Coming off the high, she laid down next to me on her back, one hand flung across my stomach.  I placed my hand over hers, lacing our fingers together, and waited to see if she was still angry at me.  Madison was highly unpredictable. Well, as far as I was concerned, she was.  Make up sex seemed to calm her, so I could only fucking hope.

She turned to look at me, so I rolled onto my side, propping my body up on my elbow.  Tracing a line on her stomach, I started, “I’m sorry, babe.”

“Do you even know what you are sorry for, J?” she asked, with that slightly frustrated tone that she often took with me.

“For a million fucking things, but mostly for being an asshole to you today, and for not returning your calls,” I answered her truthfully.

Her eyes searched mine for a moment and then she said, “You were an asshole to me today and I didn’t like it.  I get that you were busy with work but you’ve got to get that I was worried about you.  With all the shit going on at the moment, I needed to hear your voice, needed to know you were okay.  And then to speak to me the way you did... that hurt, J,” her vulnerability shone through her voice, and it hit me square in the chest.

I reached my hand up to her face and cupped her cheek.  “This is gonna take a lot of work isn’t it?”

Confusion flashed across her face, “Do you want out?” she half whispered, and I could sense the tension settling over her.

“No, baby.  I told you this was forever, and I meant it.  It’s just hitting me now, though, how much we are going to have to put into it to make it good.  But I need you to know that I want to do the work, I want this to be the best damn thing in our lives.”

She took a moment to process that and I knew when she had, because she let the tension in her body go and she smiled at me.  “Me too, J.  I tried so hard today not to get mad at you about the phone calls and I’m sorry if it came across like I was trying to keep track of you, because I really wasn’t.  I don’t expect you to be there whenever I want you, and I’m not trying to change you.”

“Right.  So, tomorrow we make it better.  But, I need you to know that this could take some time on my end.”

She laughed.  “Yeah, baby, because changing assholey ways is a very time consuming project.  You’re just lucky that I’m a patient woman.”

I grinned at her and thanked my lucky fucking stars for her.  No other woman would ever come close to her.

Chapter 19

Madison

Friday flew by, and before I knew it, it was the afternoon, and I was waiting at the clubhouse for Serena to arrive.  It had been a long and at times hard week, and I was so grateful that Serena was coming to visit.  The funeral for Bec and Georgie had been this morning, and it had been tough to sit through.  Thinking about the lives that had been needlessly taken, and watching Crystal deal with her loss, was an awful thing to have to do.  She was a strong girl, but I worried about her and probably always would.  Brooke seemed to be coping well with Crystal, and I surprised myself, but I was happy that they had each other.

After the funeral, J had to do some club work.  When I asked him what it was, he got shitty with me and said that I had to trust him, and stop asking those types of questions.  This had, of course, led to an argument, because all I had been trying to do was show an interest in what he did.  We hadn’t resolved it before he left, so my afternoon had been spent stewing on it.

I checked my watch.  It was just after four o’clock and I still hadn’t heard from Serena.  I decided I needed some fresh air, so I took myself outside and sat on the hood of J’s Jeep.  Going over and over my conversation with him this morning was not helping me; it was just making me angrier about the whole situation.  And that was not good for our relationship.

I heard the rumble of a bike, and turned to see J pulling in.  He parked his bike and walked towards me, a grim look on his face.  “Babe, what are you doing out here by yourself?” he asked, coming to a stop just in front of me, but making no move to kiss me hello.

I slid off the car to put myself closer to him, and put my hand on his chest; our bodies almost touching.  “I’ve been thinking about stuff.  About you.”

He frowned, “What stuff?”

I took in the way his body tensed up and the irritation that flitted across his face, and knew that this was a conversation he did not want to be having, but I was determined to push him on this.  “J, I want to know about things going on in your life.  I hate that you won’t talk to me about your work.”

Pulling away from me, he was visibly annoyed now.  “Madison, I thought we had agreed not to do this.”  There was a warning tone to his voice that I didn’t like.

“We had, but I’m asking you to talk to me about this stuff.”

“Do you trust me?  Trust that anything I do is done for a good reason?”

Shit, now he had me.  “I do, but - ”

He cut me off, “Either you do, or you don’t, babe.”

“Okay, I do.”

He nodded.  “Right, so you need to trust me on this one,” he said, like it was a black and white choice, when it was so far from that for me.

We stood, eyeing each other while I weighed what he had said.  Finally, I agreed, “All right, I will.”

“Good,” he muttered, and pulled me to him, wrapping me in his arms.  He laid a kiss on the top of my head, and then said, “I love you.  Love what you do for me.”