Before You (Before You #1)(29)
“Hey, it’s a classic. It has that whole kindness triumphs over greed thing going for it.”
“Right…” Jax responded, drawing out the word. “Is there any chance you’d agree to watch something more recent, like from the last decade?”
Bre folded her arms across her chest. “Not a chance.”
Jax smiled and nodded. He couldn’t fathom how he ended up sitting on the sofa watching a children’s movie except that he found it remarkably difficult to say no to anything Bre asked. “Willie Wonka it is.”
Halfway through the movie, he noticed that Bre’s eyes were closed, her dark lashes shadowing her face, and her head tucked against her chest. Without questioning his actions, he wrapped his arm around her shoulder, placing her head on top of his legs.
“No, I’m not tired,” she mumbled. “I don’t want to sleep.”
“Shh… just relax. This will be more comfortable. You can still watch the movie.”
“Are you sure? I don’t want to go to bed yet. The movie’s not over.” Her voice was raspy from sleeping and her eyes were hooded, making him wonder what she would look like if he woke up next to her in the morning. He groaned inwardly at the thought. He needed to stop thinking about her as anything but his friend and Cam’s girlfriend.
Shifting slightly, he traced the side of her face down to the middle of her neck with his fingertips. She shivered a little and a faint sleep-drugged smile crossed her face. He wished she were his. He leaned down to kiss her forehead, inhaling her faint lavender scent. God, he loved the way she smelled, no cloying perfume, just fresh and clean. “Don’t worry about it, Bre. We’ll finish the movie.”
She studied him, her eyes wide. “You’re not hitting on me, are you? Because that day in your room…” Her voice drifted off as if she couldn’t say the words. “I really need a friend now, not another complication. I have enough of those.”
“Then, that’s what I am. Your friend,” he whispered, and silently added for now in his head.
“Okay.” She nestled into his lap, and he thought to himself that this is what people mean when they talk about the blurred line between pain and pleasure, because while it was painful to hold her like this, he couldn’t think of anything he’d rather be doing at that moment.
Completely ignoring the movie, he watched as her eyes became heavy and she drifted off to sleep again. He wouldn’t trade being with her, supporting her for anything, and the last thought he remembered before he fell asleep was that Cam was a fool for taking Bre for granted.
Chapter Fourteen
“Well, Bre, I must say I’m shocked. Don’t you two look cozy?” She didn’t even have to open her eyes to know that voice. She felt arms tense around her stomach, and her eyes flew open, panicked. Her eyes narrowed in on Jax’s chest, which was resting next to her face. Somehow they’d fallen asleep on the couch together.
Sitting up, she turned to greet the person standing in front of the television. “Hi, Mom. What are you doing here?”
“I came back to make sure you took care everything for my mother.” Her mother’s hands were on her hips.
“I’d say you’re a few days late for that. The funeral was yesterday.”
Her mother shrugged, wholly unconcerned. “So? I’m here now, but I’m just stopping by to pack.”
“Where are you going?” Bre asked, pushing her tangled hair out of her face.
“Charles asked me to move in with him.”
“What are you going to do with the house?”
“Nothing. It’s not mine. Unfortunately, my mother left everything she owned to you.”
“What do you mean?” Bre asked, entirely dumbfounded.
Her mom’s eyes narrowed. “I’m homeless because of you. She left everything—the house, the shop in Aspen—to you. I don’t know what you said to her to make her turn against me, but she said she wanted to make sure your future was secure. I guess that means she didn’t care about my future.”
“That’s not true, Mom.” Bre didn’t know what compelled her to console her mother as if she were the parent and her mother, the child. “She loved you.”
“Apparently not as much as she loved you. She never cared about me. From the moment we moved in with her, all she cared about was making sure you had everything you needed. What about what I needed? I was her child, not you.” Her mother flopped into a chair across from the sofa, calculated tears running down her face. “She’s left me destitute. I have nowhere to live.”
The look on her mother’s face was clearly designed to make Bre feel guilty. She hated how her mother always managed to suck her back into a pattern of placating and appeasing her. Old patterns died hard. Even when her mother’s words made absolutely no sense, Bre had a hard time putting her mother in her place, not that it would matter what she said.
“You haven’t lived here since I left for college. She probably didn’t think you wanted the house. You always complained about living in a small town in the mountains. Before you met Charles, you were living with…” Bre forgot his name, and her voice trailed off absently. It was too early to deal with her mother’s baggage. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Jax pull his shirt back on over his head.