I could see the leer in his eyes, hear the triumph in his voice and did everything but stomp my feet and shake my fist before groaning and growling, “Don’t flatter yourself, Ryan. Anyone can have drunken, sloppy, random, anonymous sex if they’re really that desperate for it.”
He shrugged, bare torso flawless in the early morning sun. His chest was hairless, nipples taut and hard against his soft, brown skin, a smattering of random tattoos gracing his taut skin. “I dunno, Heather. Your bedroom’s been pretty… quiet… lately.”
“That sounds like a challenge to me, brother,” I hissed, winking as I slunk away, inspired by his dare and eager to wake him up in the middle of the night with random, stupid, crazy, loud, vagina-exploding sexcapades of my own!
Now, if only I could find a willing participant to help me…
Chapter Eight
The bar was loud and so was Randy.
Or was it Rex?
“I love this song,” he was saying, swaying sexily next to the glowing neon jukebox in a smoky, rowdy dive bar called The Deja Brew.
Or Deja Hoo—who?
I had no idea—nor did I care. I’d landed there hours ago, when it was still light out, because of the winking neon “It’s Always Ladies Night” sign in the window and the ratio of four motorcycles to each small import car in the parking lot.
The bar had been crowded then but now, hours later –I felt like I’d been here forever – it was pretty much just me and Randy-slash-Rex. And the jukebox, of course.
He was pretty in a fuzzy kind of way—thin and boyish in faded skinny jeans and an old Ramones concert T-shirt under a battered leather jacket with zippers in all sorts of odd places. His face was scruffy and his hair was long and his eyes were a bit too close together, but there was something velvety and smooth and fuckable about the way his hips moved in time with the song.
“Don’t you?” he asked, his face flushed from dancing and lips moist from licking as he stumbled back to our cozy corner booth, reaching for his fifth or sixth– Jack and Coke of the evening. He had long, thin fingers, like the rest of him, the kind that could turn me to jelly if used the right way.
I blinked back at his face, a little blurry from my own plethora of cocktails throughout the long, drunken night. “Don’t I what?” I asked, licking my own lips and tasting a combination of creamy minty lip gloss and the tangy tartness of my fourth margarita.
I’d been drinking one – my second, I think – when Randy-Rex approached, looking confident if boyish as he offered to buy me my third. Or was it fourth? I’d played hard to get and denied him, ordering one on my own. He’d lurked around adorably until I’d finished it and then asked me once more.
I’d let him buy me one, and after sitting together at the bar for a while, we took our drink and adjourned to a cozy back booth, where we’d stayed glued to each other ever since.
Now his handsome, if blurry, face flashed a look of frustration, maybe even impatience, at my slurred response. What did he expect? I’d never been a big drinker and frankly, I was more interested in how he looked than what he said, let alone what he listened to. I would have taken him home hours ago if I’d thought Ryan would be there to hear us screwing, but I wanted to make sure it was late – real late – and he was home in bed before I made my move and invited Randy-Rex home with me.
“Don’t you love this song?” he enthused, snapping his fingers – or trying to, at least. After three tries he gave up, looking confused and a little lost. Randy-Rex was a little worse for the wear himself, making me think I better get him home quick if we were going to make mad, passionate love with my bedroom door half-open—or maybe just a little more—to make sure Ryan heard every groan, moan, sigh, suck and fuck as I proved to him that I could be as drunk, desperate and horny as any former fucking Marine.
I’d heard of sibling rivalry, of course, and this was certainly taking it to extremes. I mean, who could fuck the loudest? Come on, Heather! But there was something else at stake here – my pride. Ryan had made it clear that he fancied me – at least, in a bikini. And in the same vulnerable moment, I’d made it clear I fancied him fancying me. Then that very same night, there he was, banging some bottle blonde in the next room!
Was he toying with me? I couldn’t help wonder as Randy-Rex struggled for a fourth time to snap those long, thin, sensual fingers. Trying to get my goat? Make me jealous? If so, what was good for the goose was good for the gander, and the only way to make my sordid fantasies a reality was to turn the tables on Ryan and let him know how it feels to hear someone you care about fuck someone else.
“So,” my future one-night stand pressed, waving his hands dramatically. “The song?”
I shrugged, making Randy-Rex’s nostrils flare all the more as I reeled him in with a long, deep, breathy sigh. “It’s fine, I guess,” I purred, leaning in closer to make sure he saw the swell of my breasts, pressing provocatively against the fabric of my most daring little black dress – no bra to restrict them as I went full “commando” for this mission. I waited until he took the bait, licking his lips instinctively as he eyed my small but perky tits with reckless abandon – or was he just struggling to focus? Either way, he was staring, and I let him; encouraged him even, sliding my arms tighter across my sides to increase the swell of bosom pressing provocatively against my skin tight dress.
When he was good and ripe and ready I murmured, “I have a lot of great music on my playlist… back… home.”
“Yeah?” he asked, finally glancing up from my rack to peer blurrily into my own out of focus eyes. “Home?” he pressed, licking his lips sloppily so that I could imagine them, thick and wet with my pussy liquor. “You mean, where you live?”
“Yeah,” I said, leaning closer to whisper in his ear, making sure to glance my lips, rosy and warm, against the bud of his ear as I murmured, “Where I live. In fact, I’ve got a great playlist I fuck to. All. Night. Long.”
He blinked, eyes widening in response to my provocative statement. As if he hadn’t heard it, or was perhaps waiting for the punch line, he remained silent; a first.
“So,” I pressed, inching my hand on top of his and feeling it flinch, then clench, with desire – and more. “You wanna hear it while we, you know… fuck all night long?”
“Why wait?” he said, going me one better as he stood, abruptly, knocking over his drink and tossing a wad of crumpled, greasy bills on the table to cover our ginormous tab.
“Well, we have to, sugar,” I murmured, sliding my arm through his as we wound through the deserted bar, stools already up on the bar, chairs already up on the handful of tables that surrounded the empty dance floor. “I don’t live far, but… it’ll take a few minutes to get there.”
“Fuck that,” he growled, voice bordering on a snarl as his long, wiry body tensed next to mine. “I’ve got a great one all queued up in my car.”
I wrinkled my nose, following him out of the deserted bar and into the warm, sultry night as the door shut with finality behind us. “Your car?” I snorted, finding myself unsteady on my feet as we stood – or tried to, anyway – just outside the cheesy dive nightclub. “No, baby,” I cooed, clinging to his arm more to steady myself than show affection. “Let’s do it right. My folks are away and I’ve got the whole place to myself and don’t forget that playlist—”
“You’re so hot and juicy, baby,” he grumbled, grabbing me there on the curb in front of the club and pawing me relentlessly. It was at that moment I realized how little my little black dress left to the imagination, or in the way of obstacle for an over-eager suitor like the one currently squeezing my tits and grabbing my ass. “You think I can wait to get you home before I tap that ass, sugar?”
Somehow I managed to push him away, breathing heavily from the effort. “I want you, too,” I gushed, swiping a stray lock of blonde hair back behind one ear. “But if you think I’m fucking you in the parking lot of some dive bar, you’ve got another thing—”
He grabbed me then, no longer content
to paw or pinch but pressing me close to him, so close I could feel the outline of his raging hard-on pressing tight against my quivering belly. I glanced up to watch his face leer down at me, eyes hard and cruel as he sputtered, “I don’t think, baby, I know. I want you here,” he said, pressing me tighter for effect. “I want you now,” he added, squeezing even tighter. Then leering down at me cruelly, his eyes hard as ice and no longer seeming quite so drunk or vulnerable anymore, his final words chilled me to the bone. “And I’ll have you, too.”
He was dragging me, tougher than he looked at first, stronger, too. His fingers dug into the meat of my arms, his breath smelling like cheap whiskey as he huffed and puffed along the curb in front of the club. I kicked and squirmed but all those margaritas had caught up with me – stealing my coordination along with my radar for clear and present danger.
“No,” I growled, managing to elude his grasp for a quick, sudden moment where I remained frozen in place – and he did, too. “NO!”
His face was a mask of rage. Gone was the soft, stubbly prettiness I’d admired in the neon-lit night club. Suddenly, inexplicably and quite cruelly, it had been replaced with a sheer wall of anger, nostrils flared, eyes slate black and cold, lips thin and hard set as he reared back a hand, larger than I remembered, to swing and silence me with a slap – or even worse.
In an instant, everything changed. Time seemed to slow and the air thickened as a figure appeared, massive and rapid. It was just a blur at first until, as a wall of hard muscle came into focus, I shouted out his name: “Ryan!”
He immediately had the asshole from the bar up against the wall, one large hand pinning Randy-Rex’s arms above his head while Ryan’s right hand gripped the stranger’s throat, strong fingers digging in as his victim squirmed helplessly, kicking out with thin, frail, impotent legs as my stepbrother stood, impassive and hardly batting an eye as he restrained my would-be attacker with vengeance and ease.
“Get. Off. Of. Me,” Randy-Rex somehow managed to gurgle as Ryan sneered at him, nostrils flaring as his eyes filled with glee.
“Now you know how it feels to be abused, asshole!” he said before kneeing Randy-Rex in the groin so viciously I almost felt it between my own legs!
Randy-Rex crumpled against the wall at his back, and sensing defeat, Ryan let him sag to the ground, a heap of whimpering manhood. Hah! My heart hammered as my stepbrother turned to me, his eyes full of protective rage, and his chest swollen with effort.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” he asked, tugging me away before I could dance on Randy-Rex’s whimpering body.
“Me?” I asked, arm in Ryan’s vice-like grip as he dragged me to a vehicle that looked suspiciously like my own car. “That guy almost raped me!”
“Yeah, almost,” Ryan huffed, opening the passenger door and all but tossing me inside as he stood triumphantly just outside the passenger door. “And would have, too, if I hadn’t been here to save your ass!”
It was my car, down to the Yankee Candle air freshener hanging from the rearview mirror and the fresh bottle of winter berry hand sanitizer in the cup holder. “What are you doing here, anyway?”
“Saving your ass, apparently,” he huffed, climbing into the driver’s seat and turning the engine over as we left the club – and my would-be attacker – in the dust. “I can’t believe how reckless you are, Heather. If I hadn’t been there, you know what could have happened to you?”
I ignored his harsh judgments and tried to focus on the blurry digital readout above the radio. Could it really be three in the morning? “Where… where did you come from?” I asked as he drove through an unfamiliar part of town. I vaguely remembered driving through it myself earlier that evening to get to the nightclub. Much, much earlier. Oddly enough, it felt like only a minute ago–and a lifetime ago as well. My heart pounded as the reality of what I’d done–and what had almost been done to me– sank home.
“You called me earlier, but when I answered the phone all I could hear was the mumbled conversation and piss poor country music blaring in the background. Worried me something might have been wrong, and when I finally got the call to disconnect and I called back, you never answered. So I called a cab and came looking for you,” he said, steering toward a strip of all-night convenience stores and fast-food chains open late.
I pulled my cell phone from my purse and checked the call log to confirm his story, and sure enough, I ass dialed the bastard. Ugh! Bet he’s wondering why his number was even at the top of the call log list! “But how did you know where I was? Did you do some black-ops military tracking on my phone?” I questioned, seriously. The adrenaline from the attack leaving my body as I sagged against the chair, suddenly realizing just how buzzed I was.
“I told you, I heard the piss poor country music. Small town, ain’t too many hole in the wall joints for a girl like you to venture off to,” Ryan chuckled, softer now, quieter, slower as well, as if he, too, was suffering from adrenaline withdrawals after his blitzkrieg attack on poor Randy-Rex. “You can’t just go off to clubs and pick up random strangers. It’s dangerous.”
“Look who’s talking,” I huffed, crossing my arms over my chest as he turned into a Burger in the Box and pulled up to the gaily lighted drive-thru menu.
“Waddaya mean?” he asked after placing an order for two Burger in the Box specials and pulling around to the window to pay for them.
“Haven’t you been doing that very thing every night since our parents left?” I asked as he paid for and picked up our order.
The smell of fried meat was both savory and sickening, my head spinning with the combination of eight or more margaritas and Ryan’s sudden appearance outside the club, thwarting a would-be attack that, regretfully, I’d put myself square in the middle of. I guess I’d had more to drink – and acted way stupider – than I thought.
“Yeah, but… that’s different,” Ryan said, ignoring the bag of burgers as I slid them into the back seat. I knew I would want them later, when I sobered up a bit, but for now, I was content to stare out the passenger side window, watching the streetlights blur into lemon yellow strings of taffy in the dark and listen to Ryan’s voice lecture me protectively all the way home.
“Why different?” I murmured, eyelids growing sleepy now that I was safe from harm and on the way home, my big, strong stepbrother taking the wheel – literally and figuratively.
“Because, Heather,” he said, voice soothing as my eyes finally shut on the whirring, spinning, melting lights outside my window. “I’m a man. I can protect myself.”
I nodded, silently, my head spinning even with my eyes closed, breathing heavily as sleep drew me close before Ryan’s voice staved off for one more minute or two.
“And if you’ll let me, Heather,” Ryan said, reaching over as he gently dragged a lock of hair away from my forehead. “I’d like to protect you, too.”
I wanted to reply, to nod and murmur and thank him for rescuing me, but instead I found the drone of his voice and his soft, gentle touch so soothing I fell asleep before I could do any of that…
Chapter Nine
I woke with a jolt, eyes blurry and head throbbing as I blinked at the bright lights staring me in the face. My head was pounding, the lights bright enough to make me think I was in the path of an oncoming eighteen wheeler!
“Whuzzhuzzzitz?” I mumbled, rubbing my face with both palms as if they were an imaginary washcloth, as if to erase the blur from my groggy eyes and wipe the brightness from my eyes.
“Jesus, you really were lit, weren’t you?”
I shook my head, Ryan’s face swimming in the driver’s seat of my car as the hazy details came, blurrily, back to life. “What’s it to you?” I blurted, our warm and fuzzy moment in the dive bar parking lot long cooled off on the winding drive home.
He rolled his eyes, scowling petulantly – big brother style – as the motion sense lights attached to the four-car garage illuminated us as if it was the middle of the day.
“Nothing, I gue
ss,” he grumbled, sliding from the car and dancing around the front end as if on cat’s feet. For a muscular guy, Ryan truly was light on his feet, lithe and strong in equal measure as the harsh garage lighting made him swim in sexy shadows.
“Come on,” he grunted, opening my door and reaching in to drag me from the car. “Let’s get you upstairs and into bed.”
“I thought you’d never ask,” I teased, enjoying the machinations of Ryan’s large, thick fingers as they fiddled with my seatbelt and I inhaled the manly, musky scent of his cologne. As he fiddled with the seatbelt a flash of light caught my eye, then the rasp of metal on flesh as I noticed for the first time a pair of dog tags swinging from a chain around his neck.
“I meant,” he scolded, finally sliding me from the seat as if pouring me into the driveway in front of our parents’ opulent home, “the sooner you get to bed and sleep this off, the shorter your hangover will be tomorrow morning. Trust me, Heather, you’ll literally thank me in the morning for what I’m doing for you tonight.”
I was semi-sober as we stumbled toward the back pool gate, both Ryan and I’s preferred method of entrance to the house, but I didn’t want him to know that just yet. I was enjoying playing the drunken stepsister, up for anything and able to blame it all on the booze the next day. “You know what else shortens a hangover the next morning?” I teased, hip checking him on purpose as we shambled toward the wooden gate.
“Yeah?” he asked, distracted by the gate door as he propped me on the side of the house to fiddle with the latch. “What’s that?”
“Having sex all night long,” I purred, striking a provocative pose in my tiny black dress and kinky blonde hair, feeling just buzzed enough to flirt despite the danger I’d faced earlier that very night.
“Please,” he said, ignoring me as he rolled his eyes and swung the gate wide, reaching for my hand as he inched forward into the back pool area. “You’re drunk, Heather. You don’t know what you’re saying right now, and if you’re lucky, won’t even remember it tomorrow.”
Dirty Wicked Lust: A Stepbrother Romance Page 5
