Clash(3)

“What am I going to do with you, Luce?” he threw back at me, his voice carefully controlled.

The pieces of the man I loved were fitting back together. The rage monster was retreating back into his cage. “Since you’ve almost got me topless, I’ll let you fill in the blanks to that question,” I implied, arching a brow as I turned to face him.

His eyes weren’t liquid like they usually were when we were sharing or about to share an intimate moment. The corners of his mouth weren’t twitching in anticipation. Jude was a pillar of control looking down on me like I’d just behaved like a child.

“Don’t do that again, Luce,” he said, folding the ribbon in his hands before stuffing it into his pocket.

“What?” I said with a shrug, feigning ignorance. I was starting to feel a little belligerent. I didn’t like being talked down to, most of all by Jude.

“You know what.”

I could feel a glower settling into position on my face. “Since I’ve obviously disappointed you, I wouldn’t want to do it again, so why don’t you spell it out for me?”

I cursed myself. The only thing that would result from fighting fire with fire would be some nasty first-degree burns. Jude and I didn’t need our relationship to get any more complicated, so why was I pounding on complicated’s door?

Sucking in a slow breath, I witnessed the effort it took for him to stay calm. He was making the effort to keep this from blowing up into a screaming match‌—‌why wasn’t I?

“Don’t let another man, tight wearing fairy or not, help you out of your clothes again,” he said, his eyes narrowing just enough to know some scalding emotions were firing through him right now. “If you need help out of so much as a sock, you call me, you got it? That’s my job.”

Super. The possessive, over-bearing police were back in town. It seemed as of late, they wanted to take up permanent residence. He could deny it all he wanted, but over-bearing implied he didn’t trust me, and call me a fool, but trust wasn’t only pivotal to a relationship, it was essential.

“Got it, Luce?” he said when I stayed quiet.

God, I loved him. Too much for my sanity’s own good, but I would not be commanded. “No, Jude. I don’t ‘got it,’” I said, a stage away from smoke billowing out of my nose. “So why don’t you go wait outside and let that sink in while I finished getting undressed?

“Alone,” I added before he could open his mouth to object. Because if he did, I wouldn’t be able to say no.

He paused, looking at me with indecision written on his face. Finally, he nodded. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll be right outside.”

“Is that so you can scare off any other guys who might help me with my costume, or just because you’re waiting patiently and respectfully for your girlfriend?” I said, turning and heading back over to my bag.

Jude’s sigh was as long as it was tortured. “Both,” he said just above a whisper before he closed the door behind him.

As soon as he was gone, I felt it. Guilt. Remorse. Followed up by a potent dose of regret.

I knew what I was getting into when Jude and I got back together at the start of the year. I went in willingly with both eyes open; I’d gladly gone in. Jude had been through more shit than any one person should and along with that came certain characteristics that could be classified as less than savory.

But you took the bad with the good. And when it came to Jude Ryder Jamieson, there was a surplus of good that always managed to not necessarily wipe the bad clean, but to make it a fair trade. If I was pointing fingers at who was damaged, I might as well turn that finger around, because I was no innocent, flawless flower.

That was part of the beauty of us being together. It was also part of the problem.

I had as many triggers that ticked at my temper and as many ghosts from my past as Jude did. When his anger flamed, mine responded in kind, and vice versa. The last two minutes case in point.

Then, as it always did, the anger I’d felt towards Jude shifted towards me. If I’d taken a time out to take a step inside Jude’s size twelve Converse, what would I have said or done if I’d walked on in some girl assisting him out of his clothes.

Shrugging into my sweater, I realized my reaction would not have been that far off from his. In fact, my claws would have been mid-swipe before he could open his mouth to explain. The old Jude, the one pre-Lucy, would have kicked ass first and asked questions later. The new Jude, although still not an anger management graduate, had managed to let words diffuse the situation. Not his fists.

Progress. Significant progress he’d made for me. And how had I repaid it?