Secret: A Military Stepbrother Romance (8 page)

It’s his touch on my arm for half a second as he leads me. It’s his voice in my ear when we move from the house to the lawn tent. It’s his hand at the small of my back, helping me through the crowd and into the glittering lights of the tent past the throngs of people there to smile and shake my hand. 

And it's how
damn
wet I am, and how it won’t go away. From that moment in my room, to the silent walk through the house, to the move across the lawn to the tent. Even as he sits me at the banquet table at the front of the room, I’m utterly, completely, and hopelessly turned on.

And it’s because of
him
. I want to deny it; I mean I
really
want to deny it, but there’s no avoiding the wicked thoughts going through my head or the raw heat between my legs. 

You’re sick, or feverish or something. You should go lie down. 

Except the thought is immediately followed by
who
exactly would be
taking
me back to my room, and back to my bed, and the heat immediately flashes in my face.

It’s like this horrible thing, and I want to ignore it or push it away but there’s no ignoring this. There’s no escaping the effect this man has on me; an effect no one else has ever had over me. 

I can still picture him that night, the way he moved me, the way he invaded every facet of me, and the way he
dominated
me. I feel my face burn as I bite my lip at the memory. He was both nothing and everything I was looking for there in that dark room, if I even know what it was I
was
looking for that crazy night. Meaningless, casual fun sex, I guess. One night of freedom before everything changed; one night of escape before there was no escape.

Except no sex I’ve ever had had been like that. No one had ever talked to me like that, and moved me like that, or made me feel like that, and that’s the worst part. I want the memory of that night to be
average
, or
fine
, not fucking
mind-blowing.
 

The situation we’re in is bad enough, and horribly scandalous as it is, without also having to remember that time with him as, by far and away, the most memorable, powerful sex I’ve ever had. The way he growled, the way he demanded, the way he held me down and
fucked
me like I’d never been fucked before. 

I can feel the heat in my cheeks creep down my neck, and over my chest in that embarrassingly splotchy way I know I get. And then I realize I’m staring right at him, and what’s worse, he’s looking right at me, and
grinning
, like he’s reading my thoughts; like he knows
exactly
what dirty little thoughts were just roaring through my head.  

Yeah it's thoughts like that make it so I can barely talk straight all night. It’s why I only
barely
manage to get through a conversation with Angela, Vice President Reed’s wife who’s sitting next to me at the dinner, with no recollection of what we even discussed. It’s why I’m barely cognizant of walking around the room later, smiling and dishing out the canned “Oh, I’m here to explore opportunities in Washington the semester” response to the CNN correspondent asking me why I’m not still in Chicago getting my law degree.

It’s thoughts like that that have me shivering when I feel his hand at the small of my back, guiding me back through the crowd. Dirty, wicked thoughts like the ones about Hunter Ryan running through my mind are why I can practically hear my heart beating in the silence of the elevator with him, back up the living quarters of the house. And it’s why I basically blurt out the world's quickest “goodnight” before I’m pushing him away and shutting myself away in my room.

It’s thoughts like that why I don’t even get my dress off  before I’m hiking it up and laying back on my giant, cream-white, four post bed, and moaning as my fingers find me wet and ready. I’m sliding a finger inside, moaning at the fantasy as I lay sprawled on the bed; my regal, decent, D.C.-formal dress very
in
decently pushed up around my waist with my legs spread wide and my breath coming in gasps. I want to pretend it’s anything else in the world but him that I’m thinking about, but I can’t fool my body or the sinful thoughts rushing through me. I’m writhing as my fingers seek release — sweet, aching
release
from the horrible spell this man has on me.

The terrible, wicked, and disastrously horrible spell that my
stepbrother
somehow has on me.

And it’s inappropriate, scandalous, and wicked thoughts of Hunter Ryan, and all the things he did to me that night, that I’m thinking about as I go crashing over the edge, screaming my climax into the pillows as my whole body explodes.

CHAPTER EIGHT

“Hunter, your cell phone.”

I glance up from my coffee to see my dad nodding at my phone pinging on the kitchen counter. He frowns and gives me a look. “Pretty sure you’re not supposed to have that on active duty, son.”

“Huh, strange, I thought we were just having a little family breakfast,” I say with fake smile, mimicking his words from earlier when he marshaled Dexter and me over here from our apartment quarters in the other wing.

Dex snorts as my dad gives me another glare. “Watch it, Hunt.”

The phone pings again and I rise to snatch it off the counter. I glance down at the screen and groan. 

I was wondering how long it’d take
her
to manage to weasel my new number off of some poor sap. “Her” being Anya, the ex. Ex with a capital E and the attitude to match. Anya the total psycho. Anya the poor little rich girl from the same circle of idiocy and shitheads I left behind when I joined the Marines. 

I lied before, when I made the offhand comment to Maddie about “military family, dad served, I served”, because really, that's all bullshit. Well, yeah, my dad is obviously who he is, but where I come from, kids basically ride their parent’s coattails until that trust fund starts kicking back. I didn’t have to join the Marines at all. In fact, dad was actively against it the day I made the announcement just a week after we’d buried mom. 

But fuck that, and fuck being one of the douchebags I went to private school with. Fuck being just one more rich kid son of a public figure, free to piss away my life doing whatever. And so I joined, and I did my tour. 

But Anya is a throwback to those days before. Just one more daddy’s girl whose father works in the political machine of D.C. That whole privileged class of kids whose parents run things; the untouchables, the carefree. 

Like I said, fuck that; I need direction and something good to hang on to. Except Anya is anything
but
“direction” and pretty much the opposite of “something good”. Party girl, rich girl,  all around disaster. 

That all said
, I’m more tempted to call her back now than I ever have been since the break-up.
Extremely
tempted after last night and the near constant hard-on I’ve had ever since I walked in on Maddie in those fucking stockings. 

There’s a mumbled “good morning” from the kitchen doorway, and the temptation roars like a fucking lion inside of me as I look up to see her shuffle into the kitchen, pajamas, bathrobe and all. 

I mean, shit,
that's
how hard-up and pent up I am right now. A girl in a fucking bathrobe has my cock fully at attention in my suit. Yeah, I should
definitely
call Anya back, if for nothing else than to fuck tempting, untouchable, and
totally off-limits
Madison Adams out of my Goddamn system. 

Except…
shit
. Except I know she’d be nothing
like
Madison. I know what that particular forbidden fruit tastes like —
literally
, actually, I think with a wicked grin — and everything else pales to it. I know Anya would be
fun,
but ultimately a ridiculous waste of my time. 

‘Course, it's not like I can fuck Maddie either, so I guess I’m up shit creek right now.

Madison ignores me as she brushes past me without so much as a second look. She’s irritable looking, in wildly adorable way as she pours coffee and then starts poking through cupboards and slamming drawers.

Her mother sharply puts down her
Post
and pointedly clears her throat. “
Looking
for something,
dear
,” she says sharply. 

Maddie sighs dramatically as she slams drawer shut. “Yeah,
where
is the sugar?”

“The table,” I say, grinning at her as I lean back against the counter across the kitchen from her. She shoots me a quick sneering look before she stomps over to the breakfast table.

“I apologize for my daughter’s behavior, boys,” Eleanor says, arching a brow at her scowling daughter before turning to smile at me.

“I’d say she’s in good company,” I grin, nodding at Dexter, who’s got his head down on his arms on the table and who very well might
actually
be sleeping right now. This time it’s
my
parent who clears his throat and kicks at Dexter’s feet with his polished shoe.

“Okay,
so sorry
for not knowing where
anything
in this giant house is,” Madison says with a roll of her eyes as she sinks into the bench around the table and sips at her coffee. Jesus, fluffy pink robes should
not
be that fucking hot on someone. Stupid, fluffy pink
mom
robes should not fit across her tight little ass so perfectly, and should not ride up above her knee so high when she sits that it’s taking every ounce of restraint not to let my eyes drag up those perfect stems of hers. 

I briefly imagine her wearing the same black lace bra and slip underneath it that she wore last night.

“You know,” Eleanor says, putting her paper down and breaking my spell. “You’re right, you should know your way around this place since you’re going to
be
here for the next few months.”

I catch Maddie sending a quick glance my way and hold it, wagging my eyebrows and grinning at her until she hurriedly looks back into her coffee.

“Hunter?”

I jerk my head up to the beaming Madame President. “Ma’am?”

“Why don’t
you
show Madison around?” She says with a warm smile. “I assume you know this place quite well by now, what with the training exercises and all.” 

I mean, she’s right. You know how they say cab drivers in London have to know the name and whereabouts of every street in the city? Well I know
every
single inch of the White House. Every window, door,
secret
door, safe room, weapon’s cache, alarm, strike point, and guard post. By
heart
. Can’t wait to let that wealth of knowledge go to absolute shit when I’m forced off the job.

Eleanor smiles at me before she turns to raise a brow at Maddie. “I’m sure she could get a
great
tour and lay of the land from you.”

I grin hugely while no one but Maddie is looking my way, and mouth the word “lay” salaciously with a wicked look in my eye, loving the way she goes bright red and shoots me a murderous look before taking a big gulp of her coffee. 

I mean, this is a
terrible
idea. Alone time, with
her
, with the knowledge
I
have of secret, un-monitored places in this giant house? Yeah, horrible idea, given my raging hard-on and sinfully inappropriate thoughts about her.

But I smile broadly at the President, acutely aware of Madison glaring at me from behind her mother. “I’d be happy to, Madame President,” I say formally.