Chapter 6

Clara

I holed up in my studio. It wasn’t Emily Winter approved, so there wasn’t any danger of my mother forcing herself in there. She and my father had flat out refused to leave New York until she could do damage control on my loose reputation, and the consequences that might have for my family.

Dressed in torn and faded dungarees, with a t-shirt beneath, I sat on my leather stool and stared at my scarred workbench. In a long-ago therapy, the counselor had told me to recreate circumstances where I felt good and happy, to shift a black mood. Hence the familiar clothes, and the refuge of my workshop. Today was the first time it wasn’t working. Despite the familiar singed smell and the strong black tea, English Breakfast with lemon, no amount of mirroring happier times was working.

Jack filled my every thought.

Was I the most ridiculous person in the world? Was I the most na?ve? If my mother had any say in it, I supposed I was. Not only had I fallen hook, line, and sinker for Jack, but I had even slept with him. He would always be my first. I would have that memory forever. The worst, more disappointing feeling was that he hadn’t felt anything for me. He had told me often enough we were playing a game, I was just too stupid to understand the type.

Old, dead flowers sat in a jar on a shelf, and I pulled them down and crushed the head between my fingers, turning the thirsty petals into red dust. Like my heart, it crumbled down across the table.

My phone rang again, scraping across my nerves. Jack’s name flashed up. I felt a sudden anger rise in me. Not only was he tricking me, and trying to stick it to my father, but now he wouldn’t just leave me alone. I answered in that rush of anger.

“What?” I barked out, my voice sounding loud in the quiet workshop.

“Good afternoon to you too, honey. I take it your day hasn’t been as good as this morning was? How can we turn it around?” Jack’s deep voice purred over the phone, and made goosebumps prickle from my ear and spread across my face. If I closed my eyes I could almost smell his skin from my memory.

“We can’t,” I said flatly. Jack was silent for a moment.

“What’s happened?” he asked. A stone the size of a peach pit lodged in my throat as I tried to answer.

“Nothing, you’ve had your dinner, with benefits. It’s time to get on with real life,” I said. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t pull out all the painful feelings of rejection and disappointment and lay them at Jack’s feet. It was too humiliating.

“Real life?” Jack let out a bark of a laugh, his tone ragged. “Where are you right now?” he asked. A thrill of alarm shot through me at the sound of his determined tone.

“Why does it matter?”

“It matters, just tell me, honey,” Jack soothed, but I could hear his annoyance, barely hidden, that I wasn’t telling him.

“Well, it shouldn’t matter to you. I’m nothing to you, just a two-million-dollar dinner and a good fuck. Have a good life,” I said curtly, before hanging up. My voice had almost not stumbled over those crude words, but tears were pressing behind my eyelids and I couldn’t help lowering my face into my arms, and letting them come. I sobbed for my silly dreams, and tattered reputation. I sobbed for the ridiculousness of believing that a man like Jack Dawson would ever want me, if not for some ulterior motive. Most of all, I sobbed for the fact that one day I would cave and marry someone my mother had chosen, and I’d always have the memory of the first man I’d loved, even just for a shining moment, emblazoned across my heart in permanent ink. Property of Jack Dawson, now and forever.

When I finished my pity party, it was dark outside. I tidied my workspace, though I’d done next to nothing but wallow all day, and locked up. Dragging myself down the stairs felt like I was moving in honey. I wondered if my parents were still at my house, and shuddered. I couldn’t take another round with Emily today. My heart couldn’t stand it. I wondered if I should go and stay with Elliot and Mia, just tonight, as I stepped out of the building, into the street, and saw him.

Jack Dawson.

In the flesh.

He was leaning against that same black sports car, his arms crossed, waiting for me. I dawdled by the door, thrilled and alarmed at the same time.

“Did you really think I couldn’t find you?” Jack tossed at me arrogantly, as he approached me with a determined stride.

“Why do you even want to?” I demanded, crossing my arms and wishing I had something more as a barrier between us to fortify my defenses. He looked so handsome, and the vision of his head between my thighs only this morning in the shower was doing nothing for my pounding heart.

“Why do I want to?” Jack repeated and bit off an incredulous laugh. “What are you talking about Clara? What happened? I thought we were on the same page,” he said roughly.

“The page where you’re trying to buy my father’s company and he’s fighting you? The page where you sought me out to show him you can get to him?” I accused, poking a finger into his hard chest. “I’m not some pawn in a game between two powerful men trying to prove to each other how big their dicks are,” I cried. Jack blinked at my words, his strong face creasing into a frown before it suddenly smoothed and he let out an indescribable sound. The bastard laughed, right in my face.

I went to push him, my anger and humiliation bursting out the locked box I had been trained to keep my emotions in my whole life. He caught my arms and dragged me against his chest.

“Jesus, honey, you had me worried,” he laughed, pressing his whole body against me and lowering his smiling mouth into my hair, hugging me. “I thought it was something serious,” he murmured.

“This is serious!” I protested as he pressed kisses along my forehead, utterly distracting me from my train of thought.

“Sure it is,” he said, moving his mouth toward mine, leaving a string of kisses across my cheek.

“Jack!” I said more firmly, getting a grip on myself before I could sink into his touch. He pulled back and fixed me with a look, his amusement sobering as he took in my puffy face and reddened eyes.

“Were you crying?” he asked me softly, concern filling his voice. I swallowed thickly, that damn ball of emotion popping right back up to stick in my throat. “Honey, why didn’t you call me? You should have called me and cussed me out. Told me I was a terrible person and you hated me,” he said, rubbing circles on my back.

“What good would that have done?” I asked him, tears escaping down my cheeks. It felt so good to be held by him.

“Then I could have set the record straight, hours ago, a minute after you thought it, I could have fixed it… don’t shut me out, Clara. Don’t keep all that inside and suffer alone, especially when it’s not justified.”

“Not justified? My mother said-“ I started, and trailed off as Jack’s hands tightened on me.

“I can just imagine what she said. I need to have a talk with that woman. I don’t want her upsetting you again. That’s done, it’s over. Never again will you cry because of some vitriol from a chronically miserable person,” he said. I stared up at him in wonder for a moment.

“I’ve never heard anyone talk about Emily that way,” I muttered.

“I’m not just anyone. I’m the man who’ll stand between you and her if you want me to. It’s time she picked on someone her own size for once. Let her try it with me. I can take whatever she can throw at me,” he said. “About your father’s business. Yes, we have been in the process of taking over his company. It’s a dinosaur, bloated and overgrown. It’s losing money, quite frankly and he knows it. But, if it bothers you, I’ll put a stop to that deal right now,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that on your say so, right this moment, the acquisition is off the table. I’ll leave it alone, though it’s only a matter of time before it’s over for him. It doesn’t have to be me that proves it to him. I don’t care about any of that,” he said. His words were too much. They were everything and more.

“What do you care about?” I asked. I wanted to hear it. I wanted to know for sure that this startling and sudden love in my chest wasn’t alone. That I wasn’t crazy to feel the way I did about him so quickly.

“You, Clara. I only care about you,” he said, looking me dead in the eye. “And I’ll prove it to you, right now,” he said and offered me his arm.

“Where are we going?” I asked as he opened the car door for me.

“I’m taking you to the best-known culinary secret in town.” Shutting my door, he rounded the car. He slid into the driver’s seat with a whoosh of his smell, and I felt my shoulders relax for the first time all day.

“Seriously, where are we going?” I asked again, settling back against the buttery leather seat, wondering how going to a restaurant was going to prove anything to me.

“I’m taking you home, Clara.”

* * *

Jack

So, I hadn’t initially planned on bringing Clara home this evening, but never let someone say Martha Dawson wasn’t prepared for unannounced guests. Seriously, never let anyone say it in her presence if they valued their lives.

I took Clara to the door of No. 12, Everest Street, Queens, and rang the bell. This stoop had seen me grow up from a scraggy trouble maker, who was always skipping school to work on my homemade computers, to a young mechanic, taking a job to make ends meet while I worked on my side hustle, to now. Suited and booted, a billionaire, no less. None of that mattered when I stood on the stoop of my childhood home. I was just Jack, bringing a girl he loved home to meet his parents. I wasn’t nervous though. I knew they’d love Clara because I did.

The door opened, and familiar smells filled the air.

“Jackie! I was just putting dinner on the table,” my mother cried, her keen eyes immediately shifting to Clara. “Oh my, and who would you be, dear?” she asked, sounding very much like a wolf in grandmother’s clothing, trying to lure in a potential daughter-in-law.

“This is Clara,” I said, ushering her inside. Clara was round-eyed at the sudden turn of events, and it was strange, seeing the two most important women in my life, standing side by side. They both turned expectant looks to me. “Clara, this is my mother, Martha Dawson.”

Clara turned to my mother, and I could see her beautiful refined manners taking over, as she complimented her, the house and somehow apologized for being empty-handed all in one elegant sentence.

“Clara, honey, don’t be nervous, the only person Martha likes to be strict on is me,” I teased her, squeezing her shoulders tightly. She shot me a look.

“Martha? That’s mom to you, and you can call me mom, too, Clara dear,” Martha said, before pointing us toward the dining room. “Dinner’s in five.” She announced.

My parents had resisted any attempts to get them out of their home in the last few years. I’d dreamed of buying them any kind of house they wanted, anywhere they’d wanted, and they refused to budge. My father had bought and paid for this house with time and sweat, and he was going to die in it, according to him. I guess the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree.

Clara had gone to the kitchen to help my mom, and now, I sipped a beer and sat with my dad in front of the TV. Will Dawson had never met a sport he didn’t like to watch, and if I wanted to spend time with my dad, it was usually here, on this couch.

“Brought a girl home, have you?” Will mused, casting me a sideways look. I nodded.

“Yes, indeed, and she’s a keeper,” I told him. That earned a glance away from the game. Big stuff, in my father’s terms.

“A keeper?” he repeated. I swigged a long swallow of beer.

“I’m going to marry that girl,” I told him and was surprised by his craggy face splitting into a grin.

“About damned time you got married and gave your mother some grandkids to fuss over. A man’s not got a family, his bank balance doesn’t matter. People make you rich, not things,” Will said. It was the same mantra he had fed to me since I was a young boy, and it rang true for me today as it had then. I had been waiting a long time for Clara Winter in my life, and now I just had to make sure nothing came between us.

“Dinner boys!” Martha called to us, and my father shot to his feet. Neither Dawson man underestimated the importance of getting to the table as soon as the food was ready. I would usually be chatting with my mom, setting the table, or one of the million things I did to fall back into my old routine, but I had wanted to give Clara some time alone with her. As I saw her wide-eyed look, I hoped my mom hadn’t scared her off. I sat beside her, and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, pressing a kiss against her temple.

“Jack, stop, your parents,” she hissed. I fought a smile.

“I’m hardly trying to finger you under the table. I’m just kissing you hello,” she turned a mortified look to me, despite my intimate whisper. “Kissing hello is always ok,” I continued.

“Not in my house,” Clara muttered. I had to keep reminding myself how unused to affection my sweetheart was. She had clearly never given nor received affection when she was young, so now, she was a novice at it. I planned to get her used to it by throwing her in at the deep end. I would give all the affection I felt for her and more, until she became used to it, and even demanded it.

“Now, Jack, tell us about how you met this lovely girl,” Martha said, taking a place at the round table beside Clara. She reached out and gripped Clara’s hand, squeezing it. Clara’s cheeks reddened. It was probably the most maternal touch she’d ever had.

“I bought her in an auction,” I said calmly, and my father spat out his beer, and coughed. When he calmed himself enough, he muttered something that sounded like ‘crazy rich people’ and started work on his roast chicken.

“Not like that,” Clara rushed to explain, giving me a stricken look.

“I’m just kidding. I met her at a charity event, paid a hefty donation to a very worthwhile cause, and met Clara, who was there because she generously donated a beautiful handcrafted necklace and earrings to the cause to raise money,” I surmised, diffusing the situation. I didn’t want her to feel awkward. My mother nodded eagerly.

“Charity work is such a great vocation for wives with, er, money.. leaves lots of time for kids and you know… kids,” Martha said, with the tact of a hammer hitting a nail.

“You want grandkids, thanks for making that clear, mom,” I teased her. She huffed and fixed Clara with a conspiring look.

“You’d never know it, considering how much he works, but he’d be a great father,” she said to Clara, who smiled and cast me an appraising look.

“Yeah, I think so too,” she said quietly. Pride swelled inside me, along with the almost unstoppable desire to take her upstairs and start that family right that very moment. I slid my hand around hers, and she linked her fingers through mine. My parent’s exchanged a look I could see a mile off. Relief. I knew what they meant. I felt it too. I had finally found Clara. The stuff of the people whose house we were sitting in, was finally in reach. A love that lasted a lifetime, almost in my grip.

* * *

Clara

Some women might be angry at having a family visit sprung on them without warning. They might wish they weren’t wearing faded dungarees, or that they’d washed their face that morning, but those women weren’t me. Not right now. Right now, as I climbed the creaking stairs of Jack’s childhood home, I marveled at the sense of warmth and family that enveloped the entire place.

I’d always read that family wasn’t a place, it was people, but I’d never understood it till today.

Seeing the pictures that lined the stairway; graduation photos, and prom, first birthdays, and anniversaries, I felt angry for a moment. How much Elliot and I had missed out on, through the sheer luck of having Winters as parents, had never really registered on me till now. No wonder Elliot had grabbed hold of Mia with both hands and married her as quickly as he could. When you see that life you’ve always dreamed of, with warmth and acceptance, a life full of love, you hang on to it.

“Here we are, this is where the magic happened,” Jack said, leading me to a door down a narrow hall. Inside, faded posters hung on the walls, decorated with the faint motif of baseballs. A sagging single bed sat in the middle of the space, and an old desk, crammed full of mismatched computer parts sat in the corner, beside an overstuffed bookcase.

“What magic? Did you have girls other than me in here, Dawson?” I teased him, as I looked around.

“Not a one. Despite my mother having met and married her own ‘forever and a day’ love, at the tender age of eighteen, she wasn’t too happy with me having girls back. Of course, this is implying I was interested in anyone. The magic I was referring to was programming, and fuck, it’s exciting to see you in here now. You are every teenage fantasy I ever had come to life… adult ones too, for that matter,” Jack said, grabbing me around the waist, and pulled me to sit astride him on an old armchair in the corner.

“Forever and a day?”

“It’s my folk’s mantra… I’ll love you forever and a day. Seems to have worked for them,” he said, his eyes warm. There was so much in his eyes at that moment, I could hardly bear the hope that flourished in my chest.

I twisted to keep spying.

“You had a lot of books,” I remarked, trailing a finger over textbook spines.

“What can I tell you? You fell in love with a nerd,” he said, starting to kiss my neck.

“I guessed that from the Bill Gates poster. Who said love anyway? Cocky much.” I said a light tease as there was no point in denying what was between us at this point.

“Yep, love. You love me, honey, didn’t you realize it yet?” he asked, as he raised his hips, and made his arousal very apparent. “Take these off,” he murmured, helping me to my feet between his legs.

Heat flooded through me at the thought of having sex in his old room.

“What about your parents?” I asked him worriedly, unclipping my dungarees regardless.

“Contrary to my youthful appearance, I’m not a teenager. I’m a man, I’m going to fuck the woman I love, discreetly, and terribly quietly,” he laughed, as I grinned, and shimmied out my panties. He undid his fly, and pushed his boxers down, revealing that perfectly long and thick dick. “Come here, honey,” he said. I sat astride him once more, gasping with pleasure as the hard ridge of his cock slid up and down my damp folds. He angled his hips and raised me a moment, edging himself inside me, and then sat back, leaving me to sink down on the full length of him. This time, the stretch didn’t hurt. It felt achingly good, and I was so wet, I slid down easily. It had been torture sitting next to him at dinner, talking about kids, and families, getting wetter and wetter. I had been getting turned on by the idea of him being a family man, which seemed extreme, but whatever. I gave up questioning the things Jack Dawson made me feel. I rocked on his lap, and we both sighed, once I was fully seated.

I rose and fell, enjoying the feeling of him moving inside me. His hands came to hold my hips, helping me.

I leaned down to kiss him, and he crushed me to his chest, as his hips somehow managed to keep moving in and out in a steady rhythm.

“Did you call me the woman you love?” I couldn’t resist asking, as I rose and fell on him. He hummed his agreement deep in his chest.

“Yeah, I love you, Clara Winter. You’re the first and last woman I am bringing home,” he said. “Just like I’m the first and last man who’ll ever be this deep inside you.” He thrust faster. “The first and last to put a baby in you… our baby, our family,” he said. His words made me double over with pleasure. I was completely lost in this man, and I couldn’t even bring myself to care what Emily would say. She didn’t matter anymore.