“I aged out at eighteen. There was a difficult period when I tried to access further support. I had to make do with what I could find for a while.”
Jackson made a conscious effort to relax his jaw. “The shed.”
Leah laughed. She actually laughed. “Yes, the shed. It was summer and I wasn’t there for long. I had offers from past foster homes, too. They let me stay a couple of nights here and there when they had room. Then I got the housing placement.”
“It must have been scary.” They’d reached the beach house now and Jackson turned her toward him, tracing her cheekbone with one finger. “You can share it with me, if you want to.”
“Why?” She frowned, searching his face. “It’s in the past. Why does it matter now, Jax?”
He couldn’t explain. “It just does. It matters to me.”
Leah stepped closer. Turning her head, she rested her cheek against Jackson’s chest and curled her arms around his waist. He wrapped her up tightly, soothing them both, playing with the ends of her hair where it fell between her shoulder blades. The clear sky was beginning to fill with faint stars, the waves lapped sleepily onto the sand.
“I felt worthless and vulnerable and helpless to do anything about it.” Her voice was so quiet, he strained to hear her. “Abandoned and anxious. It really sucked.”
“I’m so sorry,” Jackson murmured over the top of her head. “I’m so, so sorry.”
She lifted her chin and they held each other’s gaze. Leah’s eyes glittered, framed by charcoal lashes. The dusting of barely there freckles over her nose had faded into the half-light, leaving her skin delicately pale against the inky tendrils of her hair. She was a lake nymph. A dandelion seed. A wisp of smoke. Real and yet unreal. Something that could vanish at any moment. He wanted to keep her so badly. A weird ache rubbed at the inside of his chest.
Jackson jerked his chin toward the house. “Takeout? I’m buying.”
A smile broke out on Leah’s lips. “Lead on.”
Dinner was delicious. They picked it up from Juliana’s on Williams Street less than ten minutes away—homemade Italian meatballs, drowning in a spicy marinara sauce, covered in cheese and served over linguine. Tearing off chunks from a loaf of fresh, herby bread which came with the meal, they demolished the lot, their table manners carelessly casual. Jackson licked his fingers and stretched, loosening the kinks in muscles exhausted from the surf.
They did the dishes together. Simple chores, easy company. A nudge here, a joke there, unchecked laughter. Leah flicking him with soapy water and Jackson retaliating with a crack of the dishtowel against her ass when she bent to open a cupboard.
He struggled to think of anything over the past couple of years that had brought the kind of light-hearted relief he felt around Leah. People didn’t tease him. They came to him with problems to fix, tasks to get done. They expected concise conversations. Immediate action. No one but Leah thought there was any more to him.
Like warm rays of sun on chilled water, she thawed him, until Jackson felt more real than he had in years.
“What now?” Leah dropped onto the couch with a tired and happy sigh.
He lifted a deck of cards from the shelf of a bookcase. “Poker?”
One of her dark eyebrows kinked and she smiled a knowing smile which kicked him in the groin. God, the way she could switch from dorky to dirty on a dime did him in. “Just poker?”
OK, now he wasn’t interested in just poker. Desire inched stealthily through his bloodstream and Jackson made a speedy evaluation of her clothes (of which there weren’t many) and his own (similar). He liked his chances. “Strip poker would be more fun...”
“Obviously.”
“It’s your call.”
“Hmmm.” Leah made a show of thinking about it. He was almost certain she wasn’t wearing a bra. There was suddenly a lot less room in his shorts. “Alright. I’m game if you are.”
Jackson dealt the cards and shot her a deliberately wolfish smile. “You better hope you brought your A-game, Raven. I’m not taking any prisoners.”
Leah chewed her lip, folding protective arms around her body. “Maybe we should play euchre instead?”
This was going to be fun. “Too late. You’ve gotten your hand—do your worst.”
Forty minutes later, he was sitting in his boxers, with Leah’s flush—the two, five, nine, jack, and king of diamonds—laid out jauntily in front of him. Damn that he’d ever trusted her innocent expression. She lounged beside him, still wearing every single item of her clothing. Jackson chucked his pair of sevens on to the table. Forearms braced on his thighs, hanging his head with a wince.
Leah squinted over the top of her glasses, waggling a finger toward his hips. “Get ’em off, Jax.”
He’d unleashed a monster.
Jackson raised himself slowly to his feet. She ran hungry eyes over the planes of his chest, the mischief falling from her face, and he stood taller. Knowing she wanted him, seeing the effect his body had on her, he looped his thumbs into the waistband of his boxers slowly. Leah’s lips parted.
