Page 63 of Wired Justice

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Jake tooka shower on his side of the motel room, while Sophie did the same on hers. He paid for a Chinese food delivery, and carried the bag to the connecting door between their rooms, wearing only a towel as he knocked. She seemed to have liked that before. Who was he to mess with something that worked?

Sophie opened the door. Jake struck a pose, tightening his abs. “Your beefcake delivery.” He held up the bag.

“Beefcake? Not sure what that is, but I wouldn’t mind a bite of what’s in front of me.”

Jake laughed. “Is my Sophie flirting?”

“I am able to learn new skills. Many new skills. But first I need food.” She plucked the bag from his fingers. Jake followed her over to the coffee table, tightening the towel to prevent a mishap.

“Did you feed the dogs?” he asked. As if hearing themselves mentioned, the two rascals stuck their heads around the bed inquisitively.

“These two aren’t about to let me forget anything to do with them,” Sophie said. The dogs advanced, looking hopefully at the Chinese food containers Sophie extracted from the bag and set on the coffee table. “We shouldn’t give them anything. Particularly Tank. He needs his digestive system built back up.”

They ate on the narrow couch side-by-side, occasionally feeding each other choice bits with the chopsticks. Jake savored the companionship as much as the food. Just knowing how well they had worked together today satisfied him on some deep level.

Sophie’s phone buzzed, dancing a little circle on the coffee table. She picked it up. Her brows drew together in a frown. “It’s . . . someone important. I have to take this.”

Sophie pressed the phone to her ear. She got up and walked into his room, and shut the connecting door firmly between them.

The good feelings Jake had been reveling in evaporated. “Son of a bitch.” He threw down his chopsticks and picked up the Kirin beer he’d ordered with the meal, taking a long swig to cool his temper.

Who was she talking to that she wouldn’t tell him about?Alika? That helicopter-flying businessman was going to snake his woman right out from under him if Jake wasn’t careful.

He didn’t know what to do.

Sophie had told him they were partners with benefits, nothing more.

She had told him being jealous was a turn-off . . . but the thought of her and Alika together made Jake want to rip something apart. He’d managed to keep his attitude in check when she was dating that Todd guy, but barely.

Maybe he wasn’t okay with this situation, after all.Maybe he couldn’t do “partners with benefits” casual sex, at least with Sophie. He’d certainly had no problem with that in the past.

But the secrets she was keeping, just like the many times she’d abandoned him, didn’t feel good. Jake wasn’t keeping anything from her.

Getting Sophie into bed had been a place to start. If he could make her feel good, he could build a connection, and maybe she’d come to feel the same way about him . . . but it didn’t seem to be working.

She was the one who made him feel good, even when he was just trying to get her out of her depression, make her lose herself in pleasure. And every time she shut him out, put distance between them, told him he didn’t matter, it hurt worse.

But what was the alternative? Breaking things off?

They’d barely gotten started. He couldn’t wait to touch her again, couldn’t stop thinking about how she felt, tasted, sounded, sighed. All day, little memory bits from their night together had come back to distract him. She had come to mean way too much for him to just turn off feelings that had been building, on his side at least, since the day they met.

If only he had someone to talk to.

His sister Patty came to mind. Jake was the oldest, and he and his younger sister, Monica, had fought all their lives like wet cats, but his youngest sister, Patty, had always been a friend. She looked up to him, and had been a real cling-on after their father left the family when Jake was a teen. It had taken Mom years of taking Dad to court to squeeze the bottom line out of that selfish prick.

Such a screwed-up cliché.He despised his father. Jake never made promises he couldn’t keep, and when he finally settled down, it would be for life—which was why he was extra careful not to get emotionally involved—except that it had sneaked up on him.

“Shit,” Jake muttered, and finished his beer.

Patty had married a good guy a couple years ago and had a baby on the way. She might know how to advise him.

Wearing the towel seemed silly, now, freakin’ embarrassing, and he couldn’t go outside when he desperately needed to move and discharge his angst. A run would be perfect. He would just have to go get his clothing from his room . . .

Jake speed-dialed Patty as he finished the last of a container of mu-shu pork.

“My favorite big brother! You never call. Who died?” Patty actually sounded worried.

---