Beautiful Brute: A Stepbrother College Romance (Court University Book 3)

by Eden O'Neill

“It’s okay, honey,” Mama said, sounding like she was almost coaching. “It’s okay.”

  Mom’s jaw moved, and beside her, Dad huffed.

  “You don’t have to do this, Sherry,” he said, his expression hard. “I told you we don’t have to do this.”

  “But we do, Rick.” She faced him, her brow wrinkled. She touched a hand to the table. “You see what he’s done. We’re both hurting him.”

  “What are you talking about?” I asked, exchanging glances across the table. No one seemed to want to look at me. At least, not directly. “What aren’t you telling me?”

  Mom laced her fingers. “Rick told me about your conversations. About your hurt. But not until this whole thing with your stepsister did I realize how bad it was. Your hate for him.”

  My stomach fucking twisted, jostling and shit like I was on a roller coaster.

  Mom swung her gaze at me. “That’s what that all was about, right? What it all boiled down to?”

  I said nothing, more complicated than that so I said nothing. Maybe a long time ago, I would have owned up to that shit—hell, preached it from the rafters. I’d screwed my father by literally screwing his stepdaughter. I would have been proud of it, gloating it.

  That was if that fact remained true.

  So many things weren’t what they were anymore and I cuffed my arms.

  Mom touched my arm. “Baby, I haven’t been telling you the truth.”

  I looked at her, frowning.

  Mom wet her lips. “I let you believe something that isn’t true.”

  “We both did,” Dad stated, his gaze once again averting. “And really, we don’t have to do this.”

  “Not ‘doing this’ is what started all this.” Mom put her hands out. “Not doing this is hurting our son, and I’m not going to make him suffer anymore. Not for things I’ve done. Not on my watch.”

  “Mom?” Emotion in my voice that surprised me. I couldn’t even fucking fathom how this woman could ever possibly hurt me. Even when I was mad at her over some trivial shit, she’d never truly hurt me. Never had. She could never.

  “Jaxen, your father never cheated on me,” she said, her eyes so sad. “It was me, me the whole time who was unfaithful to him.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Jax

  A pin fucking dropping could have been heard, nothing in that goddamn room. I caught a look of my father in that moment.

  But he looked sadder than my mom.

  In fact, visibly sadder, like none of this shit should be happening. None of it should be.

  None of it.

  “What are you talking about?” I asked, gritted. “Why are you saying this?”

  “I’m saying it because it’s true. It was me who cheated on your dad.” She pressed a hand to her chest. “Me and your father left this family because of that.”

  I didn’t understand. What she was telling me was complete bullshit. “But I heard…”

  “You heard wrong.” Again, looking at me. She touched my face. “And I let you believe that because I was angry. I was angry at your father for just leaving us. For leaving you? It was the wrong thing to do on my end, and something I never should have done.”

  My face tugged out of her reach. “He left because of you?”

  “And me, my love.” Mama reached for Mom’s shoulder behind me, squeezing. “He left because of us. Our affair.”

  “You know your mama was my sous chef,” Mom said, squeezing Mama’s hand. “I… I fell in love. Fell in love with her. We started an affair, and it lasted for almost a year before your father found out.”

  My whole body chilled, sobered. Mama had come into our lives right after Dad left.

  Almost right after.

  I hadn’t thought about the timing then, just a hurt kid who was mourning the loss of my father. He didn’t even call me.

  He just fucking left.

  He was here, and then he wasn’t so quickly, gone for almost a year before I saw him in the courts. He dragged my mom and me through all that custody shit, talking about how he wanted me to choose him.

  I couldn’t breathe, my chest caving in. “Why would you do that? Why would you let me think that? That he didn’t…”

  Want me.

  Because that’s what I’d thought. He’d left so that’s what I thought. “Why would you let me think that he abandoned me?”

  “Because I did, Jax.”

  My father’s eyes clashing with mine, his hands folded on the table.

  He nodded. “I did leave you, left you by leaving the situation. Thinking back, I know it was my pride.” His gaze escaped, almost shame there before it returned. “I was angry at your mom too, and it took almost a goddamn year before I got my head out of my ass enough to come back to you.”

  “Why didn’t you just tell me the truth then!” I shot. “Why make me think that it was you who ripped this family apart this whole goddamn time—”

  “Because I played a part in it, Jax!”

  His words ricocheted across the room, ping-ponging with mine.

  He shook his head. “I left you for a year. And yes, you were okay in the end. But I did that, it was on me. I couldn’t deny what I did, that I ran from you and the situation. I left my son because I was angry with his mother. So when I did come back and found out she let you believe what you did, I didn’t make her correct it. How could I? I was guilty myself. It’d have been completely hypocritical of me.”

  “But I needed you,” I admitted, hating that I was admitting that. My nostrils flared. “I didn’t think you fucking cared.”

  “I did what I did because I cared,” he rasped, his voice so thick his throat worked. “You had a good thing going with your mom and her partner by the time I came back. You were happy. If I would have told you the truth, you would have resented me and her. The admittance would have completely imploded everything for you.”

  But I would have had him.

  And now, I knew they were both liars.

  They were both full of bullshit, even Mama. She’d been the other woman, gone along with it.

  Everything I knew was completely turned on its head, all the people I loved, trusted. In the end, I only had one real thing.

  I’d blown that up too.

  I fucked with Cleo, and she and her mom were the two people who didn’t have anything to do with this. She was the one piece of pure fucking light.

  And so, I really was paying for my sins.

  “We’re all to blame for this, Rick,” Mom stated, looking at my father. “We all imploded everything. Each of us in our own ways.”

  Leaning forward, I laced my fingers, no words for any of them. Mom touched me, and though I wanted to draw back, I was just so tired. I was tired of hate.

  I was tired in the darkness.

  I drowned in it, lost in this fucking shit just as much as my parents. I was tired of the weight of it.

  I was just so tired.

  “We all messed up, Jaxen,” Mom said, Mama taking her hand behind her. “And we’re not asking for your forgiveness. We don’t expect it. We just…” She rubbed my back. “We don’t want you to hurt anymore. Suffer over lies or half-truths. We don’t want you to hurt yourself or others for things we all had a part in.”

  My eyes fell shut, knowing exactly where she was going with that. She thought I’d hurt others, more specifically, Cleo, and she didn’t have to say it.

  That’s how they all felt.

  They thought I’d hurt Cleo intentionally, and I shoved my hands into my hair.

  “I wasn’t trying to hurt Cleo, Mom,” I said, lacing my fingers behind my neck. “I’d never want to hurt her.”

  They studied me as I braced my arms, a million eyes on me in that moment. I think the heaviest were on myself. I didn’t want to hurt my stepsister, not on purpose and never again.

  I wet my lips. “I’m in love with her.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Cleo

  I took out the trash pretty late that night, but it took me t
hat long just to get the energy. I’d decided to come home for the weekend after midterms, pretty common at Bay Cove. The professors tended to schedule examinations early in the week, so Fridays, students basically blew off if the professors didn’t flat out cancel classes anyway. It became customary for me to come home and Mom catered a big meal for us to eat. Dad typically was in town too, but he’d left early this morning.

  He hadn’t said exactly where he was going, but that it’d been important. I figured it must have been since he’d skipped out on us today. It’d been pretty out of the blue, but work did tend to take him away sometimes. It happened.

  In any sense, I wasn’t angry. Mom had made sure to be around, and we stuffed our faces while watching old episodes of Friends. We did that for hours before she let me know she was zapped and wanted to go to bed. She’d kissed me goodnight, then I decided to take the trash out before heading up to bed myself.

  That’s when I saw him.

  Lawson Richards strolled the street in a pair of sweatpants and university hoodie, a border collie guided by a leash in his hands. He must have come home too for the weekend, his dog well-mannered as it didn’t tug at the lead. I’d seen the pair of them before. After all, Lawson and I lived in the same neighborhood and went to the same schools growing up.

  The guy had just never left me for dead before.

  That was outside of the strike against him for attempting to put his hands on me without my consent.

  The pair passing my house, I immediately stiffened, but since I was basically on the sidewalk Lawson saw me easily upon striding past.

  One would have thought he’d seen a ghost.

  He stiffened too, tugging back his collie who’d decided to go on the walk without him. I didn’t think he’d actually say anything to me. After all, he had no right at all.

  But then, he guided his dog in my direction.

  “Cleo. Hey,” he said, wrapping the dog’s leash around his big fist. He wrestled with it. “You’re home too.”

  Not really wanting to do this, I topped the trash can with the lid. I started to open the gate to go back inside, but he waved a hand.

  “Cleo…” he started, but what else did he have to say? The guy was a complete jerk, and I couldn’t believe I’d idolized him the way I had. I had a tendency of making a lot of piss-poor mistakes lately. “Come on. Can I just…”

  “Can you what?” I turned, bracing my arms. “What could you possibly have to say to me?”

  As it turned out, it wasn’t much. He rubbed his mouth. “I guess I just want to apologize.”

  Physically laughing in the open air at this point, I glared. “You already did that. Your text. Remember?”

  And boy, did I remember it well. It came the next morning to check and see if I was okay. The only reason I believed he was even standing here apologizing now was because he happened to see me.

  He tapped his leg with the leash. “Not for that. I mean, yes that. But…” His jaw shifted. “For something else I did. It was completely sophomoric, and had I known that guy was your stepbrother…”

  “Wait. What?” He had my attention goddamn him.

  He mentioned Jaxen.

  My stomach did that twisty-unraveling thing again. Except this time, it didn’t feel like butterflies. This time I wanted to be sick where I stood.

  Truth be told, neither of my parents had brought up the thing with Jaxen after I flat out refused. They’d kept coming at me with all kinds of things, wanting to know if he’d manipulated me. If he’d coerced me into sleeping with him. They wanted to know if he’d hurt me on purpose, but I hadn’t wanted to talk about any of it. If I did that, I’d have to admit that my feelings for him were all one-sided and that he had played me. I’d have to admit that I had screwed up.

  I’d have to admit how I felt meant absolutely zero things to him, that he’d screwed me over and I’d fallen like an idiot for someone who didn’t care.

  Avoidance had been easier, and though I didn’t want to talk about Jaxen now either, what Lawson said put me off.

  I hugged my arms. “What are you…”

  He showed me something, his phone. I started to back away until I recognized the number.

  It was Jaxen’s.

  Lawson had sent a text message to Jaxen’s phone, the picture of Jaxen and me in bed. I didn’t understand, and Lawson pulled the phone back.

  “Honestly, I just thought I saw the guy you’d been in bed with at the club that night,” he said, cringing. “I saw a guy you fucked after you got on me for—”

  I stepped up on him. “What did you do?”

  “Like I said, something stupid.” Scrubbing into his hair, he unraveled his dog’s leash, letting the breed walk a little. “It was so petty. He and I were both at the same club. Like I said, I recognized the guy. Anyway, he put down his phone for like a second, and I didn’t think. I happened to be at the bar too and saw an opportunity.”

  Chilled, I stared on. “Opportunity?”

  Lawson’s mouth worked. “I sent him the picture of you guys to his phone, then deleted the thread after saving it there. After that, it was a quick send over to your mom from his line. I wanted to embarrass you. Call you out on your holier-than-thou shit for turning me down.”

  I shook my head. “I’m assuming you got my mom’s number from your mom.”

  “Yeah.” He had the nerve to actually appear guilty. He moved his jaw. “As you know, they’re friends. I made up some excuse about needing your line for some school stuff and asked my mom if she could send me your mother’s number. Told Mom I was going to ask for your contact, and she believed me since she knows we go to school together.”

  Unbelievable, completely unbelievable.

  “Cleo—”

  A punch to his jaw and so hard, I actually thought I broke my fist.

  I cursed in the air, and with his dog, Lawson asked me if I was okay. I didn’t know if I was madder that he was arrogant enough to pretend to care or that I’d done no damage to his pretty face at all.

  “Back the hell away from me,” I seethed, on the cusp of tears. He had no idea what he’d done. No idea. “Do you have any clue what you’ve done? To my family?”

  My dad was so upset, both of my parents freaking out. It’d been nothing short of talking them down to keep them from doing anything about Jaxen.

  Jaxen.

  Reality hit me like it hadn’t before.

  He’d been telling the truth.

  Oh, God, he’d been telling the truth, and I hadn’t believed him. I’d left him out to dry like my adoptive father had in the past.

  I wasn’t there for him.

  “Cleo, I’m so sorry. That’s why I said something. I overheard my mom talking to yours on the phone today about it. I had no idea that guy was your stepbrother. I just wanted to call you on your shit. I hadn’t… I mean, your stepbrother?”

  How funny this guy wanted to judge, like he had a right?

  I pointed at him. “You didn’t want to call me on my shit. You wanted payback—point-blank, because I wouldn’t let you put your hands on me.”

  He said nothing, of course, and how could he?

  It was true.

  I really was hella freaking good at picking guys. I actually thought he’d been the nice one.

  And tossed the one I wanted away.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Cleo

  I tried Jaxen several times that night, but his phone must have been off or dead because it went straight to voicemail every time. I ended up having to give up and go to bed, but when I woke up the next morning, same thing. I couldn’t get past the voicemail option. I thought to leave him a text message, but decided on a whim, just to head back to school. Odds were, he didn’t go back home for the weekend and I needed to talk to him. This couldn’t wait.

  I needed to apologize.

  I hadn’t held faith in him like I should have, so first thing, I was up and heading on the road. I told Mom everything this morning, that what happened wasn�
�t Jaxen’s fault but Lawson’s. I told her this whole thing was a big misunderstanding, and she immediately contacted Lawson’s mom too. Odds were, he hadn’t told the truth to her. He was a coward, and cowards didn’t tell the truth. It’d probably be best if he decided to go to another school next term because I had a feeling once Jaxen learned Lawson’s place in all this, he’d be coming for him as he should. He’d screwed us both.

  Mom hadn’t understood my need to go until I told her that truth too, that it hadn’t been just sex as awkward as the conversation was. I had real feelings for my stepbrother, and though she hadn’t been in love with that, she hadn’t stopped me from going.

  “I trust you know what you’re doing,” she’d said and that we’d discuss everything when Dad came back home. I asked if she knew where he went and she said she didn’t have too many details herself. He just said that he had to leave quickly and was supposed to check in with her this morning. I assumed he had a work obligation, usually the case and since Mom didn’t seemed to be too alarmed, I wasn’t either. Anyway, I didn’t want to bother him with all this anyway. That wasn’t priority. I needed to get back to campus and talk to Jaxen.

  My hour-plus-long commute was anxiety-ridden, and not one moment of it did I think about anything else. My thoughts were completely on Jaxen and what I’d say to him. I didn’t know how to handle this situation.

  I’d never been in love before.

  Of course, I’d loved people. I loved my mom, my adoptive father, and my biological dad. I loved my baby brother, Nathan, but this kind of love with Jaxen was completely different. It was all-consuming and so overwhelming I couldn’t even easily admit it to myself. It was terrifying, but also the most beautiful thing I’d ever felt. I wanted to be surrounded by it every day, which made all of this just that much more scary. Odds were, he might not feel the same way. Topics such as this, openness and feelings, were just so much harder with him, and add to the fact I hadn’t believed him about the text? I just didn’t know what would happen.

  Instead, I attempted to focus on driving, and though I didn’t normally answer text messages on the road or even look at my phone, something compelled me to glance over to my device on my passenger seat when it buzzed.