Enjoy Your Stay (21 page)

I’m sitting on the veranda, looking at the mess of our letterbox when Coop’s hire car pulls up the drive. He eyes Jack’s Ute, raises his brow and gives me a little wave when he sees me watching him. Then he climbs out of the car, flashes that perfect rock-god smile. My heart is supposed to do cartwheels—at least, that’s the way it used to behave when Cooper was around. For now, it just hurts.

Coop takes the steps two at a time, and says, “Looks like someone was in a hurry to get inside?”

“Yeah, apparently one accident a year isn’t enough for Jack. He’s just lucky I didn’t hospitalize his arse once I saw how wasted he was.”

The muscles in his jaw tighten. He scans the outside of the house, and the distance from the letterbox to my room. “Where is he now?”

“Sleeping it off, probably. Don’t know. Don’t care.” I shrug it off, but it doesn’t take a genius to hear the sadness in my voice and figure out that I care a lot.
Too much.

“Well, I’m just glad you and my son weren’t in the car with him this time.”

He slides onto the seat beside me and places his hand over my belly, rubbing in slow circles like he did yesterday. It’s nice, but weird. I kinda tense up and he stops, but then my stupid hormones go nuts and I burst into ugly-crying so hard he tucks me into his arms. “Hey, what’s wrong, beautiful girl?”

“I don’t … kn … know.” I sob into his chest. God, he smells so good. Like cologne, and hot boy, and fuck—all I wanna do is throw his arse down on the veranda and ride him like my favourite pony, but my heart hurts, and my head is confused, and I can’t stop crying.

He smooths circles on my back, and I sob harder. “Hey, Hols, come on. Whatever it is, it’s okay. I’m here, and we’re gonna do this thing together, okay? Just you and me, and that beautiful, perfect little baby of ours. I’m gonna teach him to play the guitar, and he and Daddy are gonna play the Sugartown Hotel every Friday night, and my pretty lady’s gonna be sitting front and centre. I know this shit is scary. I’m scared too, but we’re gonna do this together, yeah? I’m not gonna miss even a single minute of this kid’s life. Of our lives.”

He leans down and kisses my hair, and then when I turn my tear-streaked face up to his, he wipes away the salt from my cheeks and kisses each of them tenderly before placing a chaste kiss to my lips. It’s odd, the sense of security I feel in his arms. I mean, this is the guy who knocked me up and pissed off to become a rock star. Who knows how many women he’s fucked since the second he left Sugartown. Who knows if he’d even still be here, if there wasn’t a baby involved? But the point is, he is here. He’s here, with his pretty words and his warm protective arms, and his presence that doesn’t make my heart hurt the way that Jack’s does. He’s here, he’s the father of my child, and right now, he’s exactly the sort of stability I need. So even though I know I shouldn’t, I breathe into the kiss and the bond between us, and I kiss Jackson Rowe goodbye.

I
SLIDE
my hand up the length of my cock and stretch out on the sofa, attempting to knock one out before everyone and their dog gets home. Yeah, that’s not exactly true, I know Cade and Ana will be gone for several hours more because they just left for the movies, and I’m expecting Holly back any minute. Am I hoping I get caught? Hell yes.

I’m still fucking torn up about the fact that she’s chosen that cocksucker. I know, I know, I pushed her into it by being a stupid-arse fuck, and then I pushed her further away by telling her I couldn’t deal with her baby being his. Honestly? My blood boils when I think about him being anywhere near her, much less having a piece of him inside her. The minute he arrives I wanna smack down in the worst possible way, but I don’t, because I know how much it would hurt her. She’s chosen him, and though it fucking kills me, I’m not man enough to suck up the idea of being called Daddy by a kid who’s not mine. I know it’s not fair, not to her, and not to the kid, but it is what it is.

Fuck. Why am I thinking about this now? Why the fuck can’t I just purge that woman from my system? No matter how much I drink, or try to forget, I can’t.

I grip my hand tightly around my Johnson, pumping it up and down with a punishing fist. I think of
Sports Illustrated
models, and the last porno I watched, Scarlet Johansson, and then, of course, Holly, as I fuck my hand and pretend it’s her sweet cunt I’m ramming into. My breath comes faster, my balls tighten, and my phone goes off. I groan. I’m so fucking close I think about just letting it go to voicemail when panic comes from out of nowhere, and slams me in the chest.
What if there’s something wrong with Holly and the baby?

I slide my arm over to the coffee table and pick up the phone. Sure enough, the screen is flashing up a picture of Hols’ cute-as-fuck pregnant head that I snapped one day while she was curled up sound asleep in my sheets.

“Great timing, Hols,” I groan, releasing my grip on my cock and answering the phone. “Yeah?”

“Jack, where are you?” Holly asks.

“Uh, home.”

“I might need you to come pick me up.”

“I’m kinda in the middle of something here, Hols.”

There’s a beat of silence, and then she clears her throat. “Right, don’t worry then, I’ll call someone else.”

And now I feel like a complete arse.
“No, I’m here,” I say before she can hang up “Whaddya need?”

I sigh and tuck the man meat away, then grab my keys and fly out the door. “What’s happening?”

“Snickers got out. Well, that’s not true. I got this intense craving for ice cream, not that fake, watered-down stuff they sell at the corner store—the good stuff. Ice-cream cake. You know, that one with the little chocolate frogs in it? Only our supermarket didn’t have any, so I drove to that weird store, you know the one in Broadwater that kinda smells like pee?

“Anyway, I didn’t wanna leave Snickers in the hot car, so I made him wait outside, and then when I came back he was gone. So after freaking out for the last half of the day and waddling my fat arse around that shithole of a town—seriously, the people are fucked up there—I drove back here, because I know they don’t have a pound, and I thought that maybe someone might have found him and brought him here to the Sugartown Shelter, but they’re closed, so I kinda broke in and I found him, and I even found the keys after searching through like five hundred of them. The good news is I got our dog back, but the bad news is I’m kinda locked in, and—”

“Whoa, whoa, wait. You broke into the pound to get our dog back?”

“Maybe?” she squeaks, then after a beat says, “Okay, yes. I broke in. I need you to come and bust me out.”

“Why didn’t you just call Vickie? She would have just come in there and opened up for you.”

“Well I didn’t think of that, otherwise I would have.”

“Okay, I’m gonna make a few calls and see if we can’t get you out without your crazy arse winding up in jail.”

“No, no, no, you can’t call anyone.”

“What? Why?”

“Did you ever hear about that time that someone modified the town sign from Sugartown to Boogertown?”

“You didn’t?”

“Yeah, that was me. Do not judge me, Jackson Rowe. It was years ago, long before you and Cade came to town. Ana and I were drunk off our faces on peach schnapps. You know what that shit does to me. Anyway, Davis always suspected me, but he never had anything concrete. I think that mean old bastard has been itching for me to slip up ever since, so he can throw me in the slammer and lock away the key.”

Shaking my head, I lean against the Ute and try not to laugh. “Okay, so no cops. I still don’t know why you didn’t call Vickie.”

“I panicked. Snickers was crying, and you know how much I hate it when he whines and gives me that sad little puppy-dog face. So I just kinda jimmied the bathroom window opened, but then the bathroom has some kind of deadbolt on it, and I accidently locked it on my way through. I found Snickers and got him out, but then once the other dogs saw I was letting him out they all kinda got whiney, and I may have done something really bad.”

“Hols, what did you do?”

“I may have let them all out, but now we’re all stuck in here, and they’re shitting and pissing all over everything, and they won’t go back in their cages. I need you Jack.”

I laugh out loud
. I gave up a wank with a fucking happy ending for this? Fuck me. I have issues.

Holly bursts into tears, and I can’t help but laugh again.

“It’s not funny. I’m gonna get arrested, and all these dogs don’t have a home to go to, and I have to pee really bad.”

“I’m on my way, sweetheart. Sit tight.” I jump in the truck and slam it into reverse.

Five minutes later, I’m pulling up to the kennel outside of town. I’m surprised the noise alone hasn’t drawn the police. The barking is almost making my ears bleed from here, so I don’t know how Hols is coping with it. I check the front door and dial her number, only she’s not answering. Fuck. Please don’t tell me she’s gone into early labour and the dogs have eaten the baby.

I bang on the door. “Holly!”

The only response from inside is that the barking reaches epic proportions. “Fuck! Hols? Where are you?”

I dial her number again. Nothing.
FUCK! I’m gonna have to kick the door down.
I stand back and kick the fucker in with my sole of my steel capped boots. It takes a few good kicks before I get it open, and then I rush into the dark-as-fuck pound trying to find Hols. I scream her name, but I can’t hear a thing over the fucking dogs. I run through the building, bumping into just about everything, the only light coming from the moon outside and the green glow of the exit sign.

“Hols!” I scream again, and run out to the area where they keep the dogs. “Fuck it, Hols, where are you?”

“I’m in here.” I follow her voice through another room. There’s a wire door between the main part of the pound and the outdoor area, but it’s padlocked. I give it a few hard kicks, and the whole thing falls off its rusted hinges.

Holly rushes forward, followed by Snickers and around fifteen other dogs. “Where the fuck were you? Why didn’t you answer your phone? I thought you’d gone into labour, and the dingos had eaten your baby.”

“I had to pee. I left my phone behind, and I couldn’t go with all the dogs watching me.”

I glance around, wondering where the hell she’d pee in a place like this. The bathroom she mentioned before meets up with this part of the kennel; that’s more than likely how she got back here without having to tackle the door I just kicked in, but she said she’d accidently locked the bathroom door behind her. Holly flushes and answers my unasked question by pointing to a patch of outdoor carpeting.

“You peed on the carpet?” I double over with laughter, and then straighten and wag my finger at her. “Bad girl, bad.”

“Shut up.” She gives me this fucking adorable little frown and then begins laughing too. “Do you know how hard it is for a pregnant woman to hold it?”

“Come on, let’s try getting these dogs back inside their kennels where they belong before we get arrested.”

“I tried, they don’t want to—” Hols’ is
cut off by the wail of a siren, and blue-and-red flashing lights slicing through the dark night.

“Shit.”

“We’ll, they’re not going to arrest us, are they?”

“Hols, we’re breaking and entering.”

Her face crumples, and the waterworks are back in full swing. “I was just trying to get my dog back.”

“Yeah, by breaking and entering, and not using that pretty head of yours,” I say, as I wrap an arm around her and kiss the top of her head. And then I remember I’m not supposed to do shit like that because she chose him, and I didn’t choose her and her baby. I inhale the scent of her hair, and then I quickly step back and turn away.

Constable Davis rounds the corner with his gun raised. “Hands on your head,” he says, as his partner flashes the torch over our faces. I place my hands above my head. I sure hope Holly is too; I can’t see on account of the blinding light shining in my eyes, and I really don’t feel like having to watch her get shot tonight, so I’m hoping her hands are held real fucking high.

“Jackson Rowe?” Constable Davis asks.

“Hey, Greg,”

“What are you doing’ here, son?”

“Getting our dog back?”

“I gotta say, I’d expect that from young Holly Harris here, it’s not the first time I’ve found her in a place she shouldn’t be. Ain’t that right, Holly?”