Keeping Jahleel (Loving All Wrong #1.5) (17 page)

However, there was no telling what people saw in the club last night. Was I worried, hell yes I was worried. And afraid.

Not of my career failing. Not of the inevitable media bashing. Not of nothing.

But of someone. Someone who’s name both Amanda and I have been dancing around because we were too afraid to utter it.

Lion T’mar.

M
arsha swung the door open a whole minute after Jahleel rang the doorbell.

Her hands promptly went to her curvy hips, her cute little mouth opening to start some unnecessary dramatic shit.

But Jahleel spoke up before she could. “Look, Marsh, not in the mood for your shit, ‘kay? Just here to see my daughter.”

She watched him for a beat, then took a breath and stepped aside for him to get in. “She’s sleeping, though.”

“S’okay,” he mumbled lifelessly. “Just wanna see her…”
To make sure she’s
real
and still here in my life
, he omitted.

As he headed up the stairs toward Claire’s room, Marsha asked, “Are you okay, JK?”

“Far from it,” he answered in truth, hauling himself up the steps. He felt as though he’d been climbing them forever, would never get to the top.

A pause, then, “Can I get you something, babe? Tea? I’ve got your fave. Lady Grey.”

“Nah, I’m good, Marsh.”

When he got to the top of the stairs, he turned to look down at her. She stood at the bottom, watching him warily, twisting her fingers together. Clearly, his quiet, downtrodden demeanor was baffling her.

Ever since he’d found out about Claire, he’d been antagonistic and acerbic toward her, blaming her for fucking up how he’d planned on starting his family.

With
her
.

What Marsha did was wrong in every way, but he couldn’t continue hating her for loving him.

“Come here,” he beckoned in a soft, forgiving voice.

She didn’t hesitate in climbing the stairs two at a time to get to him. Stopping one step below, she stared up at him, completely passive.

Leaning down, Jahleel pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I’ve never taken the time out to thank you.”

“For what?”

“Claire,” he said. “Might not have been the ideal way for getting my first kid, but…I love her. And I’m glad she’s here. Thank you for her. A gift that’ll always be
mine
.”

Marsha gave off a disappointed sigh and nodded. He wasn’t sure what else she was expecting, but that’s all he had, all he could give.

Turning away, he took the left and continued on to Claire’s room.

Claire was stretched out in her bed crucifixion style. Arms and legs spread wide, mouth hanging open. She was a wild sleeper. Couple of times he crashed with her in bed and woke up with minor bruises from the kicks and punches she threw in her sleep. This trait was from her mother.

Claire might resemble him to a fault, but everything else, personality and behavioral tendencies, was from her mother. Marsha was the same when she slept: wild and warring. God knew what the hell they dreamed of to be throwing punches like that in their sleep.

That made him emit a low chuckle—for the first time since he’d hopped on a plane and got the fuck out of Vegas. To get away from
her
.

Far, far away.

Funny, earlier this morning when he was boarding the flight
to
Vegas, he’d felt as if he would die if he didn’t see her soon enough. He’d been needing her to breathe. Next thing he knew, he was running away from her
to
breathe, because just looking at her was sucking the fucking life out of him. Suffocating.

If anyone had told him that Saskia, of all persons, would do this to him, he would’ve probably cut their fucking tongue out. Saskia? Fuck, no. Not Saskia. She’d never do that.

If there was any fucking up to be done, it would be from him. He was a natural fuck-up. Even when he didn’t know he was fucking up. It was second nature for him.

Well, didn’t he just sustain a hard slap of reality?

Fighting to ignore the punitive pain lacerating his whole fucking heart, he kicked off his boots and climbed into bed with Claire. This little girl slept so soundly, one could pull this house apart and rebuild and she would never wake. She woke only when she wanted to.

Leaving the airport, Jahleel had shot straight to Marsha’s because he’d had a sudden urge to see the only girl he truly owned. The girl who would always love him because he was hers. The girl who’d never hurt him because he was hers. The girl who’d always defend him because he was hers. The girl who would always, always, through nature, through blood, through God, be
his
.

Claire Kingston.

Fuck every other lying, pretending creature called woman. Fuck love. Fuck marriage. Fuck all the lies life tells.

He was done with relationships. Wouldn’t even make sense, anyway, because he didn’t think he was ever going to stop loving Saskia. She owned him, but he didn’t own her. He was forever hers, but she never belonged to him. She belonged to the world. She lived in a house of lies. A house and a life he didn’t care to be in. She’d played him for a fool. Embarrassed him. Maybe to get back at him, to get even? He didn’t know. But…

Saskia ruined him.

Claire mumbled something in her sleep and turned to face him, curling up close to him, as if she could smell him. Pressing a kiss to her nose, he wrapped his arm around his little bundle of life, pushed aside all pain and feelings of betrayal, and hugged close to his heart, his only babe.

“Daddy! Wake up, Daddy!”

Jahleel awoke to Claire bouncing up and down on top of him. He groaned as her little kneecaps penetrated his ribcage. He should have known better than to fall asleep in her bed, because this was her usual manner of waking him up.

Painfully.

“Jesus Christ, Claire,” he carped, gently guiding her off him.

She wriggled and tried to climb back onto him. “You have to get up, Daddy. Mommy bought a yummy pizza this big”—she stretched her tiny hands out to indicate the size of the pizza; no one made pizza that big—”and she’s gonna eat all of it if you don’t get up. She won’t listen to me, Daddy. She won’t wait until you’re up. Come on, Daddy. Let’s go!”

He laughed. Easily. Freely. Simply because she made him happy.

Close to a year ago when he’d just found out about Claire, she wasn’t this receptive of him. She was a recalcitrant little brat who drove him battyfuck crazy. Always taking her mother’s side instead of his.

Now, she called him Daddy, instead of “that man.” She was obsessed with him. Turned the tables and started taking his side instead of her mother’s. Now they were father and daughter.

Sitting up, Jahleel rubbed his eyes with the heels of his palms while a yawn forced its way out, then he got to his feet and took Claire up in his arms. She loved that. Loved when people lifted her weighty ass up like she was new born.

Out the bedroom and down the stairs, he found Marsha in the living room sitting cross-legged on the couch with a large box of Hawaiian pizza on the coffee table, along with two bottles of Pepsi, watching
Avengers.

Jahleel dropped down on the sofa with Claire, leaned forward and plucked up a slice of pizza. He put it at Claire’s mouth for her to take a bite, then bit into it himself.

“Was any of what you said earlier even sincere?” Marsha asked, her eyes fixed on the television.

Feeding Claire another bite, he answered, “You should know by now I don’t say shit I don’t mean.”

“Maybe you meant it, maybe you didn’t. But you said all that only because you were hurt…”

Finishing off the last of his pizza, he reached forward for another slice. Claire was engrossed in the superheroes movie.

“Just spit out whatever’s in your mouth, Marsh, and tell me what’s on your mind.”

Her head swiveled to him then, eyes narrowing. “You’re a celebrity now, JK. Your business is everybody’s business. You’re here right now, with me, because you can’t have
her
. Because she doesn’t want you. Because she used you. Just like Krissy did.”

Jahleel bit into his pizza to buy himself some time to think before he spoke. Obviously she’d been watching the entertainment news. She saw something on it, and his heart raced at the dreadful thought of what that might be.

His phone had been blowing up with calls from his manager, Lion T’mar, since he’d landed in SF. But he’d ignored them all because he was pretty much hating everyone related to Saskia. So he had no idea what the world knew.

The pizza suddenly tasted like sand in his mouth. To God, he hoped the news mentioned nothing about a sex tape. Not because he would be embarrassed, but because he didn’t want the world to see
her
in that light.

Saving her from that tape being released into the world was his number one reason for walking out. Sure, he was hurt and shit, but he didn’t want a sex tape of her, made with her ex, while she was
engaged
to him getting out there. That wouldn’t be good for her career, her reputation.
He
would win all the sympathy from fans, but she would be slapped with a bright red A on her forehead and suffer media trashing.

As angry and disgusted as he was with her, he didn’t want that for her. If she was going to move on with that tatted prick, he wanted her to move on in the same light, the light where the world loved and adored every single thing she did. Not with a tarnished reputation.

“What exactly did the news say?”

“Huh,” Marsha sneered. “So it’s true. She
did
cheat, didn’t she? I fucking knew she would! I told you not to trust—”

“Easy with the swearin’ in front of my kid, Marsh,” he warned.

She scowled.

“What did the news say?”

Contented with his failed relationship, because that was what she’d always wanted, Marsha bit cheerily into her pizza and spoke with a full mouth. “That she was seen partying and tongue-locking in a Vegas club with her ex, Tex Laklin. They had no photos of that, just what ‘sources’ reported. They did, however, have photos of you going into the hotel this morning, then leaving angrily not long after with Zane Zekiel. Photos also of Tex Laklin leaving half-an-hour later. And photos of Saskia leaving sometime after that.”

Marsha grabbed her bottle of Pepsi and gulped some down before continuing. “The photos might not have shown what happened, but people aren’t stupid. Same as I guessed it, others will. Such a bummer they didn’t have photos of what went down in the club. Ha!”

Jahleel’s agitation got mitigated as he let out a slow sigh of relief while Marsha had her fun at his expense.

Nothing about a sex tape. No evidence of the club scene. Just rumors and speculations.

Saskia could work with that. Let her PR people salvage it. Lion could come up with some bullshit story. Petty stuff. She could come out unscathed, if they tackled it smartly.

But he wouldn’t be her saving grace this time around.

Pushing all thoughts of Saskia and her fucking paparazzi-following, no-privacy, chaotic life out of his thoughts, he pulled Claire onto his lap. But her mind wasn’t there; she was lost in the movie. A movie addict just like her father.

“I’m gonna have my assistant bring some stuff over for me, ‘kay? Crashing here for a couple of days,” Jahleel mumbled, leaning back and making himself comfortable. “Wanna spend more time with Claire.”