Mahogany Desires

Chapter 35

          THE PRESSURE OF THE hot water beating down onto his muggy skin felt heavenly. The knots in his shoulders loosened just a bit as he rolled them back and forth. He pushed his wet hair out of his eyes and spread both of his hands against the white tiled wall of the shower.

He was stuck. 

Never-you-mind a rock, he was stuck between a boulder and a hard place. 

Less than a few hours ago, they’d received news from Brandon’s surgical doctor that there was a possibility of damage to the nerves in the brain and if so, his best friend would wake up brain dead.

Talk about life’s irony. 

With an angry fist, he struck the wall and gritted his teeth as the pain quickly seared through his knuckles. Realizing that the physical pain distracted him from the emotional whirlwind threatening to destroy him on the inside, he slammed his fist into the wall again and again… and again.

When he finally relented, his knuckles were bruised and bleeding with pieces of skin scratched off but still, he felt no relief. He set it under the running water and forced himself to refrain from crying out in pain while the searing hot water made contact with his bleeding hand.

“Damn it!” Jason swallowed hard and tried his best to choke down the urge to cry. He hadn’t shed a tear since the day his father passed and he wasn’t going to change that now. He was going to be alright. Even if life had a way of kicking his ass when he was down, he was going to make sure that he was alright.

Machayla needed him to be alright. Jason understood that she doesn’t necessarily want him to play her hero but it was too late. That’s what he wants to be for her: the man she ran to when she was in trouble. He’d asserted the role the moment he’d notice that first bruise on her delicate skin so many nights ago and he was going to keep that role.

Now if only the hero of this reality could find a way to save everyone he cared about. That was where his problems laid.

How does a man single handily get rid of a crooked cop out to kill an innocent girl because of who her father was meanwhile stop her fiancé whose out to get him and his crew? How the hell was he going to deal with the possibility that his best friend was knocking on death’s door? And his brother, one of the people he trusted the most, betraying his trust for a damn girl.

“Jason?”

Jason quickly swallowed down the feeling of helplessness that all but demanded to come forth, cleared his throat and answered to the call of her sweet voice. “In the shower, I’ll be out in a minute.” He waited for her answer to come but except for the shower running, he heard nothing.

Feeling more paranoid than ever, he twisted the knob for the water and was ready to hop out of the shower when the curtain were ripped away to show an almost naked Machayla clad with nothing but her under garments on.

Jason’s jaw slacked open at the sight and his chest tightened instantly. Suddenly, not only was he incredibly stressed but he was also sexually frustrated and her standing there in nothing but two pieces of cloth, barely covering her womanly parts, was not helping… not at all.

He acted fast as he could when he realized that he was indeed in all his naked glory and his arousal for this woman with beautifully sun kissed brown skin, who’d somehow gotten him hooked on her, was starting to show it appreciation for the sight that she was giving him. 

All of a sudden he start to feel a bit shy in front of her and he quickly tried to grab a hold of the striped curtain to cover himself. Too bad for him, Machayla’s grip became ridiculously tight when she realized what he was trying to do. Getting ready to try again, he clasped both hands on the curtain only to hear her suck in a deep breath.