figure things out, but once I did, it all became abundantly clear. Jax and I were having yet another disagreement, this time about a matter of great import. Callie’s care.
“I don’t understand why you’re fighting me on this,” he said, shaking his head and scowling at me. “I owe you for over four years of childcare. Any decent father would pay, and since this is no hardship for me, I don’t get what your objections are.”
“I’ve been handling this, Jax.”
“Yeah, you have. All on your own, too. But that’s no longer necessary. I’m just making things right, and I’ll continue to do so.”
Maybe he hadn’t intended for his words to come out as cocky and arrogant, but they had. It made me mad, but it also made me feel afraid. He was taking matters into his own hands without listening to my input. What else might he do without my input? How far would he go?
“Callie is my daughter.”
He stared at me, his dark brows set in harsh lines. He raised his voice, making me glad Callie was in daycare rather than here at home. “She’s our daughter. You wanted me to meet her. You asked me to be a part of her life.”
This was true, but there was more to it than that.
“I should be consulted on these types of decisions, though. I feel like you want to grab the reins from my hands. Like you want to take her over.”
That made him pause. He went silent, and I knew he’d begun to analyze what I said. “You think I have some weird master plan to steal her away from you?”
I hadn’t thought of something quite that specific, but now that he brought it up, my blood ran cold. The truth was he had the resources to do whatever he wanted, and not just on the basis of partial custody, either. With the right lawyers, he might be granted more. A lot more. And the possibility of that would be a nightmare. It took me right out at the knees.
Before I could fall apart, though, he raised a palm to my cheek. He threaded a hand into my hair, gently pushing it back behind my ear. This was an action he’d taken in the past, a move I remembered from before he’d gone to London. The familiarity of it, the sweetness of it, rinsed over me like a warm rain, soaking away some of my fear and discontent.
“I know we’re working on this, Roxy, on becoming a family. I know I could be a dick about the circumstances surrounding my parental rights, too, but I don’t want to go down that path. I want you to trust me. I want to make things better between us, not worse. I think we’ve both suffered enough in recent years. Don’t you?” His breath fanned over my ear as he spoke, and I shivered.
Realization dawned then, loud and clear. I didn’t resent Jax because of what he’d been doing for Callie. I resented him because of what he hadn’t been doing for me. With me. I wanted what we used to have. I wanted him, and up until that point, he’d shown me no indication of wanting me back. His lack of interest hurt, even though it shouldn’t have.
I recognized that he’d been holding back. He was careful around me. His blue eyes had darkened significantly as he bestowed me with that intense gaze of his, making desire pool between my thighs until my legs trembled. I knew that look. When he’d given me that look previously, it led to exquisite physical pleasure. Pleasure I hadn’t experienced since.
It’d been something I believed I could do without. But now with the object of my desire so near, I could no longer pretend that my craving for him didn’t exist. It did. More than ever.
I could still feel the heat of his hand warming my cheek, and as he leaned in so that his lips were within mere inches of mine, every nerve ending I had jumped up and begged for more. My breasts grew heavy and my nipples puckered. The ache in between my thighs intensified until I felt my panties saturate with dampness while my heartrate accelerated like I was running a hundred-meter dash.
It’d been so long since I’d experienced this. Too long.
But he dropped his hand and pulled away. “I care too much about you, about both of you, to allow you to suffer like that ever again,” he said, and taking a deep breath, he pivoted toward my door. I reached out to stop him, to tell him how I felt, but he’d already stepped over the threshold. “I’ll be back tomorrow, Rox.”
And then he was gone.