Second Chance Stepbrother

by Penny Wylder

  He cups my chin. Turns my face to his. When I meet his eyes again, I’m surprised by the heat of the fire burning in them. The passion so intense it threatens to burn anything that stands between us. Passion that hot could burn me in the process, too. Could burn both of us, from the wanting.

  He kisses me anyway. It’s different from our other kisses. Sharper. Fiercer. There’s a desperation in it, and I give in, kiss him back, let him feel the desperate ache that echoes in my veins too. This time, when we break apart, he rests his forehead against mine, those eyes still sharp and hot and burning holes through mine.

  “No,” he says. “We can be more. We can make this more.”

  Without another word, he stands up. Breaks away from me, and my whole body aches at the sudden absence where he used to be. I stare up at him, dumbstruck, and he shakes his head, turning away.

  “This time you’re the one who’s running, Paulina.”

  He leaves me there, alone on the dock, and I watch him walk all the way back to the cabin before I finally find the strength to make myself stand again.

  8

  I’ve spent a lot of the last few days out here by the lake. Just watching the water, thinking. Wishing for what could have been. Knowing that it’s too late now, too impossible a task to surmount. Josh thinks we can make this work somehow, but he doesn’t know my dad. Doesn’t know how long it took Dad to find real happiness, lasting happiness. There’s no way I can take that from him. Not after everything Dad sacrificed for me, raising me all on his own, giving me every advantage in life.

  Two days before we’re supposed to leave, Dad finds me like that. Perched on the end of the dock, legs hanging over the side, staring out at the water. He takes the seat beside me in silence for a while, glass of lemonade in hand. For a moment, I just pretend that nothing has changed. That it’s still that summer 6 years ago when we first came here, and I didn’t know I even had a shot with Josh yet, let alone how horribly taking that shot would go. Everything is still ahead of us—anything could happen.

  That’s what I’m busy pretending when Dad reaches over and chucks me on the bottom of the chin. The way he used to when I was little, and moping.

  I clear my throat.

  “Everything okay there, Pau?”

  “Yeah. Great.” I force a smile. I’m going to have to lie better than that, I know. “Just a bit sad the summer’s coming to an end, that’s all. It’s been a great one, hasn’t it?”

  Dad smiles back at me. He seems happy enough, though weirdly, that smile doesn’t seem to quite reach his eyes. He turns to gaze across the water again, and takes a long sip of his drink.

  “It really has,” he finally agrees.

  I smile. “You’re happy here?”

  “I am.” He sighs. “And I’m happy to have all of you here. You and Josh and Susan. It feels right, doesn’t it? The four of us.”

  My throat sticks. I force it open with a sharp inhale of air. “Yeah. It really does.”

  “Like old times.” He’s smiling for real now, the nostalgia sharp in his expression.

  “So you made the right choice, huh?” I smirk. “Marrying that old flame?”

  He laughs. “Oh, there wasn’t a flame back then. But it surprises you, what can crop up over time.”

  Don’t I know it.

  Dad’s looking at me again though, a little too closely, so I turn away to study the grass behind us instead, pretending I’m checking on the sun.

  “How about you, though, Pau?”

  “What do you mean?” I ask, far too quickly, my voice too high-pitched. Dammit.

  “You’ve been quiet the past few days. Haven’t seen you and Josh out romping around. Haven’t seen you doing much of anything, to be honest.”

  “I’m just tired,” I lie.

  He elbows me. “You’re going to have to do better than that with the guy who raised you, sweetheart. I know you almost as well as I know myself by now.”

  I sigh, and it turns into a frustrated groan at the end. “It’s nothing, Dad. Really. Just some stupid melodramatic… whatever.”

  “Is this about a boy?” His tone goes serious, scolding, but I know he’s mostly joking. He likes to pretend that he’ll crush any guy who crosses me, even though he’s the gentlest person ever.

  “It’s not about a boy,” I assure him.

  “A girl then?” he asks, his tone carefully neutral.

  I roll my eyes and elbow him. “I don’t play for that team, so no.”

  “Just saying, if you did, I’d be completely behind you.”

  “Oh my god, Dad.”

  “Well, you’ve yet to bring a boyfriend home…”

  I roll my eyes and glare at him. From the way he’s grinning, I know he’s just teasing though. “There’s nobody, Dad. It’s not about that.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “It’s…” I rub my temples. What can I possibly say to fix this? “It’s just something I can’t talk about, okay? It’s a personal problem, and I know you always say I can tell you anything—”

  “You really can, you know,” he interrupts.

  I talk over him, “But sometimes, there are just secrets that are better off kept secret and dealt with yourself, you know? Sometimes you aren’t ready to talk about them to people yet.”

  “I understand that,” he replies, much to my surprise. This time, when I look over at him, he’s finally stopped scrutinizing me. He’s gazing across the water instead, right at our cabin. Though in reality, he seems about a million miles away from here or the cabin just now.

  “What do you mean?” I ask softly. Now it’s my turn to pry, because he’s shaking his head already. I nudge him. “Dad?”

  “What if…” He sighs, downs the last of his lemonade in one big gulp and sets it aside. When he turns to face me again, hands on his knees, I feel a new knot forming in my stomach. Why does he look so nervous, so penitent? It makes my heart ache to see him looking this way, sad and pensive. Is it me? Did he find out about Josh and me?

  “What if I told you that I’d been keeping a secret too?” Dad finally asks.

  I blink. It throws me off so much that for a moment, I don’t know what to say. Then I find my voice again and reach out to touch his shoulder. “I’d say that’s okay, Dad. Everyone needs to do that from time to time.”

  “Yes, but… Well, this one affects more than just me.” He clears his throat. Shakes his head. “I’m starting to wonder if maybe the truth wouldn’t have been better off from the start.”

  “It usually is, I guess. Even if it’s awkward.” I side-eye him. Though in truth, I’m thinking about just how hypocritical I sound right now, giving him that kind of advice. Dammit, self.

  “Pau, I hate to do this, when the summer has gone so well, but I just… I have to say this.”

  Oh god. Here it comes. My stomach turns to ice, my veins pumping that freezing cold nitrogen throughout my body. He knows.

  “I did something. The summer we stayed here last. I think it might be why… Why Susan and Josh didn’t talk to us for a long time.”

  I blink. Stare at him. Gape, actually, is a better term. “What?”

  “I just, it seemed like you and Josh were getting very close back then, and I knew that they were going to be moving away. Plus you’ve always been impulsive and quick to care about people—and that’s a great thing, Pau, it really is, but it can lead to getting easily hurt, so I… I wanted to avoid that if possible.”

  I cross my arms, slowly. “What did you do, Dad?”

  “I told Josh to stay away from you.”

  I can feel myself standing, though I’m not really aware of it. “You did what?”

  “You had so much going on, Pau—your art, college applications, deciding where you wanted to go and what you wanted to do. If you got knocked up by some kid who was about to move a few hundred miles away, what would happen then?”

  “Knocked up? You think I’m that irresponsible?”

  “You were so young—”


  “That doesn’t make it okay for you to meddle like that!”

  “I know, Paulina, and I’m sorry. I just wanted to come clean and tell you so that you understand where I’m coming from and why…” He closes his eyes, shakes his head. “Why Josh seems a little strange sometimes. I’m going to talk to him too, apologize. Obviously I overstepped where you two were concerned anyway.”

  I storm away from him, not dignifying that with a response.

  “I’m sorry, Pau,” Dad calls after me. But I’m not ready to talk to him yet. No. I need to find Josh first.

  It doesn’t take me long to find him. He’s out behind the woodshed, shirt tied around his waist, sweat glistening along his abs as he lifts the axe to chop another block of firewood. For a second, I pause just to watch him work and savor the way the sun glistens off his muscles, highlights every inch of his glorious body.

  Then I step into his line of sight, and he sets the axe aside, eying me with a cold, sideways stare. He runs a hand through his hair, and I try not to let that distract me either, because damn, even that simple motion drives me crazy. Makes me want to tackle him right here and kiss that pout off his stupid lips, run my hands over his hard pecs…

  “Are you talking to me again?” he asks, and I swallow my crazy lusty impulses.

  “I’m sorry.” I step closer. “I shouldn’t have been avoiding you. I shouldn’t be running. You’re right.”

  His eyebrows rise. “That may be the first time I’ve ever heard you say that.”

  I roll my eyes. “Josh. I’m being serious here.”

  He steps closer to me, too. “Serious about what, exactly, Pau?”

  I swallow hard. Lick my lips. “About us. Josh, I…”

  He just waits me out in silence, eyes on me, red-hot, but compelling me. I want to tell him the truth. The whole truth and nothing but.

  I have to.

  “I know what my dad said to you. All those years ago.”

  He grimaces, but nods.

  “I’m sorry he did that. And I’m sorry you felt you had to listen. And… I’m also sorry that I got scared. By this, by us, by how much I feel for you. It freaked me out, especially given… Given everything. This whole situation. But it doesn’t change how I feel. It doesn’t change what I want. And I want to be with you.”

  A throat clears sharply. But it’s not Josh’s.

  Josh realizes first. His eyes widen, and his mouth goes slack. I whip around, follow the direction he’s looking, over my shoulder.

  Behind me, carrying a tray laden with three more glasses of lemonade, stands Susan.

  To judge by the shocked expression on her face—a mirror image of Josh’s face right now, the resemblance between them starkly visible for once—she heard everything I just said.

  “I…” I wince. “Susan, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”

  “Paulina,” she interrupts. I stammer to a halt. What else can I say? How can I explain that away?

  “We were practicing for a, um… a play, and…”

  “Are you in love with my son?” Susan asks, point-blank.

  I can’t lie. I can’t tell the truth. So I just stare at her. Force my mouth to open. I have to say it. I think back to my conversation with Dad. To my own advice. The truth is better. Even if it’s awkward.

  But before I can answer, Josh speaks up. “Whatever she might feel, Mom, I’m the one who…” He straightens his shoulders. Looks at me. “I love Paulina.”

  Now it’s my turn to gape at him, open-mouthed. Even so, despite the situation, the awkwardness of it, all the ways this could go wrong, I can’t deny that hearing those words sets off fireworks in my belly. He loves me.

  When I turn back to Susan, she’s still holding the lemonade tray in one hand, though the glasses are all rattling, because her other hand is pressed to her mouth. I dart forward to grab the tray, but I bump it in the process, and there’s a deafening crash as the glasses shatter on the ground, spraying my sandaled feet with lemonade.

  That’s when Dad comes running around the corner. “Everything okay here?” he asks.

  Nobody answers.

  He looks between all three of us, brow furrowed.

  Josh turns to face him. “I just said that I’m in love with Paulina.”

  And there it is again. That explosion of electricity, that fire I can’t tamp, no matter how wrong, how complicated it may be.

  Dad looks as shocked as Susan. He glances back and forth from Josh to me and back again, mouth moving without words. Then he finally recalls himself. “For how long?” Dad looks at me as he asks.

  Josh laughs, a bitter edge to it. “I’ve loved her since I was sixteen years old. Since our first kiss, right here on this lakeshore. You probably know that already, or you wouldn’t have told me to leave her alone,” he adds, pointed.

  “Josh,” Susan warns.

  But he’s taken on a defiant air now, chin lifted. He turns to face me, ignoring both of our parents. “I’ve loved her every minute of every hour of every day now, for years, and I never stopped. I can’t stop—I won’t stop now, even if I’m technically her step-brother, it doesn’t matter to me, I can’t… I can’t let her go, now that we’ve finally found each other again.”

  “Neither will I,” I reply. I catch his hands. Squeeze them tight.

  When we turn back to our parents, they’re watching us with wide eyes. For a long, long moment, no one speaks.

  Then Dad turns to Josh. “I’m sorry, son,” he says, and the son makes it sound even worse, even more real. I think he’s about to do it again. Tell Josh to leave me alone, to get out of here. I don’t want to fight with my father, but I will if I have to. I will for Josh.

  Instead, Dad smiles a little. “I should never have told you to leave my girl alone. I wouldn’t have if I’d known what kind of a man you’d turn out to be. How in love with her you are.”

  Susan wraps her hand around my father’s and squeezes tightly. “I suppose we should have seen this coming,” she murmurs, a faint smile on her mouth.

  “Wait.” I blink at them, frowning. “You aren’t mad?”

  “How can we be?” Susan asks. She turns to smile at my dad, eyes sparkling. “We know exactly how you feel, after all.”

  “But…” I bite my lip. Frown. This isn’t what I expected. I never thought our parents could understand, could be… okay with this.

  “It’s a bit of an unusual situation, granted,” Dad points out. “But I think we can all agree that if we can’t follow our hearts… Well. Where would we be then?”

  I break away from Josh. Cross the muddy ground to fling my arms around Dad. Susan crosses behind me, hugs her son, and pretty soon we’re all laughing. Tears sting at the corners of my eyes, but they’re happy tears. Tears of relief. Because, somehow, against all odds…

  We’re going to be okay. We’re going to do this.

  “One question,” I say, once I’ve stepped away from Dad, caught Josh’s hand again. “If you told Josh to stay away from me for all these years, how come you told him about me? About where I’m going to college and all?”

  Dad raises an eyebrow. “I never spoke to Josh about you.”

  Josh casts me a sheepish sideways glance this time. “Well, we are Facebook friends,” he points out.

  “You never like anything I post, you never comment or message me, or…” I blink at him, confused. “You still look at my page?”

  “From time to time,” he admits. Then he grins a little, sheepish. “Okay, maybe more often than I care to admit.”

  My eyes are widening. My smile is, too. “You cyber-stalker,” I say.

  He pulls me to him. “You love it, admit it.”

  I turn away before he can kiss me, before this gets too crazy. “But, Dad, Susan…”

  Susan, for her part, is already taking my dad’s hand and tugging him gently back toward the cabin, a smile on her face as she watches us together. “Don’t you worry about us, kids. We don’t want to stand in the way of anything real. And t
his…” She pats Dad’s back lightly. “This is the real deal.”

  “You can say that again,” Josh murmurs.

  Then I forget about our parents, because he’s tugging me back toward him, and I’m turning to face him, those big gray-blue eyes of his devouring me from head to toe as he studies me.

  When he leans in this time, I don’t pull away. I don’t run anymore. I’m done doing that. He pauses an inch from my lips, whispers so I can feel his lips graze mine as he does.

  “I love you, Pau.”

  “I love you, Josh.”

  Then he kisses me, and I lose myself in that kiss headfirst. When we break apart, we’re both breathless, panting, our hands wrapped around one another, arms clutching so tight it feels like we might break. I don’t care. I just want him as close to me as he can get, right now.

  “You’re still a stalker,” I whisper in his ear, grinning.

  He smirks and nips my ear back. “I’ll take stalker over step-brother any day.”

  Epilogue

  Two Years Later

  I’m lying on the dock with my feet in the water, staring up at the late afternoon sun in my favorite spot in the world. I hear footsteps pad behind me and sit up. Before I can turn, though, warm legs drop around either side of me, and arms encircle me from behind. Josh leans in to kiss the nape of my neck, then slowly around to the side of my neck, while he pulls me back against him.

  “What’s on your mind, daydreamer?”

  “Not much. Just enjoying the quiet.” I turn to grin at him. “Without Dad here making all his usual daytime card-game racket, it’s kind of peaceful for once.”

  Josh laughs. “I know the feeling. It’s strange not having Mom to serve lemonades, but I’m sure she and your dad are having fun down in Hilton Head.” They decided they needed a couple’s vacation, not a family one for once. Personally, I was more than happy to give them space—especially since it means we have the cabin all for us.