Always His (The Always Series Book 3) Read online

  Always His

  J.P. James

  Contents

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  Also by J.P. James

  Blurb

  1. Jake

  2. Jake

  3. Jake

  4. Vance

  5. Jake

  6. Vance

  7. Jake

  8. Vance

  9. Vance

  10. Jake

  11. Jake

  12. Vance

  13. Jake

  14. Vance

  15. Vance

  16. Vance

  17. Jake

  18. Vance

  19. Jake

  20. Vance

  Epilogue

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  About the Author

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  Also by J.P. James

  The Always Series

  Always Yours

  Always Mine

  The Love Series

  Filthy Love

  Blurb

  Prison made me rough and hard, but the boy next door is going to take it all.

  After I got out of the slammer, I just wanted to be left alone.

  I got a job, bought a house, and tried to forget the last five years of my life.

  But then the boy next door caught my eye.

  Jake’s gorgeous. Eighteen, muscular, and self-possessed, if a little shy.

  The problem is that prison made me rough. Way too rough for a soft, sheltered teen like him.

  But Jake keeps stealing glances at me. Hell, he peeps through the curtain as I swim in my pool, and throws longing gazes as I work on my truck shirtless.

  One day, he comes over to “borrow some sugar.”

  Sugar? Guess again, sweetheart. I’ve got something hard and demanding for him to taste.

  But can the neighborhood gay boy handle the rough and tough ex-con?

  Or is my past going to come between us?

  Note from JP: You’ll love this thrilling story about a gorgeous ex-con and the tantalizing boy next door. Lives are shattered and hearts broken, but in the end, both men experience an ecstatic finish with lots of steam! No cheating, no cliffhangers, and always an HEA.

  1

  Jake

  While most of the seniors in my class are sitting in the bleachers cheering on our football team, I’m home alone again on another Friday night binge watching Thirteen Reasons Why. Is it pathetic that my middle-aged mom goes out more than I do? She doesn’t have a problem reminding me of it every chance she gets either. You’d think she’d prefer a son who stays out of trouble and gets good grades, but sometimes I feel like I’m disappointing her simply because I spend most of my time alone up in my bedroom.

  I’ve always been the shy kid in class who gets perfect scores on every test and pop quiz, but if my mom had any say I’d be the quarterback on my school’s varsity football team. To be honest, I’m not into that at all. Who wants to be bruised and battered after practice? Why would you voluntarily want to get sacked by some dude who weighs three hundred pounds and looks like a refrigerator? I mean, I keep myself in good shape by running and lifting weights, but contact sports? I prefer to keep my brain intact, thank you very much.

  As a result, I’m not the most popular guy in my small town. Milford is a village really, and the folks here adore football. It’s our sustenance, shelter, and religion. Don’t get me wrong - I like football okay, but I don’t live and die by how our team does. Therein lies the problem. My classmates think I’m pretty weird, and leave me to my own devices.

  It’s okay though. I don’t mind being alone. The solitude suits me, but I am looking to get out of Milford soon. It’s a nice town to grow up in, but I just don’t belong here. It’s probably because I haven’t been able to be my true self yet. I wouldn’t say I’m living a lie, but I haven’t come completely out of the closet either. My classmates all suspect that I’m gay, but no one’s confronted me about it, to my great relief.

  Of course, my mom doesn’t have the slightest clue about her son’s predilections. How she hasn’t figured it out yet is beyond me. After all, I’ve never mentioned a girl to her before. Isn’t that weird for a teenage boy? Nor has she caught me looking at porn on-line or any kind of dirty comics.

  But who knows? Elena has always lived in her own world and operated according to her own rules. She’s probably too busy with her own romantic life to really notice the absence of mine, to be honest. Suddenly, her voice interrupts my thoughts.

  “Jake!” she bellows from downstairs.

  Shit. I thought she was going out to a bar with her friends tonight. Elena hangs out with a few other divorced moms here in Milford. They have a clique that gets together every Friday night to prowl for single men in the area. It’s embarrassing to be honest. The whole lot of them are in their forties and fifties, yet they wear revealing clothes more suitable for a tween. I definitely wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end of their attentions, even if I was straight.

  But girls just want to have fun, right? My mom’s been married and divorced three times, but her failed marriages haven’t deterred her from dating whatsoever. She spends all of her free time searching for her next toy boy. It’s insane. I love my mom, but she hooks-up with more guys than a drunk college girl in Cancun during spring break.

  Rolling my eyes, I pause the episode I’m watching and climb out of bed. Hopefully she doesn’t plan on nagging me about my non-existent social life. Watching amazing TV is how I prefer to spend my Friday nights and Elena shouldn’t make me feel guilty about it. If I’m lucky, she’s on her way out the door and just wants to let me know that she left money in case I want to order a pizza.

  I shuffle over to my bedroom door and crack it slightly. “Yeah, what Mom?”

  “Come down here!” she hollers. “Now!”

  Sighing heavily, I glance longingly at my bed again. What on Earth could be this urgent? My feet drag as I trudge down the stairs.

  “Where are you?” I ask as I reach the bottom.

  “In the kitchen,” she replies.

  I doubt Elena wants me to try something she cooked because she’s not much of a chef. In fact, I do most, if not all, of the cooking for the two of us. Mom doesn’t have a single domestic bone in her body, and she prefers it that way. Frankly, it might be the reason why all her husbands divorced her. Isn’t the way to a guy’s heart through his stomach? Oh well. It’s all lost on her.

  “Hey Mom,” I utter morosely, standing in the doorway. “What is it?”

  Elena pours way too much vodka into a martini shaker and adds olive juice. Oh no, she’s already started drinking. The last thing I want to do on a Friday night is listen to one of my mother’s drunken rants. I think I’d rather go join my classmates at tonight’s football game. She shakes the metal container vigorously and pours its contents into a glass. Finally, she glances in my direction.

  “Honey, please don’t tell me you’re staying in tonight. It’s Friday,” she says as she raises the glass to her lips. Her words aren’t slurred yet, so I’m guessing this is her first martini of the night. Four more of those and she’ll be passed out on the living room couch again.

  “Mom, please. Not again,” I plead with her.

  “You should be out with your friends,” she says emphatically. “You’re a teenager. You should be going out and having fun, and not staying home like some little old man.”

  I sigh. How many times do we have to go through this? It’s as if Elena doesn’t understand that I’m not a social butterfly like her. In fact, I’m quite the opposite. My mom struts around town with her bl
eached blonde hair and overly tanned skin like she’s still in her early twenties. It’s embarrassing when I hear rumors about who my mother has hooked up with in our neighborhood. Word gets around fast and everyone in Milford knows that my mom is a round-heeled woman.

  I raise my hands in protest.

  “I like staying home on Friday nights, Mom. I work really hard in school throughout the week to get good grades, and during the weekends I just wanna chill and relax,” I say. “Is there something wrong with that?”

  She makes a face, like she’s tasted something sour.

  “You should be at a party with kids your own age, and not sitting up in your bedroom listening to those boring podcasts and reading books. I swear, Jake, you would think they gave me the wrong baby in the hospital because you don’t act like you’re my kid. You always wanna stay inside instead of going out and having some fun. When I was your age, I used to sneak out of my bedroom window to go to all of the twenty-one and up clubs. My fake ID could get me into anywhere. It cost me fifty bucks, but it worked like a charm,” she says proudly.

  Oh god, another of her rants. Besides, Elena has got to be kidding me right now. What kind of mother encourages their son to get a fake ID and sneak into twenty-one and up clubs? Most parents hassle their kids about studying for the SAT’s, not about breaking the law. If I’m being honest, the only reason I want to go to college is to get as far away from my mother as possible. Don’t get me wrong, I love Elena, but living with her is a nightmare.

  “Mom, you should be happy that I don’t sneak out at night,” I say. For Christ’s sake, what kind of child has to say these words to his parent?

  Narrowing her eyes, she places a hand on her hip. “I’m not saying you should do all the things I did when I was your age, but you should try being more social. You’ll be graduating soon and you won’t see classmates again until your ten year reunion. Trust me. That’s the way things happen.”

  I roll my eyes.

  “So why bother to be friends with them now? What’s the point?”

  My mom puts her hands on her waist threateningly. “Because you don’t want to look back on your senior year and realize you wasted it in your bedroom watching Netflix every weekend,” she says as she finishes her first margarita. “Isn’t that obvious?”

  I try to change the subject.

  “I thought you were heading out tonight? You know, with your friends and all?”

  Elena opens her mouth, but before she can say a word, she lets out a drunk hiccup. “I was, but Linda cancelled because she isn’t feeling well, and Marie has a date tonight. So I’m stuck here instead. With you.”

  Damn, that’s harsh. Sometimes I think Elena forgets she’s a mother completely. It’s probably because she had me at such a young age. While all her friends were going away to college, she was sitting at home cradling a newborn in her arms. Deep down inside, I think she’s always regretted getting pregnant in high school. She was still a kid when she had me, and missed out on quite a lot because of it. Half of the time I can’t tell which one of us is the parent.

  “There’s nothing wrong with a nice quiet night at home,” I say in a calm tone.

  “Speak for yourself,” she scoffs as she makes another martini. “How do you ever expect to get a girlfriend if you never go out?”

  Not this again. Newsflash Elena, I’m gay. Sometimes I just want to blurt that out, but at this point I shouldn’t have to. Sure, I haven’t officially announced that I’m into guys yet, but the signs are all there. I just wish she would come to realization that I’m interested in men without me having to tell her. Maybe if she wasn’t out searching for her next husband every chance she gets, she would have noticed that I have posters of the hottest male actors in Hollywood draped along my bedroom walls. I mean, I don’t know how I could be more obvious, short of bringing a boyfriend home.

  Come to think of it, maybe I should just tell her so that I don’t hear more of these lectures.

  “Elena,” I begin.

  “Yeah?” she says, as she shakes the metal canister.

  I wish the words would just pour out of my mouth, but honestly, I’m still not ready to tell her yet. I’ve wanted to since I was ten, but she was always too busy to sit down and listen. Besides, I doubt she’ll be happy when she finally does find out. Ever since I was a kid, she’s been drilling into my mind that my life will follow a certain course: I’m going to graduate from college, get married, and then start a family. Boom boom boom. Of course I can do all of that and still be gay, but I think mom expects to have a daughter-in-law someday, and not a son-in-law.

  I heave a defeated sigh. “Never mind,” I mutter while turning away.

  “Where do you think you’re going? I’m not done talking to you yet.” Her words stop my feet in their tracks.

  Damnit, I hate when Elena doesn’t have any plans. Now she’s probably going to hound me for the rest of the night about my social life, or at least until she passes out drunk. Slowly, I turn toward her and prepare to endure the full blown rant she’s about to launch in my direction. I walk over to the kitchen table and take a seat with slumped shoulders. Chances are I’m going to be here for a while.

  “I don’t want you to become one of those weird hermit people who never leave the house,” she begins.

  I interrupt her. “That’s not going to happen, Mom,” I reply. Sure, I prefer reading a book over going to parties, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to become a hermit. My mother loves to over-exaggerate.

  But the lecture has already begun.

  “Why can’t you hang out with the boys on the football team? They’re the popular guys who get all the pretty girls. Don’t you want to meet girls? Maybe if you hung out with those guys instead of your drama friends, the girls at your school would want to date you,” she says.

  Ugh. Every time she utters something about me dating girls, I get one step closer to telling her the truth. I don’t think I’ve ever been attracted to chicks. I’ve pretty much been gay my entire life. But if Elena knew the truth, she’d probably want to keep me locked inside of the house. My mom’s completely against gay marriage and has even mentioned that she believes homosexuality is a choice. It’s hard enough having to worry about what the kids at school are going to think when I do decide to come out, but it hurts to know that my own mother won’t accept the fact that I’m gay.

  It’s weird. She’s not a closed-minded person, but I guess everyone is different when it comes to your own child. Eventually Elena will find out though. It’s not like I can keep my sexual orientation from her forever because at some point, I’d like to meet someone and fall in love, like any normal person. The problem is that there aren’t many openly gay guys at my school, which makes it hard to date in my small town. Not only that, but I’m not attracted to any of the boys at Milford High. The acne-ridden teens just aren’t my type. My dream guy ideally would be hot, hung, and handsome. Maybe an alpha male who’s ripped and studly, but with a heart made of gold.

  I sigh. Who am I kidding? Guys like that don’t exist around here. Especially the ones my age. Almost all the gay guys at my high school are shorter than I am with scrawny builds, and not my type at all. Plus, I want to be with someone I feel safe around. The kind of guy who will protect me from any and all harm. A real man, and not the immature teenage boys I see walking down the hallways at Milford High.

  In fact, I’d be interested in someone like our new next door neighbor. Shit, that man is hot. Vance Raider is the epitome of what a real man looks like. Just the other day, I saw him mowing the lawn without a shirt on in the blazing hot sun. It was seriously like a scene from a movie. Sweat beads trickled down his bronzed skin as he pushed the mower across the grass. I could hardly take my eyes off his bulging muscles as they rippled, glistening under the hot sun. Plus, his bulky arms weren’t the only things swollen. I probably shouldn’t have been looking, but the huge bulge in his jeans caught my attention and I couldn’t help but to gape. Man, how big is he? In my estimation
, at least ten inches.

  So yeah, our new neighbor is the total package: tall, dark, and handsome with a shitload of tattoos covering his massive muscles. Hands down, he’s the sexiest man I’ve ever seen in my life. How in the world did he end up in a place like Milford? Most guys here wear khakis and dorky sneakers. Their pot bellies bulge from under too-tight polo shirts, their skin pasty and pale.

  But let’s be real. Vance is the man of my dreams, but I doubt he’d be interested in a guy like me. That is, if he’s even attracted to men. Who am I kidding? A guy like that is probably straight, and even if he is into guys, I’m sure he wouldn’t want to date a high school senior. He’s all man, and probably wouldn’t waste his time with an eighteen year old boy.

  I sigh heavily. I should probably forget about Vance, although that’s hard to do since he’s always outside doing yard work shirtless. It’s almost impossible to get homework done some nights because all I can do is fantasize about that perfectly sculpted body. Sometimes I end up beating myself off as he runs the lawn mower or clips the hedges. Yeah, it’s that bad.

  “Hello! Earth to Jake!” my mother shouts as she waves her hand in my face. Shit, she must’ve realized that I haven’t been listening to her this entire time. “Did you hear a word I said?” she asks.

  I nod, but the truth is I’ve been drowning her voice out with thoughts of our hot new neighbor.

  “Yup,” I say, hopping up from the chair. “And you’re right, Mom. I do need to get out more and make some new friends.”