Thrive: A Friends-to-Lovers Standalone Romance (Stonewood Billionaire Brothers Series)

Lesson of the Day: Be honest with your feelings and they will be honest with you too.

Mikka

The next night, I threw on a pink blouse that cut low in front and squeezed into some dark jeans for dinner. I finger combed my hair in the mirror, wondering if everyone would be able to see my failed relationship on my face.

I didn’t hide losing well. I remember crying in my bedroom for days when I found out Sarah Bell had gotten a better grade than me on a test in 8th grade. My mother didn’t comfort me; she told me that if I couldn’t be the best in school, I should find something else to be good at. So, I doubled down to prove to her I could do it. I passed up opportunities at friendships, underage drinking parties, and maybe even a boyfriend or two in order to stay at the very top of my class.

My relationship had been somewhat the same. She’d told me I should find the best in a partner and that Dougie wasn’t it. So, I doubled down on him. I pushed us so hard, we broke. At first, I only saw myself as the one to blame. But Jay kept saying there were two in a relationship and Dougie had become the slacker in ours.

Still, admitting we’d lost was something I didn’t know how to do. I just didn’t know how well I would be able to hide the feeling of having failed either.

I made my way downstairs and heard not just Jay but another man’s voice. When I turned the corner into the dining room, I looked toward the kitchen but couldn’t see past Lorraine busying herself at the table.

“Grab these napkins and set them next to the plates, please,” she said.

I counted four place settings. “Who’s joining us for dinner?”

“Well, I’m trying to do us all a favor.” She set down the last glass and poured large amounts of red wine into each.

“What kind of favor?” My voice held skepticism. Lorraine had done a lot of little things lately to push Jay and me together. Two nights before, she’d made a candlelit dinner and thrown rose petals on my bed. Jay and I had laughed, but I’d felt a tension between us building. I didn’t want awkwardness in our friendship and knew we’d crossed too many lines for it to disappear overnight. Still, Lorraine’s blatant attempts at matchmaking were worsening things.

“You’ve been quiet in your room for most of the day. Moping around with your tail between your legs.” She walked over and smoothed down a piece of my hair as she studied my face. “You’re not healing, missy. And so we have to do something about that.”

“For an 80-plus-year-old, you seem to be very perceptive,” I countered.

“You bet I am.” She gave my cheek a good pat before she turned to busy herself again. “Brady lives in town. He’s the hottest guy I know your age, I promise. You helped me and so I’m helping you.”

“Helping me with what?”

“Helping you get laid. Get an orgasm. Something to loosen the tension in your shoulders, girlie. It’s making me uncomfortable.” She leaned over the table to whisper to me, “He gets around. He’ll go for you. I promise. I’m sorry that Jay’s being so uptight. I thought the roses would work, I swear.”

She mumbled her last sentence as she walked back into the kitchen, leaving me with my mouth agape.

Jay and Brady walked out of the kitchen laughing before I could recover.

Brady stood as tall as Jay and had a chest as wide as his friend too. Their laughs rolled through the room, rich and warm, like hot chocolate for the cold soul. I grasped the back of a wooden chair to keep from falling over as my knees buckled at all the testosterone floating around.

Brady’s hair was much lighter than Jay’s and curled a bit more too. His blond locks were full, ready to be mussed, and they framed his face well. The man gave Jay a run for his money. I had to give Lorraine that.

When I glanced her way, she winked so dramatically the whole room probably caught the old bat’s antics.

“Do I want to know?” Jay asked.

I shook my head and grabbed a glass of wine. I handled it slowly because Lorraine had filled it to the brim.

Brady eyed it. “She use two or three bottles to fill all these?”

I held back a smile and shrugged. “I’m Mikka. Nice to meet you.”

“Ah, yes. You’re the beautiful Asian woman everyone keeps talking about.”

I lifted a brow. “That how they describe people here?”

It was a good jolt of reality, letting me know I didn’t belong in this town.

“By ethnicity? By appearance? Sure, but honestly, they describe you as a million different other things too. You just have to have more than a one-sentence conversation with them. I can’t be bothered to do that.”

“A man of few words?” I asked coyly. Had I really said that? I felt like Brady could handle it, that it was the type of communication he responded to.

“A man of few words for gossip. I figured, instead of that, I’d stop by and see for myself.”

“Good thing you did too,” Lorraine yelled from the kitchen. “I made your favorite: Chicken noodle soup for the cool night.”

She brought the soup through and ladled out a large helping for each of us. We sat and made small talk, mostly Brady asking me questions and Jay sitting silently as he sipped his wine and took in our conversation.

“So, you’re Jay’s personal assistant? What does that entail?” he asked.

Jay jumped in, his tone much more serious than it had been before. “Everything and anything you can think of.”

I shifted a little in my seat and folded my napkin. “I’m not sure if it’s everything. I know his schedule, handle his endorsements, and attend meetings with him to make sure he’s taken care of. That sort of thing.”

“Seems like a lot,” Brady said into his food.

“It is. And she’s downplaying it. The woman has been my crutch since I moved to LA,” Jay replied and his tone was genuine, like I meant the world to him.

I smiled. “We’ve been there for each other.”

Lorraine killed the mood with a loud cough that was completely fake. “Mikka probably should have had more of a handle on Jay’s partying or they wouldn’t be here. But the cat’s out of the bag and I’m sure even with you not gossiping, Brady, you’ve heard. Jay’s in recovery and Mikka’s stuck here with him. You need to take her out so she can get some fresh air away from the boy.”

If I could have kicked the old lady in the shin under the table, I would have. As Brady laughed into his napkin, Jay’s face got more and more red. “Mikka’s not gonna just go out with some stranger, Lorraine.”

“Stranger? Man, you’ve known me since high school,” Brady tossed back. “When you were in high school, I brought a damn ladder to Sandy’s so you could climb out her window when her parents showed up. I was the only one there to bail your ass out.”

“Jax should have come to help me out,” Jay grumbled.

“Yeah, but instead, the stranger came.” Brady crossed his arms and stared down Jay.

My friend sat there struggling with something. I didn’t know if he was frustrated that Lorraine was making me look like his keeper or if he just didn’t want me to go. “You’re a stranger to her. Plus, knowing your damn antics makes it even worse. She’s not interested in going out on the town with someone like you.”

“Why? You just told me you took Sandy out the other night. We all know she’s willing to go out for just one thing. If I wanted that, I would have called her. Instead, I’m trying to get to know the new city girl. No bad intentions.”

“Your intentions are always bad, dumbass,” Jay threw back. The name flew off his tongue like they tossed it around casually, and Brady didn’t even flinch when he said it. He actually smiled like they’d done this dance before. “Mikka’s here to work, not play.”

I couldn’t believe he was sitting there speaking for me as if I wasn’t in the room and was just an employee that he got to control.

Lorraine let out a “woo-ee” under her breath and I felt it deep in my soul. Maybe more than I ever had. I was finally without Dougie, without someone trying to control my every move, and didn’t need another man doing just that. “Um, hi, Jay.” I waved and snapped my fingers at him. “I’m right here. I can speak for myself.”

“Don’t entertain his bullshit, Meek. You’re not going out with him. He’s trying to piss me off by sniffing around where his damn nose shouldn’t be.”

I read into his words more than I should have. My stomach rolled at the thought that just days before another man had tried to control me, tried to tell me exactly what to do and take away my say. “Who says I’m not? I need a night out.”

“Yeah, Jay, who says she’s not? She needs a night out.” Brady mimicked me, and his white smile spread so far across his face, I swear it would have been the width of the room if he could have made it that way.

Jay studied me, like he couldn’t quite read my thoughts.

Good because they were all bad.

I needed a night out because my body heated all day at the idea of his proximity to me. It’d only been two days since I told Dougie we were over and every minute, I wondered when Jay would ask me again if I was with him.

Maybe we’d just been in the moment. Maybe this wasn’t what he wanted.

I was fine with that. More than fine. We wanted to protect our friendship anyway by not indulging in anything more.

That meant that what Brady proposed was perfect. I needed a distraction from Jay and the relationship I’d just ended.

Brady was tall, built like an athlete. He knew how to hold a conversation and seemed as interested in me as I was in him. There wouldn’t be any strings. He knew I lived in LA.

Jay’s hand was on my thigh under the table before I could think of anything further. The shock of it flew straight to my core. “Babe, if you want a night out, I’ll take you out.”

I stared at him, the look in his eyes so full of concern, I almost gave in. This was Jay though, the man that would do anything for his friends.

I was falling for a man who’d put me back in the friendzone. We were both sober, we weren’t drinking and losing our inhibitions.

I crossed my legs so that his hand fell away. “I’m not looking to go out with a friend.” My words implied exactly what Brady and I wanted.

“I know the night scene in this city isn’t much but there’s a festival in a few days. I can take you, we can go through the fun house, have some funnel cake, see if Lorraine’s pie wins the blue ribbon this year. Spoiler alert: it wins every year.”

As if on cue, Lorraine waltzed back in with an apple pie in a brown bag. She set it down and ripped the bag from it to present us with a pie that had caramelized spun brown sugar arching above it like a carriage holding a delectable treat. It smelled like cinnamon and apples, like autumn in the warmest way. “I win because mine’s the best.”

“I’m not arguing that, Lorraine. Rosie might because she knows Paul is sweet on you. Either way, I like yours best.” Brady blatantly sweet talked the woman as she cut him a massive slice. He winked at me as she set it down on his plate. The warm feeling of having an admirer was back, like I wasn’t whole yet but I could get there. I knew it would take time, but having his attention might push me a little further on my way.

“Well, the festival sounds nice,” I said as I cut a piece of pie.

“You should all go, then,” Lorraine chimed in. “Brady can swing by and help us pack up some of the pies.”

“I’ll do that,” he said around a mouthful of pie.

Jay was unusually silent. Restraining myself from glancing over at him, I took my first bite of the pie. My concerns of whether or not Jay was frustrated with Brady coming melted away. My concerns over Dougie and my relationship ending melted away. My concerns about going back to LA and finding my own life melted away.

All I could wrap my mind around was the sweet taste of fall on my lips. It was like I’d disappeared into a place where colorful leaves floated through the sky and the scent of caramel apples filled the air while someone wrapped me up in a comfy blanket.

“Well, I know Mikka will vote for my pie too.” Lorraine chuckled. “It sounds like you think it’s as good as your mini wand.”

“What’s a mini wand?’ Brady asked.

“A vibrator.”

“Oh, jeez,” I mumbled.

Lorraine continued. “Mikka grew up in a porn shop. An official one. I looked it up on the world wide web.”

I smiled because I knew my mother’s site was a precise representation of how pristine and perfect her shop was. She and I had spent boatloads of time and money working with web designers to make sure her store was represented correctly and that people had a great online shopping experience.

When Lorraine offered to pull up the site on her phone, I was surprised at how savvy she was. She announced that she’d favorited the site. Jay snickered next to me and nudged my leg with his.

He sat there, completely relaxed and I wondered if I’d imagined the tension between Brady and him. He even jumped into the conversation to poke fun at my mom’s shop. Then he concluded with saying it had shaped a fine woman and was a really lucrative business.

Coming from any Stonewood, I knew that was a compliment. Brady nodded too, like he didn’t take the statement lightly. When we wished him goodbye, he hugged me and whispered in my ear, “Looking forward to getting you to myself for a few hours at the fest.”

I thought I heard Jay grunt but when I turned around he was waving goodbye to his friend and wishing him well.

We helped Lorraine clean and I got a phone call soon after.

Our company wanted another drug test.

After Lorraine excused herself to go to her downstairs portion of the home, I rinsed off and knocked on Jay’s door. It was cracked, like his life was open to the world but I didn’t want to invade his privacy. Movie stars didn’t have that much to begin with and his last name earned him even less.

“Door’s open.”

I stuck my arm in with the drug test package in my hand. “I come out of obligation to my job.”

I was pretty sure I heard him sigh, but when his door swung open, any frustration had disappeared. He looked like he had in his first movie. It was a rom-com where he and the actress cozied up with him shirtless in every other scene. With just some sweats on and no shirt, I knew I needed to get the test done quickly.

He took it from my hands without really meeting my eyes. “Bob call you?”

The mood between us was different. Jay didn’t crack a joke or try to ease the discomfort of the situation. The question hung in the air as he tore open the bag.

“Um, yes,” I said quietly. “Just a minute ago.”

“Talked to my therapist just a minute ago too.”

I waited for him to elaborate because he wouldn’t have said it if he didn’t mean something by it.

“She thinks I have to let my emotions unfold sometimes without worrying about keeping those close to me happy. Sometimes I have to make myself happy.”

I narrowed my eyes. What was he trying to say? There was something deeper there. He wanted me to understand that something was coming. I just didn’t know what it was.

He turned to go into his en suite bathroom.

When he returned, the cup was full and the test strips showed that it was clean.

I put my hand on his shoulder. “You’re doing amazing.”

I wanted us to get back to who we were before the kiss in LA. I wanted him to smile like there weren’t twenty different things on his mind, a rollercoaster of feelings, none of which we would want to experience ourselves.

He nodded, put his hand on top of mine and squeezed. “I’m getting there.”

He grabbed the cup and took it to the bathroom to dispose of. I glanced around to see what he had been doing. His script was on the bedside table and some of the takes were on the TV screen.

Working.

Jay had always, always worked harder than he played. I had wondered when he was getting it done because he hadn’t asked me to read the last part of the script they would be filming. The main actress would be flying in soon, and the film crew hoped to get their scenes taped in two weeks’ time.

When he walked back in, I pointed at the pages. “You’re working?”

“On the scenes we’ll do here.”

“I should help you.” I grabbed the packet and looked over the lines. I’d read them all. I knew the movie inside and out. I hadn’t provided much feedback because the script was better than anything I could have written. I was in awe of it.

“Not giving me an option?” He chuckled a bit. “You love that script.”

“It’s a good script.” I acted nonchalant as I sat down on the bed and reread the part they were filming here. “Do you think Lela can handle this?”

“She’s more brilliant than people give her credit for.”

“God, this scene is going to wreck people.”

“‘I’m going to kill him.”’ Jay paced back and forth, and his whole body morphed into a man on the brink of rage, so different from the type of character he usually played. I felt the edge in his voice, the intensity in his walk, the urge to inflict bodily harm.

I immediately knew women would react to him in a whole new way after seeing him as this character.

“‘You don’t have any ground to stand on.’” I glanced at the paper. “‘I want your love. Not your protection.’”

“‘You get both. Always.’” He walked up to me, pushed himself between my legs and lifted my chin. “‘I’ll die for you.’”

He paused to stare down at me with a look of love, of complete sacrifice, like he was giving his whole heart to me.

He was just acting. They were lines from a movie, a movie written by someone else. He was repeating words he’d memorized, looking at me the way he would look at the actress.

Still.

I got lost in them. I found myself swimming in the blue, blue color of his eyes, treading through all the emotions he felt. Being on the receiving end when he opened up the amusement park of his soul was like being pummeled by a waterfall of pain and love and determination. He pushed all those feelings onto me with just a look.

Then he whispered, “I’m going to die for you. You and I already know it. I intend to take that man with me when I do.”

He was Brad Pitt in Fight Club, Denzel in Training Day. He was bordering on crazy, definitely lethal, and hotter than he’d ever been. A dangerous man ready to protect the woman he loved.

“I literally can’t look away from you,” I whispered.

He held my gaze for a moment, looked down at my mouth, and then stepped back to wipe a hand over his face. He relaxed after a few breaths, and then a real smile flew onto his face. “You think I got that line?”

I could see that line going down in history; I felt it in my bones, and goosebumps spread over my skin just thinking about it. “You crushed it. Oh my God!” I shivered. “It’s going to be so good. You have to make sure they film it from the woman’s point of view, camera angled up at you.”

“You can be on set and tell them yourself.” Jay waved me off like it wasn’t a big deal.

I slumped onto the bed and stretched my arm out, shaking the script a little for him to take. “You know it doesn’t work that way. I’m your PA.”

“You’re more than that. You need to step in at some point. This is the best opportunity. The director will be there. He wants this movie to be the greatest.”

I shrugged, suddenly feeling like Jay was peeling back my skin to see the blood that gave me life. He was seeing my vulnerability. “PA’s don’t offer advice. But you need him to portray your anger and sexuality from her point of view. And when she takes control when you have sex that night, it needs to be from your point of view, the camera angled so that she’s the one finally dominating. It will be an amazing display of her controlling him, him submitting to her, but also him masterminding everyone else. So, in the end, she’s the one who controls through him.”

Jay stopped writing. “Our director is going to love you. I’m not writing that down. You can tell him.”

“Jay.” I rolled my eyes and got up. “I love you for trying.”

“I don’t just try,” he growled.

“Fine.” It wasn’t worth arguing with him. “I’m going to bed.”

“Don’t want to go to Ray’s?”

“Do you?” I asked because I would go with him if he wanted to. It wasn’t so that I could watch him either, I admitted to myself. My intentions had turned selfish.

“Mikka, you don’t have to come with me every time.”

“I know,” I rushed to say. Then I took a breath. “I know. You just went out the other night and I…I wondered where you were. It’s easier for me, not you, if I go when you go.”

“I didn’t go to Ray’s that night. You know that now.”

I nodded, starting to back away from the conversation and retreat to my bedroom. I didn’t want to hear that he went to dinner with Sandy. My words came out more accusatory than I intended. “Right, you went to see Sandy.”

“You jealous, little one?” He sat down on the bed and leaned back on his hands, his arms straight to hold up his muscular chest.

“Of course not. In the past couple years, I’ve seen you in just about every position and cleaned up plenty of your one night stands.”

“Doesn’t mean you enjoyed it. Did you wish you were one of them?”

“I never wanted to be a one night stand of yours, Jay.” I meant those words too. His friendship was so much more important, and every one of his conquests of the night ended up never talking to him again.

“I never wanted you to be one either,” he shot back. “Sandy would only ever have been a one night stand if I’d done anything with her. You’re a million times more important than that.”

I didn’t know if he meant that I was his friend and that’s why I was important or if I could potentially be something more. I shouldn’t even have been thinking about it.

“Good. Friends should be more important than the women you leave behind.”

He laughed but it was hollow. Something else was on his mind as his eyes tracked up and down my body. “Yes. I wonder if friends should be as jealous as I was of Brady tonight.”

“Jay,” I whispered to stop him but he didn’t let me.

“He better not be more than just a one night stand, Meek. That idea alone makes me want to shut that door behind you and lock you in here with me until the fest is over. Does Dougie know you’re going out with him?”

“I’m going to the fest with all of you, not just Brady.” I was skirting around answering his question. I’d already told him I was breaking up with Dougie, but I didn’t want to admit the failure again. I was free but I wasn’t sure about anything anymore. Being free meant floundering around for what I really wanted. It meant I wasn’t on a set plan ahead.

Jay was the last person I wanted to admit that to. He saw me as someone who overcame every battle and I told him I would overcome this one too. “Same difference, Meek. We both know what Brady wants. Mostly to irritate me, I’m sure.”

“Are you saying he’s merely hanging out with me to irritate you, that I’m not good enough for his attention on my own merit?”

“I swear if you weren’t tied to a man right now, I’d show you how easy it is for you to have any man’s undivided attention. Shit, I’d probably have committed my noncommittal ass to you a long time ago had you ever been available.”

I waved his comment away, trying not to hear it or let it spark hope somewhere deep down where I didn’t need hope right now. “You don’t commit your ass to anyone. Let’s be honest, your attention was definitely elsewhere with Sandy the other night.” It would ground us both to say the truth out loud.

He licked his lips and nodded slowly. He got up from the bed and took a step toward me. “When’s the last time you talked to Dougie?”

I stepped back toward the door. This line of questioning was going to get us in trouble fast. “It doesn’t matter.”

“Oh, it matters.”

“Why?” I took two more steps back as he took another toward me.

“Because you’re stalling. Are you scared of us, Meek?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You do. You’re one of the smartest people I know, and I come from a long line of smart businessmen. I’m starting to realize that Dougie was a lot of horrible things, but he may have served as a barrier between us the past couple of weeks.”

“Why would I ever need that?” I threw back at him. He couldn’t possibly know what I’d just figured out: Dougie had been a tool to help me keep Jay at arm’s length, to stop myself falling over the edge like so many others before me had. I didn’t want to love him and his charm. I could not let a kiss or two turn into something more.

Because I didn’t know if I could handle losing more.

I worried that the loss of Jay would hurt more than the bruises Dougie inflicted or the failure of our relationship. If Jay didn’t fall for me as I knew I would fall for him, the wreckage would be catastrophic. Epic. Devastating.

“You and I both know why. We’ve always worked well together. We’re always in sync. The day I met you on the beach should have been the day I made you mine.”

“I had a boyfriend.”

“Had or have?”

“We shouldn’t be having this conversation right now,” I mumbled as I looked away.

“Woman, you don’t make mistakes with words.”

“I definitely can make mistakes with words,” I countered, but it wasn’t true. My mother had taught me Chinese and English and hired speech pathologists to make sure no one would be able to tell that I was the daughter of an immigrant. It was another way to ensure I’d be the best, and she told me daily that she expected that.

He shook his head like he couldn’t believe I was trying to lie to him. “When did you end it?” he asked softly.

Maybe I felt the need to cry because he said it so delicately or maybe because he rested his forehead on mine before I could answer.

Why was this the part that hurt so much?

My throat burned as I took a deep breath. My voice shook along with my chin as I answered, “He called me. I answered.”

I didn’t say the words. I didn’t admit the failure just yet.

“Is it over?”

“Jay, can we just…”

“Answer me. Yes or no?”

“Yes.”