Jackson rose upright and said in a low, dangerous voice as he stared down at me, “Get out of the pool, Camille. Get your dress back on and follow me to your room so we can talk. This is not a request. You’ve got until the count of ten before I haul you out of that pool and carry you over my shoulder, which as I’m sure you’ll agree, will be quite the spectacle.”
I wasn’t about to test him. I scrambled out of the pool, giving an apologetic look to Marius and then assuring him it was okay. And then, doing exactly as Jackson asked, we made our way to my room.
Once in there, we went at it like cats and dogs. Like literally… Jackson was barking his dismay at me and I was hissing like a cat seething in anger. The dividing line was the birthday party and he did not want me to attend. He was completely fine if the party went on and if an assassin wanted to take a shot at my dad, so be it. But he did not want me in there.
I told him it was impossible to have a birthday party celebrating my coming-of-age to ascend to the throne and not attend.
The fight reached a boiling point when I told him that the party was a long-standing tradition, something he clearly had lack of respect for.
Jackson’s eyes flashed and then went flat. It was clear I was inferring his lack of respect extended back to the fact he chose not to stay in the navy as a career, something his family had a long-standing history of doing.
I immediately started mumbling apologies but Jackson turned on his foot and stormed out of my room, slamming the door shut behind him. I knew Jackson well. I knew he hadn’t gone anywhere and was merely standing out in the hallway with the other two agents. He took his duties seriously and was not about to leave his protective role no matter how pissed he was or if I had hurt his feelings.
I waited for almost an hour before I swung the door open and demanded he come back inside. Enough time had passed. Surely cooler heads were ready to prevail.
No such luck.
The minute he was in my room and the door closed, Jackson was railing at me again over my poor choice to agree to go forward with this part.
But no amount of arguing was going to change anything. His mind had been made up but so had mine. As much as he felt he was going to be able to change things, it wasn’t going to happen. I was going to attend this party one way or the other.
With or without him.
The best thing I could do was to just get him to shut up for a bit, and the best way to get that done was to shock him into silence.
So I started taking off my clothes and, as expected, his mouth snapped shut.
His voice was brimming with anger laced with lust. “What are you doing?”
I gave him a saccharine smile. “I’m going to climb on top of the bed and I hope you join me. Because I’m done arguing. You can either fuck me or go stand in the hallway while I take care of myself. Either way, I’m done arguing.
It was the promise of taking care of myself that changed everything. Oh, Jackson was still angry and still set on changing my mind at some point. But I knew the image of me laying on my bed with perhaps my fingers between legs or even a sex toy scrambled his brains.
Just as I intended.
That was our first argument, thus it was our first makeup sex. And it was beyond amazing.
The sex had definitely taken the edge off, and when we were done, we were able to talk to each other a little more rationally. Still the same arguments, but we each let the other talk and we each listened. We ordered dinner be sent up to my room, and we talked some more, but little by little, Jackson realized I was not going to back down.
We retired early that night, feeling a little awkward as there were still hard feelings, but Jackson ended up making love to me so slowly I almost lost my mind. I fell asleep in his arms but he didn’t sleep well that night at all. I woke up a few times because I was cold and found that rather than holding me, he was on his side of the bed staring up at the ceiling, the moonlight from the windows reflecting in his eyes.
One time I woke up and saw him standing at the balcony doors, looking out quietly. He was so beautiful, the outline of his naked body against the moonlight and I got out of bed and moved to him. I tried to hug him from behind but he murmured, “Go back to bed, Princess. You need your beauty sleep.”