My heart twisted at his words and I gripped the doorknob tightly in my hand. “I don’t think you’re an evil monster.” Because I didn’t. I wasn’t sure what I thought anymore, in all honesty.

“I called and got the name of the best OBGYN in this area. I can get us a private meeting with him at any time so you can decide if you like him. Just tell me what you want or need.”

He had been searching out the best doctor for me and the baby. My heart twisted some more.

“I’d like that. I need to see someone,” I told him. “Dr. Andredai confirmed the pregnancy, so I would need to get my records sent to the new doctor from his office.”

Jax nodded. “I’ll call him and have that done as soon as you’re sure what doctor you want here.”

He was talking like he was staying here. He couldn’t stay here permanently. “Jax, you’re not done recording the new album. You need to go back to LA,” I reminded him.

He let out a hard laugh. “Yeah, well, they can all f**k off. I can’t finish it now. I’ve got more important things in my life.”

“Your tour is in four months. The record has to release before then,” I argued. I had been with him through five album releases and tours. I knew how this worked.

“Tour needs to be canceled anyway. I can’t leave with you pregnant. I’m not going anywhere you can’t go,” he said as if this made complete sense.

“Jax,” I started, and he reached out and took my hand in his, stopping my train of thought.

“Sadie, you’re it. My life. My world. Even if you don’t want me or can’t trust me, you are still my reason for living. And our baby—I won’t miss one minute of that. I want to be by your side through the whole thing. We created a life together. I f**ked up, and I’ll live with that my entire life, but I won’t leave you. I’ll be here for whatever you allow me to be here for.”

“You can’t throw away your music career. That’s insane. You’re not thinking clearly,” I started to argue, but the lump in my throat was growing and I had to push it down.

“Nothing matters if you’re not in my life. Nothing,” he said, and took a step toward me. “You and our baby are all that will ever matter to me.”

At first I thought he was going to kiss me, and I was trying to decide if that was a good idea, when he dropped his hand then turned and walked away.

What was I going to do with him?

“Please tell me you’re going to forgive him,” Amanda said from behind me. I figured she would have listened in.

“How can I? What if he hurts me like that again? How can I trust him?”

Amanda sighed and wrapped an arm around my waist. “I understand. I thought after finding out my boyfriend got paid to sleep with women that I’d never be able to trust him again either. That was a lie I never imagined I could forgive. But I did. Because he loved me enough for both of us when I didn’t think I could love him anymore. Right now Jax is loving enough for you, him, the baby—which, I might add, I am ecstatic about that news. God, that man is pitiful. Come on, Sadie, give him a break.” She laid her head on my shoulder. “You’re gonna be Jax freaking Stone’s baby momma.” She giggled.

A smile tugged at my lips at her ridiculous description. Maybe she was right. Jax had never done anything like this before. We had fought, but that had always ended in really hot sex in crazy locations. This had been our first big one. And my emotions were so raw right now I wasn’t dealing with things right.

“I don’t want to love him. But I do. So much.”

Amanda sighed. “Join the club. He has several major fan clubs all over the world. And women offer to have his baby millions of times a day online.”

She was making a joke, but she was right. I laughed this time. It wasn’t a full laugh, but it was a laugh.

“I’m going to go home and talk to Jessica, and then I think I’ll go to his house and see him. Now that we’ve both had time to think and process, we need to talk.”

“Yes, you do,” she agreed.

Jax

When the doorbell chimed through the house, I knew it was her. No one else would come looking for me here. I hadn’t told a soul where I was. But Sadie would know. I ran down the stairs and headed for the front doors, unlatching them and jerking one open before the first chime ended.

She was standing there, dressed in the same jeans and thermal shirt she’d had on earlier today. Her eyes met mine, and I could see she was nervous. I hated to think of Sadie ever being nervous to come to me. I wanted to reach out and grab her and hold on for dear life. But she didn’t look like that was what she was hoping for. I stepped back and motioned for her to come inside.

“Opening your own doors?” she asked me, and I wasn’t sure if she was teasing or not.

“There isn’t any staff here. They left earlier this evening when I told them they could go,” I explained. Although even if someone had been here, no one would have beaten me to the door tonight.

“Oh, well, that’s probably best. We don’t need anyone listening to us talk about this.”

I agreed. I wanted Sadie alone and to myself.

“You hungry? Did you eat a good dinner?” I asked her, thinking about the fact that she needed to eat for not only her health but our baby’s as well.

“Jessica made me pasta salad and baked chicken,” she said with a small smile. That little smile gave me hope. I hadn’t seen a smile on her face since the morning before I’d lost my mind.

“Good. Want dessert?” I asked. “Mrs. Mary left chocolate cake.”

She shook her head. “No. I’m still too full.”

Then we could talk. “Let’s go to the great room. More comfortable seating in there, and I’ve got a fire going.”

“Okay,” she replied.

Before I turned to lead the way, I held out my hand to her like I always did before we went anywhere. It was a habit and one I loved. She always came to me so willingly. This time her eyes went from me to my hand and she froze. Yet another thing I had ruined. My girl didn’t come to me anymore with ease.

“You don’t want to touch me anymore?” I asked, unable to keep my mouth shut and be patient with her.

She jerked her gaze back up to meet mine. “I . . . Of course I do. I just . . . God, Jax, this is so confusing.”

I stepped toward her, reached down, and took her hand, threading her fingers through mine. “Not this part. This,” I said, holding our joined hands up, “is never confusing.”

She let me take her to the great room without moving her hand away.

I took her to the butter-leather sofa facing the fire and reluctantly let her hand go so she could sit down. I wasn’t moving across the room from her, though. We were going to talk, but we were going to be close to do it.

I sat down beside her and turned my body to face hers while draping an arm along the back of the sofa. “You came to see me. Not going to lie, Sadie, I’m really damn hopeful right now.”

She clasped her hands together in her lap and looked at them instead of me. “Can you promise me that you’ll never do that again? Never assume something of me without asking me first?” she asked, and then slowly turned her gaze to look at me.

She was here to give me a second chance. “Baby, I swear to God, I’ll never hurt you like that again. I would have to hear it straight from you before I believed anything bad of you ever again. And even then I don’t think I’d believe it. My girl is still as perfect as she was when I fell in love with her. I questioned that, and it will eat me up for a really long time. I can’t forgive myself, but I really want you to. I’ll do anything you ask. Just love me again, Sadie. Please.”

She inhaled deeply and kept her eyes fixed on me. “If I hadn’t been pregnant, would you have come for me?”

I had asked myself this same question already. The answer was yes. I wouldn’t have been able to make it another night without seeing her and making sure she was okay. “Yes. Even when I believed that bullshit, I was worried about you. I missed you. I never stopped loving you.”

She studied me for a moment, and then she nodded. “I believe you.”

I was ready to pull her in my arms now. “Can you love me? After all this . . . can you love me again?” I asked her, needing to know if her heart was going to be closed off to me forever.

She smiled. “I never stopped loving you. I wanted to. It would have been easier. But I can’t turn it off with a switch. I’ve loved you for five years, and I’ll love you for a hundred more.”

I held out my hand again. “Come here.” I waited to see if she would. Her small hand lifted, then slipped into mine. I tugged her over to me and grabbed her waist, then deposited her in my lap.

“I’m gonna need you now,” I told her as I pulled her mouth to mine.

“M’kay,” was her response just before my mouth covered hers.

Sadie

Jax broke our kiss just long enough to pull my shirt up over my head and toss it aside. He got my bra off next, before easing me back onto the sofa while kissing the tops of my br**sts and circling each areola with his tongue. When he bit each pebbled nipple, I cried out. But then, he knew I would.

I loved the tight sting from his teeth.

“We’ll be sweet later. Right now I need you,” he said as his hands started working on my jeans and tugging them down my body. Once he had me completely naked, he stood up and stripped.

It was a sight that the majority of the female world fantasized about but that I got daily. The Jax Stone strip show. Nothing was better than that.

He kissed his fingertips, then touched his side, where my name was tattooed in the shape of an infinity sign.

“If you’d never believed me . . . would you have removed that?” I asked.

Jax lowered his body over mine and kissed a path up my stomach, through the valley between my br**sts, then along my collarbone. “I was hurt, Sadie. But once I came out of my pain haze, I would have realized it didn’t f**king matter if you’d done it or not. I can’t live without you, baby.”

“I’d never hurt you like that. I don’t want you to believe I could do that to you,” I told him.

“Mmmm,” he murmured in my ear. “Well then, make my ache feel better right now. Stand up for me and stick out that sweet ass.”

My body was already tingling, but those words made the tingles burst into flames. He moved off me, and I stood up and bent over to grab the back of the sofa.

His hands circled my waist and he groaned. “Fuck, Sadie. This ass is amazing.” He put his hand between my legs. “Spread them wider.”

I did as I was told and waited anxiously for him to fill me. This was normally how we ended fights. In one thrust he was inside me. I cried out his name and held on to the sofa as he moved his h*ps so that he slid in and out of me. “My sweet ass,” he said as he slapped one of my butt cheeks.

Whenever we fought, Jax needed sex that reminded him that I was his. It eased his mind. This was part of it. Claiming my body. The good part for me was that his words made me hotter.

“No one else gets to touch this. Just me. It’s always just been mine,” he said in a reverent tone as he caressed the spot he had spanked. “Tell me it’s mine, Sadie.”

Biting my lip, I kept from smiling, but I didn’t say anything. When I didn’t tell him he got more demanding, and I loved that. His hand slapped my other butt cheek. “Tell me,” he repeated, and I pressed back against him with my bottom and he growled.

His hand slid down to my swollen clit, and he stopped moving. I was panting now, needing him to take me over the edge. “Tell me,” he repeated in a deep, demanding voice.

“It’s yours. I’m yours,” I said, desperate for him to take me there.

“Fucking right I am,” he growled, and slammed into me as his thumb played with my tenderness between my legs.

I started to tremble as my orgasm built. “Now, Sadie,” he said, and just like that I exploded as his arms wrapped around me to hold me up, and he emptied his release inside me.

We both shuddered and cried each other’s name. Then we were on the sofa and I was curled up at Jax’s side as he pulled a cashmere blanket over us. I laid my head on his chest and traced the infinity with my name on his side.

“Thank you. You always know when I need it like that, and you make it f**king amazing,” he said as he kissed the top of my head.

“You’re welcome, but I enjoyed that mind-blowing orgasm at the end, so it wasn’t all for you,” I teased him.

He chuckled and pulled me closer. “I’m gonna want you again in a few minutes. I’ll be sweet this time,” he said.

I wasn’t sure I needed sweet right now. “Maybe we could do sweet tomorrow. I kind of like the idea of you f**king me against the wall next.”

“God, I love you,” he said as his thumb slipped under my chin and he tilted my head back so that I was looking at him. “You tell me you want to be f**ked, and I’m hard instantly. You ready to deal with the reaction you created?”

Laughing, I moved on top of him. “I think I can handle it.”

He reached for his jeans on the floor and reached into the pocket. “First, this needs to go back where it belongs. Where it will always belong. For f**king ever,” he said as he slipped my engagement ring back on my finger. Then he kissed it. “Don’t ever leave me again, baby. Even if I act like a shit. Slap me or get naked. Either will get my attention.”

I grinned, bent down over him, and kissed his nose. “Why didn’t I think of that the first time?”