by Sybil Bartel
I pulled away from his grasp and glanced in the back seat where Ethan had fallen asleep. “I need to get him home.” I gestured toward my piece of shit car. “Are you all done?”
“Almost.”
It was all the warning I got.
His lips landed on mine, and I gasped in shock.
His tongue sank into my mouth.
A whoosh of heat and need and blinding desire rushed through my body so fast and so hard, I lost my balance.
Huge arms caught me, wrapping around my back.
Dominant like his every move, his tongue swept through my mouth as his hand grasped at my hair. It wasn’t like he was just kissing me, it was as if he were claiming ownership.
I’d never been kissed like this.
I’d never been held like this.
And I’d never, ever, felt the heat in my veins, or the aching, consuming, painful tightening between my legs that had me one breath away from begging for more. But just as fast as the lust consumed me, reality hit equally as hard.
This was my stepbrother. This was a man who lived in the woods alone. This was a man who thought women were possessions. And he was kissing me in public like it wasn’t the scandal of all scandals.
I shoved at his chest, hard.
His hand still wrapped tight in my hair, he pulled his lips back, but not because me pushing him away had any impact on the solid wall of muscle that was his chest. Fighting temptation, I also fought for composure, but stupid words came out of my mouth anyway.
“It’s broad daylight.” I’d intended to be accusing, but breathless, my tone had no bite.
His huge hand cupped the back of my head with dominance, but his brow creased in confusion. “You are ashamed?”
“Yes…. No. I don’t know,” I stammered, my traitorous heart at war with my conscience. “I should be. And you should be too.” But all I could think about was his kiss, and his arms around me, and the rich, clean scent of him that was so much stronger as he held me. Every second longer I stood in his embrace, I never wanted him to let me go.
His lips wet from our kiss, he looked down at me with all the dominance of a man so alpha, he answered to no one. “I feel no such thing.”
“You act as if this is…” Desperately trying to hold on to all the reasons why this was wrong, I struggled for the right word for having your stepbrother give you the best kiss of your life, but came up empty. “As if this isn’t wrong.” He had to know how this would look to anyone other than us.
“It is not wrong.” His intense gaze penetrating to my soul, he lowered his voice. “And you are beautiful.”
Oh God. “Just please, stop.” I pulled away, and he let me go.
“I cannot tell you that you are beautiful?”
Hearing him say that word, calling me it, it did things to me. But I was under no illusion what I was. “Phoebe, my sister, she’s beautiful. I’m….” I waved my hand awkwardly past my hips. “I’m not.” An uncomfortable laugh that was more snort than anything else escaped. “You picked the wrong sister.”
His nostrils flared, and his jaw clenched. “No, I did not.”
“Right, okay.” Heat hitting my cheeks, I reached for my door. “I have to go. Thank you for fixing my car.” And for giving me the best kiss in the history of kisses and for ruining me for any other man, ever. My stupid knees still knocking from his touch, I stumbled as I turned to get behind the wheel.
Lightning fast, his hand shot out and caught my upper arm. “You are upset. You should not be driving.”
My mouth got the best of me. “You shouldn’t be kissing your stepsister.”
Glacier blue eyes stared at me, then he dropped his hand, but he didn’t say anything.
Swallowing hard, I felt even worse. Guilty for saying it, guilty for making him feel bad, and just plain shitty for ruining what was the single best moment of my life. “Okay.” Already fighting tears, I turned the key, and when the engine immediately caught, I wanted to break down. “Thanks again. See you around.” I tried to pull my door closed.
He caught it midswing and squatted at my open door. “You look like you are about to cry.”
“I’m not.” I was.
He reached out and his huge hand grasped the side of my face. “I did not mean to make you upset.”
Oh God, I was a terrible person. “I know.”
His thumb stroked my cheek. “I want to show you something.”
I couldn’t help it, I laughed. “Is this the part where I say, I bet you do?”
“You are curious,” he stated, ignoring my bad attempt at a joke.
I was curious about a lot of things, like what he looked like shirtless. But that didn’t mean I was going to rip his clothes off in the middle of a diner parking lot during morning rush hour. “Most people are curious.” About a lot of things.
“You are not most people.”
Still embarrassed about ruining the kiss, about saying what I did to him, about everything, my mouth went for a walk. “Do men get issued a manual of compliments? Here, throw these key phrases at women and they’ll be lying at your feet.” I pulled away from his grasp.
He frowned. “I do not want you lying at my feet.”
Jesus, he was even sexy when he was frowning. “Lying at your feet, putty in your hands, melting at your touch, desperate for your attention—it’s all the same sentiment. I’m not beautiful, and I am like millions of other women.” Except millions of women hadn’t just kissed a gorgeous muscled god of a man who was their stepbrother. “Now I have to go. I still have a job, at least for today, and this little boy needs a proper nap.”
“Do not ever say you are not beautiful,” he retorted sharply.
I gripped the top of the steering wheel. “Callan—”
“I have no desire to compare you to other women.”
My forehead hit my hands. “Do you ever say the wrong thing?” Besides telling me he wanted to take care of me, which wasn’t even wrong, it was just him being honest.
“You did not undress me with your eyes,” he abruptly stated.
My head popped up and I looked at him in surprise. “What?”
“When you first met me,” he clarified. “You did not look at me as a potential mate.”
Was he serious? “Um, I hate to break it to you, but every woman looks at a man like you as potential husband material.”
“You object to me saying I want to care for you, yet you say every woman wants a mate?”
Jeez. “I said potential mate, or husband material, but I was merely referring to the way you look.” He had to know how handsome he was.
He let the comment slide about his looks. “You were curious. You still are. I see it in your eyes.”
Of course I was curious about what he wanted to show me. He’d kissed me so completely, so sensuously, I’d felt it in my entire body. He was intriguing and incredibly smart in a way I’d never met in another person, and the look in his eyes alone told me he was holding back a world of shit. And he’d fixed my car. And made Ethan stop crying. And oh my God, why did I want to see what he’d look like holding Ethan so badly?
“Is that a question? I don’t know what I’m supposed to say to that.” Besides admit that my lips were still tingling?
He softened his tone. “What time are you done with the child?”
His strange manner of speech no longer sounded strange coming from him. It somehow fit, like all of those hard muscles covering his entire body. “Why?”
He stood, straightening his long, muscled legs. “I am picking you up.”
I should’ve said no. I should’ve driven away. I should’ve done a lot of things, like not let him kiss me in the first place, but I did none of it. Instead, with utter lack of self-preservation, I dug myself deeper. “I get off at six.”
He nodded once. “I will be at your apartment.” He shut my door and, without a backward glance, strode to his truck with his tools.
I WATCHED HER PULL into a parking space over an hour late.
Hunting all afternoon had done nothing to quell the restlessness, but when she got out of her vehicle, the building impatience that had plagued me all day was replaced by a quickened pulse.
Inhaling, I slowed my heart rate and got out of the truck. Impatient to see her, angry she was late, but relieved nothing happened to her in her old vehicle, my thoughts stilled when she turned.
Her face swollen, her eyes red, she bit her lip.
Instinctually, I took her face in my hand. “What happened?”
“That was it.” She burst into tears, her hands going to her face to cover her sorrow. “I thought I would have more time with him, but today was the last time I’ll see Ethan.”
Unaccustomed to holding any woman for comfort, I put my arms around her. “Why?”
“Lena, my boss, Ethan’s mom….” Her breath hitched. “Sh-she said it was best this way. Best for Ethan. So he didn’t have time to get upset.” She sniffled. “She waited until last minute to tell me today was it. The movers come tomorrow, then she and Ethan will be gone.” Her voice cracked. “I’ve watched him since he was two.”
I knew how to care for a child. Everyone on the compound did because the duty was shared by all, but I did not relate to being a parent, nor the decision to take a child away from a caregiver. “I am sorry.”
“Thank you. Me too.” She pulled away. “I, um, need to go inside.” Her hand fluttered in front of her. “I need to wash my face.” Stepping around me, she walked toward her apartment.
I followed.
When her hand fumbled with her key, I took it from her and opened her door, but she did not move. Standing still, her gaze fixed on the ground, she inhaled as if weighing a decision.
I made it for her. “Inside.” I captured her elbow and guided her across the threshold, then shut the door behind us.
She glanced at the door. “I didn’t ask you to come in.”
I purposely chose my response. “You did not have to.”
She looked around her small living room as if seeing it for the first time. “That’s not what I meant.”
I knew what she meant, but her lips gave me words her body language did not back up. “You are under no danger.” I gently pushed her toward her couch. “Sit.”
She sank to the edge of the couch, but she did not address what I had said.
“I’m going to miss him.” Her voice filled with grief, and she swiped at her eyes. “Sometimes… it felt like he was mine.” She looked up at me as if I held the answers she was seeking. “I know he wasn’t, but it still felt like that, you know?”
I did know. I had thought Decima was mine. “I will get you something to drink.” I walked into the small kitchen, took a glass from the first cupboard I opened, and filled it from the faucet. The water ran pure and clear. We had not had potable water on the compound, not until I’d installed a filtration system last month.
I held the water out to her. “Drink.”
Both hands wrapped around the glass as if she would drop it. “I have to get a new job. She gave me two weeks’ pay, which was nice, but if I don’t find work, I won’t be able to pay my rent.”
I held back my thoughts about a female having to work to pay for a roof overhead. “It will work out.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
“It will.” I didn’t tell her there was still a building on the compound that could house fifty, or that there used to be quarters for three hundred before I had bulldozed all of the dilapidated buildings except the main hall and my quarters.
She took a sip of the water. “I’m sorry I was late, again.”
I did not condemn her, nor condone her tardiness by telling her it was okay. Apologies were the guilt of poor decisions. I changed the subject. “You said you needed to wash your face.”
There were apartments above and on either side of hers, and I wanted to get her out of here. I grew up with a hundred people at any given time, but it was not like this. Land, woods, endless deer trails, there was always solitude if you wanted. But here, there was no space, and no wind blew through the trees. All I heard were other conversations through thin walls, plumbing and the incessant drone of televised voices.
“You’re right.” She stood, still holding the glass. “You said you wanted to show me something?”
My living quarters. Now more than ever. I nodded and took the glass. “Yes.”
The same curiosity as last night came back, and she stared at me a moment. “You’re not going to tell me.”
I did not know if I was uncomfortable or impressed by her correct observation. It wasn’t a question, but I answered it anyway. “No. I am going to show you.” And let her ask her questions after she saw where I lived, how I grew up.
“Will I like it?”
I was under no illusion that she would. But I sensed if I was going to convince her to date me, as they called it outside the compound, then she needed to understand for herself who I was. “Only you can answer that.”
Her eyebrows drew together. “Are you taking me to your… land?”
“Wash your face.” I did not want to answer any more questions until she could see for herself.
Heat colored her cheeks. “I googled it, you know. Last night, today, while Ethan was sleeping.” Sorrow clouded her expression when she said the boy’s name. “I looked up River Ranch.”
I said nothing because I was accustomed to saying nothing.
“The pictures were only of the front gate. And River Stephens.” She paused like she was waiting for a reaction. When she got none, she went on. “It said a lot of people died in a raid three years ago.” Her voice turned quiet. “Is that true? Did you see them die?”
I had seen many people die, and not just on the day she spoke of. “My life has been very different than yours.”
She swallowed. “May I ask what was it like?”
Indecision caused me to hesitate, but only for a moment. I had been deceived most of my years, and I would not do that her. If she were going to come with me to my land, she needed to do so with some knowledge of my past. “No one was allowed to leave. You relinquished all assets, monetary and property, to the compound when you joined. Females were raped in the name of procreation. Men were beaten for sport. No one was allowed medical treatment off the compound, and there was an unmarked, mass grave for all defectors or anyone not deemed worthy of the small compound cemetery. I spent my formative years learning to hunt, ignorant of most of the abuse of power. By my eighteenth turn around the sun, I knew with certainty that River Stephens was a sick man. After that, I spent all of my time in the woods, hunting for game to feed the many mouths that were there not by choice, but by circumstance.”
Shock widened her eyes and stole her voice. “Oh my God,” she whispered.
“Do not pity my upbringing,” I warned.
She quickly closed her mouth and nodded. “Okay.”
“Tell me why it upset you when I said I would like to take care of you.”
“It’s just….” She shook her head and dropped her gaze. “Never mind, I’m being stupid. I’m crying over a lost job and a four-year-old, when you’ve….” She caught herself and shook her head again. “Just never mind.”
I tipped her chin. “You are not stupid, and I did not say my past was more important than your present.”
She blinked her brown eyes that reminded me of a doe and stared at me a moment. “You speak differently.”
When you spoke to few people and conversed with even less, you learned from reading. “I am aware.” But she was not. “I am not a conversationalist,” I explained. I never had been.
“By choice?” She frowned. “Or because of the circumstances you described?”
I looked for pity in her expression, in her tone, but I did not see any. Relenting, I gave her the answer. “Both.”
The corner of her mouth hinted at a smile. “You’re conversing with me now.”
I was, and I didn’t hate it. I nodded toward a small hallway. “Do what you
need to do.”
Inhaling, she forced a small smile and disappeared down the hall.
I glanced around her living space.
Size wise, it was not much bigger than my quarters, but the similarity stopped there. This was only the second home I had been in outside the compound, and I noticed they both had couches, drywall and finished flooring. There had been none of that on the compound.
My chambers only had a bed, a chair, a shelf and a small washroom. This apartment had much more. Two shelves with books and framed pictures. A couch, a chair, a low table between them. A television on a stand, a small desk, and a counter separating the kitchen from the living space with stools at it, even though there was already a small table in the kitchen area with chairs.
I glanced at the carpet underfoot and made a mental note to not wear my hunting boots next time I came here. When I heard the water turn on in the bathroom, I walked into the kitchen and placed her glass in the sink. I was looking at her stove, thinking about the five ovens lined up in a row in the mess hall at River Ranch and how I had not used them since I’d dismantled the compound. I was thinking I should sell them, when the front door flew open.
“Okay, bitch, you’re done crying!” The blonde sister walked in carrying a bottle of alcohol. “I got tequila!” She kicked the door shut behind her. “Where are you? We’re getting drunk, going out tonight and getting you laid!”
Hunter still, I stood in the kitchen as her last three words sank in and made my blood boil.
“Em!” the blonde shouted, dropping her purse and the bottle of alcohol on the low table in front of the couch. “You hear me? Where are you? You in the shower?” She started down the hall just as Emily came out of the bathroom.
