Beautiful Brute (Court University 3)
I was still reeling about what he didn’t say.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Cleo
Jax’s appearance was fleeting over the next few days. I mean, I saw him, but usually, it was only in the evenings. He’d come sneaking into my dorm room after the place was dark and both Kit and I had turned in for bed. He’d moved out, officially, but still came and went as he pleased.
It was obviously just to see me.
He’d make it into my bed, and well, there was no more talking. We didn’t talk, not at all really, and outside of a few WYD text messages here and there, the only vocalizations between us were me moaning or him groaning. He didn’t seem to want to talk about anything else until he was making me come. Even then, he didn’t tend to stay long. He was usually gone the next morning before the house woke up, but did always send me text messages. He’d let me know where he was headed or what classes were giving him hell.
Basically, nothing personal.
I knew exactly what he was doing, avoiding me and our conversation about Dad’s birthday party, and as the days ticked down and Friday came around, I didn’t even bother pushing him about it. He’d expressed no interest in coming.
I sent a text anyway.
Me: About to head out of town. Head home.
I told him I’d drive down to December’s bachelorette party directly from there. My parents lived close to Miami so that made sense. Their house was only a few miles away from the beach unlike the more than an hour away from Bay Cove’s campus.
Jax: So I’ll meet you in Miami then? I’ll get a room for us. We can chill there after we’re both done.
That was all I got, my answer right there. He wasn’t going back with me to our parents’ house. He was choosing to stay on campus, then drive separately for his friend’s bash.
Me: Yup. I’ll see you.
Jax: Drive safe.
So drive safe I did, heading out after my final class of the day. I called my parents before I left first just so they knew I was coming and could look out for me.
The drive was incredibly silent and completely different than how it’d been on the way down. How ironic that day and time felt so far away now.
So much had changed.
I really didn’t know what was up with Jax and my adoptive dad. I’d speculated stuff in the past, but none of it could be confirmed or denied. I just knew, whatever was, had been bad enough to bother both of them at different points.
And for my stepbrother to hate me before he even knew me.
I’d assumed before that, maybe, Jax had been in the middle of a messy divorce. I mean, my biological dad’s and my mom’s hadn’t been great. Parents separating would be hard for anyone. I, personally, had held bitterness for a long time when my dad had left our family.
Again, I didn’t know, and it wasn’t like Mom and Rick had ever given me any indicator that anything was wrong back then. I had just been told not to ask about Jax, that he was staying with his mom, and that was it. Thinking back, I do think Mom and my adoptive father had kept a lot from me about his previous family. I mean, I’d been in a fragile state myself considering everything with Nathan. It’d been fresh for years and long after my little brother had gone.
I was in the dark about virtually anything beyond my own worries.
“Oh, baby. She’s here. She’s here.”
I laughed upon coming into the doorway of the suburban home, and my mom basically launched herself at me in the entryway.
“Honey. Hon-ey.” She squeezed me, making me drop my bag. I laughed. She grinned. “Gah. I feel like I don’t even have a daughter. You don’t text me nearly enough!”
By “not enough,” she must not find her updates from me only every few days acceptable. I always texted her back when she texted me.
“Of course, I’m exaggerating,” she said, pulling away. She tugged at my braid. “Now, tell me all about your news as we finish dinner up.”
Her arm slung around me as my adoptive father filled the hallway, a wide grin on his face as he wiped his hands with a kitchen towel.
“There’s my peaches.” He kissed the top of my head, getting my other side. “Safe drive, sweetheart?”