With a tool in each hand, I set off across the street, and Jules is right beside me. Anger rolls off her in waves, rivaling my own.
“My brothers are coming in a bit to help tear some of this out,” I tell her.
“Fine. There’s plenty here they can demolish, but I get to start.”
I unlock the door, and she takes a hammer, hardly flinching at the weight of it, marches right through to the kitchen, and starts fucking swinging.
This is amazing as fuck.
“I hate him!” The hammer crashes through the cabinets. “I hope he’s rotting in hell. I hope every single second is fuckingterrorfor him.”
She rears back and swings again.
Remind me never to piss off my wife.
Jules takes another swing, making the cabinet door fly open. She swings at that, too, and it goes flying across the room.
“Baby, you need some gloves and eye prote?—”
“Don’t fucking tell me what I need.” She rounds on me, her blue eyes fierce as she strips off her shirt and flings it aside. She’s now clad only in a bra from the waist up as she takes another swing. “I’ll tell you what I fucking need. I need to beat the shit out of something.”
Smash.
Crash.
“You’re doing that,” I reply and grin when she spins to glare at me. “Well, you are. But Wildfire, if my brothers see you like this, I’m going to have to kill them because they’ll be looking at what’s mine.”
“It’s a bra, Brooks. The same as a bikini. Are you going to turn into a controlling asshole who tries to tell me what I can and cannot wear? Isthatwho I married?Again?”
“Enough.” All humor fleeing the premises, I tug the hammer out of her hand and toss it aside, then frame her face and make her look up at me. “First of all, compare me to that piece of shiteveragain, and I’ll spank your ass until it’s so red, you won’t sit for a fucking week.”
She swallows, and tears fill her pretty blue eyes.
“Second,thisbra is not the same as a bikini. It’s sheer, sweetheart. I can see your gorgeous-as-fuck nipples. So no, youcan’twear this around anyone but me. Not to mention, it’s not safe to be this undressed while wood is splintering all over the fucking place.”
All the fight leaves her body, and she leans into me, taking a shuddering breath. It just about breaks my heart.
“I am so mad.”
My hands roam up and down her back, and I kiss the top of her head.
“I know. Youshouldbe mad, Jules. You were lied to and manipulated, and it’s so fucking unfair. You didn’t deserve that.”
We stand here for another minute, and then I hear the front door open.
“Hello?” Beckett calls out.
“In the kitchen,” I yell back. Jules hurries to pull her top over her head and then wipes her cheeks dry. “Are you okay, baby?”
“Yeah.” She sniffs and then smiles at Beck as he walks into the kitchen. He pauses, glances around, and then narrows his eyes at me.
“What the fuck did you do?” he demands.
“Gave her a hammer,” I reply. “And if you evenhintat the idea that I would have hurt her in any way, I’ll tear your stomach out through your fucking belly button.”
“Wow, that’s descriptive,” Bridger says as he also walks in. “You guys okay?”
“We’re fine,” Jules says. “We’re not fighting. Honest. I’m going to let you guys handle this and head to the restaurant. They’ve been filling in for me this morning.”
