End of Day (Jack & Jill #1) (6 page)

AJ scowled, jaw clenched, then turned around. “About?”

“I hauled away some trash for them the other day, and I noticed there was a broken fish tank in the pile. Looked like a pretty nice one. Anyway, I was going to see if they had a new one yet. My daughter has one she no longer uses and I’m sure she’d be willing to sell it to them for a decent price.”

Red. That’s all AJ could see, and he could feel his pulse in the vein on his forehead. “Something tells me they’ve already replaced it. But I assure you, I’ll have a word with them about it.”

“Great, let me know what you find out.”

AJ shot Cage a belligerent look, slit eyes daring him to so much as let his lips twitch into anything resembling a sign of amusement. “Let’s go.”

T
he woman that
attempted to settle in Jillian Knight’s body would never have been able to sell sex toys. She knew the only people who required battery-operated plastic and silicon devices were lazy and unimaginative dolts who didn’t have a clue how to use their God-given parts for pleasure. If a guy wanted her restrained during sex, he would have to physically overpower her. But in the spirit of new beginnings, Jillian decided she’d sell sex toys better than the Pope sold religion.

Jackson left to get paint and more alcohol. They both agreed when their new jobs started they would cut back on the booze and act like grownups again instead of college kids during rush week. Jillian took the opportunity to soak in the huge master bathroom tub, in need of some peace and quiet to reflect on her new life. Much to her aggravation, the doorbell rang just as she settled into the steamy abyss laced with her favorite fragrance: gardenia.

“Go away,” she mumbled to herself with her head resting back, eyes closed.

It rang again and again at more frequent intervals until she was ready to break the finger of the perpetrator.
Go the fuck away!

The water sloshed everywhere as she stepped out and wrapped a satin robe around her soap-slicked body, cinching the tie with a few expletives whispered to no one in particular, then slapped her wet feet against the hard floor to the front door.

“What?” she answered, throwing open the door.

For the second day in a row, AJ stood on her front door stoop wearing a pissed-off expression that somehow excluded his eyes, which took liberty with her body in ways that both exhilarated and frightened her. “How stupid do you really think I am?”

Jillian narrowed her eyes, lips twisted to the side. “Well, given your high military ranking I would have said average to normal intelligence, but since you decided to incessantly ring my doorbell like a five-year-old doped up on sugar, I’m now inclined to say somewhere between borderline deficiency in intelligence and feeble-mindedness.”

“I have an IQ of one-twenty-two. Where’s your
husband
?” He stepped into the house, forcing Jillian to retreat.

She loved watching his whole body tense as his strong chest heaved with each wrathful breath. “You tell me, Sherlock. Where is my
husband
?” Jillian rooted herself in place. She vowed that no man was going to intimidate her, not ever again.

AJ barged past her to the living room, then the bedrooms. Yet, somehow she knew he wasn’t looking for Jackson. A few minutes after he stomped down the stairs. She decided to follow him.

“Find what you’re looking for?” she asked, stopped at the bottom step.

AJ stood with his back to her, thick muscled arms crossed over his chest. He stared at the patched wall. “You broke into my place.”

“No … more like broke through. We were exercising, sparring actually. It was Heineken’s fault.”

He turned. “I’m not talking about the wall! I’m talking about the cheap-ass fish tank full of fucking Betta fish that have killed each other and the piss-poor paint matching.”

Jillian waved him off. “I didn’t break in for that. I went through the front door, without breaking it. Someone wasn’t using their
one-twenty-two
IQ when they decided to hide their house key in the most original place ever—under a planter.”

Her muscles clenched in rigid defense from the speed that AJ used to close the distance between them. The extra few inches of the bottom step put them closer to eye-level.

“Jackson is your brother.” His deep voice vibrated, devoid of any question. She felt his warm breath inches from her mouth as his icy words wrapped around her nerves.

“He is.” She eased a slow swallow, unwilling to show emotion.

“So are you a liar or just a real sick bitch?”

Jillian shrugged as her eyes focused on his lips. But she didn’t crave their warmth or the feel of them against hers; she craved the metallic taste that would bleed from them. “Depends on the day.”

He grabbed her left arm and just as quickly she struck his nose, not enough to break it, just enough to give a warning and make his eyes water. She surprised herself. That survival instinct was still there and it smothered the quick flash of regret.

“Chain of command,
Sergeant
! You touch me without permission and there will be consequences.”

AJ released her arm and dabbed the slow drip of blood from his left nostril. A grin pulled at his lips—a grin that surprised Jillian and she let her guard slip. As if he timed her blink just right, he had her pinned facedown on the stairs, hands restrained at her back with his whole body bearing down on hers. “That’s
Senior Master Sergeant
to you,” he whispered in her ear as she struggled beneath him.

She gasped as he sucked and bit the back of her neck with bruising force, his erection pressed to her ass. Why did that turn her on so damn much?

“Fuck you!” She wriggled an arm free and landed a solid blow to his ribs, allowing her to break free for a split second before he had her pinned down again, chest-to-chest, face-to-face. The sash to her robe loosened in the struggle and left her robe open, her naked flesh against his clothed body. His eyes searched her face for a long moment, and the instant his expression softened, lips closing in on hers, she head-butted him.

“Goddammit!” AJ growled.

Jillian wiggled out and shoved him back onto the floor. She re-tied her robe, wild eyes holding his gaze, both of them breathless.

Luke … she couldn’t stop thinking about Luke. The stranger on her floor was Luke. He had to be Luke. Her body belonged to Luke. He was her heart. Luke was her entire world.

She closed her eyes and told her brain to stop! Luke was gone … forever. Even if her mind couldn’t accept that and move on … her body needed to. Jillian was not Jessica. Period.

“Is it weird that your coveting-the-neighbor’s-wife thing turns me on?” Straddling his body, she lowered one inch at a time. AJ’s hands slid up her bare legs beneath her robe.

“You’re fucked-up.”

“Pot. Kettle. Black.” She smirked.

His jaw clenched as she pressed her lips to his neck; his hands made a painful claim to her hips. Driven by a need with a pulse and voice of its own, she curled her fingers around the neck of his T-shirt, stretching it down until hungry lips brushed over the firm ridge of his collarbone.

His body was stone beneath hers as she moved her mouth back up his neck, slow and calculated like a wasp getting ready to sting. And that’s what she did. She flicked her tongue against his, then taking his lower lip between her teeth, she bit him—hard.

“Fuck!” Releasing her hips he brought his hand to his mouth.

Jillian stood, smiling as her tongue swept along her lips tasting his blood. It tasted like control. She wasn’t an animal—she was a survivor. It was a ridiculous justification, but it’s all she had. “My water’s probably cold. Show yourself out.”

Without so much as a curious glance back, she walked up the stairs, shed her robe, slipped back into the bubbly water, and gave herself the most explosive orgasm she’d had in too many months to count.

*

Smoke and rust.
Jillian specifically told her
ignoramus
brother she wanted to paint the living room pewter and pumpkin.

“Close enough.” Jackson dipped the wooden stirrer into the thick, dark orange liquid.

“You’re such a guy,” she mumbled, arranging the drop cloths.

“Why the mood? I thought you were going to take a relaxing bath.”

“I did, but it got interrupted, and then I had to finish in lukewarm water.”

“Interrupted?”

Jillian bit back her grin. “Yes. Sarge.”

Jackson poured the paint into the roller pan. “What did he want?”

Twisted lips hid a dubious smile as her eyes rolled to the ceiling. “Hmm … let me think. He wanted to know where you were, and then he made the brilliant observation … well, at least I think it was an observation and not a question … that you are my brother.”

He glanced up, one eye squinted. “It’s pretty messed up that we let anyone believe it in the first place.”

She grinned. “Yes. But in our defense, we never told anyone we were married, and the truth is … we’re about as messed-up as they come.”

“So he came over just to let you know he’s on to us?”

“Not exactly. I think he was on a mission to solve a mystery.”

Jackson pulled off his T-shirt exposing his freakishly fit, tattooed torso that always seemed to clinch the deal when he wanted to get laid. “What mystery is that?”

“I think he wanted to see our downstairs wall to confirm we were the perpetrators that broke into his house. Apparently Betta fish don’t get along.”

Jackson rested his hands on his hips and leaned forward. “
We
?
You
broke into his house, and why the hell didn’t you replace the fish with the same type he had before?”

Jillian pinched her bottom lip between her thumb and forefinger. “I was tired, and hungover, and—”

“Stupid?”

“It was just a lapse in judgement. Sam Walton’s will do that to you.”

He handed her a beer, a paint brush, and a side of disapproving brotherly eye rolling. They tapped their bottles, cranked up the music, and attacked the white walls. By midnight they were delightfully buzzed, covered in paint—some of which did make it onto the walls—and ready to dive into the next color when the doorbell rang.

They shared blank stares, of course wondering if the doorbell did in fact ring or if their ears were as impaired as the rest of their bodies.

“Who could that be? Don’t these people go to bed by eight?” Jillian snickered.

Jackson lifted his shoulders then opened the door. “Hey, AJ. Is everything okay?”

Jillian peeked around Jackson. With wide, glassy eyes she checked out AJ’s swollen lip and small knot on his forehead. Hers was concealed by hair.

“No. Everything is not okay. It’s after midnight and you’ve had the music so fucking loud over here I can’t sleep!”

Jackson’s lips puckered into an O as he grimaced. “Sorry about that. I think we’re ready to call it a night.” He turned. “Right,
Sis
?”

Jillian’s wry grin was meant for Jackson, but AJ’s eyes narrowed into slits of displeasure as if they were making him the butt of their joke—and maybe they were. But even in her foggy, relaxed state, she couldn’t stop thinking about the heat from his lips, the taste of his tongue, and how his hands sliding up her bare legs took her halfway to her bathtub orgasm.

“Yes, we’re going to bed, but not together. We only do that on April 10, National Sibling Day. Oh and Twins Day, which is coming up sometime in August … I think. But it’s an unofficial day so we don’t always celebrate it.”

Jackson snorted out a laugh. “She’s full of shit.”

Jillian found her intoxicated eyes lingering on AJ’s bare feet and large defined calves. The right one had a serpent tattoo wrapped around it. She imagined tracing it with her tongue.

“I’m aware of that. Just try to be more respectful of the noise level.” AJ cleared his throat.

Jillian’s eyes flicked up to his, but his quickly cut to Jackson’s.

“Will do. Good night, AJ.” Jackson shut the door before AJ even turned away.

“Fuck, Jill! You have to stop that shit.”

M
ost brothers remember
how bratty their little sisters were or how they were treated like a princess. Jackson’s sister hated being called “younger,” but that’s what she was, at least in his mind. Jillian was born seven minutes after Jackson, and rarely did a day go by that he didn’t remind her of it.

When he thought of his sister, it was usually the ghost of her innocence. It was the young teenage girl that watched a video on slaughter houses and declared never to eat meat again. He remembered the shrill scream of her racing across a room to save a spider from its near death as their father prepared to snuff out its life under his shoe. She shooed him away then coaxed the spider onto a piece of paper to set it free in the backyard.

Jillian walked away from the front door, refusing to acknowledge him. She always hid her regret behind a pile of denial.

“What happened to you?” he asked, his voice a notch calmer. “You’re not that person anymore. You shouldn’t even want to be that person. She died. Let. Her. Go.”