Chapter 365/Are You Jealous?
Chapter 365
Jake’s point of view
I stared at her in absolute disbelief. "You are not normal. Not even a little bit."
I turned away from her immediately without another word, throwing myself into my room and slamming the wooden door behind me with a loud, echoing thud. I threw on my clothes with a frantic velocity before marching back out to the kitchen.
I yanked the heavy iron lid off the pot, a rich, mouthwatering aroma immediately billowing through the space to confirm the meat was perfectly tender. I killed the flame and let out a loud shout that rattled the walls of the house. "Julie! Dinner is ready! Get out here and eat!"
I began arranging the plates neatly over the wooden table. The moment she walked in and sat down in total, eerie silence, I let out an irritated grunt. "You could have at least helped me set the table and carry a few plates... that’s the bare minimum a woman could do."
"I hacked through a mountain of vegetables and scrubbed down the marble countertop," she answered flatly, her eyes fixated on the food with obvious hunger. "I’d say that’s more than enough. Don’t get greedy."
"You are incredibly lazy," I muttered, trying to rattle her composure.
I served the steaming food onto our plates and we sat there in a heavily loaded silence.
The moment Julie began eating quietly, I let out a proud smirk. "Well? What do you think of my cooking? Admit that I have a phenomenal talent in the kitchen."
She kept her eyes firmly on her plate, answering dryly, "It’s fine. Edible."
"Are you seriously refusing to admit that it’s delicious and professionally made?" I pressed, intentionally bothering her.
"I said it’s fine, Jake," she replied, her face turning stone-cold. "Stop being so incredibly needy like a toddler."
We finished the meal in total silence and stood up to clear the table. Wanting to reassert control, I said firmly, "Alright... it’s your turn to work. You’re washing these dishes by yourself."
She arched her brows in pure disbelief. "And why the hell should I do that just because you ordered me to?"
"Because I’m the one who put in the labor to cook dinner," I argued logically. "It’s only fair that you wash the plates and the pot."
"I helped you by chopping the vegetables with a knife," she shot back stubbornly. "So you can help me clean up right now instead of being lazy."
"You are a deeply stubborn, infuriating woman," I muttered in frustration. "You never listen."
A provoking smile touched her lips. "And you are a hell of a lot more annoying and needy." She stepped in front of the sink, grabbing the bottle of dish soap with a defiant look. "I’m going to scrub the plates down with the soap, and you’re going to stand right next to me to rinse them and put them on the rack. Move it."
I stepped up behind her with completely silent strides. Reaching out with my large hand, I gathered the thick, cascading strands of her brown hair that had fallen loosely over her face and neck. Leaning down until my warm whisper grazed her ear, I murmured, "These long locks are going to drive you crazy while you’re trying to move around... you need to tie them up so you can actually see what you’re doing."
She pulled a black elastic hair tie off her slender wrist and tossed it back toward me with complete indifference. "Here. Gather it and tie it yourself since you’re complaining so much."
I carefully gathered the silky mass of her hair with excruciating slowness, wrapping the tie tightly around it. It was incredibly thick, completely filling my palm, and a heavy, intoxicating scent of lavender wafted from the strands a fragrance so mesmerizing it completely bypassed my ability to describe it.
"Is it going to take you an entire goddamn year just to tie my hair, Jake? Hurry the hell up," she muttered, clearly bored by my pace.
I let out a low rumble of a laugh against her back. "I’m done, you impatient, irritating woman."
We washed the dishes together in a deeply unsettling, heavy quiet. The moment we finished, she took wide strides straight back to her bedroom and shut the door.
A sudden, overwhelming urge to provoke her and get under her skin consumed me again. I walked over and pushed her door open, stepping inside without knocking or asking for permission. She was laying down comfortably over the mattress, her legs stretched out as she read a book with a deep, absolute focus.
"I had no idea you were actually capable of reading books and novels," I mocked. "I figured you were illiterate."
She didn’t even look up from the pages, her eyes scanning the lines as she shot back, "Not everyone is a mindless, uneducated fool like you, Jake."
"Who the hell are you calling a fool, Julie?" I snapped, a wave of irritation hitting my chest. "I’m a master technician who disassembles the most complex explosive devices on the planet. My intellect could run an entire country."
"I genuinely find myself wondering," she mocked, turning a page with her slender fingers, "where exactly did you buy this supposed genius intellect from?"
"It’s a god-given talent and rare genetics that people like you could never possess," I retorted with overbearing confidence.
She flashed me a quick, heavily sarcastic wink. "Right. It’s blindingly obvious."
"What are you doing tomorrow?" I asked, shifting the subject.
A wicked, knowing smile spread across her face. "Why do you care? Are you trying to take me out on a romantic date?"
I let out a loud, booming laugh. "You have a wild imagination, girl... you are completely opposite from my type."
"Tomorrow night I’m going out with Mike to have dinner," she delivered flatly, her tone completely killing my laughter. "He’s the one who personally invited me."
My entire frame instantly locked up, a sudden, blinding fire of jealousy and pure rage erupting deep inside my gut. "You and Mike... alone? Out at night?" I demanded, my tone dropping into a harsh sharpness.
"Yeah," she answered with a provoking simplicity. "What the hell is weird about that?"
"Why the fuck are you going out with him?!" I snapped, my voice rising in a hostile flare. "Is there something going on between you two?!"
"Of course not," she scoffed, clearly irritated by my explosive reaction. "Mike is exactly like an older brother to me."
"He doesn’t see you as a goddamn sister, that’s for sure," I spat, a thick bitterness filling my mouth. "He stares at you like a starstruck, brainless idiot every single second. He’s absolutely infatuated with you, and I’m a man I know exactly how men look at a woman."
She stared at me with a heavily loaded quiet, a triumphant gleam flashing through her green eyes. "And why exactly are you looking so unhinged, raging, and screaming like this? Are you jealous?"