Stepbrother Dearest (27 page)

I licked a hot teardrop off my lips. “Don’t look at me, Greta.”

She put the drinks down and immediately pulled me into her.

In Greta’s arms, the tears were multiplying. My hands dug into her back in a silent plea for her not to

let go yet. I eventually calmed down.

“I hate this. I shouldn’t be crying for him. Why am I crying for him?”

“Because you loved him.”

“He hated me.”

“He hated whatever he saw in you that reminded him of himself. He didn’t hate you. He couldn’t have.

He just didn’t know how to be a father.”

It surprised me how close to being right she was despite her not knowing my secret. Randy hated what

he saw in me that reminded him of Patrick.

“There’s a lot I haven’t told you. The screwed up thing is, after all the shit we went through, I still

wanted to make him proud of me someday, wanted him to love me.”

I let out a deep breath because I’d never admitted that to anyone.

“I know you did,” she said softly.

Looking into her eyes reminded me that I was staring into the soul of the first person who’d ever

actually succeeded at making me feel loved. For that, I would be eternally grateful to her.

“Where would I be tonight without you?”

“I’m glad I got to be the one with you tonight.”

“I’ve never cried in front of anyone before. Not once.”

“There’s a first time for everything.”

“There’s a bad joke in there somewhere. You know that, right?”

We laughed. I loved her laugh.

“You make me feel things, Greta. You always have. When I’m around you, whether it’s good or bad…I

feel everything. Sometimes, I don’t handle it too well, and I fight it by acting like an asshole. I don’t know
what it is about you, but I feel like you see the real me. The second I saw you again for the first time at
Greg’s when you were standing in that garden…it was like I couldn’t hide behind myself anymore.” I

touched her face. “I know it was hard for you to see me with Chelsea. I know you still care about me. I can
feel it even when you’re pretending you’ve stopped.”

It was the most honest thing I’d said to her all night. Greta always wore her heart on her sleeve, and

even though she was trying not to make it obvious, her discomfort around Chelsea had been evident.

(Although, Chelsea seemed to be oblivious to it.) I couldn’t have imagined how I would have handled it if
the situation were reversed.

My tears had finally dried. As we continued to sit in the wake of that embrace, her lips were begging

me to kiss them. I wished there were a magic eraser that would have allowed me to experience it just once
and delete the consequences immediately after. Of course, that would never be possible. I didn’t think

there was anyone worthy of those lips anyway, least of all me. So, I just stared at her mouth, wanting to
kiss her but knowing I wouldn’t.

Maybe she read my mind, and I scared her off, because she got up like a bat out of hell.

The next thing I knew, she’d run off to the roulette table, slapped some of her money down on the

number 22, and the rest was history. This girl had a major horseshoe up her ass.

***

Nineteen-thousand dollars. I didn’t know what shocked me more: that she won for a second time

tonight or that she’d managed to turn my evening around with that awesome play on 22. The mysterious

text wasn’t preoccupying me anymore. Instead, I was once again stoked to be here and vowed that for the

rest of the night in these final hours together, we’d have the time of our lives.

She made me take a thousand dollars cash. I had no intention of spending it. I’d been using my money

the entire time. I didn’t care if I spent every red cent I owned on her, I couldn’t have ever repaid her for
being there for me that night. I’d done nothing to deserve it.

We ended up at one of the casino clothing stores, and that was where the mood for the evening shifted

to a place we couldn’t quite come out from under for the remainder of the trip.

I’d picked out a dress that I thought would look perfect on her, and she’d gone into the dressing room

to try it on. I played with my phone to distract from the thought of her undressing just feet away from me.

She was taking a really long time, so I asked, “You alright in there?”

She said her zipper was stuck, so without thinking, I moved the curtain to the side and stepped into the
dressing room. “Come here.”

The second I got one look at her gorgeous back in that dress, I immediately realized that putting

myself in this position was a big mistake. My fingers tingled as they gripped her hair gently, moving it over
her silky skin to the front of her shoulders.

As I pulled at the material, her breathing became more rapid. Knowing that my touching her was the

reason for it made me breathe faster, too. I was losing control. Salacious thoughts invaded my brain. One
in particular had me breaking the dress apart in one violent rip and taking her from behind while I

watched her face in the mirror.

They’re just thoughts, I told myself. Focus on the task at hand.

“You weren’t kidding,” I said as I tried my best to fix it so I could get the hell out of there. Finally, it
budged. “Got it.”

“Thank you.”

I didn’t have to lower it a few inches but couldn’t resist a glimpse of the milky skin of her back. “All
set.”

It reminded me of every other part of her body that she’d once given to me fully and completely for

one night. It may have only been once, but in my gut, I knew a part of her still belonged to me. Her body
language proved it and made me wonder if I was the first and last person who’d ever truly pleasured her.

My hands wouldn’t leave her shoulders. She was looking down, and I knew she was battling her

feelings, too. This was the first time since our reconnection that I truly realized how much Greta still
wanted me sexually. Our desire for each other was so powerful in the confines of this tiny space that you
could taste it in the air.

I kept looking at her in the mirror until she looked up and met my gaze. When she turned around

suddenly, I wasn’t prepared. Our faces were just inches apart, and I’d never wanted to kiss her more than
that moment. My eyes dropped to her mouth, and I counted in my head to keep myself in control. The

counting wasn’t working so I closed my eyes.

When I opened them, I no longer had the urge to just kiss her. It was far worse. Thank God she

couldn’t read my mind because the image of fucking that beautiful mouth was so clear in my head that I

felt myself getting hard and prayed she didn’t look down.

I needed to leave but couldn’t move.

Chelsea.

Chelsea.

Chelsea.

You love Chelsea.

Having these feelings is okay as long as you don’t act on them, I told myself. This is natural. You can’t
prevent what your body wants, only whether you follow through with it. And I deserved a big shiny trophy
for resistance. Instead of the “mirror ball,” we’d call it the “blue ball.”

The store attendant came by. “Is everything okay in there?”

“Yes!” Greta shouted.

But I knew in her voice it wasn’t. This was messing with her mind, and I’d be fucking damned if the

night ended in her getting hurt.

Even though we hadn’t acknowledged what was happening between us verbally, I instinctively said,

“I’m sorry.” Then, I slid the curtain and left.

***

We decided to spend the night at the hotel since we’d been drinking. After we’d both separated to

shower before heading to the casino nightclub, I met Greta back at her room. When she opened the door,

the sight of her in that fitted burgundy dress knocked the wind out of me again. Her hair was still sopping
wet, but she looked amazing.

“Wow,” I breathed out, not intending to have said it out loud. The word had left my lips before my

brain could warn me not to seem so obvious. I needed to make a joke to offset my slip. “You definitely

can’t pass for an old lady in mourning anymore.”

“What do I look like now?”

“You look flushed, actually. Are you feeling alright?”

In all honesty, she looked like she’d just been properly fucked, and it made my dick ache.

“I’m fine,” she said.

“You sure?”

“Yep.”

“It felt so good to take a shower,” I said.

And by that I meant the two orgasms I gave myself thinking about an alternate ending to our dressing

room encounter.

“I know what you mean,” she said.

“Do you need to dry your hair?”

“Yeah. Just give me a minute.”

I turned on ESPN and lay down on the bed.

About ten minutes later, she came out of the bathroom.

“I’m ready.”

Her hair was up, her neck was exposed in all of its glory, and I knew I was in trouble for the rest of the
night.

I jumped up and turned the television off.

We walked down the hall, and the smell of the soap on her skin was invading my senses. I glanced over

at her and wanted her to know how beautiful she looked when I said, “You clean up nice.” When we

entered the elevator, I added, “I like your hair up like that.”

“You do?”

“Yeah. It’s how you were wearing it the night when I first met you.”

“I’m surprised you remembered that.”

I hadn’t forgotten one thing.

Not. One. Thing.

We’d started reminiscing about how I used to torture her and at one point, she said, “Well, you weren’t

exactly as mean as you wanted me to believe you were.”

I returned that with, “And it turned out you weren’t that innocent.”

The tone in my voice made no secret of what I was referring to. We looked at each other with a silent

understanding that the conversation needed to end there.

If I thought the night was going to get any easier once we entered the distraction of a nightclub, I had
another thing coming.

***

We’d been dancing a lot. It was the most fun I’d had all night. The bass was blaring, and I could feel

it pumping through me. Dancing bodies tangled together around us, but Greta and I kept a space between

each other.

It was necessary.

At one point, I went to the bathroom and as I made my way back through the multi-colored flashing

lights, I spotted a guy dancing very closely around her and talking in her ear.

When I returned to the spot where she was dancing alongside him, my conscience gave way to a primal

and impulsive reaction. I wrapped my arm around her tiny waist and pulled her firmly back into me. She

didn’t resist. My arm was still dominantly locked around her when she turned to look at me. I gave her a
warning look. In that moment, we were the Elec and Greta of seven years ago. I was jealous, and I was

once again making it obvious. Given the not so minor detail of my being in a serious relationship, it was
unfair to expect her to accept things that I couldn’t, but she cared about me enough to let me get away

with this somehow.

We didn’t speak about it, and eventually, my caveman moment passed. I let go of her, and we were

back to getting lost in the music.

Everything changed, though, when a slow song had come on. People started scrambling to find

partners while others left the dance floor. Somehow, it felt like we were the only ones left.

Greta panicked and started to walk away.

I couldn’t blame her, but what if tonight was it for us? I wanted this dance.

I grabbed her hand. “Dance with me.”

She looked scared but let me reel her into me anyway. A deep breath escaped me when her entire body

melted into my arms. She closed her eyes as she planted her head on my chest. My heart was hammering

against it as if to tell me that I was an idiot for not realizing that this was precisely what it wanted.

For the first time since we arrived at the casino, thoughts of Chelsea were completely buried by the

intensity of my feelings for Greta. Needing to know if she felt it, I looked down and at that same exact
moment, she looked up at me. I was losing my ability to breathe. I touched my forehead to hers and just

knew. That was the moment I stopped lying to myself. I was still in love with her. I didn’t know what to do
about it because I loved Chelsea, too.

Before I could think it through, Greta pulled away and started running off through the darkness of the

crowd.

“Greta, wait!”

Within seconds, I’d lost her. I made my way to the exit and ran toward the elevators. The doors were

closing, and I stuck my arm through the opening to stop them.

She was crying. God, what had I done to her?