Unfinished Ex (Calloway Brothers, #2)(35)

Lowering my head to rest on his chest, I laugh. “Babe, you’d have thought anyone who touched your penis at age fifteen would be a good catch.”

“You may have a point.” He wiggles his butt. “Listen, all this talk about my man meat has it wanting some attention.”

I lift the sheet and stare at his growing erection. “Well, hello there.” I lick my lips.

“Wait.” Jaxon cups my head in his hands. “I just wanted you to know that while you give head better than a porn star on a donkey’s dick, that’s not why I married you.”

“Uh… thank you?”

“All I’m saying is you’re it for me, Nicky Calloway.” I give him a look. “Yeah, I know technically you’re still a Forbes. You can be Princess Nicky Consuela Bananahammock for all I care, as long as we’re together until the day we die.”

My eyes become glassy.

“Promise me,” he says. “Promise me that whatever we do in life, we’ll die together, in bed, eighty years from now.”

“I promise.”

Then I kiss down his chest, past his abs, and right to his throbbing penis, and I seal the promise like a porn star.



“I apologize,” a woman says, waking me.

I shake away the memory and look at my shoe, which is wet.

“She spilled her juice,” she says, pulling a wad of tissues from her bag and wiping it up.

“It’s fine.”

“We kept them up way too late. They’re slaphappy or something. Tell the nice lady you’re sorry, Amanda.”

The little girl’s lip juts out in a pout. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, sweetie,” I say. I take the tissues from her mother. “Really, no need. These are my commuting shoes. No big deal.”

“Do I know you?” she asks, studying my face.

“I’m not sure.”

Please don’t let her be someone from Calloway Creek who is now going to praise her daughter for ruining my Nikes.

“I feel like I’ve seen you before,” she says.

The train comes to a stop. My stop. I gather my things and stand. “I get that a lot. I hope you have a nice night.”

“You too. And again, very sorry.”

I hurry off the train. Ordinarily, I’d love to be recognized, but for the right reasons. Considering where we are, the likelihood of that isn’t great.

As I make my way back home, it starts sprinkling. I do my best not to look over toward Jaxon’s house as I approach it. He was there last night. On his front porch. In the dark. Was he taking his dog out, or did he know I’d be heading home?

The rain picks up a bit as I pass his house.

“A good weather girl would have an umbrella with her!” I hear shouted.

I stop, the rain starting to seep through my top. He knows more than anyone how I hate being called a weather girl. “Are you stalking me?”

He laughs. “Wow, you really think you’re something, don’t you? This is my front porch. I have every right to sit on it.”

“And I have every right to walk down a street and not be harassed.”

His porch light comes on. I can see him clearly now, albeit through the thickening sheet of rain.

Why are you standing here in the rain? Go. Move. He’s wearing jeans and a T-shirt. A blue shirt that I know matches his eyes. His feet are bare, not to mention dry. And he’s looking at me like I’m the devil reincarnate. “Indeed you do. I was simply pointing out that you must not be a very good forecaster if you didn’t know rain was coming.” He pulls out his phone and snaps a picture of me, soaking wet. “I’m sure your groupies would be interested in knowing you suck at predicting the weather.”

And with that, he goes inside, shuts the door, and turns off the light.

Don’t do it. Keep walking.

I open the gate.

Or do that.

I step through, go up the sidewalk, climb the three stairs to the porch (noting they’ve been painted), and pound on the door.

“Nobody’s home!” I hear.

I pound more. “Jaxon! Answer the damn door.”

It opens. He clutches his chest like a surprised superfan. “Oh my god, Nicole Forbes.” Then his hand drops to his side and his demeanor changes. “Sorry, I get my weather reports from someone who actually knows what they’re doing.”

“Shut up, Jaxon.” His dog appears. I lean down and pet him. “Hey there, Heisman.”

“Heisman, go to bed.”

The gorgeous golden doesn’t move.

“Heisman,” he says sternly. But Heisman ignores him and starts licking my shoe. “Damn it.”

Jaxon cracks his neck from side to side in obvious frustration.

“It’s the juice on my shoe. A little girl spilled it on me on the train.”

“Thanks for the play-by-play. Now, want to tell me what you’re doing at my house?”

Behind me, the heavens open up and sheets of rain come down. Streams of water roll off his roof. I can’t even see the streetlight in front of the Simperson’s house anymore.

“I don’t know. You said what you said, and I got mad. I should have kept walking.” I glance behind me. “And now this. Can I just sit on your porch until it passes?”