Amanda shook her head. No she couldn’t run away again. That’s the sort of thing you do when you are young, stupid and impulsive. She was a mature woman now, though her actions recently would probably dictate otherwise.
What if she was pregnant? Jake would never let her go if she was. She would be tied down to him whether she wanted to be or not. He would never let her walk away with his child. He would find her, hunt her down. Drag her back kicking and screaming every step of the way.
And then she really would be in a whole heap of trouble. So what now?
The peel on her doorbell broke through her thoughts. She looked at the clock on the wall. Who the hell was that at seven thirty in the evening? Why couldn’t she just have some peace? How hard could it be?
She waited a few minutes, perhaps whoever it was would think that she was not home and would go away
The doorbell chimed once more and she let out a frustrated sigh. Reluctantly she got up off the sofa and slowly made her way out through the hallway and to the front door.
“Jake.” She exclaimed in sick horror as she opened the door and looked at him standing on her doorstep. He looked tired she noted.
He did not say a word but just barged in and went into her living room leaving her alone at the front door staring after him. “Come in, why don’t you.” She drawled sarcastically.
Oh great. That was all she needed, or rather didn’t need, another fight with Jake to complete her horrible day.
She took a deep breath, which did not work, trying to prepare herself for world war three. She closed her front door and as slowly as she could she walked across the small hallway to the front room.
She stood at the threshold of the door. Not wishing to step into the room completely as she looked at Jake’s back. He was turned to her fireplace. One hand on the mantel. “Jake?” she waited for his response but none came for a long time and then when he did speak he said.
“Have you eaten yet?” he asked in a still quiet voice. But he still did not turn around to face her. Amanda frowned, the question caught her off guard. She had not been expecting an invitation to dinner.
“Ah… no.”
“Grab a coat. I’ll take you to dinner.” He commanded. Amanda’s spine stiffened.
“Jake I am not in the mood right now.” She explained.
“I said grab your coat.” His voice dropped. He was angry.
“I was going to grab a sandwich and turn in for the night.” She tried again.
“I said grab your coat.” Jake barked, shouting it out. Amanda jumped and stepped back. She had never heard Jake shout. Never. Certainly not that explosively.
Amanda’s heart raced as fear took hold. Jake never got that angry. Never. She could have given in but she had to stand her ground. If she gave in this once then he would see it as a weakness and then he would use it every time.
“I am not going to let you order me about.” She told him. She kept her voice low and slow. Just in case. She heard him curse.
“Can’t you just get your coat?” Frustration entered his tone then.
“I do not want to go out and have dinner with you.” She said more firmly.
“Does everything have to be a fight with you?” He sounded weary now, and Amanda felt her resolve melting away. It would be so easy to give into him. But then she caught herself.
“Apparently yes.” She heard him sigh jadedly.
“Mandy, just get your damn coat.” His voice rose again and Amanda balled her fists to keep herself from jumping at the steel edge in his tone.
“Or what?” she challenged him, her chin raising in defiance.
It all happened so fast that Amanda did not have time to even take a step back.
Jake had been standing at her fireplace, his back to her and a hand on the mantel one second and then the next he whirled round fast. Coming at her at a fast pace.
He did not bother walking around her sofa. Instead he stepped up onto it and jumped down the other side. Neither did he stop when he had reached her.
His arm came round her waist. Her feet left the ground. Her body slammed hard against him that knocked the air from her lungs. Her arms now pinned to her sides because she hadn’t even managed to hold them up when he had come at her.
“Are you trying to provoke me?” he asked lifting an eyebrow. There was a tinge of amusement lurking in their depths now.
“No.” Her mouth was dry and her voice was small. “I just don’t see why I should let you order me around. I am not a little lap dog that’s at your every beck and call.”
His scent filled her nostrils, his body heat invaded hers. Warming her at an alarming rate. Her heart rate increased and she felt the tremors of pleasure and just a little sliver of fear went through her, but even that excited her.
She closed her eyes and breathed in his heady scent and she heard him groan loudly as his arm tightened around her. She felt her feet land on the floor and she opened her eyes to look up at him. His face was close to hers. Almost touching.
“You are the most damned frustrating woman I have ever had the misfortune of meeting. Do you know that?”
“Then let me make it easy for you. Leave.” Even as she said the words her heart sank at the prospect of not being in his arms and she shivered.
“Trust me that don’t help. Even when you are not there, you are there.” He told her as he bent his head. His lips found the pulse ticking in her neck and she sighed and made a noise in her throat.
Jake walked and Amanda had no choice but to mirror his movements backwards. She jumped as she felt something hit the top of her legs and she opened her eyes. She was looking up at the ceiling of her kitchen.
Jake leaned closer, using the weight of his body to gently push her down and she found herself sitting on the edge of her kitchen table.
She felt the breeze on her skin as Jake removed her top and then her bra followed quickly. In between he lavished little kisses on her. At her collar bone. Her ear lobe. The column of her throat. The corner of her mouth. The tip of her nose.
She heard the zip on her skirt. He pulled her up against him once more, his hands around her waist as he kissed along her jaw.
His hands smoothed over her hips, pushing down the skirt and her underwear and then she was sitting back on the table. His lips came to hers then and he kissed her deeply as he bent down pushing her back so that she was lying on the table. Jake’s hands on the table either side of her holding his body weight.
“Jake.” She murmured.
“Why are you driving me insane?” he demanded roughly against her. “Do you have any idea what you are doing to me?” did he have any idea what he was doing to her?
She heard more rustling of material. His chest was bare now. And Amanda ran her fingers over the hard muscles.
Jake stood up and looked down on her. She watched him as he lifted her knees and then parted her legs. Then he was filling her and she cried out.
He thrust deep, a hand coming up to her ribcage, across her abdomen and then lower until he had found the sensitive nub. She arched her back as he tormented her.
She felt exposed. Lying on her table. Jake standing looking down on her. Looking down on what he was doing to her.
She tried to sit up. To close the gap between them so that she did not need to be so self-conscious. So that he could not stare at her. But his other hand slid up her abdomen to gently push her back down. “I want to watch you.” He told her.
She felt awkward being laid so bare to him. She felt embarrassed by it. “I like watching you.” Jake tried to ease her embarrassment.
He could see the tight lines of her face. He knew that she wasn’t finding it easy being watched by him. But he couldn’t help it. He looked down at what his thumb was doing and then watched himself sliding in and out of her. Damn how hot did that look?
He looked at her face, at her full breasts as they gently bounced with each thrust.
She felt the tension in her muscles as her excitement built. S
he moaned as it grew stronger. Jake’s thrusts became more urgent. Faster. Deeper. His thumb quickening becoming firmer as he drove her closer to the edge.
Jake felt her body go still, her muscles clenched tight. He watched as her breathing stopped and she held her breath. He knew that meant she was almost there. He loved the way everything stopped for a few seconds before she came. Like everything had ceased for her except that overwhelming feeling as she teetered on the edge. Surfing the highest point of her orgasm before she fell over the edge.
He felt the tightening of her muscles that were wrapped around him. It felt fantastic, so right. Any second now and she would be shivering and shuddering against him.
She stilled completely, her fingers spread out as a moan tore from her. She arched her back and then it happened. She cried out as she fell over the edge. Shivering and shuddering against his hand. Around him. And then he felt his own and he was following her over the edge.
Soon they both stilled. Their breathing hard. Jake pulled her up and wrapped his arms around her. Her forehead coming to rest on his collar bone. Their bodies warm and slick with sweat from the aftermath of their lovemaking.
Jake tangled his fingers into her hair. Stroked her back lovingly as her breathing calmed.
Amanda felt Jake move and then he was speaking to her. She didn’t hear what he said, still too dazed to take anything in other than the pleasurable exhaustion that had invaded her body. She looked up.
“Here.” He said and she felt one of her large bath towels wrap around her. He had obviously reached out to take it from the pile on the side.
“Thank you.” She said weakly looking down. Not being able to look Jake directly in the eye.
“Mandy.” His voice low, urgent. She looked up at him. He smiled down at her, using his hands to smooth her hair away from her face as though she were a small child. His lips touched hers in a gentle kiss. Amanda groaned. She knew where this was heading… again.
“We shouldn’t be doing this.” She tried to save herself.
“Too late Mandy. We’ve already done it.” He told her in a raspy husky voice. “Three times now.”
“We shouldn’t be doing this again.” She corrected.
“I’m good to go. What about you.” Jake said. Amanda put her hands to his chest and pushed at him.
“No really, we shouldn’t be doing this.” Jake kissed slowly down the column of her throat.
“Why not?” Jake asked her.
“You… are… my brother.” It was a very weak excuse and she knew that. Knew that even more when Jake stilled briefly and then she felt his lips against her throat curve into a smile as he chuckled throatily, delightedly.
“So…” he began as his tongue touched her pulse ticking away in her neck. “I am your brother when it suits you. What ever happened to…? I’m not your anything Mr Michelson.” Amanda’s own words from his seductive lips taunted her mercilessly.
“Jake I mean it. Stop it.” She said in a firmer voice.
“What’s done is done. Why still fight it Mandy? You don’t have to. I’ve told you I won’t think any less of you if you give in. I wish you would.”
“That’s because you like to win.” She told him and his body stiffened.
“I won’t deny that. But that’s not the reason.”
“Then what is the reason. What do you gain from this?” She asked him. She heard him take a breath and her heartbeat quickened. She wasn’t ready for the answer. She should not have asked the question. “No.” The word exploded from her mouth in panic. “Don’t say it.” And then she pushed at his chest. She needed to put distance between them. She had made more than enough of a fool of herself not once, not twice but three times.
Jake stepped away from her without a fight and Amanda felt the bitter sting of disappointment that he hadn’t put up more of a fight.
He turned from her, retrieving his shirt from the floor and adjusting his trousers. She used the time to wrap the bath sheet around herself and tuck it under her arms in a sarong. At least now she felt as though she were dressed. Jake turned to her and they stared at one another for several moments.
“You should want me to stop not because I am your brother but because of your husband.” Jake reminded her in a quiet still voice.
He had her there and Amanda knew it. Why had she not thought of that? Because, she had been enjoying his kisses. His touch. His lovemaking. She felt her cheeks flush hot.
“Of course… my husband.” She agreed.
“Where is he?” Jake asked her.
“Out.” She did not elaborate. Adding more lies would only lead to a lot more trouble. Certainly more than she could handle. Jake shouldn’t be so nosey anyway. It was none of his business.
“Why don’t you wear any rings?” he asked her.
“What?” a confused frown creased her forehead.
“Rings. You know… rings.” She watched Jake’s eyebrows lift as he regarded her.
“Erm…” she said.
“Your engagement ring and your wedding ring. Don’t women want those things when they get married?”
“I…” she instinctively looked down at her ring less fingers. Why couldn’t she think of the little details like Jake? Because she was not accustomed to deceiving people, like Jake was, she decided.
“Well?” he continued relentlessly. He was not going to leave it alone until she gave him an answer.
“I… I took them off.” She told him.
“Why?”
“When I was… cleaning. I just haven’t had the time to put them back on yet.” She decided right there and then that that had to be the feeblest of all excuses that she had ever come up with.
“Why don’t you do it now, while you remember?” He told her.
“What?”
“Your rings. You could pop them on now seeing as I have reminded you of it. I would love to see them.” Jake flashed her a wide wolf like grin.
Alarm bells clanged in her head and her heart beat so painfully in her chest that she thought that Jake must be able to see it. Like in the cartoons.
Her mind scrambled for something to say. She had no rings upstairs that she could put on to bluff her way out of it. In fact, she had very little jewellery. It had not been on her list of priorities over the last few years.
Keeping a roof over her head and food in her stomach had been the biggest focus she had had.
“Ah… actually… they are at the office.”
“Your office?”
“Yes. It was my office I was cleaning.”
“How very convenient for you.” Jake told her sarcastically. Her head snapped up and she squared her shoulders.
“What do you mean by that?” She demanded hotly. Instantly bristling.
“Oh, you are not that dense.” He drawled. No she wasn’t. She should come clean now. Sure Jake would be angry. But she knew that he would be relieved.
He would have some words to say to her, some would not be very nice, but she would survive that. She was in no danger from him. He would never hurt her, she knew that.
She already had the feeling that he suspected that she wasn’t telling the truth. He kept hinting at it, trying to give her the opportunity to come clean, she knew that too. What was the point of keeping up a pretence that was fooling no one?
“Jake, there is something I have been meaning to tell you.” She looked down at her hands and nervously played with her slender fingers.
“I’m listening.” He said quietly.
“Well… things did get a little… out of hand.” She began but then stopped as she tried to calm her racing heart.
“Go on.” He urged her. Amanda’s heart sank. He was not going to make this easy for her, was he? “Not a chance.” Jake assured her, answering her unspoken thoughts.
“Well the thing is… I… Alan… that is. Alan is.” Just say it, she told herself, just say what needs to be said and then it will be over. Done with.
“Alan is… what?” Jake prompted he
r.
“Well if you would let me speak. I mean really Jake. It is very hard to concentrate when I’ve got you looming over me like some overbearing big brother. And for your information I don’t like that.”
“Mandy.” Jake rose his voice to get over hers and she stopped immediately. “I am not going to let you change the subject. You do that a lot when you get uncomfortable. Haven’t you worked out yet, that that’s why we end up having so many arguments?”
“We end up arguing because we hate each other Jake.”
“We argue because you seem to be able to handle that better than all the other stuff. You use it to protect yourself. So that you don’t give yourself away. Too late, you have already given yourself away. I knew why you did it when you were fifteen and sixteen. Mum knew it. Dad knew it.”
“No.” she shook her head at him.
“And you know it. You pretend that you don’t know it. But you know it.” Jake told her confidently.
“No.” She denied instantly.
“Yes. Getting angry with me was the only way to channel all that sexual frustration you feel building up whenever you are around me.”
“That’s not true.” She sighed and took a breath. This was fast going to become a shouting match between them and Amanda was suddenly very tired.
She no longer wished to continue this. The argument or having Jake here. She wanted him to go. “Alan is a fantastic husband and I love him.” She jutted out her chin in defiance.
The atmosphere in the room changed instantly. It grew colder, quieter, as they stared at one another. Jake’s face clouded over and she tell that he was angry now.
“Alan is an idiot.” He told her. “A good for nothing sorry excuse for a man. A pathetic waste of space.” How dare he insult Alan like that? Amanda felt her blood begin to boil.
“Alan is a good man… underneath it all.” She defended.
“A good man.” Jake snorted in disgust and Amanda folded her arms across her chest.
“Alan is my husband.” She informed him tartly. “And he is a good man.”
“The man is nothing more than a vulture and I refuse to believe that you were short sighted enough not to have seen it.”
Battle Lines. Page 15
