by Jewel E. Ann
Luke had perfected the I-don’t-answer-to-anyone attitude.
“I’m serious, Jones.” She snatched his book and stomped back to the bathroom, depositing it in the toilet along the way. “Lock your fucking door tonight!”
*
Jessica’s stomach screamed at her to hurry up as she applied some light make up and added a few curls to her hair. The aroma of fresh bread and savory herbs wafted up the stairs, enticing her to make her way to the dining room.
“Don’t you look lovely.” Felicity’s welcoming smile eased Jessica’s nerves.
Everyone else was already seated. She chastised herself for wasting so much time plotting Luke’s death when she should have been showering and helping with dinner. Helping with what? Jessica wasn’t sure. She could side a shed or fix a leaky toilet with minimal instruction, but baking fresh bread seemed as intimidating as flying around the world in a hot air balloon.
“Thank you, Felicity. Sorry I’m late.”
“You’re not. My kids are all vultures so they were all early.”
A few chuckles and eye-rolling ricocheted around the table. Jessica made eye contact with Luke as she took a seat next to him. The appreciative smile that stole his lips settled like warm yet sour milk. The stiff, forced smile on hers confirmed it.
“Jessica, this is Lake, our youngest.” Tom leaned over and wrapped his arm around the younger female version of Luke. She was quite possibly the most beautiful teenage girl Jessica had ever seen: high cheek bones, black hair that fell to her shoulders in a chic wedge cut, dark blue eyes, and a model’s body.
“Hi, Lake. Very nice to meet you.”
“You too. So you’re the one who has caught my brother’s attention.”
Jessica placed her napkin on her lap. “I wouldn’t say that. Then again, these days I don’t think it takes much to capture his attention.”
Luke sighed, but only enough for Jessica to feel his exasperation, his displeasure.
Liam cleared his throat. “Well he’s thirty-three and you’re only the second girl he’s brought home … ever.”
Lake shoved a bite of food in her mouth and mumbled over it, proving her manners weren’t as refined as her beauty. Jessica already loved her. “Yeah, but he was engaged to the first girl.”
Like dimming the lights in a theater, silence invaded the room. Everyone’s eyes were on Luke with caution, then Jessica with sympathy, and ending with a scowl for Lake.
“What?” She shrugged. “Sorry, I didn’t know it was top secret.”
“It’s not,” Luke intervened. “Jessica’s not my girlfriend or fiancée, so … it’s fine.”
Everyone relaxed and carried on with dinner, except Felicity and Tom. Jessica could feel their empathetic eyes on her, gauging her reaction to Luke’s clarification. So he had a fiancée, and a lunch date, and possibly a glass or two of wine … so what? He also had something happen to him in college, but what? Why would he tell Jessica, the “not girlfriend or fiancée,” about his personal life?
“Mmm, this is amazing.” Jessica focused on the food and found her smile after taking a bite of her herb-roasted asparagus.
“Thank you. Actually, Luke seasoned the vegetables.”
Jessica dabbed her lips. “Well, looks like he’ll have a talent to fall back on if the mind-manipulation thing doesn’t pan out.”
Laughter bubbled from his family as Luke’s hand rested on her leg. Jessica turned to stone. Her pulse raced like he’d slammed down the accelerator to her heart.
“Ah, my dear friend, Jessica, has such a refreshing sense of humor.” His grip on her leg tightened.
Was it a test? Jessica rested her fork on the table and curled her fingers into a fist, pumping it several times. She wanted to dig her nails into his hand instead of her own. The growing need to throw him on the floor, tear off his clothes, and taste the saltiness of his flesh consumed her.
“Did your lunch date have a refreshing sense of humor?” she asked with a smile, but firmly clenched teeth.
“Aw, Luke … you called me your lunch date. How sweet.” Lake stuck out her pouty lower lip.
Luke smiled and released Jessica’s leg. “Yes, I did. I don’t get many lunch dates … with all the ‘mind-manipulating’ that I do, so it was nice to have one with my favorite Lake.”
Felicity melted in her chair, no doubt touched by Luke’s sentimentality. Jessica, however, was ready to knock out a few teeth.
They coasted through dinner with Luke giving an occasional sidelong glance to Jessica, which she returned with absolutely nothing: not one look, one smile, one word.
“Thank you for dinner, Felicity. I need to go make a phone call.” Jessica stood as everyone finished their dessert.
“You’re very welcome. We’re going out on the houseboat in a little bit so grab a jacket or you can borrow one of mine.”
“Oh … okay.” Jessica retreated to her bedroom and collapsed on the bed.
Luke was heroin in her veins. Just his proximity made her world a better place, yet at the same time he felt like her imminent demise. She was going to need another psychiatrist just to recover from him.
“Jessica?” He knocked on the door.
“Go away … or come on in.” She sighed as he opened the door.
“Do you really have a phone call to make?”
“Yes. But God’s busy right now. His mother/secretary, Mary, took a message. I’m sure he’ll call back later.”
“Do you want to talk?” He sat in the chair he’d been in that morning with the pool stick.
“Not really. Do you?”
“I think we should.”
“Fanflippentabulous! You go first.”
“You’re angry.”
Jessica sat up, pulling her knees to her chest. “You’re judging me.”
“I apologize. You’re right, that wasn’t fair.”
“Why did you want me to believe you had a lunch date when in fact it was your sister?”
“To see how you would react.”
She closed her eyes. “It was a test?”
“Jessica—”
“Did I pass?” Her words were slow and sharp.
Luke leaned forward resting his elbows on his knees. In casual clothes and his hair sporting a slightly-ruffled look, he had the appearance of a normal man capable of speaking uncensored words that hadn’t gone through some politically correct filter.
He looked at her and she waited and waited.
“Sorry, Jones, I can’t understand you, probably because I don’t speak mute. So I’ll just go while you make sure all your words are lined up in perfect order. I don’t really give a damn if I let a few escape that haven’t been given much actual thought. Sometimes emotions matter more than the right words, and if you overthink every goddamn word it’s like suffocating it until all the emotion is gone.”
She swallowed and took a deep breath, still riding that wave of courage. “I thought it was sex, you know? I haven’t had it in … forever: ten months, two weeks, one day, and a few hours. Yes, I’m counting.”
Luke’s attention jumped from the floor to Jessica. She returned a one-shoulder shrug.
“But even after you assured me we would never have sex, as in less than zero percent chance, I still wanted to be with you. And maybe it’s because I can tell you anything, even if I haven’t told you everything, but it feels like something more than that.”
Jessica ran her fingers through her hair. “Does the thought of you on a date with someone make me jealous? Yes. Do I know that some completely put-together girl is going to steal your heart someday? Yes. Does it crush mine? Absolutely.”
She bit her lips together until her eyes blinked back the impending tears. “Am I aware that no matter how brilliant and talented you are I will never be completely right … normal?” She nodded as the words broke from her throat.
Luke would never give her normalcy. At best, he’d give her acceptance.
“You two coming?” Tom yelled from downstairs.
Jessica stood, blotting the corners of her eyes. “Good talk, Jones. Good talk.” She grabbed a hoodie out of her suitcase and slipped it on.
“Jessica?” Luke grabbed her wrist as she walked by him.
“Don’t.” She gave him a sad smile. “You don’t have to say anything. Think of everything I just said as off the record and … forget about it.” She pulled away and headed downstairs.
*
Miles of glassy water under a blanket of stars greeted the Jones family as they all boarded the two-story house boat.
“Are they setting off fireworks tonight?” Lara asked.
“Yes. In about thirty minutes,” Liam answered. “You’re going to love this.” He rested his hand on Jessica’s shoulder.
She smiled, pulling the sleeves of her hoodie over her hands. “I can’t wait. This house boat isn’t too shabby.”
“Our dad bought it at an auction, then completely refurbished it.”
“I’m looking for a sailboat next. You should come help me work on it, Miss Fix-it.” Tom wrapped his arm around Jessica’s shoulders and gave her a squeeze.
“Sure.” She forced as much enthusiasm into her response as possible, knowing it was probably her first and last visit to Luke’s parents’ place.
“There’s drinks and snacks inside and chairs on both the upper and lower decks. Feel free to look around.” Felicity tossed an armful of blankets onto one of the chairs as everyone else crowded inside to grab drinks.
“I’m going to take a look up top.” Jessica pointed toward the stairs.
The view was picturesque from the top deck. Lighted boats dotted the water like glitter and some of the most magnificent homes Jessica had ever seen framed the nearby shores.
“Wine?”
Jessica turned. Luke stood behind her holding two glasses of wine.
“Thank you.” She took one and watched him with a suspicious eye as he sipped from the other. “What are you doing?”
He swallowed, rubbing his lips together. “What do you mean?”
“I mean the wine. You don’t drink wine.”
“Sometimes I do,” he replied, each word slow and laden with so much meaning … so much intention.
The patient that wanted to be nothing more than a woman—his woman—stared at him. It had to be a joke, another test.
He took her glass and set both of them down on a small table.
“Jessica,” he whispered as he moved toward her until her back hit the rail.
She blinked over and over. Her hands itched to touch him. Her skin ached to feel him.
“I don’t want you to feel sorry for me.”
He tugged at the hood strings to her sweatshirt. “I don’t.”
She no longer needed the hoodie. Her body heated like a furnace to a fever pitch, but she didn’t dare move.
“Are you going to kiss me?” she whispered as he moved closer until the space between them evaporated.
“Yes,” he breathed.
His promise caressed her body as much as his touch that moved from her sweatshirt to her face.
She drew in a quick breath and held it while her mind spewed silent chants to any and every God anywhere in the universe that could possibly hear her. She asked for strength and resistance.
“And, Jessica?” He stopped less than an inch from her lips.
“Huh?” she whimpered.
“You’re going to stop before you make me bleed. Got it?”
Nodding in rapid succession, she would have sacrificed her right arm had that been the deal he wanted to make with her.
She jumped, even surprising herself, the instant his lips brushed hers. Her conscience had impeccably stupid timing. He paused, his eyes searched hers.
“What’s the catch?”
“No catch,” he whispered, brushing his lips against hers again: teasing, tasting, tempting.
She covered his hands and pulled back. “There has to be a catch.”
Luke sighed, releasing her. “There’s. No. Catch.”
“You said ‘less than zero percent chance.’ Numbers are my thing, Jones. I know what that means.”
“It’s a kiss, Jessica. Not sex.”
Her head jerked back. “Whoa … clearly you don’t understand. A kiss is a save the date, an RSVP to my vagina that says: You. Will. Be. There.”
Luke rested his hands on his hips and looked to the heavens. Maybe God was taking his call that night.
“So you’ve slept with every guy you’ve kissed?”
“No! But I’ve never kissed a guy that in my head I’ve thought, ‘less than zero percent chance.’”
“You two bay birds envious of our little lake?” Lane asked as he and Anne climbed the last few steps.
“I would be if you had my bridge.” Jessica picked up her wine and took a sip, controlling the urge to gulp down the whole glass.
“Are you a San Francisco native?” Anne asked.
“Yes. I will never leave.”
Lane locked his gaze to Luke’s. “Sounds familiar.”
“I’m attached to my job, not the city.” Luke rested against the railing next to Jessica.
“Is Luke the rebel for not staying in Tahoe and opening a bed and breakfast?” The ten mile Jones’ radius was interesting but the fact that Luke, Lara, and Liam all owned B&Bs too was crazy to Jessica.
Three somber frowns surrounded Jessica. What was she missing? And dare she ask?
“Nah, Luke did what he needed to do. It was for the best.”
A pained expression disguised as a smile stole Luke’s handsome features after Lane’s comment.
“Look!” Anne pointed to the sudden burst of color in the sky.
Lane stood behind Anne, pulling a blanket around them. “There’s another one.” Lane nodded to the extra blanket Anne had set on the lounge chair.
Luke gave Jessica a questioning look.
“I’m fine.” The heat from their moment still clung to her body.
The awkward, junior high dance feeling continued the rest of the evening until everyone arrived back at the house and said their goodnights. Luke followed Jessica up the stairs and stopped as she turned into her room.
“I’ll lock my door.”
She pulled off her hoodie and tucked her dark hair behind her ears. “Maybe I should go to the dungeon.”
“What?” The perplexity in his expression matched that of his voice.
“A BDSM club. What if the only way I can be with someone is if they’re submissive? Maybe I’m a dominatrix and I just don’t know it. I’m sure you think that I have this need to cause pain, but that’s not it. It’s just about the blood.” She plopped down onto the edge of the bed and stared at the floor.
“Does the blood arouse you?”
She shook her head.
“Then I don’t think you’re a dominatrix, and while I’m sure you could hold your own in a dungeon, it’s not where you belong.”
Jessica looked up. “Where do I belong?”
“I’m not sure, but it’s not there.”
They could have been making out like teenagers had she only kissed him on the boat. Instead Jessica was headed for a place far from his lips. She’d fallen in love with Luke and the fact that she didn’t kiss him proved it. Love takes nothing but gives everything. Jessica hadn’t given him everything yet.
“Do you believe in spirits?”
“Spirits?” he questioned.
“Yes, like when someone dies, do you believe they have a spirit that leaves their body?”
“I-I don’t know. I’ve never given it much thought. Why do you ask?”
Her hands began to tremble. She clenched them together to make it stop as he moved to the bed and knelt in front of her. She felt the instant pull of her heart from his nearness.
“Tell me about the spirit.” He tugged at her hands until she released her firm grip, then he held them in his.
“When Four died … I think his spirit transferred to my body.”
“Wh
y?” Luke whispered.
“Because I killed him.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Knight
The Monaghan’s lived in a small ranch style house with mature trees in the front yard and a stunning view of Mt. Hood from their back deck. AJ’s father, Jim, was a mirror image of AJ aged another thirty years, except Jim smiled more. His mom, Charlene “Char,” bubbled with personality as rich as her strawberry and gray hair that fell past her shoulders. She embraced Jillian with all the warmth of a daughter the second they walked through the door.
“I take it your parents don’t buy that I’m your ‘friend.’”
“Why do you say that?” AJ questioned as he set their bags at the foot of the bed.
“They have us sleeping in the same room, genius. Which you realize can’t actually happen.”
“They’re not stupid. The last woman they saw me with was Brooke.”
“Your ex-wife?”
He nodded, tossing the folded blanket from the end of the bed and one of the pillows onto the floor. “Don’t worry, I’ll be sleeping on the floor tonight.”
Jillian pushed him back until he sat on the bed, then she crawled up on his lap. “You told your parents the bruises on your face were from a training incident. Thank you.”
“Yeah, well my mom used to counsel victims of domestic abuse. I’m not sure how she’d feel about her son being one.”
She shoved his shoulders until he fell back. “Domestic abuse? Really? You think I’m abusing you?”
AJ stared at her as he slid his shirt up revealing the bite marks and scratches. Jillian feathered her fingertips over them.
“I’m—”
“Don’t.” He pulled her onto his chest, silencing her with his lips.
Desire stirred a need for him. She shifted her hips to feel his arousal between her legs. His acceptance and forgiveness turned her on as much as his body.
“Not now.” He gripped her waist, ceasing her movement.
She buried her face in his chest and nodded. “You’re right.”
“Up you go.” AJ sat up, lifting her with him and setting her on her feet as if she weighed nothing.
“I’m going to stop … doing that. Okay?” She could do it. She could do it without Luke. There was no other choice. Jackson was right. She had to make a choice between AJ and Jessica.