by Emilia Finn
“You stole it?”
I forgo creamer for my coffee, and try my damnedest to ignore the muscle filling out Luke’s chest. Or the ink that litters it and his shoulders. So much ink, so sexy, it makes me consider getting a new job.
Leaning against the counter, I bring the coffee up and hiss at the burn as it goes down my throat. “I guess,” I answer in a non-answer. “Though there’s no way I carried that thing by myself, so it’s not all my fault.”
“You drank all that?” He looks toward the messy table, and lifts a brow at the empty bottle. “You need to go to the hospital to have your stomach pumped, or…?”
“Um…” I press a hand to my belly, and frown. “Perhaps. I might wait it out for a minute and see what happens.” I look around the kitchen. “You have any bread?”
“Er… in the fridge?” Finally, he enters the kitchen and makes his way to the fridge door so I catch a glimpse of a wide back and more ink.
My brain niggles, and coffee tries to help me along, but the bottle of Jäger taunts me and wipes away whatever I was trying to remember without remorse.
“You keep bread in the fridge?” I accept the half-eaten loaf when he turns back and offers. “Why?”
“Because if we leave it on the counter, it goes moldy before we can finish it. The fridge helps it keep for an extra couple of days.”
Reasonable explanation, I suppose.
I open the bag, and dig a hand in without thinking to wash up or use my damn manners. I pull the slice out, fold it in half, and shove the end into my mouth like it’s a slice of greasy pizza.
“Soak up the alcohol,” I speak around the food when Luke goes back to the doorway and stares.
His crassness from… well, every single time I’ve ever spoken to him, is pushed aside for this morning person. This guy who doesn’t seem nearly as hungover as he should be, considering the Jäger. He looks sleepy and rumpled, but it’s the comfortable kind rather than the hot mess kind that I am.
“Where am I?” I look around the kitchen and scowl. “Like, what part of town?”
“Not so far from Main Street. A couple blocks.”
“A couple blocks which way? If I can get back to Main, I can reorient myself and get back to where I’m staying.”
Morning-Luke is slow and lazy with his movements. “That way.” He points toward the wall at my back, and grins a slow, devilish grin. “Two and a half blocks and you’ll be able to see the police tape from your crimes.”
I bite off a chunk of the bread and narrow my eyes. “Police tape?”
“The statue?” He nods toward the pair and folds his arms. “The ice cream man has been a fugitive and on the run since I was a kid. The llama…” He shakes his head. “I fear you’ve brought the end of times down upon us. Miss Dixie’s gonna look, and when they immediately think to ask us, since everyone blames every crime in this town on my brother and me, the cops are gonna find not only the llama, but the other one too. Years of hiding and training, wasted. We’ll never live it down if both statues are discovered on our watch.”
“Ya know what?” I swallow down a hunk of bread and chase it with coffee. “You just said a lot of words, really fast. And my brain is just…” I drop down onto the chair I was standing on just a moment ago, slump in on myself, and groan. “I feel sick.”
“You need water. Not coffee.”
“Coffee has water in it.”
I fold in half, and reach across the space between where I am and where I need to be, only to almost topple out of my chair and fall to the floor. I snag my heels, one after the other, and drag them back to me.
It’s almost certain I flashed Luke everything under my dress, but as I swallow the last of my bread, I can’t find all that many fucks to give about it.
“I need to go home and shower. I feel really…” I bounce my shoulders and whimper. “Gross.”
“Well, that’s unfortunate, and not at all a compliment for my brother.”
Words filter through my brain like play-doh through a soup strainer. Slow, painful, and only parts get through at a time. My brow wrinkles as I try to concentrate on what he just said, but at the same time, I work on my heels and try my damnedest not to fall out of my chair.
Each time I let my gaze stray a little to the right, and I catch sight of the liquor bottle and empty glasses, my stomach roils, and my tongue turns desert dry. So then I try not to let it stray. I demand my eyes not go—
“Hey.” Luke’s voice turns smooth as velvet while I work and give myself a talking-to. Indulgent and sexy, it draws my eyes up as another woman walks under his arm from the hallway and plasters herself to his side.
She fits under his arm the way I fit under his arm, rests her cheek on his bare chest, and wraps her arms around his hips so they become one person. My heart flips when he smiles for her.
My spine snaps straight, and my stomach lurches, but this time, it has nothing to do with alcohol, and everything to do with hurt feelings. “Wow.” I jam my left foot into my heel and work on the clasp with rage coursing through my blood. “Wow!” I shoot to my feet and growl. “Are you serious right now?”
Luke and his friend glance back to me so we’re three raging bulls, staring each other down. Except Luke is less rage, and mostly curiosity.
Okay, well, maybe I’m the only enraged party in this little showdown.
“What the hell is that? You’re not even gonna wait for me to leave before bringing another woman out?”
His eyes sparkle. He got entirely too much sleep last night, and it pisses me off.
“Where’d you hide her? In the fucking closet? Is she your—” I stop and look at the woman. “Are you his girlfriend? Because he and I slept together last night.”
“Er…” She’s beautiful. Her boobs are way nicer than mine, and her legs are longer. “Not his girlfriend,” she snickers. “We met last night.”
“Well, I met him a week ago! I was in first.”
“Wow.” Luke covers his smile with a tattooed hand.
“Wait, you slept together last night?” the woman asks. “Seriously?”
“Well, I mean, we slept together. Like, actual sleep. There was no…” I lift both hands, make one circle with my fingers, and a… uh… penis with my pointer finger. “We didn’t do that… but we slept!”
“Well, if you get a chance with the,” she points her fingers all penis-y, and snickers, “I totes recommend. Good size, amazing girth, endurance for days, and not at all selfish. He didn’t come until I was up to, what?” She looks up at him. “Third, fourth orgasm. Then we showered and did it all again. He didn’t once say his legs were cramping.”
“I wonder if I should create a Yelp page for reviews,” Luke ponders. “Because that was solid feedback.”
“Ten out of ten, would totes recommend,” Busty-With-Legs-Who-Likes-Girth adds on for my own benefit. “And I’m heading out now anyway. So, I mean… you do you.”
A knock at the front door makes me spin so fast that I almost fall.
Luke’s gaze whips to the statues, his friend’s eyes remain on him, but I’m not feeling all that charitable right now, so I storm to the door while Luke ditches the girl and bolts across the room to grab a hand towel. He drapes it over the llama’s head like that’ll somehow camouflage the whole setup, but he gets no more time, because I yank the door open with more flourish than necessary, and meet the fiery eyes of a blonde woman with nice tits and a big smile.
I turn back to Luke. “Wow! She’s yours too?”
The woman doesn’t wait for an invitation, but rather, walks in wearing an adorable sundress and wedge heels.
“Fuck,” Luke breathes out a sigh of relief. “Emma. You scared the piss out of me. I thought it was the cops.”
Emma stops by the table and looks around at the warzone. Two women. Now three. A dozen empty shot glasses. A toppled bottle of liquor. An ice cream statue.
And a freakin’ llama!
“You guys are getting more and more disgusting ever
y damn day.”
Busty-With-Legs looks into Rob’s eyes, blushes, and backs away. “Sorry. I’ll just…” She retreats into the hall. “I’ll make myself scarce.”
Another knock at the door makes Luke groan with exhaustion. No longer lazy and having fun, he presses his hands against his eyes and curses the universe.
I don’t have to open the door this time, because Emma is all over it. She strides across the room, past me so her perfume wafts and almost makes me fall as I lean into it, then she swings the door wide and snarls.
“Grace Fucking Risotto. Fuck off, slut.”
“Emma Kincaid!” Grace Fucking Risotto, who has a bruised chin and a floaty top screeches. “What the hell are you—” Then her eyes latch onto mine and turn angrier. “Two of them! Are you fucking serious?”
“There’s one more.” I toss fuel on this fire and jerk a thumb over my shoulder. “Big boobs, long legs, she actually seems kinda nice. But still…”
Grace’s eyes snap to Luke’s and turn to lava. “This is all your brother’s fault! He’s a snake prick, and you know he did this on purpose to take you away from me.”
“I’m gonna rip your hair extensions out and toss you out the window if you don’t fuck off,” Emma growls. “Then you can blame me for taking him away from you.”
“Fuck you, bitch!”
“Wanna test me?” Emma snarls and does this thing with her feet. She was a cute woman in a cute sundress a minute ago. Now she’s Bruce Lee in wedges. “You know I’ll be the reason you need a nose job… again.”
“Rob!” Grace shouts and wakes half the damn neighborhood. “Why is she even here?”
“Because she’s family, Grace. You gotta leave.”
“Rob?” The play-doh makes its way through my sieve. “Rob is…” I look around. “Who is Rob.”
A heavy arm drops down onto my shoulders and holds me down when I want to shoot through the roof. I squeal and draw Emma’s attention, but her curiosity turns to a small grin when my captor presses his lips to my temple and my body tenses up.
“Relax,” Luke’s smooth voice plays through that sieve. “This is me. He’s Rob. She’s Emma. The bitch at the door is a filthy slut. And when you claimed me earlier, that was hot.”
I burst from his embrace and slam against the counter with a cry of pain. My shin screams, and my hip throbs, but I give myself space to see the whole room in one glance.
Luke is at the door with Emma and ‘the dirty slut,’ also known as Grace Risotto. But then there’s another Luke, less tattoos, wicked grin, who studies me while I freak out.
“You…” I look to the one at the door. “But he… And then…” I bring a hand up and rub the pads of my fingers against my temple. “Jäger.”
The Luke closest to me points to the other one. “Twin brother. I’m older, in case you needed to know who was alpha.” He points past the other one, to the girl in the hall. “High school girlfriend, but she rode more dicks than the rest of our high school combined. I’m no saint, and neither is Rob, so we don’t wanna shame people for their friendliness toward the opposite sex, but she breaks my brother’s heart every time she fucks around. Hence, Grace Risotto is a fucking bitch, and never welcome in this apartment while I’m here. In fact…”
Luke moves around the sundress girl, shoves the other brother out of the way, and with a taunting smile, slams the door in Grace’s face. Then he turns back to me, but stops behind the sundress and rests his hands on her shoulders.
“This is Emma. She’s family, and she thinks she’s alpha because she’s older than us, but it ain’t true. We all know it.” He plops a kiss on her cheek and chuckles when she smiles. “She’s our best friend. Mostly she’s his best friend, but I claim part ownership since he and I pissed in the same womb at the same time.”
He releases Emma and comes back to me. “He’s Rob. He spent the last twenty minutes fucking with you, because you thought he was me, and he gets off on messing with good folks.”
“You’re Rob.” I look to the other guy and desperately search for something. Anything. Any kind of clue whatsoever to tell these men apart. “You have different tattoos.”
“He also walks different,” Emma inserts with a friendly smile. “And he has the tiniest scar above his left brow.” She walks to Rob, slowly, seductively, and reaches up with a gentle hand to rub the pad of her thumb over its target. When Rob smiles, she slaps his forehead and scares the hell out of him. “He’s also an asshole, and has problems with loyalty.”
“You’re not loyal?” I scowl at the man and drop a hand to my hip. “Makes sense, considering that first chick, and the girl with the Risotto.”
“No,” Emma scowls. “The opposite. He’s too fucking loyal, to a woman who is trashier than a panda in an alleyway. They had feelings one time, and now he feels like he can’t dump her into a volcano like she deserves.”
“So who’s…” I point toward the hall. “Who was that?”
“Yeah, Rob.” Emma looks to him and lifts a brow. “Who was that?”
“That was my bad,” Luke sheepishly says. “Risotto was here last night, I booted her out, then I took him out and got him plastered on cheap booze.”
“Seems I wasn’t the only one,” Rob smirks and winks for me. “Jäger and Miss Dixie’s? Seriously.”
“That’s a whole ‘nother bag of what the fuck.” Emma moves to the statues and shakes her head at the llama. “What the hell did you do?”
“I have a headache.” I press my hands to my face and barely stop short of crying. “It hurts like a train is running over my brain, then backing it up and doing it again.”
“Here.” Luke leaves my side and snags a bottle of water from the fridge. He hip-bumps Emma aside, slams the fridge again, then he reaches up and snags a bottle of ibuprofen from the cupboard above. “Come back to the room. We’re going to rest,” he says for Rob and Emma. “Be quiet, and don’t murder anybody.”
“I don’t murder anyone, ever.” Rob scowls.
“I wasn’t talking to you,” Luke replies on a laugh.
He grabs my hand and pulls me into the hall, only to stop again when we meet up with Busty-With-Legs. “Get out, and run far away. Don’t look the blonde in the eyes. Don’t speak to her. Do not give her sass.”
“She important?”
“The most. Best friend,” Luke answers with a shiver. “And a fighter. She’s good at what she does, and she’s fed up with women messing with her man. Just say your goodbyes and move along. It was nice meeting you.”
“And you,” she chuckles and shakes her head. “Until we meet again.”
“Bye. You.” He pulls me along. “My room. Clothing optional.”
“Luke!” I stumble in my heels, but he catches me.
I drop down onto his bed and grab my head when it hurts, but he’s fast, kneels in front of my legs and offers the water and medication.
“It hurts,” I whimper.
“You got hammered last night.”
When I don’t take his offerings, Luke opens the bottle of ibuprofen and shakes two out onto his palm. Then he sets the bottle aside and cracks the water open. When I make no move to take either, he reaches up, opens my mouth with a gentle finger on my chin, then he places both capsules on my tongue and smiles when I don’t bite his fingers off.
“Here you go,” he croons.
He places the bottle of water in my hands, and helps me wrap my fingers around so it doesn’t fall to the floor, then, bringing my hands up, he helps me tip it back so cold water rushes over my tongue and down my throat.
“The bit about how you and I met last week, so you had dibs over that chick…” He smiles and wipes a dot of water from beneath my bottom lip. “Turned me on a little.”
“I’m fairly certain watching a tumbleweed in the desert turns you on,” I croak past my aching throat, only to sigh when the cold water hits my stomach. I study his eyes, since he’s literally less than a foot away. “I didn’t know you were a twin.”
; “You knew I had a brother.”
“Yeah, you mentioned him, but…” I shake my head. “I didn’t connect it all. So then that other chick walked out—”
“It pissed you off.”
“Little bit,” I admit.
“See, I told you. You are incapable of having a one-night stand and not catching feels. You’re a marry-up chick, white picket fence, family brunch and all that shit.”
“What the hell are you talking about? We didn’t have a one-night stand. We didn’t sleep together.”
“Exactly.” He lifts my water again and helps tip it back. “We didn’t even have sex, and you’re already throwing down with some chick about how you met me first.”
“I was pissed because you were…” I frown and wipe a hand over my lips. “I thought it was you, and that was rude. I wasn’t mad because I’ve caught feelings. I was mad because you were being rude.”
“You pissed on my leg.” He smiles and places the bottle on the floor. “Do you remember stealing the llama?”
“No!” I’m not sure if I’m happy or sad. Laughing or crying. “I don’t remember much of anything.”
“We are in so much fucking trouble when Dixie reports him as stolen. And the cops will come here first. They always do.”
“If the cops come here first, then why do you have that other statue too?”
“Because I…” He stops for a moment, and frowns. “It’s our turn. It’s just the way it is.”
“And if the cops knock on your front door and ask to come in?”
“Then Rob and I are going to prison. And anyone who is in this apartment at that time is probably also going to prison, because that would make you an accessory.”
“Lovely.” I flop back onto the bed and cover my eyes with my arm. “I’m never going to be able to practice in this town, you know that, right? First, everyone is going to assume I’m sleeping with clients.”
“Just one client,” he inserts, and draws a pattern on my knee with his fingertip.
“And now I’m stealing things, and an accessory to previous crimes.”
“Busy girl. Are you feeling better yet?”