Page 7

7

Cliff

T oday has been one hell of a day. I start pouring myself a drink but am interrupted when a knock on the door pulls my attention. Looking down at my watch, I see that it’s six o’clock at night, which means that it’s probably Jade.

Setting my glass down, I make my way over to the door. Opening it, my breath is knocked out of me when I see her standing in the doorway. She pushes me to the side and forces her way inside. I know I need to say something, but every ounce of brain power I have fizzled out when I saw her in a short skirt that skims her beautiful thighs on legs that go for miles. Her tank top is nothing special, just a plain black one, but all I can see is how it hugs her tits perfectly, calling to me.

“Cliff!” I hear her say, shaking me out of my stupor. My eyes go up to hers and they’re filled with so much emotion. Shit, I feel like crap. I’m over here checking her out like the ogre that I am and she obviously has something going on in her head.

“What’s wrong, Elsa?” I ask, using the nickname I’ve given her recently, hoping it will break her out of whatever thoughts she has going on.

She places her hands on her hips and purses her lips. “Don’t call me Elsa,” she snaps.

I take a step toward her, pushing a strand of her hair that has fallen out of her ponytail back behind her ear. “Why not? You’re my ice queen, right?”

Her face softens at my words, but she doesn’t let me deter her from what had her reeling when she first came in. “Cliff, I don’t want to call Mya and Taylor.”

I take a step back from her, giving us some distance before I do something stupid and move back toward the bar cart. “Do you want a drink?” I ask her.

“Yes, please. I think I might need to be drunk to get through this,” she says with a small chuckle.

“Jade. It’s going to be fine. But maybe we should order dinner. That way we have a reason to not be on the phone for too long.”

“Is it? Are you sure? Because I see this going a different way.”

“Yes. Taylor’s going to be pissed, but Mya will keep him calm. She’s going to remind us why it’s a problem and we just need to make sure that we stay firm,” I tell her as I pour each of us some whiskey. “I’ll be with you every step of the way.” I hand her the glass.

“If you say so,” she says as she sips on her whiskey. Okay, it can’t be that bad if she’s not downing her drink.

“But seriously, let’s order first,” I tell her. With my hand on her back, I guide her over to the couch. My stomach grumbles, breaking the tension slightly. Jade let’s out a cute little giggle, but I don’t let it distract us. I’m fucking hungry. I barely had time to go to the restroom today, let alone eat something.

I plop down on the couch, tapping the seat next to me. She does as I say and then pulls out her phone. “What do you want for dinner?”

“Whatever you want,” I tell her.

“Okay, how about Indian?” she asks.

My stomach sours slightly at the suggestion. Indian doesn’t sit well with me. It’s so spicy and I always end up having heartburn.

“Sure,” I say, knowing that I’ll pick the blandest thing on the menu. It’s something I’ve had to deal with all my life.

“I’m going to order from Spice Haven. What do you want?”

“I’ll take chicken biryani rice,” I tell her while grabbing the remote off the coffee table. I pull up Netflix and start scrolling through the main menu, looking for something good.

“Dinner will be here in thirty minutes,” she says, placing her phone down on the table. Jade is like that. When she’s with you, she stays present. Never distracting herself by scrolling through her phone. At least, that’s how she is with me, and I love it.

“Should we go ahead and call Taylor? I already gave him a warning that we would be calling them,” I say to her. Placing my hand on her thigh, I get an idea. “We should probably get our story straight before we call, right?”

She shrugs her shoulders. “I told my teammates that we were friends and after spending so much time together, began to develop feelings.”

I nod my head while I mull over what she’s saying, but there isn’t really anything to change because she’s right. “I agree. That’s the obvious story. We will continue with that.”

Without any other reason to delay, I hit the call button and after only one ring, Taylor picks up. “What the hell is this that I read? Something about you and Jade being together? And why didn’t you tell us ahead of time.” He pelts us with question after question immediately, and I didn’t expect anything different.

“Well, hello there to you too, big brother,” I say to him with a huge grin on my face, which annoys Taylor so much I can see his left eye visibly twitching.

“Enough of that, Cliff. Tell us what’s going on,” he demands.

Jade grabs the hand that I have on her leg and squeezes it, giving me the strength to keep going, because even though I told her it wouldn’t be so bad, I wasn’t jumping for joy at the thought of telling them either.

“Well, as you know Jade and I spend a lot of time together since I became her manager,” I begin. “Or at least I used to be.”

“What do you mean ‘used to be?’” Mya interrupts to ask.

This time Jade jumps in to answer her instead of leaving me out to dry, “I changed management to Hunter when I started developing feelings for Cliff.”

Mya nods her head, replying, “That makes sense. Being forced together means you get to know each other better. When did you know you had feelings for him?”

Jade’s gaze leaves the phone and meets mine when she begins to speak, “I’ve known for a while that Cliff was for me. He’s the kindest man to walk this earth. Every time I need someone to talk to, he’s there with no judgement. When I’m upset and need someone to hold me, it’s him I want to turn to.”

The longer she talks, the more the world around us fades away and I can’t help but get lost in her brown eyes. And even though I have a voice in the back of my head telling me that this is all for show, I can’t help but believe what she’s saying. I’m slightly aware of the fact that my brother and his wife are still on the phone, but everything comes back when Mya speaks, “Awe. That’s sweet. What about you, Cliff?”

My gaze moves back to the phone where Taylor and Mya are both looking at me, waiting. I don’t leave them waiting for too long when I answer with nothing but the truth. “Jade has been mine since the moment I met her.”

There is a small pause after my confession and I can feel the sweat drip down the back of my neck. When Taylor snaps at me, “Well, I think this is stupid but you two seem to be on the same page.” Then he narrows his eyes as he points at me through the phone before leaving us with a few more words. “Don’t fuck up our family events.”

We all watch as Taylor storms out of the room.

“Well, I think it’s wonderful. Taylor is right, but as long as you keep each other first, it will all work out,” Mya says then looks over her shoulder, in the direction of where Taylor disappeared to. When she looks back at us, she gives us a conspiratorial grin. “Don’t worry about him. I’ll get Taylor on board.”

“Thank you, Mya,” I say to her, feeling a bit of the pressure releasing.

“Thanks, Mya. We should probably go, our takeout will be here soon.” Jade offers to get us off the phone, probably done with the awkwardness Taylor brought.

“Sounds good, Jade. Love you guys,” Mya replies then hangs up the phone.

I drop the phone on the side table. “Well, that went better than I thought.”

She shrugs her shoulders. “I guess so. Though Taylor seemed really mad.”

“Like Mya said, he’ll get over it,” I tell her, hoping that both Mya and I are right.