Crude: A Stepbrother Romance (6 page)

I’m silent at the breakfast table the next day; silent and relieved that Knox is still in bed.

I
can not
believe he heard. Like, can’t even begin to process how utterly mortifying it is that my own
stepbrother
heard me using a vibrator with him in the room right next room. I crunch my cereal slowly and sip my coffee, trying not to think about last night out by the pool or up in my room; about how quickly I could feel myself get caught up in his whirlwind.
 

Or about how hard he was; how
big
he looked inside those pajama pants.

Or how
ready
he was to just
do it
like that. I mean we just met for crying out loud! What does he think, that he can just
stroll
into my room looking all hot and shirtless like that and just
suggest
that? It’s just like back at the Music Hall, with his blatant little insinuation that I “come have some fun” in the damn men’s room bathroom with him. I mean
honestly!
It’s so...
gross
; so arrogant and so crude to think
any
girl would ever just jump for something like that. Who even
asks
that?
 

Of course, there’s the darker thought too; the thought that for a second there, for a
very
brief half second, I wanted it.
 

I can feel myself getting red-faced right there at the breakfast table even just thinking it right now, but I know it’s true. For a half second, I was tired of being the goody-two-shoes. I was tired of being who I was and all that came with that, and for a half second, I wanted to just
let go
. I wanted to let go like I did at that show where I pretended to be someone I wasn’t; the show he saw me at.

God, what the hell is it about Knox Shepherd that has me changing the way I think about even
myself
?

“Ahhh, Knox, good to have you join us.” I look up sharply at my father’s words to see Knox in sweats and mercifully a shirt this time, shuffling into the kitchen. He catches my eye, and for
just
a second, I think that just maybe I’ll see even an iota of regret there. I think for one flash of a second that
maybe
I’ll see some sign of there being a real person in there who feels embarrassment for acting like a total caveman.

He winks at me.

Yeah, nope; new day, same Knox.

“I trust you slept OK in the makeshift room, Knox?” My father says, glancing up from the paper; “The other wing should be ready by next week, but your mother and I just didn’t want to put off the move any longer.”

Knock smiles innocently at my father as he pours himself a cup of coffee; all smiles today without a trace of the attitude and disdain from earlier, I notice.

“Oh, yes sir, I caught a ton of
Zeeeez
’s last night.”
 

I want to push my face into my cereal. He’s accentuating the “Z” sound on purpose; he’s making
vibrator
sounds.

In front of me.
 

To my dad.
 

What is
wrong
with him?
 

My dad gives him a strange look and a half smile,
thankfully
not catching the crudeness in his joke; “Well, you’ve got a few days to make yourself at home around the estate, and then I was thinking tomorrow you’d be going out to the fields with Mike, one of my chief foremen.

“
Bizzzzz-zy
as bees, huh Mr. McCauley?” Knox says with a big shit-eating grin, accentuating the “z” sound again.
 

Oh my
God
, he needs to stop this, now.
 

My dad just shakes his head though with a curious smile before he looks back at his paper. He doesn’t know what Knox is really doing and what he’s really talking about here.

Of course he doesn't; he’d kill him.
 

Knox grabs half a bagel from the tray on the table and blows me kiss before he saunters back down the hallway.

I somehow manage to gulp down the rest of my coffee in record, near-mouth-burning speed before I grit my teeth, set my jaw, and go after him. What happened last night is
mortifying
and so
very
unfortunate, but I am
not
going all summer with Knox Shepherd playing these fucking games.

I catch up with him upstairs in the hallway outside our bedroom doors, grabbing him by the elbow and yanking him back; “Are you out of your fucking mind?” I hiss, glaring at him and fully realizing the crazy in my own voice.

He grins at me; “Woah! Watch the dirty mouth, princess!” He leans close and winks at me;, “Unless you want me to
do something
with it, that is.”
 

Heat flashes across my face and I hastily look away; “Why are you always so crude?”

“You just bring it out in me I guess,” He says, sighing dramatically before he suddenly starts to yank his shirt off right there in the hallway.

“Uh,
what
the hell are you doing?” I stammer, trying not to let my eyes linger like they
really
want to on his sculpted abs, or his tattoos, or the deep grooves in the v of his hips. I shake my head and force myself to stare at the wall next to him.

Knox just shrugs, tossing his shirt into his room; “You know, not all of us grew up with a pool big enough to have it’s own zip code in the backyard. It’s summer in Texas, Paige. It’s hot as
fuck
outside, and I apparently don’t have to go slave in the salt-mines for your dad just yet. I don’t know about you, but I’m going swimming.”
 

Before I know it, he hooks his thumbs into the waist of his sweats and shrugs them right off his legs,
right
there in the hallway, until he’s just standing there in his grey, skin-tight boxer-briefs.
 

Oh my God, why am I standing here watching this?

“Enjoying the show?”
 

I blush furiously and scowl at him; “No.”

“Liar.”

OK, why does someone who spends this much time being such a prick have a body like
that
? I mean it’s like he’s fucking photoshopped or something with his lean, sculpted muscles, the swirling ink across his shoulder and down his arms, and those briefs hugging every single…

Ooookay, walk away; walk away right now.

“You coming?”

I swallow; “Excuse me?”

“Swimming, princess.” He says, taking a step towards me and leaning his arm against the doorframe of his room right next to me.
 

“I have to go practice the piano,” I say quickly.

“Of course you do.”

“
Yeah
, I do, actually.”

Knox smirks; “Because your dad told you to.”

“Because I’d like to
succeed
at it and at life,” I say heatedly, trying to pointedly ignore the fact that he’s leaning in closer to me because I know that he’s just doing it to get to me flustered.

It’s working.

“So play what you want to.”

Why
is he so fucking irritating? Why is he so challenging at every step?
 

“Because…” I trail off as I feel his scent invade my senses and feel his hand come up and brush across my arm; “I just can’t, OK?” I say hastily.
 

“You need to lighten up.”

“Oh go swimming, dick,” I huff, finally moving back and away from him.

“You can watch if you want, princess.” He winks and saunters over to the staircase; “buzz buzz buzz!” He hollers over his shoulder with a laugh.

I groan and drop my face into my hands as crude, tattooed sex-god Knox clad in just his skin-tight boxer briefs casually makes his way across our marbled-floor, double-staircased, crystal-chandelier foyer, throwing vibrator jokes over his shoulder.
 

What the
hell
is happening?

“So what’s life like up in the castle, man?” Justin’s hunched over his coffee table, hard at work rolling the joint.

I sip my beer and shrug; “Boring.”

He grins, looking up from his handiwork; “Yeah but
rich
boring.”

“I guess.”

OK, yeah, he’s right. It’s amazing what just a little time spent up in the McCauley mansion does to your sense of perspective and normalcy. I hadn’t even realized how much I’d let it just become the everyday norm until I was driving back out to Garland, past the strip malls and the shitty apartment blocks where Mom and I used to live, just sitting there baking in the desert.

“How’s your new dad?”

“
Dude!
Have some fuckin tact, man!” Justin puts the pot down long enough to punch Mark in the arm, shaking his head.

Mark shrugs and gives me a guilty look; “Sorry. You know what I mean though.”

I’m not totally sure why I’m even still hanging out with these two idiots after graduating high school.

“Yeah, it’s fine, don’t worry about it.” I take a slug of my beer; “He’s alright I guess; super fucking strict, but alright. He wants me to work for him though, which is total bullshit.”

Justin rolls his eyes; “Aww, poor baby. The billionaire oil tycoon wants to give you a job; cry me a fuckin’ river man. Plus your mom is marrying him, that basically guarantees you a cushy office job somewhere doing nothing but banging secretaries and taking lunch meetings.”

“Aww, man, plus that
chick!
” Mark reached over from the other side of the couch and prods Justin in the arm before he gives me a nod and thumbs up; “Bro, that chick is
hot
.”

For some reason, I can feel my jaw tense at his words; I can feel my fist tightening around the aluminum can in my hands; “What chick?”

Paige? How the fuck would they even know-

“C’mon dickhead, Joe McCauley’s daughter! We looked her up online as soon as you told us about your mom and him.”

Justin nods at me, finishing the last twist on his joint; “She’s pretty fine man, in like, a weird way.”

I can feel the heat rising inside of me, something that almost feels like anger welling up and threatening to burst out. What the
fuck
is this? What am I, getting territorial or some shit?

Mark laughs; “Aww man, too bad you can’t hit that, huh?”

Keep cool; stay fucking cool. They’re just horsing around.
I drain the last of my beer down my throat, forcing myself to keep it together; “Says who?”