Twins For My Bestie’s Brother (Billionaire Daddies)

17. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

Lily

E verything has been perfect. A fairy tale. The way I always saw it in romcoms as a child.

Dinner at the nicest restaurant in town without any constraints on the bill, the best champagne, oysters, caviar, and dessert. I know dessert doesn’t sound like a luxury, but let me tell you, I spent years looking at my bank account every time I made a purchase. Dessert was never in the cards for me back then.

Afterward, we had walked off dinner on the boardwalk, me on Jackson’s arm, the whole town as our witness on a temperate autumn evening.

As wonderful as it is, it’s also awkward—in the best way, though. In that tittering first date way. Jackson and I have a lifetime of memories together, even as intimately as being in bed together. And yet this is uncharted territory.

Conversation comes and goes. The silences are scary but comfortable. Jackson eventually looks at his watch.

“What time is it?” I ask.

“Almost eleven if you can believe it,” he says, sounding surprised himself.

“Time flies, I guess,” I reply, leaving off the “when you’re having fun” bit. Gotta have some air of mystery, right?

“It does. Too quickly.”

My heart swells.

Jackson slows us to a stop and turns to face me. He touches his chin thoughtfully, rubbing his fingers through his beard which I can tell was freshly trimmed this morning. “I should probably take you home.”

“Yeah, we don’t want to break curfew,” I tease.

He chuckles. “Your parents will hate me if that happens.”

I giggle, but the laugh fades to quiet. This is it, I guess. The end. And it was lovely. It was perfect. I just don’t want it to end.

“In all seriousness, I . . . ” Jackson stops. “I don’t want to take you home, but—”

“I don’t want to go home,” I reply.

His eyes widen. “Oh. Okay. Good.”

I nod. “Good.”

We stare at each other. I wait for him to make a move. Come on . We’ve literally had sex and other than a kiss on his cheek at the beginning of the night, not a single smooch. We’re under the stars, the bay is lapping at the shore, and it’s a perfect milieu.

And . . . nothing.

I break eye contact first. “Great, I guess we should . . . keep walking.” I start to go.

“Wait a second—” Jackson captures my hand in his and pulls me back toward him hard enough that I land against his chest. He locks his arms around me, keeping me pressed to him. Again, our eyes lock. “I want to kiss you.”

“Yeah, and I want you to kiss me, but you’re not doing the whole kissing thing, Jackson!” I reply playfully.

Jackson shakes his head. “I just keep thinking about what would have happened if we’d done this fourteen years ago. You know.”

I run my hands up his arms to his shoulders. “You mean . . . if things would have worked out or . . . ”

“Yeah, I wonder.”

I smile. “I don’t know.”

“At least if we had done this fourteen years ago, I’d be justified in being as nervous as I am.”

“You’re nervous?” I ask.

Jackson tries to smile. “Isn’t it obvious?”

It is. “I’m nervous too.”

We linger there, looking at each other in the moonlight saying nothing and everything at once. The truth is, we weren’t ready back then. For us. Because what’s happening here feels so big. So limitless. I’m scared I’ll never want to let go.

I push myself onto my toes, so our lips are close. “You said you wanted to kiss me,” I whisper.

Jackson nods. “I did.” His words paint my mouth, and a moment later, he kisses me.

We don’t have to put on a show for anyone. And we aren’t desperate like the other night when everything exploded. No. Expanded.

For the first time, it’s just Jackson and Lily.

Jackson tilts his head to the side, parting our mouths. His nose brushes up against mine, bumping up against the small stud. “How was that?”

“Better than what you would have done when you were sixteen,” I reply.

He laughs. “I guess there are some upsides to being patient.”

We finish up our walk and decide to head to a local bar for a drink and some quiet conversation since it is not the night, but this feeling, that is young.

We sit at the bar, side by side, our stools as close as possible so we don’t have to be apart.

The bartender, a woman who must be in her early twenties, says as she passes the drinks across the bar, “I’ve seen you two around town. You’re so cute together.”

“Oh. Thanks,” Jackson says, resting his arm on the back of my seat.

“Like the duality. Clean cut and wild child. Obsessed,” she says, before flitting over to some needy patron at the end of the bar.

Jackson licks his lower lip. “Huh. Never been called a wild child before, but—”

I burst with laughter and swipe my beer off the bar. “You know who the wild child is in this—“ Don’t say relationship . “Dynamic.”

Jackson smiles, eyelids lowered as I settle back into his arm. “I didn’t want to assume .”

After a sip of my beer, I wonder aloud, “Do you think it’s too much of a . . . duality?”

“What? You and me?”

“Yeah, I mean, you’ve got your act together, and I’ve—”

“Don’t do that, Lil.”

“I’m just saying. I mean, I barely have a job. I’m—”

Jackson cuts me off with a wave of his hand. “You were waylaid. That’s temporary. That happens to everyone.”

“Even you?”

“Oh, especially. You think the capital gains are always gaining? No.”

I wag my finger. “See, you have capital gains. I have a tattoo gun. There’s the difference.” A chasm of difference.

Jackson places his fingertips of one hand in the middle of my collarbone, then slides them across the bone, careful not to stray any lower. His touch is featherlight and sends prickles of electricity down my spine. He stops on the line tattoo of the Olympic Mountain Range, one of the tattoos I have come to regret because of how it represents the past and, unfortunately, one visible often when I look in the mirror. “Is different bad?”

“Not bad,” I say, trying not to let my voice sound ragged though his touch is creating warmth between my legs.

He spreads his fingertips out until his palms rest on my chest too. “I like your wild, Lily. I like you exactly the way you are. If anyone should be worried, it’s me. I’m too normal for you.”

“No, you’re . . . grounding,” I say. “I need someone to keep my feet on the ground.”

“And I need someone to pull me up so my head’s in the clouds from time to time. That’s a good balance, I think.”

I smile up at him. “I didn’t know you were so good with words, Jackson.”

“I try. You make it easy.”

I push him away, not meaningfully, though. “And you’re a flirt.”

He cups my shoulder and pulls me back. “And that’s a bad thing?”

I tip my head back. “No, but if I’m not careful, I’ll fall.”

“Then you’ll catch up to me because I’ve already fallen.”

I grip the collar of Jackson’s shirt and pull him into a kiss. I can’t help myself. It’s too easy being with him. I’m falling. Falling fast. When I hit the ground, I’ll be done for. I don’t think I’d mind that.

A loud thunk of something hitting the bar interrupts our kiss. I turn quickly and am horrified when I find myself face-to-face with Will. He’s standing next to my stool, his hand on an empty beer glass he used as a gavel against the bar.

He stares me down, nostrils flared. “We get it.”

I’m speechless as I stare back at the man I used to call mine. He doesn’t even look like himself. He’s transformed into something hideous like his feelings inside are eating away at him on the outside.

Jackson’s hand tightens on my shoulder, pulling me under his arm and away from Will, if that’s even possible. “Will, it’s good to see you. You having a nice night?”

“Cut the fucking shit, Roy,” Will growls.

Jackson is composed. Calm and even-keeled, thank God, because I’m close to trembling. “You’re going to have to use your words and be more specific. You came over and interrupted our conversation.”

“Conversation?! You two are practically fucking at the bar!”

“We’re not!” I snap in response. The fire comes in fits and starts with him. I’m never able to stand up for myself long enough to change anything with him. I lost years of my life bending to his temper. “Leave. Us. Alone.”

Will’s demeanor changes now that I’m talking to him. He gets that glistening sad look in his eye, the one that he’d put on when he was apologizing. He leans closer to me, invading my personal space. “Are you done torturing me?”

His breath reeks of alcohol. I almost feel bad for him. Almost. I turn away from him, disgust infusing my expression.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Jackson slide to the edge of his chair, putting one foot on the ground. He’s on high alert. Ready to act. “Will, I think it’s time you back off, okay?” Jackson says, still poised.

Will’s expression shifts back into darkness. He steps around my chair to get in Jackson’s face. “I think you need to back off, man.”

Jackson places a hand on the bar. He taps two of his fingers back and forth, fast.

“You’ve been with her what ? A couple of months. Pshhh. That’s nothing compared to what we—” Will claps his hand down on my shoulder, possession resonating through his fingertips. “What we have .”

Jackson grabs Will’s hand and yanks it off me. “Don’t fucking touch her, dude.”

“I’ll do whatever the fuck I want.”

“She doesn’t want you, man.”

“You think she wants you?’

Jackson laughs and runs a hand down his face. “I don’t disrespect people I care about.”

Will pauses. His eyes narrow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

The corner of Jackson’s mouth perks up. “You know what the fuck I mean.”

I wish I knew what the fuck he meant. There’s a subtext to this conversation I feel I almost understand, but not quite.

The bartender returns. “Hey, guys. Cool it.”

Will ignores her. “What are you going to do about it?”

Suddenly, Jackson is up and out of his chair, squaring up to Will. “You want to go there?”

I leap out of my chair and grab Jackson’s arms. “Jackson, don’t. It’s not—”

Will goes toe to toe with Jackson. “Come on, pretty boy. You think you can fight?” He puts his hands on Jackson’s chest and shoves.

I yelp in surprise. “Will, what the hell?”

Thankfully, Jackson absorbed most of the force. He faces off with Will again. “I’m not the one who should be worried, Earring .” Shove .

Okay, this is kind of amazing, and while I’m definitely more of a ‘Make love, not war’ type, no guy has ever gone to bat for me like this.

It’s doing something to me. Not enough for me to want to keep Will from getting hurt, but—

“Break it up, or take it outside!” someone shouts.

I realize all eyes are on us now, the bar closing in. I’m not sure if they’re ready to keep them from killing each other or to pick sides and turn this into a WWE match.

Will holds his hands up in surrender and starts to back away. “Fine, fine.” He turns to go and then, in a flurry of motion snaps back and sucker punches Jackson in the nose.

There is a chorus of screams and exclamations, mine included.

Jackson recoils, bent over, cupping the wound. “Goddammit. Fuck.” He spits, blood spattering across the floor.

“Oh, my God, Jackson—“ I go toward him, helping him stand up straight. Swelling blooms down from his cheek. “You’re hurt, oh my God.” I glare back at Will. “You sucker punched him!”

Will’s lips bend downward, and he shrugs. “That means you’re going to punk out, Roy?”

I grab tighter to Jackson. “Don’t. Let’s just go. Let’s—”

Jackson gives me a fleeting smile, then focuses on rolling up his cuffs. “I’m fine.” He lifts his eyes away from me, lasers in on Will, pupils pinpricks. Jackson guides me behind him. “Stay back, okay?”

Before I can say anything, Jackson pushes past me and lays his hands on Will. They struggle until Jackson gets Will where he wants him and knees him right in the groin. And chaos ensues. People run to break them apart and shout about calling the cops or taking things outside.

I stay back just as Jackson told me to, trying to mobilize people to break them up.

They might be fighting over me, but there’s a key difference. Will is fighting to get me. Like an object.

And Jackson . . . he’s fighting to protect me. And after years of being made to feel like nothing, it’s nice to know that someone believes I’m something worth protecting. More than nice.

It’s everything.