Twisted Hate: An Enemies with Benefits Romance

To be fair, Josh was the one who’d insisted on calling me JR first. It was short for Jessica Rabbit, the cartoon character. Some people might take it as a compliment, but when you were a redhead with double Ds, the constant comparison got old fast, and he knew it.

“Drinking alone?” Josh shifted his attention to the empty bar stools on either side of me. It wasn’t peak happy hour yet, and the most coveted seats were the booths lining the oak-paneled walls, not at the bar. “Or have you already scared off everyone within a twenty-foot radius?”

“Funny you should mention scaring people off.” I eyed the woman standing next to Josh. She was beautiful, with brown hair, brown eyes, and a lithe body clad in an incredible graphic-print wrap dress. Too bad her good taste didn’t extend to men, if she was on a date with him. “I see you’ve recovered from your bout of syphilis long enough to sucker another unsuspecting woman into a date.” I directed my next words to the brunette. “I don’t know you, but I already know you could do way better. Trust me.”

Did Josh actually have syphilis? Maybe. Maybe not. He slept around enough I wouldn’t be surprised if he did, and I wouldn’t be upholding girl code if I didn’t warn Wrap Dress about the possibility of contracting an STD.

Instead of recoiling, she laughed. “Thanks for the warning, but I think I’ll be okay.”

“Making jokes about STDs. How original.” If Josh was bothered by me insulting him in front of his date, he didn’t show it. “I hope your oral arguments are more creative, or you’ll have a tough time in the legal world. Assuming you pass the bar, of course.”

His mouth curved into a smirk, revealing a tiny dimple in his left cheek.

I held back a snarl. I hated that dimple. Every time it popped up, it mocked me, and I wanted nothing more than to stab it with a knife.

“I’ll pass,” I said coolly, reining in my violent thoughts. Josh always brought out the worst in me. “Better hope you don’t get sued for medical malpractice, Joshy, or I’ll be the first to offer my services to the other party.”

I’d busted my ass to get a spot at Thayer Law and a job offer from Silver & Klein, the prestigious law firm I interned for last summer. I wasn’t about to let my dreams of becoming a lawyer slip away when I was so close.

No freaking way.

I was going to pass the bar exam, and Josh Chen was going to eat his words. Hopefully, he’d choke on them too.

“Big talk for someone who hasn’t even graduated yet.” Josh leaned against the bar and propped his forearm on the counter, looking irritatingly like a model posing for a GQ spread. He switched subjects before I could fire another retort. “You’re awfully dressed up for a solo date.”

His gaze swept from my curled hair to my made-up face before lingering on the gold pendant resting against my cleavage.

My spine turned to iron. Unlike Clark the Consultant, Josh’s scrutiny seared into my flesh, hot and mocking. The metal from my necklace flamed against my skin, and it was all I could do not to yank it off and pelt it in his smug face.

And yet, for some reason, I remained still while he continued his perusal. It wasn’t lecherous so much as it was assessing, like he was gathering all the puzzle pieces and arranging them into a complete picture in his mind.

Josh’s eyes dipped to the green cashmere dress hugging my torso, skimmed over the expanse of my black-stockinged legs, and stopped at my black heeled boots before he dragged them back up to meet my own hazel ones. His smirk disappeared, leaving his expression unreadable.

A charged silence crackled between us before he spoke again. “You’re dressed for an actual date.” His pose remained casual, but his eyes sharpened into dark knives waiting to carve out my embarrassment. “But you were about to leave, and it’s only five-thirty.”

I lifted my chin even as the heat of embarrassment prickled my skin. Josh was many things—infuriating, cocky, the spawn of Satan—but he wasn’t stupid, and he was the last person I wanted knowing I’d been stood up.

He would never let me live it down.

“Don’t tell me he didn’t show.” There was a strange note in his voice.

The heat intensified. God, I shouldn’t have worn cashmere. I was roasting in my stupid dress. “You should worry less about my love life and more about your date.”

Josh hadn’t looked at Wrap Dress since he showed up, but she didn’t seem to mind. She was too busy chatting and laughing with the bartender.

“I assure you, of all the things on my to-do list, worrying about your love life isn’t even in the top five thousand.” Despite the snark, Josh continued staring at me with that indecipherable expression.

My stomach swooped for no obvious reason.

“Good.” It was a lame retort, but my brain wasn’t working properly. I blamed it on the exhaustion. Or the alcohol. Or a million other things that had nothing to do with the man standing in front of me.

I grabbed my coat and slid off my seat, intent on brushing past him without another word.

Unfortunately, I’d misjudged the distance between the bar stool rung and the floor. My foot slipped, and a small gasp rose in my throat when my body tilted backward of its own accord. I was two seconds away from falling on my ass when a hand shot out and gripped my wrist, pulling me back up into a standing position.

Josh and I froze at the same time, our eyes locked on where his hand encircled my wrist. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d voluntarily touched. Maybe three summers ago, when he’d pushed me, fully clothed, into the pool during a party, and I’d retaliated by “accidentally” elbowing him in the groin?

The memory of him doubling over with pain still gave me great comfort in times of distress, but I wasn’t thinking about that now.

Instead, I was focused on how disturbingly close he was—close enough for me to smell his cologne, which was nice and citrusy instead of fire and brimstone-y like I’d expected.

The adrenaline from my near fall pumped through my system, pushing my heart rate into unhealthy territory.

“You can let go now.” I willed my breaths to come out steady despite the suffocating heat. “Before your touch gives me hives.”

Josh’s grip tightened for a millisecond before he dropped my arm like it was a hot potato. Annoyance wiped away his previously unreadable expression. “You’re welcome for making sure you don’t break your tailbone, JR.”

“Don’t be dramatic, Joshy. I would’ve caught myself.”

“Sure. God forbid the words thank you leave your mouth.” His sarcasm deepened. “You’re such a pain in the ass, you know that?”

“It’s better than being an ass, period.”

Everyone else looked at Josh and saw a handsome, charming doctor. I looked at him and saw a judgmental, self-righteous jerk.

You can make other friends, Ava. She’s bad news. You don’t need someone like that in your life.

My cheeks flushed. It’d been seven years since I overheard Josh talking to Ava about me, right when she and I were becoming friends, and the memory still stung. Not that I’d ever told them I’d heard them. It would just make Ava feel bad, and Josh didn’t deserve to know how much his words hurt.

He wasn’t the first person to think I wasn’t good enough, but he was the first to try and ruin one of my budding friendships because of it.

I flashed a brittle smile. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ve exceeded my daily tolerance for your presence.” I slipped on my coat and gloves and readjusted my bag. “Give your date my condolences.”

Before he could respond, I pushed past him and quickened my steps until I hit the chilly March air. Only then did I allow myself to relax, though my pulse maintained its frantic speed.

Of all the people I could’ve run into at the bar, I had to run into Josh Chen. Could the day get any worse?

I could already imagine the taunts he’ll pepper me with the next time I saw him.

Remember when you got stood up, JR?

Remember when you sat at the bar for an hour by yourself like a loser?

Remember when you got all dressed up and used up the last of your favorite eyeshadow for a dude named Todd?

Okay, he didn’t know about the last two things, but I wouldn’t put it past him to find out.

I tucked my hands deeper in my pockets and turned the corner, eager to put as much distance between myself and Satan’s spawn as possible.

The Bronze Gear had been located on a lively street of restaurants, with music wafting in the air and people spilling onto the sidewalk even in wintertime. The one I was walking on now, while only one street over, was eerily quiet. Shuttered shops lined both sidewalks, and scraggly bunches of weeds sprouted from cracks in the ground. The sun hadn’t quite set yet, but the lengthening shadows lent an ominous air to the surroundings.

I walked faster out of instinct, though I was distracted not only by my run-in with Josh but also the dozens of items on my to-do list. When I was alone, my worries and tasks crowded my brain like children clamoring for their parents’ attention.

Graduation, bar prep, possibly reaming Todd out over text (no, not worth it), more apartment searching online, Ava’s surprise birthday party this weekend…

Wait a minute.

Birthday. March.

I came to a dead halt.

Oh my God.

Besides Ava, I knew someone else with a birthday in early March, but…

I fished my phone out of my pocket with a shaking hand, and my stomach plummeted when I saw the date. March 2.

It was her birthday today. I completely forgot.

Tendrils of guilt squeezed my insides, and I wondered, as I did every year, whether I should call her. I never did, but…this year could be different.

I told myself that every year, too.

I shouldn’t feel guilty. She never called me on my birthday, either. Or Christmas. Or any other holiday. I hadn’t seen or spoken to Adeline in seven years.

Call. Don’t call. Call. Don’t call.

I worried my bottom lip between my teeth.

It was her forty-fifth birthday. That was a big one, right? Big enough to warrant a Happy Birthday from her daughter…if she cared about getting anything from me.

I was so busy debating myself I didn’t notice anyone approach until the hard barrel of a gun pressed against my back and a raspy voice barked out, “Give me your phone and wallet. Now.”

My heart jolted, and I almost dropped my phone. Disbelief hardened my limbs into stone.

You’ve got to be kidding me.

Never ask the universe questions you don’t want answered because it turns out the day could, in fact, get a lot fucking worse.

JOSH

“Don’t say it.” I cracked open my beer, ignoring Clara’s amused expression. The cute female bartender she’d been flirting with had left to deal with the happy hour rush, and she’d been watching me with a knowing smile ever since.

“Fine. I won’t.” Clara crossed her legs and took a demure sip of her drink.

She was an ER nurse at Thayer University Hospital, where I was a third-year resident specializing in Emergency Medicine, so our paths crossed often. We’d been friends since my first year of residency, when we bonded over our mutual love for action sports and cheesy nineties movies, but she had as much sexual interest in me, or any member of the male species, as she did a rock.

Clara certainly wasn’t my date, at least not in the romantic sense, but I hadn’t corrected Jules’s assumption. My personal life wasn’t any of her business. Hell, sometimes I wished it wasn’t my business.

“Good.” I caught the eye of a pretty blonde at the other end of the bar and flashed a flirtatious smile. She returned it with a suggestive one of her own.

This was what I needed tonight. Alcohol, watching the Wizards game with Clara, and some harmless flirting. Anything to take my mind off the letter waiting for me at home.

Correction: letters. As in plural.

December 24. January 16. February 20. March 2. The dates of the most recent letters from Michael flashed through my mind.

I received one every month like clockwork, and I hated myself for not throwing them out the instant I saw them.

I took a long swig of my beer, trying to forget the stack of unopened mail sitting in my desk drawer. It was my second beer in less than ten minutes, but fuck it, I’d had a long day at work. I needed to take the edge off.

“I’ve always liked redheads,” Clara said, drawing me back to a conversation I didn’t want to have. “Maybe because The Little Mermaid was my favorite Disney movie growing up.”

Her face creased into a smile at my long-suffering sigh.

“Your lack of subtlety is astonishing.”

“I like to have at least one trait that’s astonishing.” Clara’s smile widened. “So, who was she?”

There was no use trying to sidestep her question. Once she sniffed out something she thought was juicy, she was worse than a Pitbull with a bone.

“My sister’s best friend and a pain in my ass.” Tension knotted my shoulders at the memory of my encounter with Jules.

It was just like her to be prickly even when I tried to help her. Forget an olive branch. I should hand her a bouquet of thorns and hope it pricked the fuck out of her.

Every time I tried to make nice—which, to be fair, wasn’t often—she reminded me of why we would never be friends. We were both too stubborn, our personalities too similar. It was like pitting fire against fire.

Unfortunately, Jules and my sister Ava had been thick as thieves since they roomed together their freshman year of college, which meant I was stuck with Jules in my life no matter how much we got on each other’s nerves.

I didn’t know what her issue with me was, but I knew she had a penchant for getting Ava into trouble.

In the seven years they’d known each other, I’d watched Ava trip out on Jules’s pot brownies and almost streak naked at a party, consoled her after she drunkenly dyed her hair semi-permanent orange at Jules’s twentieth birthday party, and rescued them from the side of a road in Bumfuck, Maryland after Jules had the brilliant idea to join some strangers they met at a bar on a last-minute road trip to New York. The car broke down on their way there and, luckily, the strangers turned out to be harmless, but still. It could’ve gone so very wrong.

Those were just some of the highlights. There were a thousand other instances when Jules had convinced my sister to go along with one harebrained scheme or another.

Ava was an adult and capable of making her own decisions, but she was also too damn trusting. As her older brother, it was my job to protect her, especially after our mom died and our father turned out to be a fucking psycho.

And there was no doubt in my mind that Jules was a bad influence. Period.

Clara’s mouth twitched. “Does the pain in your ass have a name?”

I took another swig of beer before answering with a curt, “Jules.”

“Hmm. Jules is very pretty.”

“Most flesh-eating succubi are. It’s how they rope you in.” Aggravation crept into my voice.

Yes, Jules was beautiful, but so were wolfsbane and blue-ringed octopi. Pretty exteriors hiding deadly poison which, in Jules’s case, came in the form of her viperous tongue.

Most men were blinded by all those curves and big hazel eyes, but not me. I knew better than to fall for her trap. The poor sods whose hearts she broke at Thayer were further proof I needed to stay far away from her for my personal sanity.

“I’ve never seen you so worked up over a woman.” Clara’s face was now a mask of delight. “Wait till I tell the other nurses.”

Oh, Jesus.

Gossip Girl had nothing on the nurses’ station. Once news reached their ears, it spread through the hospital like wildfire.

“I am not worked up, and there’s nothing to tell.” I switched the subject before she could press further. I had no desire to discuss Jules Ambrose a second longer than necessary. “If you want real news, here’s something: I finally decided where I’m going for vacation.”

She rolled her eyes. “That’s nowhere near as interesting as your love life. Half the nurses are in love with you. I don’t get it.”

“It’s because I’m a catch.”

It wasn’t arrogance if it was true. I would never hook up with anyone at the hospital, though. I didn’t shit where I ate.

“Humble, too.” Clara finally gave up trying to pull more information about Jules out of me and went along with my obvious deflection. “Okay, I’ll bite. Where are you going for vacation?”

My grin was real this time. “New Zealand.”

I’d been torn between New Zealand for bungee jumping and South Africa for cage diving with sharks, but I finally decided on the former and bought my tickets last night.

Medical residents had crap schedules, but those of us in emergency medicine had it better than surgeons, for example. I worked a mix of eight and twelve-hour shifts with one mandated day off every six days and four stretches of five days off annually. The tradeoff was we worked nonstop during our shifts, but I didn’t mind. Busy was good. Busy kept my mind off other things.

I was, however, pumped for my first vacation this year. I’d been approved for a week off in the spring, and I could already picture my time in New Zealand: crisp blue skies, snow-capped mountains, the sensation of weightlessness as I free fell and the adrenaline rush that set my body alive whenever I indulged in one of my favorite adventure sports.

“Shut up.” Clara groaned. “I’m so jealous. Which hikes are you going to do?”

I’d done extensive research on the best hikes in the country, and I regaled her with my plans until the bartender returned and she got distracted. Since I didn’t want to cockblock—or pussyblock, in this case—I focused on my drink and the Wizards vs. Raptors basketball game on TV.

I was about to order another beer when a soft female voice interrupted me.

“Is this seat taken?”

I turned, taking in the cute blonde I’d made eye contact with earlier. I hadn’t noticed her leave her spot at the bar, but now she stood so close I could see the faint smattering of freckles across her nose.

Habit kicked in, and I flashed a lazy smile that caused the blonde to blush. “It’s all yours.”

The whole hookup song and dance was so familiar by now I barely had to try. Everything was muscle memory. Buy her a drink, ask her about herself, listen attentively—or appear to do so—with the occasional nod and appropriate interjection, brush my hand against hers to establish physical contact.

It used to be thrilling, but now I did it because…well, I wasn’t sure. Because it was what I’d always done, I guess.

“…want to be a vet…”

I nodded again, struggling not to yawn. What the hell was wrong with me?

Robin, the blonde, was hot and willing to take this somewhere private, if her hand on my upper thigh was any indication. Her childhood adventures in horseback riding weren’t exactly riveting, but I was usually good at finding at least one interesting tidbit in every conversation.

Maybe it was me. Boredom was my constant companion these days, and I didn’t know how to get rid of the bastard.

The parties I went to were the same old, same old. My hookups were unsatisfying. My dates were chores. The only time I felt anything was when I was in the ER.

I glanced at Clara. She was still flirting with the bartender, who was actively ignoring her customers and staring at Clara with an enamored expression.

“…can’t decide if I want a Pomeranian or Chihuahua…” Robin droned on.

“Pomeranians sound nice.” I made a show of checking my watch before saying, “Hey, I’m sorry to cut this short, but I have to pick up my cousin from the airport.” It wasn’t the best excuse, but it was the first one I could think of.

Robin’s face fell. “Oh, okay. Maybe we can meet up sometime.” She scribbled her number on a napkin and pushed it into my hand. “Call me.”

I responded with a noncommittal smile. I didn’t like promising things I couldn’t fulfill.

Have fun, I mouthed at Clara on my way out. She shook her head and gave me a small smirk before shifting her attention back to the bartender.

It was my quickest exit from a bar in a while. I wasn’t upset about how the night turned out. Clara and I often went drinking together and split when we got…distracted, but now I had to figure out where to go.

It was still early, and I didn’t want to return home yet. I also didn’t want to hit up one of the other bars lining the street in case Robin went bar hopping later.

Fuck it. I’ll finish watching the game at the dive spot near my house. Beer and TV were beer and TV, no matter where they were located. Hopefully, the metro was running on time so I wouldn’t miss the rest of the game.

I turned the corner onto the quiet street leading to the metro station. I made it halfway when I spotted a flash of red hair and a familiar purple coat in the alleyway next to an out-of-business shoe store.

My steps slowed. What the hell was Jules still doing here? She’d left a good twenty minutes before me.

Then I noticed the glint of metal in her hand. A gun—pointed straight at the scraggly, bearded man in front of her.

“What the fuck?” My words echoed in the empty street and bounced off the shuttered storefronts in disbelief.

Maybe I fell asleep at the bar and entered the Twilight Zone, because the scene in front of me didn’t make any fucking sense.

Where the hell did Jules get a gun?

Jules shifted positions so she could look at me without taking her eyes off the man. A threadbare beanie sat on top of his longish brown hair, and a black coat that was two sizes too big hung on his skinny frame.

“He tried to mug me,” she said matter-of-factly.

Beanie glared at her resentfully but was smart enough to keep his mouth shut.

I pinched my temple, hoping it would jolt me out of whatever alternate reality I’d stepped into. Nope. Still fucking here. “And I assume that’s his gun?”

I was somehow not surprised Jules had turned the tables on her would-be mugger. If she got kidnapped, the kidnapper would probably return her within the hour due to sheer irritation.

“Yes, Sherlock.” Jules’s hand tightened on the weapon. “I called the police. They’re on the way.”

As if on cue, the wail of sirens sliced through the air.

Beanie stiffened, his eyes darting around with wild panic.

“Don’t even think about it,” Jules warned. “Or I’ll shoot. I don’t bluff.”

“She’ll do it,” I told him. “One time I saw her nail a guy in the ass with a Smith & Wesson because he stole a bag of chips from her.” I lowered my voice to a conspiratorial stage whisper. “She takes hangry to another level.”

The situation was already absurd enough. I might as well play into it.

Like I said, I was bored.

Jules’s mouth twitched at my fabrication before her face resettled into a stern frown.