The Charlotte Chronicles (Jackson Boys 1)

She’s rabid for me. Her hands are fused to the sides of my head, angling me for better access. Her tongue stabs inside my mouth as if she’s fucking me. Her aggressive desire turns me on even more.

We barely reach her doorway before I’m unzipping her shorts. Her hands are down my jeans, and her nails are making tiny divots in my ass. I’m inside her before her panties hit the floor, and I’m coming before I’ve thrust into her more than a handful of times.

“I love you so goddamn much, Charlotte,” I say. When I pull out, a flood of come drips down her legs.

“I love you too,” she says. I swing her up and carry her into the bedroom, where I spend the next hour making up for my hasty lovemaking at the entrance.

42

Charlotte

Returning to the office after a week away is intimidating. The paperwork has piled up so high in my full inbox it makes me never want to leave again.

“Free agency has started in basketball, and you have three new prospects. Antonio Spence has called twice,” Lainey announces, striding into my office with her tablet. “And Tuvane Richards got picked off the wire by the Wildcats.”

“Remind me never to go away again.” Tuvane got traded two years ago to the North Carolina Cougars and had me handle the move. In the meantime, he’s gotten married. Somewhere on the shelf is his notebook.

“You need to hire more people,” Lainey says.

“At least two.” I spot it. Tuvane’s notebook is on the bottom right in all its blue and orange glory. Thank goodness for team colors. It’s about the only way I can keep everything straight. “But I’m not sure I can even afford two at this point.”

I’ve only been officially in business for three years, and while the books are in the black, hiring two more people and opening another office is an expansion I’m not prepared for.

“Are you really leaving? Nick mentioned something last night.”

“Did you get your babysitter issue worked out?”

“Nice tactic,” Lainey says with asperity. “Trying to avoid my question with an uncomfortable one of your own.”

I smooth my hand over the cool surface of the walnut desk that my parents gave me when I opened my office here in Dallas. “Honestly the idea of moving is overwhelming. I don’t know anyone in San Diego. All of my friends are here. My business is here. My family is in Chicago. Half the time that I would be in San Diego, Nathan would be gone on some secret mission he can’t speak of. But if I want to spend any time at all with him, I have to be on the West coast because when he is not on a mission he would be in San Diego training.”

“And there’s no chance that he would leave the service to do something else?”

I give her a tiny shrug, which probably doesn’t convey the full amount of helplessness that I feel. “He said he’d quit, but I don’t think he would be able to. Even after telling me he would leave and come with me to Dallas, he kept talking as if we would be living in San Diego. It’s as if his brain wouldn’t accept the words he said to me. It’s a calling for him, so I don’t want to be living here five years from now with him resentful that he left.”

Lainey makes a face. “I get that you love him and have forever, but this is a shitty dilemma you are in.”

“There is no dilemma. The trouble is accepting the right decision.” I try to smile but fail. “Now cheer me up with some gossip. What happened last night?”

She shrugs as if Nick coming over to play house is no big deal. “We played with Cassidy until she fell asleep. That girl loves him so much.”

“He’s a good guy, Lainey,” I say for what seems like the hundredth time. And for the hundredth time, her nose scrunches up as if something stinks in the room.

“In the two hours that he was at the house, his phone rang more times than a cash register on Black Friday.”

“He is the starting quarterback for one of the most watched football teams in the country. He’s rich, attractive, and has the body of a god. Of course his phone was ringing, but it doesn’t sound like he answered it.”

“Nick is a great guy to you because for all intents and purposes you’re his sister. To the rest of the female population, he is walking heartbreak.”

This is a familiar and old and boring argument, so I abandon it. No one is going to convince Lainey that the bogeyman in the closet is not a helmet-wearing, pigskin-carrying football player.

“Let’s hire a manager for the bar. You can run this office full time with Reese. I’ll cover all the West coast teams. You and Reese cover the South and Midwest. We’ll hire someone to cover the East coast.”