Wilde Forever (Wilde Women Book 1) (40 page)

In every way that mattered, Jackson Merrill represented the wild card in her unwritten list. It bothered her that she’d fallen for him so quickly. Never having been a believer in that ‘love at first sight’ rubbish, it was more than a little galling to admit that pretty much summed up where she stood. Reluctantly at that.

How in the hell was it even possible to feel so deeply for someone she’d known for just a week? There was absolutely nothing sensible or reasonable about such behavior. And not only that, even though she’d been careful not to say the words out loud, he certainly had. She’d been rocked to her core last night when he’d said he was falling in love with her.

Brynn tried to remember if she’d ever,
ever
heard those words come out of her ex-husband’s mouth. The answer was a resounding ‘
no
’ and especially not in the circumstances she and Jax had been in. Roger might have thrown the love word around when he’d been caught acting like an ass but he’d never wrapped her in his arms and said those words while he’d been inside her. Not the way Jax had.

Time and distance did funny things to memories. Especially the ones that had ‘
meh
’ written all over them. It wasn’t a surprise that Roger had cheated on her. Or so often. At no point in their relationship had they ever been what you would call, hot for each other. Brynn shuddered and groaned into the pillow. When it came to her sexuality, she’d relied on the no-nonsense, matter-of-fact ways that had ruled her life. She’d gotten what she deserved, she supposed. Her reputation as an ice queen hadn’t been all that far off the mark.

But Jax had certainly blown all that crap out of the water. With him she was a completely different person. She felt like an honest-to-God woman for the first time in her life.

She’d proven her mettle time and time again when she was up to her eyeballs in the world of finance and practically every day since as she step-by-painstaking-step built a business from nothing and succeeded. A ‘screw the haters’ mentality had been the fuel in her engine through the years of non-stop hard work that got her to today. Only now she wasn’t so sure this was where she wanted to be.

When she’d heard the words coming out of her mouth as she yelled at Nana that she’d had enough and wouldn’t be continuing the business, it hadn’t felt like the end of the world. Well, maybe it did a little. But something had been shifting inside her this past week. Being with Jax completed her in some strange way and all that stuff about unprotected sex and the possibility of babies hadn’t freaked her out nearly as much as it should have.

That didn’t mean she wasn’t terrified he’d simply get in his big truck one day in the not too distant future and drive off because his business demanded that was what he do. She was. But relationships didn’t come with crystal balls. By opening the door into her heart, even if only a tiny crack, she’d invited in the terror of losing him and also the unfamiliar exhilaration that came with surrendering to somebody else.

Jax was a complicated man with shit going on in his head she could barely imagine. He’d walked away from a promising medical career when it didn’t fit him anymore. She respected that on a deeply personal level, having done something similar herself. He’d also opened up to her in ways she had no doubt had been difficult. Admitting his need for control and the reasons why hadn’t scared her off in the least, something that surprised her to no end. After what he’d been through in the war, it actually made perfect sense. She couldn’t even imagine what living like that minute by minute, day after day was like. The constant danger. The visceral fear.

Yielding to his powerful needs didn’t feel like submission at all. It felt like an act of unconditional love, something she hadn’t known she was capable of and that scared her almost as much as an uncertain future. He was so upset that he’d been rough with her but for Brynn, understanding that he needed her, needing taking her hard and maybe a bit aggressively only made what she was feeling more substantial. Even when he tried to slow down and be more loving, a point came when that wasn’t enough. It was fucking thrilling that he pounded his possession into her hipbones with every thrust. If it was the last thing she ever did, she was going to make him understand that she was okay with it. Welcomed it in fact. Each time they came together like that she inched closer to revealing her true feelings. If he was brave enough to show her who he really was, it was only a matter of time before she did the same.

And that right there was the damn elephant in the room. All her bitching and moaning about Nana’s crazy scheme to marry her off, the insistence by her parents that she needed a life, even Charlie and Rhiann’s endless rhapsodizing about soul mates and eternal love—all of it was not so much a festering annoyance as a secret yearning.

He’d asked her to trust him and told her they could fix whatever mess she’d made. Until he’d said the words she hadn’t realized that was exactly what she needed to hear, just one more way she was surrendering to this man, this surprise entrant in the sweepstakes for control of her heart. Brynn snuggled the pillow Jax had slept on closer to her and closed her eyes. Maybe together they could find a way to make some sense of all this unexpected madness.

“Ms. Charles,” Jax said as he walked into Brynn’s grandmother’s eyesight and extended his hand. “I’m Jackson Merrill, a friend of Brynn’s. May I have a word, please?”

The unwelcome sight of Brynn’s bakery apron tossed on the floor near his feet nearly undid him. There was something powerfully symbolic about it that struck at his gut. He didn’t need any further proof that something ugly had gone down.

Violet-colored eyes, the kind that were unusual enough to give a man, any man, pause, looked him up and down with neat precision in a way that left him feeling naked and pretty much trembling in his work boots. Holy mother of God. Talk about a formidable presence, this lady was the definition of intimidating. Her hand swept out and took his after a heart-stopping moment of dead silence that he was pretty sure had been meant to send him to his knees.
Wow.
She was good.

“Mr. Merrill,” she drawled with all the panache of a queen meeting a lowly commoner. He tried not to swallow, sensing she’d pick up on the nervous reflex and use it against him. “It took you long enough.”

She dropped his hand and sat back, eyes still assessing although she didn’t seem quite as ready to eat him for dinner.

Taking a step back because he wasn’t stupid enough to sit in her presence without being invited to do so, he frowned and asked, “I beg your pardon?”

Bryanna Charles consulted her diamond-encrusted watch like it was written into the script they were acting out and sent him a scathing look. “It took you almost fifteen minutes young man. I imagined you’d make an appearance in short order after my granddaughter huffed her way out of here in high dudgeon. Her indignation was impressive, I must say,” she added with a mischievous twinkle in those violet eyes. “I suppose she told you about our…misunderstanding?”

Hmmm. She was playing him and doing a fine job of it too. Handling Brynn was nothing compared to her grandmother.

“Actually, ma’am, she didn’t say much of anything,” he told her in as dry a tone as he could muster. “She was too upset.” He paused for good measure then added, “I don’t like it when Brynn gets upset.”

Her expression went from dour and intimidating to welcoming and beaming in a nanosecond. It was as if his words had flipped a switch and the entire dynamic of their discussion had changed.
Mental note to self: stay on your toes around this lady.

“Please, have a seat Mr. Merrill,” she told him with a dazzling smile.

He considered sitting next to her in the chair that Brynn probably vacated, but he much preferred a head-on view so he could stay alert to changes in nuance or tone that would help Jax navigate this odd encounter. Picking the discarded apron up from the floor, he folded it neatly and laid it aside. He made sure to move slowly and with careful deliberation, sending this dragon woman a message by his actions. Grabbing a straight-backed chair from one of the tables, he sat down directly in front of her and adopted a casual but watchful posture.

Going for respectful but low keyed he nodded at the empty plate on the table at her side and asked, “Did you enjoy the cake? I understand it’s one of Brynn’s signature items.”

The violet eyes boring into him twinkled with merriment. “An old family recipe that my granddaughter has made her own and yes, it was wonderful. How terribly observant of you.”

Jax shrugged and tried a smile on for size. “I’m partial to the sticky buns, myself.”

He was completely surprised when she settled deeper into the big wing chair and laughed. “I understand her ‘sinful buns’ send out a siren’s call to a man’s stomach.”

This time he did swallow. Hard. Damn, she really was good. How the hell was he supposed to react to such an obviously leading statement? He didn’t get a chance to respond though because she was working off an agenda and had the benefit of having prepared in advance for this weird encounter.

“Let’s get right down to it, Mr. Merrill. Are you involved with my granddaughter? And by involved, I mean sleeping with, off course. I believe your generation refers to it as ‘hooking up’ but the phrase sounds like a TV repairman is on the scene, and I don’t much care for it.”

Boom.
That sound was his head exploding.
Fuuuuuuuck.

“I would never use such coarse terms where Brynn is concerned, ma’am, and I hope you don’t mind if I respectfully decline to answer that question. I highly doubt your granddaughter would appreciate us discussing her like that.”

“Touché, Mr. Merrill. Touché. May I call you Jackson?”

He acknowledged the polite request with a nod.

“And please, call me Mrs. Wilde. I don’t use my stage name anymore, and frankly, I’m surprised you even knew it.”

A little flattery didn’t seem like a bad idea so Jax quirked a grin and told her, “Actually, I wouldn’t if Amy hadn’t mentioned it but once she did I recognized the name immediately. My mother is something of a fan Mrs. Wilde. She’s quite an authority on the history of the American theater.” He relaxed a bit, set a work-booted foot on top of his knee, and smiled. “My brother and I have interesting memories of visiting New York to take in the Broadway shows.”

“Ah, yes. Your mother and father are friends of my son and his wife, yes? I seem to recall Robert saying something about you coming to Brynn’s aid with some work she wanted to do on Wilde House.”

Jesus. What a piece of work Bryanna Charles Baron-Wilde was proving to be.
She seemed to recall?
Jax didn’t doubt for a second that she was well aware of every single circumstance that led him to this sleepy town and to her granddaughter’s attention. A niggling suspicion that their respective parents and this powerful matriarch were manipulating them blossomed in his mind.

“Yes, they are. Friends I mean. From their college days. As for helping Brynn, I’m happy to do what I can.” Lest she imagined he was some wandering handyman, he quickly added, “I have a rather exclusive business that specializes in restoration and renovation.”

Jax realized two seconds too late, when he saw her smug smile of approval, that she probably knew everything there was to know about him down to his shoe size. His reflex defending of what he did for a living, while unnecessary, somehow pleased her immensely.

“Well, I’m glad you have the sort of expertise that old place needs. It’s a quirky home, to be sure, but it’s full of happy memories, and I know Brynn loves it.”

“That she does, ma’am.”

“So Jackson, tell me something. Since you won’t answer the previous question, perhaps you’d tell me this. Are you in love with my granddaughter?”

His heart thudded to a halt at her words as he was held firmly in the tractor-beam gaze of those violet eyes. After only a few moments in her presence he knew this woman did not suffer fools gladly so he made a snap decision. One he hoped he wouldn’t come to regret. She wanted an answer? Fine. Let’s see what she did with this. Since she asked a question about him, he’d answer. Truthfully. But he wouldn’t allow the discussion to venture off into territory where they’d be talking about Brynn. He knew damn well she wouldn’t like it, and it was his responsibility to protect her at all costs from wagging tongues. Even her grandmother’s.

“Yes, Mrs. Wilde. I am indeed in love with Brynn.”

She looked like the cat that swallowed the mouse whole. “And my granddaughter, is she in love with you?”

He swung his leg down and sat up straighter, crossing his arms across his chest knowing his body language all but screamed at her to back the fuck off.

“That’s a question for Brynn to answer, ma’am.”

Shrewd, assessing eyes watched him like a damn hawk and he had no idea what was coming next. He probably shouldn’t have been surprised that she changed course once again.

“They’re named after me. Did you know? All the girls. Darcy, their mother, honored me with that distinction, and I take my responsibility to them very seriously. Not just any men will do for my granddaughters, but I suspect you already know that.”