He giggled. “That’s you done, luv.”

“The details of the tour are all finalized,” Ollie explained as he escorted Jaxxon down the hallway and en-route back to Tony. “As I already told you, we’re going to New York first. It’s an evening flight; I knew you’d prefer one of them.”

“What day is it you leave?” asked Bruno, now walking on Jaxxon’s other side.

“Monday,” replied Ollie.

Bruno smiled when he managed to catch Jaxxon’s eye. “I’ll bet you’ll be glad to leave that apartment behind after what happened.”

She frowned. “How’d you know about that?”

“I was eavesdropping when Ollie and Richie were talking about it, sorry. So how are you?”

“Alright. It’s just stuff at the end of the day, isn’t it.”

“There hasn’t been anything else odd going on?” checked Ollie. She shook her head. “The place is still in the process of being cleaned. The mess was unreal.”

“I’ve seen worse.”

Ollie knew that, and the idea of it got on his wick. He’d hoped that her new life would get her away from that crap, give her security. He was so thankful that it hadn’t made her take a step backwards in her progress with her transition from nothing to everything she wanted. It would have cut him up if she had withdrawn from it just because of some nut, but he’d seen it happen many times with other people. They couldn’t deal with the lack of privacy or being under the microscope of the media or the sudden and massive amount of attention – the like which they could never have imagined. He’d seen grown men cry when that attention suddenly became bad attention and there were criticisms and wicked rumours and the appearance of nutcases. But this twenty-two year old woman had taken it better than most he’d known in the past to have done.

As much as he didn’t like that she was staying with McKenzie – the bloke looked at Jaxxon like she belonged to him – he didn’t want her alone and Ollie knew McKenzie wouldn’t hesitate in wiping the floor with anyone who tried to lay a finger on her. That was assuming the bugger wasn’t dealt with by Jaxxon herself first.

Bruno snickered. “Is that why McKenzie was sending you the flowers and chocolates; trying to coddle you through what’s been going on? Or is he trying to dig himself out of the doghouse? I’ll bet it’s the second; he’s so cocky and overbearing -”

At the end of her tether and feeling an inexplicably big need to defend Connor, Jaxxon spun on Bruno. “Do you know what, Bruno? I’m getting sick of your remarks about him.”

“Whoa, whoa, I was just joking around.”

“Jokes are funny.” And it was never just what he said, it was the spite and bitterness that was always in his tone.

“Ah, come on, Jaxx.”

“Don’t call me that.” Her voice was deadly. She could tolerate Dane doing it because she knew he was doing it to wind Connor up, but the way Bruno had said it so intimately as if he had that same level of familiarity and closeness with her that Connor did ticked her right off. Wisely, he didn’t follow her any further. Ollie was also wise; he didn’t comment.

As Connor pulled up next to Jaxx’s Audi in the car park outside of his apartment building later that day, he smiled. He had liked the idea that when he got home it would be to find Jaxx there, waiting. He liked that idea even better now that he was finally back. So did his dick.

“I come bearing gifts,” he announced as he entered his apartment with a giant-sized pizza. Yeah it seemed counterproductive to spend hours on his fitness levels and then devour a pizza at the end of it but sod it. When Jaxxon swerved her head and smiled sweetly at him over her shoulder from her spot on the couch where she was watching T.V., something twisted in his chest.

“Mmmm, pizza. Good thinking, McKenzie.”

Having dumped his gym bag on the floor he went straight to the living area and kissed her. He’d only meant for it to be a brief, greeting-type kiss but his control around her was as piss-poor as ever. “You’re dessert, Carter.”

“Please tell me that’s Deep Pan Margarita,” she said when he finally released her lips.

“Of course it is, I know it’s your favourite.” He sat on the armchair near the sofa and placed the pizza on the table in front of them, liking how it felt to lounge around while eating pizza out of the box like they used to; no plates, no cutlery, no prim crap.

“Good memory.”

“I could hardly forget that, it was all you ate back then. How you could eat something that often and not get sick of it always amazed me.”

“Well you forgot that I didn’t like dark chocolate.” Seeing the confused expression on his face she slapped her leg. “I knew it wasn’t you.”

“What?”

“I told Kieran that’s just not the kind of thing you’d do.” She was torn between being pleased with herself for being right and being agitated that someone else had sent them and she didn’t know who.

“Jaxx, elaborate.”

“Today I got a bunch of red roses and a box of dark chocolates sent to me.”

The slice of pizza in his hand slipped from his fingers and dropped back into the box. “You what?”

“On the card it was signed ‘C’ so everyone assumed you’d sent them, but it just seemed too out-of-character for you.”

“Where are they?”

She shrugged as she finished chewing on the food in her mouth. “I left them in the studio so no doubt someone’s took them home.”

“I bet you’d have felt like a right bitch if it had turned out that I had sent them then, wouldn’t you?”

“No, I’d have told you it served you right for sending me corny crap.”

“Christ, Jaxx.” He shook his head. “I don’t like this stalker-stuff.”

“You telling me you’ve never had some kind of obsessed fan? God, if you’d seen some of the fan mail I used to get you wouldn’t be so bothered. Anna would spend hours reading it either laughing her head off or blushing purple. There’re some proper odd people out there and, for some reason I’ve yet to understand, I seem to draw them to me.”

He snorted. “Wrong, babe, you draw everyone to you, always have. It’s just that it’s mostly the odd ones who have the nerve to do something about it.”

“It makes me shiver thinking someone might be obsessed with me though. I don’t get it.”

“I’m obsessed with you. You’re obsessed with me though so I can cope.”

She laughed. “You tell yourself that if it’s your coping mechanism.”

“You deny it to yourself if that’s your coping mechanism.” He cringed when Bronty slobbered all over the sofa at the sight of the pizza. “Does he eat this sort of stuff? I thought dogs were more meat-eaters.”

“Ah, but like I’ve said I’m not convinced he’s aware he’s of the canine line. Bronty will eat just about anything but I think it’s because before I found him he was living off whatever scraps he could find out of people’s bins. For the first week of him living with me he was eating out of my kitchen bin, I had to train him to stop it. Observe and note that your apartment is in tip-top shape despite Scooby Doo here having spent the day in it.”

“Observed. Noted. Appreciated.” What he didn’t appreciate was the knock on his apartment door mere seconds later. Cautious for Jaxx, he glimpsed through the peephole. He shot Dane a frustrated look as he opened the door but his mate only smiled in response as he walked passed him.

“Alright Con. Mmm, what’s that smell?”

“Smells like junk food,” said Niki as she waltzed in behind Dane with Little Dane hanging off her neck. Quick as anything, he threw himself at Connor.

“Alright Little Man,” said Connor as he perched the toddler on his arm so he could cling to him like a chimp the way he always did. “You been a good boy for your mum and dad?”

Chewing on his thumb, he asked shyly, “Who’z that gwirl?”

Dane was already in the living room. “Hey Jaxx – Jaxxon, this is my wife, Niki, and my boy, Little Dane.” Although all she did in response was smile and offer a ‘hi’, it was so warmly delivered it was like an embrace.

Niki had expected to feel threatened as a woman while being around someone so gorgeous but strangely she didn’t; there was something reassuring about Jaxxon Carter. It should have seemed contradictory seeing someone so perfect to the eye munching so commonly on a slice of pizza. “Sorry we didn’t get a chance to meet ’til now but I didn’t want to risk seeing you when Anita might have found out.”

Waving away the unnecessary apology, Jaxxon smiled. “Thanks for keeping an eye on her for Connor. She’s a witch that one.”

After chasing a very put-out Bronty off the sofa, Connor plonked himself next to Jaxx while Dane and Niki each commandeered an armchair. “This is my very good friend, Jaxx,” he told Little Dane. “Jaxx, this is -”

“Let me guess,” she drawled. “Are you the Fat Controller who’s friends with Thomas the Tank Engine and all his mates?”

He giggled and shook his head while Connor, Niki and Dane all exchanged a look that said ‘How did she guess he loved that programme?’

“Really? You look so much like him,” continued Jaxxon. “Have you ever met Thomas?” Little Dane shook his head again. “I know a place where you can.” His eyes bulged. “Tell your mummy and daddy to take you to a place called Wales in August and he’ll be there. You can ride on him and Annie and Clarabel.”

“And Percy?”

“Oh yeah, definitely him.” Seeing the questioning look on Connor’s face she said, “All little boys love Thomas. I learnt about the Wales thing years ago when I was helping the local nursery teacher find excursions, she was a sister of a mate of mine.” She didn’t elaborate that this mate had been coming off drugs and both Jaxxon and the young teacher had been taking shifts helping her get through it. Filled with excitement, Little Dane hit her with one question after another about this August event until finally he’d crawled onto her lap while she gave him all the details.