Page 84 of The Rival's Obsession
And I might’ve killed it with my own two hands.
When I open the door, I’m barefoot, braless, and already five seconds away from murder.
“If you don’t have cheesecake, you’re getting a stiletto to the eye.”
Jaxon Kane grins at me like he wants the threat to be real.
“Good thing I brought two,” he says, holding up a bag in one hand and a bottle of something French and expensive in the other. “Peace offering. For interrupting your sacred Saturday sloth time.”
I sigh dramatically and step aside. “Fine. Enter, peasant.”
He strolls in like he owns the place—tall, stupidly good-looking, and entirely too comfortable in his own skin. His dark hair’s a little messy, like he just rolled out of a king-size bed with someone equally gorgeous. His jaw’s freshly shaven, and the sleeves of his expensive Henley strain against arms that could throw me across the apartment if he felt like it.
Of course, he never would.
Because under all the money and muscle and menace, Jaxon Kane is one of the few men I trust implicitly.
Which says more about my judgment than it should.
I shut the door behind him and pad back toward the kitchen in my sleep shorts and oversized tee.
I eye the plain bag suspiciously. “This does not look like it’s from my bestie, Elena.”
“I took a pass at baking it myself!” he says, full of boyish pride.
The look of absolute and pure terror that must be on my face makes him bust out laughing. “I’m just kidding. Couldn’t carry it on my bike without fucking it up, and I knew that would be punishable by death.”
I let out a relieved sigh.
“You baking would’ve been the first sign of a psychotic break.”
He smirks and sets down the wine. “I outsource emotional manipulation. Like a sane person. And order takeout.”
Our friendship has always been like this—snark served with a side of genuine care, buried too deep to name. He’s been a client of The Ledger for years. Never one of mine, technically, but close enough to make me his handler on more than one occasion. Somehow, we slipped into this thing we do now—late-night texts, check-ins, the occasional wine-fueled vent session on my couch.
And for reasons I’ve never fully understood... I feel responsible for him.
Like I’m beginning to feel for Grant and Dante.
It’s not just about business anymore. Not with them.
There’s something broken buried beneath those two—Grant Harrow and Dante Marchesi—and the cracks are starting to show. Not just in their company, but in them. Their partnership,their dynamic, whatever storm they’ve been circling for years... it’s escalating.
And for some reason, I can’t stop thinking they’re supposed to come out of it together. Not just as CEOs. But as something more. Something real. Something that looks a hell of a lot like love—if they’d stop fighting it long enough to see it.
I can’t explain it. But I feel it. In my gut. In the silence between their glances. In the ache they both try so hard to hide.
I want to fix it for them.
Just like I always want to fix things for him.
Jax leans against my granite countertop, watching me with a look that’s far too observant for a man who pretends to be bored with everything.
“Wine glasses?” he asks.
“In the cabinet above the microwave. Where they always are, Kane.”
“I like watching you get annoyed.”
