Jersey Six - Jewel E Ann Page 0,73
taking showers while he jerked off.”
“Jersey …” He ached to touch her, but the timing felt off.
“I’m not broken, Coop. But you’re right. I’m running. Only you don’t see the real picture. I’m not running away. I’m running toward something. I’m chasing something. I am the predator. The captor. Not the prey. Never again will I be the prey.”
He returned a sluggish nod, mentally chewing on her words, trying to connect the underlying meaning. “Who are you chasing?”
“Not who. What. I’m chasing the truth.”
“The truth about what?”
Jersey’s gaze slipped for a few seconds. Her intent expression pointed at his chest before glancing back up at him. “My life. Why it’s taken the turns it has. And who’s to blame.”
“You’re twenty-four.”
“Yeah, so?”
“Okay. You’re a twenty-four-year-old with a rocky past, but you’re on the verge of traveling the world with a moderately famous person. And said moderately famous person likes you … quite a lot actually. So why chase demons?”
Jersey frowned, a silent punch to Ian’s gut, leaving him feeling like a failure. What did he miss? Why was his question not well-received?
“I didn’t dream of traveling the world with some guy. And no matter how much of the world you show me, it won’t erase my past. It won’t give me what I’ve lost. It won’t be an education, a useful skill, a sense of independence, a feeling of normal … ness, a family.”
Family. That he understood.
“Are you chasing me?” Ian cupped the side of her face.
She closed her eyes, leaning into his touch. “I’m chasing the truth.”
He brought his other hand to her face too. Then he leaned down, whispering over her lips, “Am I your truth?”
Jersey’s eyes popped open wide, blinking several times. “Yes.”
He kissed the girl who liked to be kissed. She slid her hands up his shirt, curling her fingers into his muscles. It felt like a silent claim. Ian ran from clingy women, dodged anything too personal, skirted the issue of love, his past, and his fears. Until … Jersey.
Her hands descended to the button of his jeans, giving it a hard tug until it popped open.
“Jersey …” he mumbled into their kiss.
She pulled down his zipper.
A groan rumbled his chest as he tried to step back. “What are you doing to me?”
Stepping toward him, hooking the waistband of his briefs with her finger, she grinned. “I’m kissing you, Coop.”
He took a mental picture of that smile, tucking it into a special place in his memory. For a flash of a moment, she wasn’t the abused, defensive, homeless woman he found weeks earlier. In that moment, she was a woman wanting a man, not a fan seducing a rock star. A woman—the woman—wanting him. And he wanted her too.
“You’re teasing me with something I can’t have.” He rested his forehead on hers, covering her curious hand with his to stop her from going any further.
“My female issue is done, Coop.”
“That was quick.”
She chuckled, lifting onto her toes and biting his lower lip as her hand broke free from his grasp and pushed down the front of his briefs. “Do we really need to talk about it?”
His abs tightened as he sucked in a quick breath when she grabbed him with her warm hand. He claimed her mouth, kissing her hard, but afraid to move an inch, not wanting to lose her touch. His tongue slid across hers, deliberate yet patient like her hand moved along him.
When the tension built to the brink of losing his sanity, they pushed away from each other, breathless and desperate. Quick hands tore off clothes. Ian shoved the suitcase onto the floor. Before Jersey could get her pants completely off, Ian grabbed her face and kissed her again.
She stumbled backward, her feet tangled in her pants. Clinging to each other, they fell to the bed. His hand slid between her legs, and she kicked her leggings the rest of the way off.
“I might die waiting for you to meet me on the other side of the world.” He kissed her neck.
She lifted her pelvis off the bed, chasing his touch. It gave him an indescribable high to know that he could strip her down to a simple woman wanting a man.
A beautiful woman with thick, dark hair that she never curled.
A shy smile.
A face with no makeup.
A body riddled with tiny scars.
But she never said no to a mani-pedi with Max. Jersey’s raw beauty drew him in, and her teasing splashes of femininity softened her jagged edges. But those eyes …