The Last Second Chance by Lucy Score

31

When the hospital staff hauled Summer away in a wheelchair, Carter running behind them clutching their perfectly packed and organized overnight bag, Summer was still shouting instructions to Gia and Joey. “Call Audrey and make sure she still has all the logins for the website. And call my parents! And make sure the posts are all scheduled for the next two days. And—” The automatic doors closed behind them cutting off Summer’s to do list.

Gia sagged against Beckett. “You’re going to be an uncle.” She smiled.

“Aunt Gia,” Beckett said, brushing a red curl back from her face. “Our kids are going to have playmates.”

“Finally. Then maybe they’ll leave us alone,” Gia laughed.

Joey looked down at her still-cuffed hand and then at the man she was attached to. He was smiling at the closed doors like it was Christmas morning. “Carter’s gonna be a dad,” he said, his voice ripe with pride.

“Where’s your mom?” Joey asked.

“Right behind you,” Phoebe said, half-jogging through the automatic doors. “The sheriff was kind enough to give me a ride. Franklin took the kids home to let the dogs out.”

“You’re like the best mother-in-law in the world,” Gia said, hugging her. “You ready for two more grandkids?”

“I’m going to wear a hole in the waiting room carpet,” Phoebe promised.

“Figured you two would need these,” Donovan said, twirling the handcuff keys on his finger.

“Oh, thank God,” Joey said, holding up their joined hands. She rubbed her wrist when the cuff slid off. “I’m still mad at you for that,” she told Donovan.

“Yeah, well, I’m still not happy about you and Beckett making out,” Jax said.

“Really? Exactly when did this make-out session happen?” Donovan asked.

“Oh man, don’t start that shit again,” Beckett said.

The nurse behind the desk shot Beckett a look.

“Sorry,” he said.

“Geez, what happened to your face?” Donovan asked looking at the bruise Beckett was sporting on his cheekbone.

“This ass—guy here goes off on me for a kiss that happened eight years ago.”

Gia bit her lip and tried not to laugh.

“It doesn’t matter if it was eighteen years ago,” Jax snapped.

Joey stepped in front of him and put her newly freed hand on his chest. “Not that I owe you an explanation since you’d left and we weren’t together anymore, but it happened one night when Beckett drove me home from dinner. We knew it was a mistake immediately.”

“And why was it a mistake?” Donovan wondered.

“Because Beckett wasn’t Jax.”

Beckett looked down at his wife. “And Joey wasn’t you,” he told her.

“You didn’t even know me then.”

“That doesn’t mean I wasn’t waiting for you.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake, get a room,” Joey muttered.

* * *

Four hours later,Jonathan and Meadow Pierce arrived within two minutes of each other. They were tiny pink bundles of health and dubbed the most perfect set of twins in the world by their parents. Joey thought they were pretty okay. Meadow looked at her with indigo eyes and the slightest frown as if she were trying to figure everything out. “You’ve got time, kid. Don’t try to figure it all out at once,” Joey whispered.

She glanced over at Jax who was holding Jonathan with Carter leaning over his shoulder. The looks of absolute adoration on their faces as they looked at the newborn did something funny to Joey’s gut. She caught Summer’s soft smile and wandered over to her bed to hand over her daughter.

“How do you feel?” Summer asked her.

“Shouldn’t I be the one asking you?” Joey asked, depositing Meadow carefully in Summer’s arms.

“I feel tired and pained and exhausted and completely in love right now. Now your turn.”

“I feel most of those things too.”

“It’s going to be fine, Joey. You’ll find your way through. You’ll be able to forgive. And you’ll be as nauseatingly happy as I am right now.”

Joey shot another glance in Jax’s direction. He was promising Jonathan that he’d teach him and his sister to ride their bikes off the dock into the pond. Summer rolled her eyes. “Can you wait until they’re at least a day or two old before you start teaching them to drive me insane?”

“Sorry, sis.” Jax handed Jonathan over and kissed Summer on the forehead.

Phoebe snapped yet another picture on her phone. “Mom, enough already,” Carter sighed sliding onto the bed next to Summer. “They’re too young for paparazzi.”

“I can’t help it.” Phoebe sighed. “They’re just so perfect! And I need just the right picture for Facebook, and we promised Evan and Aurora we’d bring them pictures of their cousins.”

“When will your parents be here?” Joey asked Summer.

“Dad said they’ll be here before eight tonight. He has the pedal to the metal in the RV.”

Jax glanced at his watch. “We should probably get going. The dogs are going to need let out soon.”

“Yeah, Waffles is probably ready for his dinner soon.”

“How about you? Hungry?” Jax asked.

Joey raised an eyebrow. “Is that really a question you ever have to ask?”

“I’m thinking steaks and baked potatoes.”

Joey’s mouth watered at the thought. “Where is this magical dinner you speak of?”

“Your house. We’ll hit the grocery store on the way.”

“Inviting yourself over?”

“The way to a Joey’s heart is through her stomach.”

They said their goodbyes to the exhausted new parents and enthusiastic grandparents. Joey led the way to her truck in the dusk. The visitors lot had cleared out considerably since they arrived, and her cherry red pickup sat by itself against a fence. Driving home would be easier without the handcuffs, she mused.

“I’m still mad at you, by the way,” she said, shutting her door.

“I appreciate your honesty. I’m still not thrilled about you making out with my brother and not telling me about it.”

“Well, it never came up in the eight years that you were living on the other side of the country.”

“Touché,” Jax sighed. “I’m better though, right?”

“Better?”

“You like making out with me better than Beckett.”

“Beckett is like a big brother to me. He could be very good at making out, and I wouldn’t know it because I couldn’t get past the brother thing.”

“You’ve never thought of me as a brother, have you?” Jax asked grabbing her hand.

Joey thought about lying but figured they’d both had enough of that. “No,” she sighed. “I never thought of you like a brother.”

“Good, because if you did, that would make what I’m about to do very wrong.”

Before she could ask what it was that he was about to do, Jax grabbed her by the sweater and yanked her to him. The kiss was frantic, unforgiving. Joey forgot about the division between them, and together they scaled the slick cliffside of need.

His hands were under her sweater, skimming over her stomach. “I thought about doing this all day,” he murmured against her. “You are never out of my mind.”

Joey kissed him just to shut him up and only stopped when he yanked her sweater over her head.

“Here?” she whispered. A parking lot seemed reminiscent of their teenage trysts.

“Here.” His fingers shoved her bra straps off her shoulders, and her bared nipples tightened at the cold. Any argument she’d planned disappeared the moment his mouth brushed the first aching bud. He pressed her down on the seat, his lips and tongue busy teasing her while his palm stroked her other breast.

“God I love bench seats,” he groaned.

Joey levered her hips against him, and Jax shifted so he could press his erection against her.

“Too many layers,” Joey muttered. While he sampled her other nipple, sucking it into the heat of his mouth, her fingers worked her jeans open before moving to his. With the zipper under the pressure of his erection, Joey cautioned herself to go slowly. But the second he sprang free, she gripped his shaft in her fist.

“Fuck,” he moaned, releasing her nipple and dropping his head to her shoulder. He let her stroke him, let her grip him like a vice, and she felt the first bead of moisture when she dragged her fingers over his crown.

“Baby, this isn’t going to be slow and sweet,” he said, dragging her jeans down until he could free one of her legs.

“Good.” She ground the word out.

When he saw the sheer lace of the red thong she wore, his eyes went glassy and then curious.

“Jesus, Jojo. What the hell is that?”

Joey, expecting a tarantula or something even worse, tried to sit up. Jax was staring at the hoof print bruise on her thigh.

“Oh, that. That’s Calypso being a shithead.”

Jax forced her non-imprinted leg up against the back of the seat and yanked her underwear to the side. He inserted two fingers in his mouth, and Joey stopped breathing when she watched him pull them out between his lips and bring them down to her exposed flesh.

“Everything about you gets me,” he said, sliding his wet fingers inside her. “I just look at you and need to be inside you.”

Joey cried out as he brushed his thumb over that tiny bundle of nerves that demanded his attention. She braced her free leg against the dashboard, her foot touching the window.

“Every time. You get so wet for me, Joey,” he murmured, leaning down to bite at her neck.

“Now, Jax. Now. I need you.” She begged him for it and thanked God he didn’t make her beg long. The second his fingers withdrew, Jax lined up his cock with her opening and surged into her. Joey groaned as she stretched to accommodate his girth. This felt good. This felt right. No matter what else was going on between them, she could always be sure that this was right. It was where they both belonged.

There was no time to get used to it. He was already moving in her. She wrapped her free leg around him, urging him deeper, and when he accommodated her, she bit into his shoulder.

Her breasts crushed against his chest as he thrust into her with a demand that bordered on violence. Jax buried his face in her neck, and Joey let him take her as he wanted. Fast, fierce, aggressive. The separation had made them both jagged and shaky with need.

He slammed into her again, and Joey was dimly aware that the truck was probably rocking on its tires, but she didn’t care. Her entire world had shrunk to the cab of her pickup. There was nowhere else she wanted to be.

“Fuck. Baby, I can’t hold on much longer.” It was the rawness in his voice that set her off. Joey reared up to capture his mouth just as he drove inside her again and she felt that delicious tightening of release. It hit her like an explosion.

“Come, Jax.” She gritted the words out. And on his next thrust, she felt him lose himself in her. She felt him come buried inside her to the hilt. His shout—her name—rang in her ears as she came around him in fitful waves of dark pleasure.

They owned each other in the moment, in the night.

* * *

By the timeJoey found her sweater in the dark and they defrosted the windows, the promise of steak had lost out to more immediate need. They settled on drive-thru tacos, and Joey ate two of them while Jax drove home.

Exhaustion settled over her like a cloud, and she fell asleep with a bag of nachos on her lap. She didn’t wake until Jax pulled up in front of her house. She could see Waffles’s silhouette frantically pawing at the glass of the sidelight next to the door.

“I should get in there,” she yawned.

“Yeah, I need to go let Valentina and Meatball out,” Jax said, scrubbing his hands over his face.

She could have asked him to come back, was going to, but something stopped her. Things still felt unsettled between them, and spending the night together probably wasn’t a good idea.

“Bring the truck back tomorrow, and I can run into town with you to pick up your car,” Joey decided.

She felt his gaze on her and didn’t turn to meet it. After a few seconds of silence, he sighed.

“If that works for you.”

“Yeah, after feeding.” Joey nodded. She waited another beat, but still the invitation to spend the night wouldn’t come.

So she grabbed her nachos and opened the passenger door. “Congratulations on the whole uncle thing,” she said sliding out of the truck.

“Thanks, Joey.”

“There’s another taco in the bag for you,” she told him before shutting the door.

He waited until she walked into the house and shut the front door before driving away.

* * *

The next afternoon,Jax pulled his Nova up to the painted brick ranch on the corner. It had navy trim and bright green ferns hanging from the rafters of the front porch. The postage stamp yard was neatly trimmed. He followed the concrete walkway up to the porch, planted his feet on the welcome mat, and stabbed his finger in the bell.

If last night in his lonely bed with his sad taco had told him anything, it was that as much as he and Joey wanted each other, there needed to be some kind of closure for her before they could move forward. And dammit, he was going to get it for her.

Forrest Greer answered the cheery yellow door wearing a New York Giants sweatshirt and a fierce frown. When he opened his mouth, Jax pushed the six-pack of beer he held into the man’s hands.

“You’ve had more than your say. It’s my turn. I’m going to marry your daughter, and you need to fix things with her.”

Forrest turned a shade of fuchsia not often seen in nature.

“Before you say it, no. I’m not good enough for her. But no one is. I know that, and you know that. I’d hate for her to end up with someone who thinks he is good enough for her. You and I have had a shitty ass relationship before now, but I love your daughter more than anything on this planet, and I plan to spend the rest of my life earning my place next to her. That should count for something. You love her too. Otherwise, you wouldn’t act like such an overprotective ass all the time.”

The vein in Forrest’s forehead was throbbing, but Jax pressed on.

“Now, I haven’t asked her to marry me yet. I wanted to come to you first.” He saw the triumphant gleam in Forrest’s eyes and laughed. “No. I’m not asking you for your permission. It’s not my style, and right now Joey is more inclined to marry me just to piss you off more.”

“So why the hell are you here then?” Forrest grumbled, shifting the six-pack into one hand.

“You need to make things right with Joey. She needs you. She wants you to be proud of her, to treat her like an adult.”

“Well, then she should act like an adult instead of running off pouting about things.”

“The only two people who aren’t acting like adults are you and me. I’ve apologized to Joey, and she seems to have reluctantly accepted it. I shouldn’t have tried to make life-altering decisions for her without consulting her, and I know that now. I think you know that now too. I don’t think either of us will make that mistake again.”

Forrest grunted with what sounded like assent.

“I live without a father. I don’t want her to do the same. Not when you’re alive and well. You’d be an idiot to let things go on this way.”

“An idiot, am I?”

“Yeah. And so am I, but she still loves us anyway. She wants to forgive you, but you’ve got to give her a reason to.”

Forrest grunted again as he looked down at the beer. “Are you trying to bribe me with alcohol?”

“That is the first six pack of Joey’s IPA. It’s a new tradition of Pierce men to brew a beer for their bride. I figured since she was your girl first, you should have the first six.”

Forrest pulled out a bottle to examine the label. “If you hurt my girl ever, in any way, I’m going to hunt you down,” he said quietly as if talking to the bottle.

“Understood.” Jax nodded. “And if you continue to hurt my girl, I’m going to drive here on the wedding day and tie you up and make you walk her down the aisle with a shotgun pointed between your shoulder blades.”

Forrest harrumphed. “We’ll see if it comes to that. She may say no to you.”

Jax grinned. “She probably will. At first. But I’ve got nothing but time to wear her down.”

“I suppose a man shouldn’t drink an entire six-pack by himself,” Forrest said. He turned around and walked back into the house, leaving the front door open.

* * *

Joey was frowning fiercelyat her monthly numbers on the computer screen. Adding two god-like horses to their stable had hiked her operating costs, and she knew it was just the beginning. Of course, once she had the breeding program up and running, the operational costs would be a drop in the bucket compared to what they’d be bringing in. But for now, she’d keep a close eye and tighten the belts where they could be tightened.

When the phone on her desk rang, she gladly abandoned her bookkeeping.

“Hey, Joey. It’s Ellery.”

“Oh, you mean old Two-Face Magee?”

“You can’t be mad at me. You’re the stubborn one who warranted pulling out the big guns. If we’d gone with our usual matchmaking approach, you probably would have left town.”

“Or gone lesbian.”

Ellery snorted. “Please, we’re four for four on our gay matches. One way or another, the Beautification Committee will prevail in your love life.”

“It’s more like a tentative like life these days,” Joey corrected.

“Give it time. Pierce men are awfully hard to ignore in the long-term.”

“Is there a reason you called, or did you just want to rub salt in wounds?”

“Oh, right! I was wondering if you do private riding lessons?”

“Maybe,” Joey said, wary of any request from a member of the Beautification Committee.

“Well my cousin’s coming into town this week, and it’s his birthday, and I thought a riding lesson would make up for last year’s hand-dipped lilac candles that he was allergic to.”

“Uh, sure. Why not?” Joey said. Taking on a few paying extras would help balance the books until Apollo and Calypso started doing the deed.

“Great! How about Wednesday at four?”

Joey flipped through her calendar. “That’s fine. Does your cousin have any riding experience?”

Ellery’s end was silent for a second. “Uh, can you hang on a second? Beckett needs something. I’m just going to put you on hold real quick.”

“Okay.” Joey drummed a rhythm on the desk with her pencil until Ellery came back on the line a minute later.

“He has some beginner riding experience, but he’s been around horses a lot.”

“Okay. And what size is he?”

“Size?”

“You know like height and weight.”

“He’s, you know, normal-sized?” Ellery’s voice trailed up, reminding Joey of the L.A. question-askers.

“Good for him. What exactly does normal-sized mean?”

“Why do you need to know?”

“I don’t want to put a three-hundred-pound man on a thirteen-hand pony.”

“Can you hang on again?” Ellery asked. “Sorry, Beckett’s really needy today.”

“Sure. It’s not like I have things to do or anything,” Joey muttered.

“Thanks!” And then Ellery was gone. Joey jotted down a note to tell Beckett to get some kind of on-hold music.

Ellery came back on the line. “Sorry about that. Beckett needed stuff for some things. Anyway, my cousin is about two hundred and fifty pounds and six feet tall.”

“Okay, no ponies. Got it.”

“Thanks for doing this, Joey. He’s really going to appreciate it.”

“Wait until after the lesson. He may hate it,” Joey told her. “What’s your cousin’s name?”

“It’s, uh—”

“If you put me on hold again, I’m hanging up.”

“Woods. His name is Woods.”