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JD

I knew she was here before I even saw her.

The air shifted—like the world held its breath—and then I stepped out from the trees and saw her standing on the old stone porch, lit by nothing but firelight and shadow.

Skye.

Still as beautiful as sin.

Time hadn’t dulled a damn thing. If anything, it’d sharpened her—curved her, carved her, made her dangerous and breathtaking.

That deep brown hair was longer, glinting like mahogany under the flames.

Her body had filled out in ways that made my chest clench.

But it was her eyes that leveled me. Still wide.

Still watchful. Still hiding a thousand secrets I hadn’t earned the right to know.

“JD,” she said softly, voice barely louder than the wind curling through the pine.

I didn’t move. Didn’t breathe.

“Come sit,” she said, gesturing to the low stone bench beside the fire. “I have to tell you everything.”

I didn’t want to sit .

I wanted to scream.

I wanted to shake her.

I wanted to kiss her.

But I sat.

Because I needed to know.

She didn’t look at me when she started talking. Her fingers played with the hem of her shirt like she was unraveling memories with every tug. She told me about Clarissa—my mother. The threats. The gun. The flight.

Each word was a hammer to the chest. She’d been hunted. Terrified. Alone. And she ran… to protect me.

But the second she said it, I stopped breathing.

“You had my son.”

I stood. My body trembled with rage. Firelight danced in the corner of my vision as blood pounded in my ears.

“My son,” I repeated. “You had my fucking kid and didn’t tell me?”

She nodded, tears streaming silently down her face. “I?—”

“What’s his name?”

“Jackson. Like yours but spelled with a-ck.”

A million images assaulted my brain—none of them real, all of them imagined. A little boy with Skye’s eyes and my stubborn chin. My laugh. Her heart. My goddamn son.

“How old is he?” I barked.

“Six.”

“Six years.”

My voice was shredded. I stalked away from the fire, fists clenched so tight my nails bit skin. “I missed six fucking years. First steps. First words. Did he ask about me? Did he ever?—”

“Every day,” she whispered.

The fire cracked. I turned back to her. Her hands were clenched in her lap now, like she was holding herself together by sheer will.

“You don’t get to be sorry,” I said. “You don’t get to break me and then tell me you did it for me. That’s not love. That’s control.”

“I was trying to survive.”

I stepped closer. She flinched—but didn’t move.

“What’s he like?” I asked hoarsely. “Tell me about him.”

She finally looked up. “He loves baseball. He’s smart. So damn smart. He asks questions about everything. He’s funny—he makes people laugh. But he’s stubborn, JD. So stubborn. Like you.”

I closed my eyes, swallowing the lump in my throat. “I want to meet him.”

“I know.”

“I want him to know who I am.”

“I want that, too.”

I paced again, dragging a hand through my hair. “I don’t know if I can ever forgive you.”

She didn’t cry harder. She just nodded, lips trembling. “I don’t expect you to.”

“But I want to meet him.”

She stood, stepping toward me slowly. The fire caught the shimmer of her tears.

“I still love you, JD. I never stopped.”

I didn’t respond. Couldn’t.

Love was a battlefield—and she’d already lit the damn thing on fire.

But I would walk through the flames.

For him.

For my son.

I stared at her, trying to reconcile the girl I once knew with the woman standing in front of me now .

“It sounds so stupid,” she said, her voice breaking.

“Saying it out loud now. But I was eighteen, JD. I had nothing. Not even a family to run to. No money. No support. Nothing but the fear of what your mother would do to me… to him. She was serious. I was a blemish on her skin. Our son one big mistake she’d rather get rid of all together. ”

My chest heaved.

She stepped closer, and for once didn’t shrink from my fury. “I had a friend in North Carolina. Shaniqua. Her cousin Malik was ex-military, had connections to help people like me disappear. They set me up in a cabin surrounded by pines and stars, and helped me build a life. A safe one.”

She looked up, eyes swimming with old ghosts. “Jackson has people who love him. A school. Baseball. Birthday parties. He’s okay. He’s happy.”

My hands clenched.

She hesitated, then added, “Tyler’s been… kind. Supportive. He’s?—”

“What?” I roared, my voice booming into the night. “You were gonna give my son another man? Another name? Another goddamn father?”

“JD—”

“You gave your body to him?” I snapped, stepping into her space. “Let him touch you? Pretend to be something you were supposed to build with me?”

“No!” she gasped. “I—he kissed me once, and I?—”

But I didn’t hear the rest.

I snapped.

I grabbed her by the waist and dragged her inside the cabin, the firelight flickering behind us like the flames of hell itself. She gasped as I slammed the door shut and pressed her back to it .

“You think I forgot you?” I growled, my mouth just inches from hers. “You think I stopped wanting you?”

Her breath hitched. “JD…”

“You ruined me,” I said, voice trembling. “But you’re still mine.”

She didn’t resist as I yanked at her shirt, didn’t stop me when I stripped her bare, piece by piece, revealing skin I’d memorized but never stopped craving. Her hands slid into my hair, mouth opening under mine with a moan that shattered whatever restraint I had left.

I lifted her, carried her to the couch, and made love to her like a man possessed.

It wasn’t gentle. It wasn’t careful.

It was raw. Desperate. A reclamation.

She cried out my name, nails digging into my back as we lost ourselves in the heat and heartbreak, the years we’d missed, the life we’d been robbed of.

Later, when we lay tangled in silence, chest to chest, sweat drying on our skin, I stared at the ceiling and whispered, “You should’ve told me.”

Her voice was so soft, I almost missed it.

“I was scared. But I’m not running anymore.”

Neither was I.

Not from her.

Not from our son.

Not from the fire we’d started together six years ago that still burned hotter than hell.