Page 151 of The Bitter Words

My phone beeps with a message. I want both to curse the interruption and be grateful for it.

I reach for it and take it off the coffee table. A message from Gia shines up at me.

Gia:Happy New Year’s to you, too. I’m glad you’re doing well. I’m going to go work out. Let’s meet back here after and you can tell me about your breakfast date.

A zing of excitement flashes through me like a lightning bolt at her reference to me being on a date with Jax. A moment passes and I remember the past two minutes.

Me:It’s not a date. If anything, it’s the same thing I always deal with Jaxon. He likes to put me in a box and only sees me as a kid.

Gia:Sorry. I know how much you hate being treated that way.

Me:Thanks. Have a good workout.

Gia:Will do. Try to enjoy your time with Jaxon. He seems like a nice guy. I really enjoyed spending time with him last night.

I place my phone in my lap and gaze over at him. “Gia says she liked getting to know you last night.”

“She’s a beautiful young woman and a pleasure to be around.”

“She’s not much older than I am.” I narrow my eyes. “Yet she’s a woman and I’m just a girl.”

“Can we forget the topic of age and focus on what we were discussing before?” He rests his palm on my knee. “We were having a great conversation and I let a niggle of worry bleed into it.”

I glance at his hand and warmth spreads through me. I release any frustration and focus on him.

“Jax, is that your way of saying you haven’t mastered the art of living with zero anxiety yet?”

He puffs out a resigned breath. “Clearly, not with that.”

“With what?”

“Nothing.” He shakes his head and removes his hand. “Back to the issue. When I was researching how to cope with my problems, I found a lot of different techniques that proved to help considerably.”

“Such as?”

He pauses for a second and stares at me with a heaviness that seems filled with desire. He glances at my lips and tugs on the collar of his sweatshirt.

“Meditation.” He nods as if that’s his way of convincingone of us that’s what he was truly thinking about. “There’s always medication if the other options don’t work.”

“I take medication for it and find it numbs me. It doesn’t really give me any relief in the long run.”

“Are you in therapy?”

“I was.” I lower my head. “It wasn’t helping, so I stopped. My brother even said he thought it made me worse.”

“That’s interesting.”

I raise my gaze to his. “What’s interesting?”

“Therapy. Your brother said it made you worse. What did your parents think?”

“They didn’t say. I just told them one day I didn’t need to go anymore.”

“And that’s all it took to get them to agree?”

I crinkle up my nose and prepare to admit my manipulation tactic. “Let’s just say I know what to do and how to do it when it comes to getting them to see things my way.”

“I know. I’ve seen you do it myself,” Jax says dryly.