Stay with Me (Wait for You, #3)(39)

I slammed my hands into his chest. “Get off.”

He froze. “What?”

“Please.”

Jax got off. It had to be something in my voice, because he rolled right off me, and I rolled right off the bed, coming to my feet. I backed up until I hit the corner of the dresser, sending a burst of pain across my hip.

He sat up and moved over the bed, both hands on the mattress. “Calla, baby, are you scared of me?”

“No. Yes. I mean, no. I’m not scared of you.” I squeezed my eyes shut briefly. “It’s not like that.”

“It’s like what then?”

We would never f*ck.

There. I couldn’t say it out loud, but there it was. I would never get naked with him. I would never get that close.

God, that shouldn’t be as disappointing as it was, but this with Jax—being in bed, tangled together and wanting each other—was normal. And I wouldn’t get any kind of normal, not with a guy like Jax. Not when he might’ve gotten over my jacked-up scar on my face, but hadn’t seen or felt the rest of me.

This wasn’t about having a low self-esteem, being inexperienced or weak or being too nervous to get naked because I needed to drop twenty pounds. My body was wrecked. There was nothing attractive about it.

Drawing in several deep breaths, I forced the sting out of my eyes and the back of my throat. “This is what I’m about. Okay? So this isn’t going to happen.”

His dark brows rose.

Damn, he gave good brows.

I was distracted again. “I mean, you’re really hot. Don’t get me wrong. And I’m sure you know that, because there is no way you don’t know that.”

The corners of his lips started to tip up.

God, I needed to shut up. “And I’m flattered that you . . . um, that you like me, but that . . . it can’t happen. Okay? There’s no way. I’m not your type of girl.”

“How do you know my type of girl?” he asked, sounding genuinely curious.

I almost rolled my eyes. “I know. Trust me. And that’s okay. You’re nice and I appreciate everything you’ve done for me and are doing, but this . . . this isn’t going to happen. All right? You got that?”

He stared at me a moment, seeming to want to push the issue, but then he nodded slowly.

“Got it,” Jax said.

And then he grinned.

I didn’t think he got it at all.

Jax lived closer to the bar, in a neat and well-kept row of townhomes not even a mile outside of town. I hadn’t gone in when I’d dropped him off and I hadn’t hung around after he’d climbed out of my car. Having woken up the way we had and my subsequent freak-out had sent me clamoring for alone time.

Time where I could make sense of what Jax wanted and how he could want it. It shouldn’t matter. It would never be, but Jax was stunningly gorgeous. He couldn’t be hurting when it came to females willing to jump in bed with him. There was a crap ton of obvious reasons why I shouldn’t be anywhere near the top of his I Want to Hit It list.

God, there wasn’t enough time in the world for me to figure that out.

I actually hadn’t gone to the bar, either, when I’d dropped Jax off. That day I moved onto the shift that he worked and I didn’t have to go in until that afternoon. So I’d picked up just a handful of groceries that made me feel like I was going on a diet and then headed back to the house. During the day, I wasn’t too worried about junkies or crazy heroin drug lords, which was probably stupid, because it wasn’t like they were vampires and only came out at night.

Things were just scarier at night, and after my shift on Friday night—and after I made pretty decent tips, I would’ve dreaded going back to the house if I hadn’t been so damn tired. I’d stayed while Jax showed me how to shut down the bar, including how to close out the registers and cash out.

That entire shift he’d acted like nothing had happened between us that morning, like things were normal. Or at least what I thought was normal with him. He charmed and he flirted. For the second night in a row, he made a point of tying my apron when I worked the floor and his hands lingered on my hips, causing me to blush, but that was all.

I’d only made it to my car when I heard my name being called out. I turned, feeling my heart do a quick jump when I saw Jax.

“I’ll be right behind you,” he said, stopping at the side of his truck.

My brows furrowed. “For what?”

He fished his truck keys out of his pocket. “Heading to your house, babe.”

I stared at him, thinking my ears had taken a drive into crazy town. “You’re not coming to the house.”

And that started an argument over whether he was or wasn’t coming that lasted a good thirty minutes, and I ended up giving up, because I was yawning more than I was speaking.

So Jax followed me to the house.

He’d actually brought a change of clothing with him, for crying out loud—a change of freaking clothing.

When we’d gotten to the house, I tried ignoring him as I made myself a cup of hot tea, but it had seemed rude not to at least offer him one since he’d planted himself on the couch and had become my personal security system.

“Thanks,” he’d said as I’d placed the cup on the coffee table.

Tired and nervous, I’d found it hard to look at him as I’d cradled the cup between my hands. “I didn’t know if you liked sugar or honey in it, so I didn’t add a lot of either.” Out of the corner of my eyes, I’d seen him reach for the mug and take a sip. “If you want those things, they’re in the kitchen.”