Pure Wicked (Wicked Lovers #9.5)(4)
Author: Shayla Black

“Pregnant. It’s a girl this time.” She smoothed her hand over her distended belly with a serene smile. “I’m due at the end of next month. Otherwise, I’m fine.”

“And you’re on bed rest until then so you don’t go into premature labor again. Feet up.” Deke hustled her back to the sofa and lifted her lower legs and placed her heels on a pillow strategically positioned on top of the coffee table. Then the man pinned Jesse with a stare, shaking his head. “So I’m guessing this isn’t a social call. Your buddy Ryan fucked up and bit it last night.”

Kimber gasped, then elbowed her husband. “Deke!”

“Am I wrong?” Deke looked his way.

Jesse raked at his hair. He hated wearing it to his shoulders and filled with “product.” The stylist he paid a small fortune for insisted it looked both cool and hot. Same with the scruff on his face. Sometimes he just wanted it all gone. “Nope. I wasn’t there.”

“Access Hollywood suggested something similar about an hour ago,” she said.

“Which I don’t watch,” Deke cut in. “You came here for a reason. What do you need?”

Tugging at his ear, Jesse grimaced. These damn earrings weren’t him, either. Crap, he shouldn’t have come here. He didn’t want to risk bringing the press down on them, especially if Kimber was having a difficult pregnancy. She didn’t need the stress.

“Nothing.” He stood. “You’ve got your hands full. I assume your son is in bed. And I… I’ll figure it out.”

“You need a place to go?” Deke barked.

Jesse opened his mouth to admit that’s why he’d come, then he snapped it shut again. Deke’s buddy Jack had some isolated cabin deep in a swamp, and it sure would come in handy about now. But Jesse hadn’t done anything for himself since fame had hit—not kept his schedule, answered his calls, or styled his hair. Hell, he’d barely wiped his own ass. Simply rehabbing his image wouldn’t cut it. As Candia had suggested, the time had come for him to change everything.

He was too damn unhappy to spend the rest of his life this way.

“No. I’ve got a place in mind,” he lied. “Before I headed that way, I wanted to spend time with someone who…” Knows I’m not the sort of man to corrupt and overdose a teenager. But one of the last times he’d seen Kimber, she’d walked in to find him balls deep in an intoxicated, barely legal girl while chugging a fifth of bourbon. Deke must know that. “Someone who wouldn’t bullshit me. Someone with a solid word of advice.”

“Well…” Kimber wrinkled her brow in thought. “I’ve always told you that you have to decide what you want your life to be and make it happen.”

Deke shook his head. “Kitten, I think he meant me.”

When she glanced at him for confirmation, Jesse sent her a half grin. “Yeah, man to man. Or something like that.”

His answer clearly surprised her. “Oh. Sure.”

While it was no secret that Deke had never been a fan of his, and Jesse really had no right to ask for even a word from the man, he was thankful Kimber’s hulk of a husband seemed willing to give it.

“Sit.” He waited until Jesse complied. “I get it. Good times and fast women are easy to come by and hard to turn down.” Deke sat back and took Kimber’s hand. Though the overhead lights cast a glow on his golden hair, no one would ever mistake him for an angel. “But you’ve got to stop acting your age in rock star years.”

“Rock star years?” Jesse frowned. What the hell was he talking about?

“Cut your age in half and add one.” Deke cracked a smile.

Jesse shook his head. “I’m not fifteen.”

“Then don’t act like it. Life isn’t about getting high or laid. Obviously, you’ve got an incredible career. It’s your character everyone is questioning. Stop behaving like a douche. Start being a man. It’s not complicated.”

Well, he’d asked for it, and Deke had never been one to candy coat.

“I’ve been sober for a year. Actually, almost thirteen months.”

“That’s great!” Kimber praised.

The other man simply cocked his head and leveled him with a hard glance. “Women?”

Jesse didn’t want to answer with Kimber in the room. His wandering penis had only been one of the reasons she’d left him. He hated to admit how little he’d changed since their breakup. “I’m no saint.”

“Hmm,” Deke mused. “Last bed partner?”

He hesitated. “A couple of cities ago.”