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  Lena’s heart shattered in two, and she suddenly thought him a stranger. Worse – someone she never had any desire to know, let alone love. Flattening her palm, she slapped his face hard. Jax recoiled under the force of her blow, and he tried to grab her again when she repeated the assault and watched him turn away. As he buried his head in the brick, his eyes hidden from her view as his back tensed, Lena stretched towards his side, and her lips met his ear.

  “And you wonder why I didn’t say goodbye?” she asked. “Because you’re just like him. Eric Stiles’ boy through and through.”

  He peered up at her with a wounded look, but Lena shook any pity off and started to turn on her heel, when his voice peeled through the air. “Why even come back, then?” he asked.

  Lena kept her eyes on the way out as she swallowed hard and struggled to speak. “I don’t even know anymore, Jax.” She faced him again. In the right light, he was still the brave boy, the one she craved with every breath in her body. But as soon as a cloud passing over the moon concealed him in shadows, Lena realized that any idea of him as something or someone sweet was little more than the dreams that ended too fast. Would the dreams leave her now? Or would they stay in her heart, destined to torment her for all time. “You’re right,” she whispered. “Should have done this a long time ago.” Steeling her strength, Lena dared to step back to his side. She thought she saw his face start to soften, but she refused to acknowledge any show of sweetness as her jaw tensed and her tongue untied. “Goodbye, Jax.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  She’d been up all night. Staring up into the shadows crossing the ceiling, the branches just beyond the house forming gray swirls over her eyes doing nothing to lull her into anything close to a dream. Without the sounds of her roommate clicking away at her computer or loud feet stomping up and down the dormitory halls, she felt like she was going crazy. At least the sound of Sully snoring was some source of comfort, and when dawn finally started to break, she showered quickly and waited for her uncle to rise. Another series of endless hours passed until he stirred.

  Lena stood at the stove and sloshed a pat of butter into a frying pan. So much for the idea that an olive oil based cooking spray would be better for her uncle’s cholesterol. But she had to work with the tools at hand.

  As the butter softened into a milky yellow puddle, Lena snatched a few eggs from the fridge along with a small loaf of bread. Placing two slices into the toaster, she proceeded to separate the yolks from the whites. It was a small step, and one that Sully was sure to rail against when he emerged from his bedroom, but she hadn’t compromised her chances of making a clean break from Deerfield only to have him die on her another way.

  The sound of a motorcycle peeling down the street distracted her from the task at hand, and she instinctively glanced out the window, expecting to see Jax despite the fact that she gave him her final word. A small part of her almost hoped he was racing to meet her, unwilling to let her go down without some kind of a fight. Would she resist? Was it wise to allow him the chance to offer an explanation that was bound to make no difference? But just the thought of seeing him made her warm inside and set her hands trembling. Lena stretched to the tips of her toes and narrowed her eyes through the glass.

  A chopper all right. But no sign of Jax. Just a weekend warrior playing at being everything Jax was. The leather jacket gracing the man’s back was too sharp and shiny to suggest any kind of danger. And that’s what Jax was. She had to keep reminding herself of that. The corners of her mouth fell into a frown. I have to keep my distance. But how the hell I supposed to do that?

  “You’re up early!”

  Sully’s voice distracted Lena from her thoughts. The man was sprouting a fresh patch of stubble as he smiled at her through bleary eyes.

  “It’s almost eleven o’clock,” Lena said as she pointed at the clock.

  Sully blushed as he shuffled his feet. “Suppose you want to lay into me for being a slacker,” he said.

  Lena was tempted, anything to try to whip him into shape, but the fight was all but knocked out of her, and she simply shook her head as she gestured for him to take a seat at the table.

  “Coffee?” she asked, filling the carafe with water and spooning the grounds into the filter before she received a response one way or the other.

  “Got any Bailey’s to go with that?” Lena rolled her eyes as Sully smirked and tossed his hands in the air. “Joke,” he said. “Just trying to see if you’re paying attention.”

  “Why would you ask that?”

  “Take a look at the stove, why don’t you.”

  Looking at the pan, Lena gasped as the sight of her attempt at something nutritious starting to pop and bubble. Turning down the heat, Lena worked her spatula around the frying egg whites, salvaging the meal as the aroma of coffee wafted all around her.

  “Here you go,” Lena said as she presented him with a fresh cup. Sully sipped slowly as the toast came to attention, golden brown and as she arranged the food on the plate, Lena handed him his breakfast only to be met by a confused stare.

  “It’s better for you without the yolks,” she started. “You really need to---”

  “Ain’t that,” Sully admitted. “Where’s your own helping?”

  “I’m not really hungry,” she said as she sat wearily at his side and smoothed her hands across her face.

  “Still think you try,” Sully suggested at he tried to offer her a piece of toast. “Got to keep your strength up for your studies or---” He stopped himself before finishing the thought, and Lena saw her frustrated stare reflected in his eyes. “Sorry,” he said. “Guess you’ll be hanging around here for a little while longer.”

  “The money had to come from somewhere,” she confessed sadly. But with her account drained for the moment, why bother to go back? Even with her tuition taken care of, she had nothing left for books, no way to contemplate a meal even though she felt certain her appetite would never return.

  “Looks like,” Lena admitted. “But you know I would do it again, right?” Laying her hand over Sully’s, she could still see the shame in his stance. “It’s what family does. You’d do the same thing for me.”

  Sully nodded slowly before releasing a great sigh. “Fact is, though, you’re one thing I don’t have to worry about,” he said. “Especially when you had that boy in your corner.”

  “Don’t be so sure about that,” Lena said. “There are things you don’t know.”

  “About the kid?” Sully asked. “Look I don’t know what’s gotten into him lately, but you really gonna sit here and tell me he didn’t always have your back?”

  On that fact, she couldn’t lie, could do nothing but nod even as it felt like she had a rock resting in the pit of her stomach. “Doesn’t matter anymore,” Lean said. “We finally said our goodbyes.”

  Sully seemed eager to press the point, but Lena left the table and rinsed out the pan, hoping to stop the conversation dead in its tracks. But Sully wouldn’t let it drop. “Hello and goodbye?” he asked. “Little girl, tight as you were, you two should at least try to talk it out. Don’t you think you owe him that?”

  “I don’t owe him or his family anything,” Lena seethed. “Not anything else. Not after…” Lena’s voice caught her throat, and as Sully pushed away from the table and took her into his arms, she felt the tears stinging her eyes as her lip quivered. Her uncle said nothing, just held her and let her sob, his hands moving down her back as Lena thought her legs might give out from under or she would fall asleep on her feet.

  Sully took her face in his hands and mopped her tears away. “Think there’s something you’re not being straight with me about,” he started. “Want to give me a hint?”

  “No,” she said as she slowly shook her head from side to side. “Just everything that went down. And I’m exhausted.”

  “Sure that’s all there is to it?” he asked. “Because if there is something else, you know you can tell me.”

  Not her uncle and not Jax. Not
that the biker would even care if he knew the truth. Lena straightened up the back of her neck and forced a smile. Giving Sully’s cheek a swift pat, she squeezed his hand. “I’m fine,” she assured him. “Maybe I just need a breath of fresh air.”

  “Maybe you need to rest,” Sully countered.

  Grabbing her jacket and her purse, her eyes briefly moved to the foot of the staircase. Soft as her bed was, she couldn’t be alone with her thoughts. Needing some distraction, she teased her uncle to get washed up and quickly took on foot.

  Moving without any intended direction, Lena felt her head start to calm as a gentle breeze washed over her eyes. Out and open was always the way to get handle on things. How many times had she stolen off into the night when she couldn’t help but feel the scorn swirling all around her? Easy target in hand-me-downs. Fair game for all manner of insults when she lacked his protection. Probably why she couldn’t sleep in the space of her old bed. Something about the house always made her feel trapped. Stuck. Just like she was right now.

  But Lena let that reality fall away as she inched her way down a steep incline and saw the trees waving overhead, and she smiled at the sound of the creek bubbling just a few feet away. Feeling as if she were stepping into the better pieces of the past, Lena inched closer to the water’s edge, and she managed to smile at the sight of her reflection looking back at her, puffy eyes and all. Wanting to draw nearer to the magical version of herself, she kicked off her shoes and sat at the bank. She sighed at the feel of the water dancing around her toes, and when she let her eyelids fall and sank into the grass, it was as if he were still there as he was before he became someone too hard for her to recognize.

  Feeling safe and secluded below the canopy of the trees, Lena allowed her hand to slip under her skirt. Reaching between her thighs, she felt her mound moist and throbbing as Jax’s face flashed across her brain. Never having known his lips, left only to imagine what he might taste like when he was in her corner, when he had her back, she let her mind wander now. The fact that it could never come true in no way replaced the possibility of the fantasy, and she moaned at the feel of her hand, feeling certain that one quick push could bring her sleep and a kind of peace, when her fingers left her body at the sound of a snapping twig.

  “Who’s there?” Lena demanded as her eyes darted around and she lowered her skirt over her knees. Abandoning the creek as she pushed her feet back into her shoes, Lena leapt to her feet, her breath hard in her chest as she started back the way she came. Managing only a few steps, she cried out at the sight of a shadow stepping into view and the feel of firm hands on her wrists.

  CHAPTER NINE

  “Thought I’d find you here.”

  Lena blinked as she saw Jax looming above her, his green eyes soft as his mouth stayed fixed in a straight line. His stare seemed soft, and she started to fall into him when she remembered who he had become.

  “Just a hunch?” she asked as she pushed away from him.

  A light gasp left his lips, and he tried to bring her back into his arms. Something in his hold… no. She knew what it was. Too close to the darkness, and Lena kicked away from him and turned her back.

  “What the hell, Lena?” he demanded. “You were never like this.”

  Not when she still had a hope of having him, not when he met her at her stoop and carried her books as he peered like a hawk when it came to her day-to-day. Should she have told him when it all went south? Part of her wanted to try her luck now, but her mind spun with the fact that he was right here at the supposed perfect moment. Was is sweet, or had he learned more from Eric than she had ever imagined?

  “Are you suddenly keeping tabs on me?”

  “Keeping tabs? What are you talking about?”

  Lena charged back to his side and started to grab his neck when she suddenly held back and pressed her hands to her sides.

  “Maybe you just couldn’t resist to get in another jab,” she spat. “Feeling me out for the others.”

  Jax’s eyes blazed as he started to speak, but Lena held her ground as her lip quivered slightly.

  “Try to take it back,” she challenged. “

  “I didn’t mean it,” he muttered. “I know you.”

  Extending his arm, his fingers flexing against the supple line of her wrist, Lena savored the feel of his skin on hers for all of a second before pulling away again. “Don’t be so sure,” she started. “I’m sure as hell not.”

  His lips curled into a tight frown, and she watched with baited breath as his hand curled and uncurled into a tight fist. “Don’t say that, Lena,” he whispered. “I said I’m sorry, okay? But please…” As their eyes locked, the anguish plainly masked his face. “I was pissed, okay?” he confessed. “All that time without seeing you. And then we get into it before I even knew why you left.”

  Relieved that the secret was still hers, Lena sighed softly and turned away from him. “Thanks for that,” she said. “Glad that you don’t really think that I’m a whore.”

  She tried to step away when Jax grabbed her arm. “You know I don’t, Lena. You’re the sweetest thing. Of course you’re not. You never could be.”

  “Don’t say that!”

  Lena started to meet his mouth, forgetting what he had said and what she had done. But for a second, for what might be the last time that she could stand to stay at his side without a twinge of regret, she kissed him lightly. His lips were soft, and her pulse intensified as took her into his arms. His hold was strong and, as the creek swirled behind them, she wanted nothing more than to get back to the place where his soft touch and his sweet smile was her entire world. Pushing away from him, she saw his eyes full of the hope, and she took his hand. Studying the lines of his palm with a small sigh, Lena’s body started to sigh as he touched her back, and she nearly sank into his touch as she left his hold and kicked close to the edge of the creek.

  “You should forget about me, Jax.

  “Lena, listen, I---”

  “I’m not sweet,” she muttered. “Lots of things you don’t know about me.” Watching her reflection as it peered up at her through the ripples, Lena wanted the image in the water to belong to someone else, someone who might be worthy of him and the feel of his body surrounding hers. If his halting breath so close to her back was to be believed, he might’ve press her to the edge of the water and taken her. She wouldn’t fight; in the end, that did no good. But it wasn’t how she wanted him most, and Jax laid his hand on her shoulder.

  “So there’s someone else,” he said.

  Lena froze as she turned to meet his eyes, and she trembled under the force of his stare. “Someone else?” she echoed. “So you do think that I’m easy?”

  “What? I… no, Lena.”

  “I was at school, Jax. Remember that?”

  “So who looked out for you?” he spat. “I wasn’t there. You had to have had someone.” His voice stopped as Lena’s heart shook in her chest.

  “No one looked out for me,” she muttered. “Had to look out for myself.” But no one on campus scared her as much as a single moment from her past.

  “Is that a fact, Lena?”

  His words still hurt, but Lena managed to find his eyes. Maybe she could tell the truth about something. “No one’s touched me since I went away.”

  Jax’s face stayed like slate until a smile poured across his cheeks, and she froze as he took her into his arms and tried to kiss her again.

  “Jax, please don’t.”

  “I’ve been waiting for you, too,” he insisted. “Forget everything I said. Just let me show you.”

  He kissed her quickly, and Lena’s hands started to move to her thighs. In some ways, it was like every dream she’d ever had coming true. How many times has she pictured their bodies mingling beside the creek as they stroked one another and kept kissing? Starting to sink to her knees, Lena met his eyes when he spoke again.

  “Let me be your first.”

  Reeling away from him, Lena slapped a tight fist to her palm as sh
e kept her eyes on his prostrate form and twisted her head over her shoulders. “You so sure of that?” she asked.

  “Lena,” he started. “You just said that---”

  “What if it happened before I left?” she said. “Did you ever stop to think of that?” She had already said too much, and Lena tried to move away when Jax took her into his arms, his breath hard and fast as he peered into her eyes.

  “No,” he said. “You would have told me."

  “Don’t be so sure.”

  “I always have your back, Lena.” His words tugged at her soul, and Lena sighed as she started to move back to his mouth. He would feel so good, taste even better, and she was on the verge of falling into his kiss and trying to tell herself that there was still some chance of everything that invaded her dreams night after night. She was nearly sure when all that what she would have to tell him in time was too much to stand, and she pushed him back with tears in her eyes. “I can’t do this. It hurts too much.”