Natural Attraction (19 page)

It occurs to me that he is running commando and I feel a hot flush envelop my body as I watch him pad barefooted, and what I am now sure is bare assed, out of the bedroom.

He is just about to disappear out of site when I see him stop and he spins to face me with a cheeky grin and his dimples flashing.  “See something you like?”

Unable to develop words I become acutely aware that my mouth is hanging slightly open and I am breathing way to fast.  I must look like one of my dogs panting on bloody heat. 

Before I realize what is happening, I see him stalk back towards me piercing me with those too damned sexy eyes.  He places a finger under my chin and pushes my mouth shut.  He then bends over and gently places his warm, soft lips against mine for the briefest, softest,
bestest
, closed mouth, good morning peck I have ever had. 

“So do
I,” he says as he spins and takes off for the kitchen again leaving me breathless and staring at an empty doorway wondering what the hell just happened.

Magic

After quickly brushing my teeth, getting dressed in my fresh clean clothes and yanking my hair back into ponytail I head into the kitchen to find Jax listening to his IPhone on an IPod player in his kitchen.  He is happily singing along to Nickelback and my god does he not only look sexy in just his jeans but his deep, rich, baritone voice is nearly enough to set my panties on fire.

I smile at him as I take in the sight of him chopping spring onions at warp MasterChef speed just like his mother had been doing yesterday. 

Is there anything this guy isn’t good at?

“I’m making you a frittata.  I haven’t made one in such a long time let’s hope it tastes okay.” He says hitting me with a megawatt smile that sends me mushy.

“Um, can I help?” I ask really, really, hoping that he doesn’t ask me to cook anything.  This is because if I have to do anything that involves adding heat to fresh food, we may just end up burning his kitchen down.

“You can grab some plates and cutlery if you like,” he says pointing towards some drawers.  “I know cooking is not your thing.” 

He grins and keeps chopping efficiently.  I get a little distracted watching his long fingers move across the chopping board as he chops the onions finely. 

Snap out of it woman
! 

Who the hell gets turned on watching someone chop onions?  I’m clearly losing it. 

I go about gathering the plates as I watch Jax sprinkle the spring onions over the top of his frittata and slide it into the oven.   The sound of Jax’s phone ringing breaks in over the top of his IPhone music and I see the word
Ma
flashing on the screen.

I see a flash of annoyance scoot across Jax’s face as he grabs his phone.

“Morrrning Ma.”

He draws the word morning out to definitely let her know he is not exactly pleased that she is ringing.   I smile at him softly because I think it’s sweet his mummy is ringing him early on a Sunday morning.  My parents don’t ring me often because we don’t usually have much to say to one another.

“That would be none of your business Ma.”

I see he is starting to look even more annoyed now.  I watch as he stares out the window and cocks his hip sideways to lean across the bench.  He stops looking out the window and his eyes lock onto me. 

I am standing near the bench not too sure what I should be doing.  Perhaps I should just go?  I start to move towards the door leading back to the bedroom when his hand snakes out and grabs my elbow.

“Yeah, she is
Ma.”

Fuck
. 

They are talking about me?

“Not gunna happen.  You need to shut this shit down and back off.” 

He is really sounding pissed now.  I feel his fingers spasm and clench slightly on my elbow and he blows out heavily.

“Alright Ma.”  He hands me the phone.  “She wants to talk to you.”

I give him a ‘
what the fuck’
look and take the phone.

“Good morning my dear!”
  A very chirpy Ro trills into the phone.

“Um, good morning Ro.”
  I’m not exactly sure what to say to her. 

I wonder what she thinks of me now.  Now she knows I have stayed the night she probably thinks I’m an A class tart.

“I wanted Jax to invite you to Sunday lunch at our place but he is being rude so I have to do it myself.  Would you like to come to lunch with us my dear?” 

She asks this with what I think sounds like a very hopeful voice.

“Um...”  I look up to Jax’s face and he is rolling his eyes and shaking his head softly.

“Don’t be shy dear, I bet he is trying to hand signal you to say no or something
.  Just ignore him.  I would
love
for you to come to lunch and I could show you my other cars.  The whole family will be here and Jax always comes to Sunday lunch so don’t let him try to convince you that he doesn’t.”

Talk about stuck between a rock and a hard place.  How to get out of this without being rude?  The last thing I want to do is offend her, but I also don’t want to upset Jax. 

Talk about pressure. 

“I really don’t want to be a burden and if I had known Jax already had plans today I would have gone home last night.”  I pierce Jax with an annoyed look and see his eyes widen slowly.  “I’d love to accept your offer but I will be heading home straight after breakfast now that I am all refreshed and rested and in a better state to drive. “ 

Jax’s eyes widen further and he starts shaking his head madly while snatching for the phone.  I baulk his attempt to snatch and shoot around to the other side of the counter.  Jax is hot on my heels.

“Well that’s too bad my dear.  I would have loved to see you again today.  I have put some croissants in the freezer in the pantry if you want to have something simple for breakfast.”

She really did sound disappointed. 

“That won’t be necessary
Ro, Jax is making us a frittata.”

I say this as I round the counter again and Jax continues to duck and weave and try to grab the phone.

I hear Ro take a sharp intake of breath and she blurts loudly, “He is
cooking?
” 

I hear her cover the handpiece of her phone with her hand and she is mumbling to someone in the background.

I stop moving and freeze. 

Spinning to look at Jax I am now seriously confused.  What is so upsetting about him cooking?  I see Jax freeze and a worried look fleet
s across his face.  He stops chasing me and looks almost defeated.  He holds his hand out and mouths, “Please.”

I hand him the phone sensing that whatever is going on here between him and his mum has something to do with me but it also doesn’t.

“She’ll be there,” Jax stilts into the phone. 

I hear his mum start babbling like a maniac but he is now walking away from me and heading towards his bedroom.   He has barely started moving away when I hear him say, “Yes
Ma.”   He then hits the end button on his phone and turns to place it on the counter with a sigh.

“Sorry about that, but you are now coming to lunch with me and my family.”

No I am fucking not.

“No I’m not.” I announce looking him in the eyes.

“Yes you are.”

His eyes harden and deepen in
color as he stares direct back at me.  I start to feel like we are having some sort of stand-off but I am not sure how we got here.

“Why did she react like that to you cooking for me?” I decide to ask. 

I don’t see what all the fuss about.   This is all getting way to weird, way too fast.

“That’s between me and her,” he says slowly. 

I can almost see the wheels turning in the back of his eyes as I see them soften and he steps towards me and reaches out a hand to gently run his finger down my cheek. 

“I
would
really like you to come to lunch at my parents’ house Ash.  I know I shouldn’t be asking you to do this, we’ve only just met, but unfortunately I think Ma’s right.  You should come to lunch.”

“Why?” I ask confused. 

First he tells his mum that it’s ‘
not gunna happen’
, then he says I’ll be there.  I am starting to feel that sense of possession that I felt earlier in bed and it’s a little bit scary.

“Because I can’t let you go home.  I want you here.” He says softly as I watch him start to suck his bottom lip between his teeth.  The wheels keep grinding in the back of his eyes.

I feel myself tense up because that sounds a bit freaky coming from I guy I only met yesterday.  There’s something in his eyes that tells me he
does
want me here and he is not being freaky.  In fact, the look in his eyes is so soft it makes me feel calm and like there is no place l would rather be than here with Jax.

“Okay.” I breathe softly still staring at his bottom lip caught between his teeth.

I watch him let his lip free as he draws in a long soft breath and then sighs loudly.  He was obviously tense about how I was going to respond to what he had said.   I look back up to his eyes and see sincere relief.

“Ash, I’ve got stuff to tell you but
it’s fucking heavy and I can’t do it yet.  All you need to know is, I’d really like to spend my Sunday with you.  If that means I have to subject you to my family, I will.  I wasn’t really ready to share you with them yet, which is why I didn’t initially say yes to you coming to lunch with me.  It was in
no way
an indication that I did not want to spend time with you.  Are we clear on that?”

“I think I am.” I give him a soft nod and break our eye contact to look out the window.  “This is all a bit weird.”

“I know Ash, believe me I know.   Let’s just play today as it comes and see where it goes, is that okay?”

I nod again but keep looking out the window wondering what this day really means.   Jax has now made it clear that he is interested in me.  I’m not too sure how to respond to that because this isn’t the standard pick up situation that one experiences in bars and nightclubs. 

This reeks far more of
really
getting to know each other and visiting family reeks strongly of relationship establishment. 

I’m still reeling that someone who looks like a movie star crossed with a rock god is showing any interest in me at all.  Yep, God is a good guy.  Let’s just hope that I can survive today without offending Jax enough that he takes the usual ‘leave me’ stance of the other people who have breezed through my life in the past.

“Okay.”  Well I hope it’s going to be okay that’s for sure.

*****

After breakfast, which was the most mind-blowing delicious breakfast meal I have ever had, Jax heads off to dress.  I tidy up the kitchen as my thank you to him for making me breakfast. 

Breakfast had been comfortable.  We had chatted about Maverick and we ran over what I had learned yesterday.  Checking the time, it was only just past eight in the morning and Jax explained that we had horses to feed before we could focus on Maverick again.  He also explained that we would need to finish about half past eleven so we could be at his parents’ house for lunch at noon.

I was looking forward to seeing how he went about feeding his horses.  This was because I’d never hand-fed a horse.  Twinkle had always been on a diet because of his Shetland, Thelwell pony tendencies. 

Now only having one horse on five acres, I didn’t feed Maverick much except for a handful of grass hay now and then with a carrot or two for a treat.

Jax reappears in the Nickelback shirt I had seen him in the first day I met him and my breath hitches just a little.  He really is gorgeous.  His eyes soon hone in on me leaning against his sink admiring the view of his mare and foal paddocks.

“Let’s get this show no the road.”  He announces grabbing my hand and once again dragging me towards the back door. 

Here we go again.

I grip his hand tightly and we are off.  He is in the process of towing me past my car when it suddenly occurs to me that I had not checked my phone since calling Jen last night.  I dig my heels into the ground and feel my arm just about wrench out of its socket as I bring the steam train that is Jax to a grinding halt.

“I need to check my phone.” I say as I try to release his grip on my hand.  He looks at my hand and looks confused for a moment then slowly lets go.

“Oh, okay.  I’ll be in the barn mixing feeds, just find me when you are finished.”

He leans in to give me a soft brush of his lips against my forehead then turns and strides off towards the barn.  I am starting to like those chaste little kisses, they are just so damned cute.

As I suspect, there are about ten texts from Jen on my phone ranging from ‘R U OK?’
To pictures of porn with little notes like ‘Try this.’  God, she is worse than a horny teenager.