Ownership

Monday morning felt different.

The heatwave had finally broken, leaving behind a clear, blue sky and a breeze that actually felt like air instead of hot soup. The factory floor was buzzing, but it wasn't the usual Monday morning misery. It was the buzz of gossip.

Everyone was talking about the cookout. Everyone was talking about Misty and Deb. But mostly, everyone was talking about Stacy.

Jax walked onto the floor at 6:00 AM, feeling like a man who had just walked through a minefield and come out with all his limbs attached.

He had survived Saturday. It had been a disaster, yes. Misty had embarrassed herself with the brownies. Deb had threatened his family with a smile. But in the car on the way home, Stacy hadn't screamed. She hadn't cried.

She had been quiet, calculating. And then, later that night, she had been... intense. She had reclaimed him. Not with words, but with a ferocity that surprised him. It was like meeting Deb had flipped a switch in her brain. She wasn't the bored housewife anymore; she was a woman defending her property.

Jax walked to the Maintenance Cage, humming to himself. He felt lighter. He felt cleaner.

He was clean-shaven again. His shirt was pressed. He was wearing his wedding ring, and he made a point of checking his phone every hour to text Stacy.

Jax: Good morning. Love you. Jax: Thinking about you. Jax: Picking up dinner tonight.

He was the model husband.

"Morning, sunshine," Ryder grunted, looking up from a pile of work orders inside the cage. "You're alive."

"Barely," Jax grinned. "But I made it."

"Did you?" Ryder raised an eyebrow. "Because the rumor mill is churning. Barb says Stacy looked like she wanted to murder Deb with a plastic fork on Saturday."

"Stacy handled it," Jax said, opening his locker. "She's tough."

"And Misty?"

"Misty is... gone," Jax said. He looked over at Line 4. Misty’s machine was running, but there was a temp operator there—a young guy in a hoodie. "She called in sick."

"Sick," Ryder snorted. "That's one word for it. She's probably at home plotting your demise."

"Let her plot," Jax said, grabbing his radio. "I'm done with the drama, Ryder. I'm focusing on work. And my wife."

He meant it. He felt a renewed sense of purpose. He was going to be the husband Stacy wanted. No more flirting. No more "leaks" in the storage room. Just honest work and a clean conscience.

The morning passed quickly. Jax fixed a conveyor on Line 2. He replaced a motor on the paint line. He even helped Kyle unjam a pallet jack without making a snide comment.

By noon, he was feeling good. Hungry.

He walked toward the breakroom, digging in his pocket for change for the vending machine.

"Jax!"

He turned.

It was Rhonda. She was standing in the doorway of her office, waving him over. She looked amused.

"You have a visitor," she said.

Jax frowned. "Who? A vendor?"

"Better," Rhonda smirked. "Go to the front lot."

Jax walked to the front entrance. He pushed open the heavy glass doors and stepped out into the sunlight.

Stacy’s white SUV was parked right in front of the building, in a visitor spot.

She was leaning against the hood. She wasn't wearing her usual "mom uniform" of yoga pants and a t-shirt. She was wearing a sundress—a bright red one that looked suspiciously like the color Deb had worn on Saturday. It was cut low in the front and high in the leg, showing off the tan she had worked on all summer.

Her hair was down, loose and wavy. She was wearing lipstick.

She looked incredible. And she looked completely out of place against the backdrop of gray concrete and rusted steel.

Jax walked over to her, stunned. "Stacy? What are you doing here?"

"I brought you lunch," she said, holding up a brown paper bag. "Leftover brisket from the cookout. And a cold soda."

"You... you came all the way down here for lunch?"

"I was in the neighborhood," she lied smoothly. She pushed off the car and walked up to him. She didn't stop at a polite distance. She stepped right into his space, her hands landing on his chest.

"Hi," she whispered.

"Hi," Jax breathed, smelling her perfume. It was new. Something spicy.

"Are you hungry?" she asked.

"Starving."

"Good." She smiled. It wasn't a sweet smile. It was a possessive one. "Get in the car."

"What?"

"Get in the car, Jax. We're having a picnic."

Jax looked around. Operators were walking out for their lunch break. People were watching. He saw Barb and Tammy by the loading dock, their jaws on the floor.

"Stacy, people are watching."

"Let them watch," she said, her voice hard. "I want them to watch. Especially her."

She looked toward the building, her eyes scanning the windows until they landed on the Quality Control office.

Deb was there. Standing in the window. Watching.

Stacy waved. A tiny, sarcastic little wave.

Then she turned back to Jax, grabbed his collar, and pulled him down for a kiss. It was deep, wet, and public. It was a claim.

"Get in," she ordered, breaking the kiss but not the contact.

Jax opened the passenger door and climbed in. The car was cool, the AC blasting. The seats were leather. Stacy climbed into the driver's seat. She didn't hand him the lunch bag. She tossed it into the back seat.

"Lock the door," she said.

"Stacy, we're in the parking lot. My boss is inside."

"I don't care about your boss," she said, reclining her seat back. "I care about my husband. And right now, I want my husband to remind me who he belongs to."

She reached over and unbuckled his belt.

Jax’s breath hitched. This wasn't the Stacy he knew. This wasn't the bored housewife who complained about the pool or the girls' dance schedule. This was a woman who had seen a threat and decided to eliminate it.

"Stacy..."

"Shut up, Jax," she whispered, climbing over the center console. "And kiss me."

Jax didn't have time to argue. Stacy lunged across the center console, her mouth crashing against his with a bruising, desperate hunger. She tasted like cherry chapstick and expensive white wine, a stark contrast to the taste of grease and stale coffee that usually coated his tongue at work.

She shoved him back against the leather seat, her hands scrambling at his belt buckle.

"Stacy," he gasped, breaking the kiss for a fraction of a second. "We're in the parking lot. The guys are right outside."

"Good," she hissed, her eyes dark and dilated. "Let them look."

She hit the recline button on his seat. The motor whined as Jax tipped backward. Before he stopped moving, Stacy was climbing over the console. She wasn't graceful about it—she was frantic. Her knee knocked the gear shift, her purse tumbled into the backseat, but she didn't stop until she was straddling his lap, her knees digging into the leather on either side of his hips.

The red dress bunched up around her waist.

Jax looked down. She wasn't wearing panties.

The sight of her—bare, wet, and waiting for him in the middle of the workday—short—circuited his brain. He reached up, his calloused hands gripping her soft thighs, leaving grease smudges on her tan skin.

"You did this for me?" he groaned.

"I did this for us," she corrected. She grabbed his erection through his boxers, her grip tight, possessive. "And I did it to remind you who you come home to."

She freed him, her cool hand a shock against his feverish skin. She didn't tease him. She didn't wait for him to be ready. She lined him up and sank down, impaling herself on him in one long, smooth motion.

Jax let out a guttural sound, his head slamming back against the headrest as she engulfed him. She was tight—tighter than he remembered—and hot. The sensation was overwhelming.

"Stacy..."

"Look at me," she commanded, bracing her hands on his chest, pinning him to the seat. Her nails dug into his fresh Dickies shirt. "Don't you dare close your eyes, Jax. You look at me."

He looked. She was magnificent. Her hair was a wild halo around her face, her chest heaving as she began to move. She set a punishing pace, grinding down on him with a rhythm that rocked the heavy SUV on its suspension.

The air conditioner was blasting full force, but the windows were already fogging up, turning the factory outside into a gray, blurred world. Inside this glass bubble, the air was thick with the smell of sex and spicy perfume.

Jax reached up to touch her breasts through the thin fabric of the dress, but she caught his wrists. She pinned them to his chest, holding him down.

"No," she panted, riding him harder. "You don't get to touch. You just take it. You take what I give you."

It was a complete reversal. For years, he had been the one initiating, the one begging for a crumb of affection while she complained about the headache or the kids. Now, she was devouring him. She was marking him.

"Who does this belong to?" she whispered, grinding her hips in a circle that made his vision blur.

"Yours," Jax choked out. "It's yours, Stacy."

"Damn right it is." She leaned down, her teeth grazing the sensitive skin of his neck. "Not hers. Not that trash in the window. Mine."

She bit him. Hard. Right on the pulse point.

The pain mixed with the pleasure, pushing Jax over the edge. He bucked his hips, driving deep into her, losing all control.

"Stacy, I'm gonna—"

"Do it," she ordered. "Fill me up."

He exploded. The release was violent, a full-body seizure that drained every ounce of tension from his muscles. Stacy rode out the aftershocks, clamping down around him, milking him until he was completely empty.

She collapsed against his chest, burying her face in his neck, her breathing ragged and harsh in his ear.

For a long minute, the only sound was the hum of the engine and the distant, muffled thud-thud-thud of the presses inside the plant.

Stacy pulled back slowly. She looked at him. Her lipstick was smeared. Her dress was rumpled. She looked wild.

She smiled, tracing the red mark she had left on his neck.

"Fix your shirt," she said, climbing back over into the driver's seat. "You have work to do."

Jax lay there for a second, dazed, trying to remember how to use his legs. He felt branded. He felt owned.

And god help him, he loved it.

He sat up, fumbling with his belt, his hands shaking. He looked at Stacy, who was checking her hair in the rearview mirror as if she hadn't just ravished him in a parking lot.

"I'll see you at home," she said coolly.

"Yeah," Jax breathed. "Home."

He opened the door and stepped out into the sun.

His shirt was untucked. His hair was a mess. He had a smear of red lipstick on his neck that he hadn't bothered to wipe off.

He didn't care.

He felt like a king again. But this time, it wasn't because he was juggling lies. It was because the one woman who actually mattered had just staked her claim in the front seat of a Toyota Highlander.

He walked past the breakroom. The guys were staring at him. Ryder gave him a slow clap.

"Legend," Ryder mouthed.

Jax grinned. He walked past the QC office.

Deb was sitting at her desk. She looked up as he passed. She saw the disheveled clothes. She saw the mark on his neck.

Her face went blank. She looked down at her paperwork, dismissing him.

Jax kept walking. He felt untouchable.

He didn't notice the figure standing in the shadows of the shipping bay.

***

Barb and Tammy were hanging over the railing, staring at the spot where Stacy's SUV had just pulled away.

"Did you see the neck?" Tammy whispered, looking scandalized. "She marked him. Like cattle."

"She didn't just mark him, Tammy," Barb said, shaking her head in disbelief. "She branded him."

"In the middle of the parking lot? In a car with 'Baby on Board' stickers?"

"Stacy came to play today," Barb said, unwrapping a piece of gum. "She saw Deb on Saturday, and she realized she had to pee on the hydrant if she wanted to keep the dog."

"Deb saw it, too. I saw her in the window."

"Deb saw it," Barb agreed. "And she didn't do a damn thing. Because you can fight a girlfriend, Tammy. You can fight a mistress. But you can't fight the wife when she's wearing a red dress and bringing brisket."

"So Jax won?"

"Jax thinks he won," Barb corrected. "He thinks he just got the best of both worlds. But he forgot about the third world."

"What third world?"

Barb nodded toward the side door, where Misty had just disappeared into the shadows of the plant.

"The underworld," Barb said. "Misty watched the whole thing. And she didn't look sad, Tammy. She looked... creative."

Barb popped the gum into her mouth.

"Stacy reclaimed the husband. Deb kept her dignity. But Misty? Misty's about to burn the whole factory down. Just wait."