Hard: A Step-Brother Romance

by Sosie Frost

  “You tricked me,” I said. “You had sex with me without saying you were my step-brother. You lied about who you were, why you found me, and what you were doing. It was cruel, and I want nothing to do with you now. No help. No moving. No nothing.”

  “How am I supposed to make it better if you won’t even listen to me?”

  “There’s nothing to make-better. You are beyond apologies at this point.”

  “Give me a chance?

  Was he kidding? I threw the laundry onto the bed. “Zach, you hurt me.”

  His smile faded. “It wasn’t my intention.”

  “First I poured my soul out to you, and then we had…”

  And there I went again, imagining everything I had tried not to imagine for the past week and a half.

  And he must have imagined it too. Zach shifted, adjusting himself without making it obvious he was adjusting.

  That namesake again.

  Hard.

  He lived up to it. He was supremely gifted. Just knowing how he had felt, tasted, and pleasured was too much for me to handle right now.

  Or ever again.

  “You are the biggest mistake of my life.” I took a breath, but I didn’t let him intimidate me. “But you know what? I’m going to take you up on your offer.”

  Zach tilted his head—a look I’d consider cute and puppyish if I didn’t know better. He was no little rolly-polly cutie, he was the wolf. Cunning. Sleek. Built for power and precision. I didn’t meet his gaze. The green was far too inviting for what I needed to say.

  “You’re going to come stay at the mansion?” He stepped closer, twirling the little pink panties around his finger. “It’s a good idea, Shay. We could keep each other company. Again.”

  I braced as he approached. He was huge, powerful, and perfect. I had never felt petite before, but in his shadow, I was overwhelmed.

  Zach could haul me around a bed with one arm and then cuddle me against his strength when we were done. And I remembered the wonderful things he’d whispered, things that warmed me from inside once more.

  My chest tightened, and everything else clenched too. How could a man who was so wrong, so horrible, and so awful tempt me?

  My head and heart tangled with each other. Neither could overpower the other.

  Con-artist.

  Sexiest man I ever touched.

  Liar.

  He smiled, baring his teeth, reminding me of his teasing bite.

  Step-brother.

  He was too close to me. The rugged, dusty scent of him dizzied my head worse than the drinks he bought me that night. I would have done anything if he were just a stranger, just someone I met, just someone I could have once more.

  But he wasn’t.

  He was Zach. He was the worst thing that ever happened to me.

  And he was still holding my panties.

  I ripped them away from him, but my fingers brushed his. A dozen little shivers cracked into a thousand tiny whispers with a million different regrets. His hand warmed mine, so much bigger and stronger than my delicate palm. His skin, light and fair, contrasted mine with perfect beauty. Like we were made opposite just to be brought together. Two sides of a coin. Two polar extremes of a magnet.

  My mouth dried. He stilled.

  “Shay—”

  His voice rumbled with a playboy’s confidence, the smooth jazz of a man who knew what he liked and got it every time.

  But not this time.

  I couldn’t let him do this to me.

  Not again.

  New life rule. Zach was a sin, even worse than the cardinal ones, if they made it. Blue-jay maybe. Or, since he was an American soldier, Bald Eagle Sin.

  In any case, Zach Harden was completely off-limits to me. Forbidden. And I had one way to make sure he left my life forever.

  It wasn’t every day a girl could recover from her mistakes with grace. It was an even rarer day she could buy redemption. I had the money. I had the opportunity. I would spend as much as I could if it meant banishing my greatest mistake. Enough was enough.

  “I’m moving to the mansion,” I said. “But once I get my trust, I’m buying your half of the estate from you. After that’s done, you’ll have no reason to contact me again.”

  “Fair is fair.” Zach leaned close. “Though I think you’re missing a great opportunity.”

  “For what?”

  “To fall for me.”

  I met his gaze, just as hard and deliberate as the rest of him. “I would rather lose every penny to my name than fall for you.”

  “Say the word. You can get me for free.”

  I laughed. “Cherish your memories. That’s all you’ll ever have.”

  “Those are some priceless memories, baby.” He grabbed a packed box from the floor, but nearly dropped it. His fingers trembled. He cracked his knuckles and tried again, lifting it without a problem. “Are these going?”

  “Put it down.”

  He winked. “I’ll take it home for you. But don’t be late. I’m ordering dinner for seven.”

  He grabbed another box on the way out.

  Great. I was barefoot, and every pair of shoes I owned was packed in the box he carried outside. My panties scattered in his wake.

  I groaned.

  Living with Zach would be living with pure temptation. Either I’d throttle him or I’d…

  I didn’t let myself finish the thought. There was no other alternative. We could tolerate each other in a semi-peaceful truce and that was it. No ordered dinners. No falling for him.

  And no reason for him to have stolen my favorite pair of black panties!

  I rifled through my suitcase and checked under the bed. Gone. God, he was a pervert.

  I fumed.

  He had it right. He deserved every part of his nickname.

  Living with Zach was going to be H-a-r-d.

  The mansion had a lot of perks. The gym. The pool. I even got myself a king-sized bed.

  But a bed like this wasn’t for sleeping. I could think of much better things to do on it.

  But the one woman I wanted in the bed was the one who wanted nothing to do with me while horizontal.

  Good thing I was just as proficient when vertical.

  I kicked my duffle bag into the closet. This wasn’t a room that deserved a mess on the floor. The bed had eight fucking pillows. Who the hell used that many pillows? Or a quilt that looked like someone stretched and ruined a scarf then tossed it over a corner. They painted the ceiling with cherubs, and mismatched marble and granite in the fireplace.

  It was all my mother’s doing, as was most of the décor in the house. If Shay noticed the mansion transitioned from eighteenth century France to nineteenth century Venice, she said nothing. My mother transformed the estate into journey through history. We were lucky she hadn’t require powdered wigs and cummerbunds to enjoy it.

  I couldn’t fault her style, even if the bleach in her hair scrambled what she thought looked classy. At least Mom and Darnell had been happy before the end. She wanted a guy with a bottomless wallet to take care of her, and he liked them blonde and pumped full of silicon. Match made in Heaven.

  I wished them well and then headed overseas. It wasn’t my place to judge and, hell, I didn’t have time for family. But life had a funny way of trapping you in an ambush and splitting your flesh with two pounds of explosive shrapnel. Fate spoke to me, saying slow down or bleed out. I woke from surgery with my mother talking about diamonds, tulle veils, and destination weddings. Took her two days and one seizure before she asked which of my organs didn’t make it back from Iraq.

  Par for the fucking course.

  My head pounded. The bed looked good, but so did the stack of weights in the basement gym and the salt-water pool. I needed to do both.

  I kicked the pillows off the bed instead.

  I didn’t need this luxury. I got used to lying in two inches of standing water and sucking mud in the middle of monsoons. I once laid motionless for twenty-two straight hours in the stin
ging desert waiting for a target to slip from the hut where the fucker traded children for God-knows-what. And that night was comfortable compared to other assignments.

  And now I owned a king-sized bed with a remote that controlled the television, lights, stereo, climate settings, and security systems.

  I even had a panic room.

  A SEAL.

  In a panic room.

  Unless an intruder planned on locking me inside of it, the fucker messing with me was in more danger—even while I blinked away headaches.

  A headache that was getting worse.

  “Fuck it.”

  I yanked my shirt over my head and kicked off my boots. Pretty sure there was a hamper somewhere in my room, but damn if I cared.

  I collapsed on the bed, feet kicked over the side. Close enough. The migraine came on strong. I clenched my eyes shut, but that didn’t do shit. I flopped over into the remaining pillows and buried my head. That was better. Darker at least. Comfortable.

  Except for my namesake.

  Christ.

  I shifted. My cock didn’t. Hard didn’t begin to describe it.

  I spent entirely too much time thinking about Shay, and I wasted even more concocting a crazy excuse for a chance to see her again.

  Christ she was pretty when she got mad.

  Shay was the kind of beautiful you hallucinated after a blow to the head. And she was the one girl who’d make me swallow my tongue before I thought of something clever to say.

  Like…I probably should have told you I was your step-brother before I fucked you. That might have helped. Keeping it secret rubbed her the wrong way…which was ironic since our problems started when I rubbed her the right way.

  I couldn’t get her out of my head or the blood out of my cock. I hoped my headache would temper my reaction, but if Shay’s hatred hadn’t swayed me, nothing would.

  She didn’t know it yet, but the SEALs trained me for intricate games of cat-and-mouse. I lived for the hunt. And after I caught Shay? I’d make sure she was both stuffed and mounted.

  If she didn’t kill me first.

  “Get out of my bed.”

  Fuck.

  The pounding headache only just started to yield. Figured. I gritted my teeth and rolled. Didn’t make it up, but I bluffed anyway. I patted the pillow beside me as my vision cleared.

  “You could join me.”

  “Are you always such an asshole?”

  “Do you always burst into people’s bedrooms uninvited?”

  I tucked my arms behind my head. My lovely intruder fumbled with a suitcase packed with more panties than a sexy woman like her ever needed to wear. She was pissed. That only made it more fun. I got off on making everything a war with her. She wound up too easy and exploded with all the subtlety of a grenade.

  Last time I checked, she didn’t have that big of a stick up her ass. Still, watching her squirm amused the fuck out of me, even if it ruined my chances to glimpse that perfectly delicious backside.

  “This is the master bedroom,” she said.

  I grinned. “Didn’t know you were into those types of games.”

  She dropped the suitcase. “How dare you take the master bedroom!”

  “What’s wrong with this bedroom?”

  “It should be…this was my father’s house!”

  I tilted my head. “And my mother’s.”

  “Don’t you think I should have the master bedroom? This is my house, built with my father’s money.”

  Was everything going to be such a fucking pissing contest with her? She wouldn’t give up until I slept in the yard.

  I wouldn’t stop until I had her in the bed with me.

  But we wouldn’t be sleeping.

  “I thought you’d take the room down the hall,” I said. Did she even see the monstrosity her father specifically designed for her? Like a scene from fucking Narnia. “It has a better balcony.”

  “I don’t want a balcony. I want the master bedroom. I want you gone. I want—” She groaned, frustrated. “I don’t know what to say to you! You’re making this more difficult than it needs to be. Are you that much of a child?”

  “I’m not the one throwing a tantrum because she doesn’t want to share her things.”

  She not-so-silently counted to ten. “Zach, don’t make this harder than it already is.”

  “Gotta admit. I’ve never heard a pretty girl say that before.”

  “I can’t believe this.” Shay paced the room. “I’ve been here for five minutes and already you’re being a monumental asshole.”

  “I was sleeping.”

  “I thought this could work. I thought you were serious when you said we’d share this place.”

  “What did I do? I was sleeping.”

  Shay wove her fingers through her thick, ebony curls.

  “This is crazy. I don’t even know you—” She pointed a finger at me. “And if you say anything about knowing me in a biblical way Imma smack that smirk off your face.”

  Challenge accepted.

  “Come on.” I extended my arms. “Do you really think I’m some big, bad troublemaker out to rob you blind?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Do you think I’m some sexual fiend who will creep on you in the middle of the night?”

  Her almond eyes flicked over me. “Probably.”

  “Think I’m a dangerous, powerful man who will threaten your pretty little body?”

  She stepped closer. Her voice lowered, her best attempt at sounding intimidating. “How would I know?”

  Shay was within my arm’s reach. Entirely too close. I could have snatched her in my grasp and thrown her on the bed. If I had my way, I’d bury my face between her mocha legs and lick until I had my fill. She’d tasted like everything perfect—that first bite of summer ice-cream, cake batter straight from the spatula, a sip of forbidden alcohol before I turned twenty-one.

  I remembered lapping up her honeyed desire, and it tortured my dreams every night. She was so unbelievably sweet I would have offered my half of the house just to look at that tight little pussy once more.

  My jeans dug into my cock. It wasn’t the pressure I wanted. Shay licked her lips. She got flustered when she realized she was staring.

  My growl reserved for her and her alone. “You know you have nothing to fear around me.”

  “I’m sharing a house with a perfect stranger. It’s wise to be careful.”

  “Then let me put your concerns to rest.” My smile wasn’t meant to charm her. It was as much of a warning as my throbbing cock allowed. “I’m not someone you run from. You’re gonna come to me. Just say the word, and I swear, not an inch of your beautiful body would regret climbing into my bed.”

  “You’re one cocky son of a bitch.”

  “When you have a cock like mine, you get to be a bastard.”

  She didn’t argue. Couldn’t argue. She knew I was right. She remembered how it pounded within her, how every frantic thrust and deliberate slam was meant to earn a not-so-innocent mew from her trembling lips.

  And that was the way it should have been. None of this but you’ve been my step-brother for a couple days bullshit. Not the territorial fear that somehow I conned her family out of millions.

  It wasn’t sex between us. It was something addicting.

  Life-affirming.

  Ball-fucking-shattering.

  And I knew she felt it too. She tried to shy away from me. She faced me only after building her defenses. I’d strip them as easily as her respectable little blouse and skirt.

  She couldn’t fool me. I saw what she hid in her panty drawer. Beneath the conservative shirts and thigh-hugging skirts, Shay expressed herself with thongs, lace, and ribbons. Dozens of colors. A handful of designs.

  Just waiting for the right man to lay her down, nip the elastic, and drag that silk over the dark paradise that crested between her legs.

  “You believe me now?” I chuckled through a husky command. “You’ve got nothing to fear sharing a house with
me.”

  She licked her lips. “I have everything to fear.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like why you’re looking at me like that.”

  She was lucky I was only looking. “You’re the sexiest woman I’ve ever met.”

  “At least in this port.”

  “I’ve been around the world, baby. Searched high and low for a perfect face, perfect tits, perfect pussy.”

  She arched her eyebrow. “Haven’t looked in the branches of the family tree then?”

  “Climb in deep enough and no one would ever see us.”

  “And that’s why I don’t trust you.”

  I laughed. “No one said anything about trust. But don’t worry. I’m not coming after you.” I lured her closer with a smirk. “Not when you’ll come to me.”

  “Unlikely. I’ll be too comfortable sleeping in this bed.”

  “You want it?” I extended my arms. “Come and get it.”

  She took the bait. Shay grabbed my hand and tugged, unsuccessfully pulling me from the bed. I resisted only enough to toss her off-balance. She tumbled forward, falling into my arms.

  Then I did what every red-blooded American patriot would do.

  I tucked her under me, wrapped one hand in her hair while the other caressed her cheek, and I lowered my lips to hers.

  What she squealed in protest silenced with the flick of my tongue against hers. Shay’s full, perfect lips surrendered within moments, softening and nibbling with the intensity of my kiss. I devoured her, worshiped her, and promised to replicate every single flick, bite, and suck on her other, equally-deserving areas.

  I wanted more than a kiss.

  I needed more than a kiss.

  Christ, after everything I had gone through—the injuries and recoveries, dealing with Mom’s bullshit, hiding her cocaine-induced death that the cops kept silent out of respect for the family’s money—I deserved more than R&R. T&A was more like it, and the only one I wanted to recuperate with was Shay.

  She warmed beneath me. I broke my hold on her lips to kiss the cocoa perfection of her neck. I nibbled over the delicate hollow at the base of her throat.

  She had liked that before.

  She shivered.

  She still did.

  Shay hid nothing from me, not while she writhed in full-body shudders from just the barest hint of my touch.