End of Day (Jack & Jill 1)

“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.