Jesse’s Story by Rosa Mink
Chapter 4
Jesse
Maddie’s breath quickens, making her chest lift faster. She looks beautiful in the soft pink top but knowing why she’s wearing it pisses me off again. No one is touching her, taking her from me. No one is going to hurt her again. I’ll damn well see to that.
Right now, she needs to know I’m serious, in this with her. And that’s only going to happen by being honest. By showing her I’m far more than just some rich boy with a pretty face. Let her understand why I’ve become the man in the papers, because it’s not the real me.
“Our dad is nineteen years older than our mom is. We’ve heard the bullshit gold-digger whispers and nasty comments about her our whole lives, but we all know it’s not true. All it takes is one look at our mom and dad together and you know they love each other. When we started having sex talks, do you know what my dad told us?” She shakes her head no, her eyes a bit softer than before and it calms my wildly beating heart. “He told us that if he’d known she was out there, he would have gladly waited until he found her to be with anyone. The only reason he wouldn’t ever erase what came before her is because it gave him Julie which in turn gave him our mom. You want to talk shit parents? Julie’s mother is institutionalized for trying to smother her as a baby. Mom’s parents…she doesn’t even know who her father is. She came here for school to get away from her cougar mother who was having sex in the open with her twenty-three-year-old boy toy when our mom was eighteen. You really think I care where you come from or who your parents are?
“I told my family years ago that until I met my girl, I wasn’t interested in taking my dick out period. Do you understand what that means, baby girl?” I ask, letting my thumb stroke her cheek as color floods it. “I’m a twenty-six-year-old virgin who runs a constructions company full of guys that laugh their asses off over it, but it’s true. I didn’t like guys that hit on my sisters when I was younger and then I started being on the receiving end of it and it just made me like it less. I know guys don’t listen to the word no all the time, but neither do all women. It got to the point where the only ones I let touch me were my family. People call me an asshole because I’m cold, but I’m not inside when it comes to what’s mine. My family, my goddaughters, those are the ones that get the real me, and now, so will you.”
“You’re serious?” Maddie whispers, those beautiful blue eyes of hers wide with shock. “There’s no way someone as built as you could be a virgin still.”
“I will never lie to you, baby girl. The only thing my dick has fucked is my hand. I’ve never had an interest in fucking anything else until I saw you and I was calling myself a complete asshole because I thought you were into women. Even still, I wanted you. More than I want to breathe, I want you.” I lift her onto my lap, letting her feel for herself how hard I am. Her ass is warm and snug against me and if she said yes, I would hump her until I came in my jeans. “I have never let another woman this close to me, Maddie.”
“Never?” she says her voice a husky moan as her head falls against my chest. It’s all I need to wrap her up tighter against me. My hand slips up again, holding onto the back of her head, and I wrap my other around her waist, breathing in her softness.
“Never. I know what you were feeling earlier. That moment of helplessness that hits you. The way you hate feeling it, being touched against your will. I know that because my sophomore year of college, my fucking roommate let some chick that had been trying to paste herself all over me into our dorm room while I was asleep. I woke up to her pulling my boxers down and grabbing my dick.”
“She what?!” Maddie gasps, her eyes dark rays of fury when she pulls it up, and I press a kiss to her forehead.
“I was livid and pissed and infuriated that someone thought that they could cross that boundary when I’d repeatedly told them I wasn’t interested in them leading up to it. The only people I ever told that to is an attorney I hired to make damn sure that she stayed away from me. Then my brother-in-law Ethan, who I know told my sister Jackie because they don’t keep secrets from each other. I told Julie and Serena after I offered to be the donor for them to have a baby.”
“Wait, Serenity is…you were her donor for them?” Maddie asks and I nod, letting go of the tension that gripped me when she sinks into my hold. “You really are the best brother ever.”
“I love my family. I protect them and help them when they need it. And they do the same for me. I don’t like not being able to help. That’s why I hire security to be at these things when I know the organizers don’t do it, or don’t have the money to do it. I’m not going to let anyone, male or female, push themselves onto someone that doesn’t want it. So, if you tell me, you don’t want this, I will let you go. I don’t fucking want to, but if you tell me to, I’ll walk away and I won’t bother you ever again,” I add, my heart racing waiting for her response.
Her hand slips up to my chest, holding onto my shirt . She lays her head back against me, and I drop my head down against hers, holding her closer. “Don’t let go.”
“Never, baby girl. From here forward, you’re mine and I will never let you go,” I promise, holding her against my heart.
“Don’t break my heart,” she whispers pulling my eyes to hers. The desire in them makes me want to claim her lips, then claim the rest of her as mine immediately, but the worry keeps my lips to myself for now. “I only have Kayla and I have to take care of her. There’s no one to take care of me if you break my heart…”
“I’ll only protect it, guard it, adore it and you. I take care of you now. You let me carry the weight. You just rest, baby girl. Just rest.”
I press a kiss to her forehead, knowing she doesn’t understand what it means to be my baby girl yet, but she will. Until then, I’m going to soak in all of the sweet moments I can manage. Once she knows, then I’ll claim her body and soul the way she’s already claimed mine.
“Tired,” she mumbles as her breathing even outs and I hold her a bit closer as I stretch out my legs. Now I know why Dad is always holding and touching Mom. There’s no controlling the need to be near and feeling the person that owns you.
The rest of the world, all of the noise surrounding us falls away for the longest time. It’s only the squeal of laughter coming closer that pulls me back to where I am, and I spot the girls heading our way, Julie and Serena talking quietly looking at her phone. Kayla comes up to us, her eyes wide as she studies Maddie asleep in my arms still.
“I knew I should have made her stay home and sleep,” Kayla states sitting down on the end of the bench next to my feet. “She works two jobs and goes to school. She’s been saving up, so we’d have enough to move out, so she takes classes all morning, then works the afternoon at the restaurant where I work, she’ll come home to buffer for me over dinner, and then works seven to midnight, sometimes later, at the gas station.”
“She wouldn’t have let you come alone. Not because she doesn’t think you’re old enough but because she wants to support you.”
“She’s always supported and protected me. You’re going to keep her safe though, aren’t you? From now on, you’ll really want to keep her because she never sleeps like this. She wakes up at the slightest sound…”
“From here forward, neither of you need to worry about a thing, Kayla. The second I saw her I knew she was mine. My family says I’m just like my father, well, he knew our mom was his, the first time he met her, married her about a month later. They’re coming up on thirty-four years together later this year,” I add, making her eyes widen.
“Don’t let her use me to stop from being with you. It’s about time I started taking care of myself. I’m going to need to if I want to be a lawyer and not just dream about it.”
“There’s a difference between taking care of yourself and protecting yourself. She’s been protecting you but you’ve both been taking care of each other. Now, that’s my job. So how about we go home and get Maddie settled for the night?”
“You can’t come to our place,” Kayla says quickly, her face paling.
“She told me you wanted to move out but were waiting to get enough saved up for it. There’s no more waiting now.” I smile at her surprise as I stand, letting Maddie snuggle deeper into my hold. “Like I said kid, taking care of her is my job now, and I know she’s not going anywhere without you.”
The girls follow us to the front of the park where I have security drop off their car, kissing them before I turn heading to my place here in town with Maddie still in my arms. I could have called for my car as well, but I love the feel of my girl in my arms. My place is only a little over two blocks from the office and I mostly use it to be alone and get to work quickly.
Everyone told me it was awful when I bought the penthouse, but I didn’t care what it looked like. I knew Dad wasn’t going to fully retire until he knew the company was in good hands. To show him it was, I needed to spend enough hours there that I earned the respect from the others in key positions. My brothers knew I could knock them in the head if they started bitching to or about me, but the rest of the leads were different.
The second I graduated, I picked up the condo and started working sixty-hour weeks minimum. After a year, Dad handed over the split titles for Julie and I and spent every single day with Mom. He turned seventy-two last month, but you wouldn’t know it to look at him. He’s still on the go with Mom and our younger brothers and sisters, not to mention with the grandkids, but none of us are going to steal a single minute of time that he can spend with Mom.
I bought up three lots of land for myself earlier this year, intended to build something on it now that I’m settled in the job, but something held me back from coming up with the actual blueprints. The land is at the end of a residential neighborhood but thank god there’s no homeowner’s association shit to put up with. I can build whatever I want, and the lots are huge.
Technically there were houses on each of them, but they were in pretty crap condition and I had them torn down. Two of the spots we filled in while the last I left prepped for building. Now I know why I kept holding off on it. I needed to find Maddie before it felt right to build our home there.
“Oh my god, are you kidding me?” Kayla says when I use the keypad to take the elevator to the top floor. “You actually live here?”
“So do you now,” I tell her, giving her the code for the elevator. “It won’t come to the floor without the code so don’t forget it. It’s a bit of a climb otherwise. I’ll get you all keys tomorrow and we’ll go get your things. If you think it’s wise to let your parents know you’re staying out, do it, if not, I’ll handle them, as necessary.”
“They won’t care. They’re used to me being holed up in our room and Maddie not coming in until really late. She probably didn’t tell you that…”
“Your father’s a drunk?” I guess when she pauses. “Has he hurt you, been physical with either of you?” I add when she grimaces.
“He pushes and shoves, breaks shit around the house and that ticks off our mother who then yells and screams. We were always afraid that it would escalate to it though, there’s nothing nice left in the place.”
“Got it,” I state, motioning her towards the bedrooms with my head. “You can use this one,” I tell her of the downstairs room before moving up the steps and down the hall to the other side of the penthouse where mine is. I lay Maddie in my bed, the sight of it calming a part of me that’d been wound tight. “Can you help her get comfortable? I’ll order us some food.”
“I’m not really that hungry but I could always go for something sweet I guess.”
“I was thinking Italian. It’ll keep well if Maddie doesn’t wake up. So how about some tiramisu and cannoli?”
“You know, I think I’m going to like having you as a brother-in-law,” Kayla said making me laugh then head out before I slide into the bed with my girl and wake her.
She needs sleep right now. I’ll have her with me for the rest of our lives. It may hurt like hell not to make her mine yet, but it won’t kill me. Only her leaving would do that.
