Falling for Jack

Chapter 18

When I finally arrived home, I looked like I went swimming with my clothes on and I forgot a towel. I was soaking wet. I went straight to the bathroom, got into the tub, stripped my clothes, turned on the hot water and took the hottest shower of my life. I was so cold, I'm sure tomorrow I will be sick.

As I'm showering, the only thing I can think about is the night I spent with Jack. The way he kissed me and the way he touched me… I get aroused just by thinking about it.

I never felt like this with Greg. With Greg s*x was just… boring. But with Jack… God! Jack showed me what I have been missing out on.

After my shower I put on some warm and comfy clothes and go check if I have any new orders on my online store.

Later in the afternoon I got a call from Cece.

"Hi Cece, how are you?" I answered the call.

"I'm OK. I wish you would have stayed longer at my party… but you were kidnapped!"

"LOL" I start to laugh and so does she. "Yeah, I guess that is a good way to explain what happened to me. I should have told you that I never drink, before we did those shots."

"Yeah you should have. I would have made you drink something else so you could have lasted longer." We start to laugh again.

"So are you home yet?" Cece probes.

"I am. Why?" I ask her.

"Was my brother so terrible that you had to run away from him, into a freaking storm?" She demanded.

"How do you know that?" I asked.

"Twenty minutes ago I received a very interesting phone call from my brother."

"Oh God." That's all I can say.

"So… Did you regret it? When you woke up and looked at his face? Or was his junk too small for you?" She shamelessly asks.

"God Cece, he is your brother!"

"Yeah, but you are my friend." I tried to change the subject "Why did he divorced his wife?"

"What did he tell you?"

"Just that he met his ex wife in college."

"And you didn't ask anything else about it?" She inquired.

"No… I had really mixed feelings about it when he told me." I confessed.

"That's because you like him." She states.

"Yeah… I do. But can you tell me or not?" I insist.

"My brother never talked about it much, but I know that he thinks that it was the worst mistake of his life. That woman was poisonous! I mean, she used to make my brother do whatever she wanted and he didn't even question it. Sometimes it looked like she had put a spell on him and that he no longer had free will. If I remember correctly they got married right after college and lived together for two years and a half. She never liked it here. She always said that she wanted to move to a big city, but my brother didn't want to because of the family business. The other issue was that my brother wanted kids and she didn't. They began to fight and soon after they divorced. She visited him a couple of times after that and I suspect that they hooked up but I haven't seen her in about one year." She tells me.

"Do you think that he still has feelings for her?" I ask.

"I don't know." Is Cece 's answer.

After all this information I feel bit sad. Sometimes when relationships are this explosive there are a lot of feelings involved that are not easily forgotten.

"OK, it's my turn now. Why did you run away?"

I confessed to her "Because I didn't want him to wake up, look at me and see his face of regret."

"I understand" it's all that she says.

"How about your guy? Did he show up at your party?" I ask her.

"Yeah he did. But he brought a date, so… meh." She tells me.

"I'm so sorry Cece!" I say feeling a little bad for her.

"Don't worry, maybe it's not meant to be."

Soon after that our phone call ended and I got back to work. When the night time arrived, I started to feel the first symptoms of a cold. I started to sneeze and to have cold shivers. I went to bed early and prayed that it doesn't get worse than this.

Next morning I am so much worse. I have a fever, a cough and a runny nose. I'm guessing my prayers were not answered. Unfortunately I have to go out to ship my orders but that's the only thing I'm going to do today.

I got dressed and went to the post office, but as soon as I got back home, I dressed in my pajamas again and went straight to bed. I had zero energy and slept most of the day.

On Tuesday I hadn't gotten any better and besides all my existing symptoms, I also had a headache and a sore throat. When I woke up I looked at my phone and saw that I had missed a call from Cece. I called her back.

"Hi Cece." *cough* *cough* "I was asleep and didn't hear my phone." *cough*

"You sound awful, are you OK?" She asks, concerned.

"No, I'm not." *cough*

"I'll go to the pharmacy to grab you some medicine and I'm going to get you some chicken soup from the dinner. I'll be at your house in one hour." She offers.

"Thank you Cece, I appreciate it." And we hung up.

When the phone call ended I drifted off to sleep again and some time later I was woken up by a loud bang in my front door.

I open my eyes and think to myself that it must be Cece, so I really need to get out of bed and go open the door. My whole body aches as I get up from bed. I wrapped myself in a blanket and made my way to the door.

Cece continues to bang on the door and I shout "I'm coming! I'm coming!".

I open the door and instead of Cece, Jack is staring back at me.

I gasped at the shock but immediately began to cough like crazy because my throat is so sore.

Jack looks at me with worry on his face. "Are you alright?"

I manage to say in between coughs "No."

He quickly enters my house, goes to the kitchen area and grabs me a glass of water. "Here, drink this. It will help."

For a moment all I can do is look at him and think "How does he know where I live?" Then I notice that he is handing me a glass of water and I take it.

I drink the water and after I ask him "Why are you here?"

"Cece was in the shop when you called her and I overheard your conversation." He says and then quickly adds "why did you run away?"

I stare at him with wide eyes. He raises his eyebrows awaiting my answer.

"Ah… I panicked. I thought you were going to regret it and ran before you could say anything." I honestly answered him.

"OK." He simply says. "Here." He puts a bag on top of the kitchen counter. "Inside there is chicken soup and medicine. Get better soon." He walks past me and leaves my house.