My Stepbrother, the Billionaire, & the Bargain: Forbidden Romance (The Step Contract, Book 1)

by Stephanie Brother

  I’m not sure why those words came out of my mouth.

  No, that’s wrong. I know why. I wanted him so badly that I would cling to a twig in a hurricane if I thought it would save us. I couldn’t stop myself from saying them.

  Blake looked up at me. The man of my dreams. I knew then that semantics weren’t going to sway him.

  He couldn’t be Blake Forsythe. That person was far away from us, in a world our parents had dumped at our feet. I rejected it completely. I had to.

  This man couldn’t be Blake. He couldn’t be.

  He couldn’t be, because he was my soul mate.

  I didn’t realize I was crying until my phone rang and I couldn’t read the number on the screen. “Hello?”

  “Jen, we’re here. Lana just realized she had an unread text from Blake. He should be coming, too. You can meet them both! Where are you?”

  It was real. “We’ve already met,” I said, somehow keeping the stress out of my voice. I looked at Blake. He had his head buried in his hands again. “We’re right by the cutaway tunnel through the building.”

  “Really? That’s fantastic!” I heard Dad talking to someone, presumably Lana, repeating what I had told him. “That’s great, Jen. You getting along?”

  I wanted to scream.

  “Yes, we’re getting along very well.” The words were ash in my mouth. “He’s a very interesting person.” My voice cracked at the end.

  “Honey, is everything okay?” Dad knew me too well.

  I was going to have to pull out the Hollywood performance if we were going to make it through the evening. “Yes. I’m fine. My allergies are kind of bad up here, that’s all.”

  “Oh. Don’t worry, we don’t have to stay too long.” Dad and Lana were walking as he talked. “See you in a couple of minutes.”

  “Okay.” I clicked off the phone, dropped it into a pocket, and dug furiously for some tissues I thought might have survived the transfer to the mini hobo bag last week. I had to dry my eyes before they became red and my mascara ran down my face. Lana wasn’t going to want to hang out with a stepdaughter who looked like she had stepped off the set of an exorcism film.

  “What’s your game?”

  He had been so quiet, I hadn’t thought he was even paying attention to the conversation. “Sorry?”

  “I said, what’s your game?” Blake stood up. The coldness in his voice jolted me from my grief. “What’s your angle? Did someone put you up to this?”

  It took me a few seconds to process what he was saying. “What?”

  Blake advanced a few steps, then stopped. “Did — someone — hire you to do this?”

  “Do what?” I asked. “Blake, do what?”

  “Embarrass me. Humiliate my family. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  I was already mourning the loss of us. This accusation hit me like a kick to the gut. “Are you serious?” I asked, incredulous. “You could actually believe that I—” I gestured around us at the park, where we had walked, “—that I could fake all of that?” He wasn’t perfect; he was paranoid. “People said I was a decent actress in high school, but that kind of performance is way out of my league.”

  “It’s happened before, to a good friend of mine. Someone took pictures of him flirting with a woman not his wife at a convention, and they blackmailed him out of thousands of dollars.” Blake was a statue in the dying light; his face gave away nothing. All the emotion, all the warmth that he had shown me was gone. He had wiped it off, leaving a blank slate in its place.

  This was unreal. Had the man not felt, seen how happy I had been just to talk to him? Was it that easy to pretend?

  “I’m very sorry for your friend, Blake, and I don’t doubt that corporate espionage does happen, but that’s not what this was. Is.”

  I reached out to touch him, but he stepped back, recoiling as if I were poison. That wounded me more than his words could have. I dropped my arm.

  “I hope that your father didn’t have anything to do with this.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “What about my father?”

  Nothing. I raised my voice. “Blake, what about my father?”

  “Keep your voice down,” Blake hissed.

  “I will not—” He cut me off my pushing hard on my back, guiding us off to the side of the building. Hushed whispers echoed behind us, and I realized we had drawn some attention, not for making out but for fighting.

  I didn’t care. “Stop pushing me,” I said, shoving his hands away. “Answer my question!”

  Blake glared at me, although if it weren’t for his eyes I wouldn’t have known how angry he actually was from the calm that kept his voice level. “My mother has been through enough men who only want her for her money. She doesn’t need any more heartache in her life. Do you understand?”

  Too far. Too fucking far.

  Not Nice Jenna took over right about then. I backed away from him. Just far enough that she didn’t get me arrested for flipping out and trying to do something medically irreversible to Blake.

  My Dad was not perfect. He had sacrificed his marriage to my Mom for his job. But he had paid that price, and now all he wanted to do was find someone to share his hiking trips with and take to the movies. He was not some made-up con man trying to swindle a widow out of her inheritance or whatever Blake thought. He was my Dad, and I loved him.

  “You’re right about one thing,” I said, keeping my voice even and pointing at Blake. “We just met today, and I know as much about your past as you do mine. I’m going to choose to believe that you’re in shock like I am, and you’re hurt, and that’s why you’re spouting some of the most ludicrous, hurtful things you could think up at somebody you just met who’s probably going to become part of your family. Say what you want about me, no matter how wrong and stupid it is — and make no mistake, what you’re accusing me of? Is batshit insane —” here he raised an eyebrow at me, so I guess it was nice to know he still appreciated a good taunt — “but if you smear my father’s name, you will be sorry. I don’t care who you are.”

  He just let Not Nice Jenna talk without commenting, other than the aforementioned eyebrow, and if there was one thing Not Nice Jenna was good at, it was running her mouth.

  “I know for a fact that he loves Lana. For that, and also because I’d like to think I’m a decent person and not a paranoid tech leader with my own social media empire to protect, I’m going to be nice to her. I don’t have to prove to you that I’m a good person. I owe you nothing.”

  It was time to stop while I was ahead. But no, there was still more coming. “So, I just wanted you to know that’s why I’m going to pretend that everything up until our parents arrive never happened. Aside from trying my best not to talk to you.”

  Okay! That’s a wrap, folks! Time for Not Nice J to go back in her box before the word vomit descended into comeback lines from dated Broadway musicals and retired sitcoms. My accusatory finger was still pointing. I lowered it, then crossed my arms. “I’m done now.”

  Then I walked several feet away from him, pulled out my phone, and tried really hard not to starting crying all over again.

  2

  Matters didn’t improve when our parents arrived.

  They must have known something had happened when they found us near the tunnel, standing on opposite sides of the walkway. Still, everyone smiled and hugged and greeted each other with enthusiasm if not love. Everyone except Blake.

  He shook my father’s hand and nodded brusquely, and that was the extent of his hospitality.

  All throughout dinner, Lana made a valiant effort to rescue the conversation whenever someone brought up an anecdote or story related to Blake and he answered in monosyllables. It was easy to talk to Lana. She was outgoing where Dad was shy, but there was mettle there, too — the character that had seen her through the transition from life as a rich kid to a widow and single mother trying to run an art gallery by herself when her parents refused to help her because they would have rather had her managing one of t
heir hedge funds. Two husbands later, she had finally found the right guy, and her parents had even changed their tune a little and set up an extremely modest fund for her to spend on vacations with Dad. It meant they could actually hike part of the Pacific Crest and pay for flights to go there, if they found the vacation time instead of settling for day trips to local preserves. Lana was frank about most of this with us and said she had long ago given up caring if her parents spied on her expenses, which I found disturbing and sad, but Dad said if he was able to spend more quality time with her, he didn’t care that much about the strings attached. They weren’t going to starve; they just weren’t swimming in cash.

  I understood Blake’s skepticism, but he wasn’t giving Dad a chance. I was sure it was because of me.

  “I’ll call you tomorrow, Dad,” I said after we exited the restaurant, giving him and Lana hugs. “Maybe we can go jogging or something if you want before I have to head back on Sunday.”

  “That’d be great, Jen,” Dad said. If he was concerned about the tension between me and Blake, he was tactful enough not to press further.

  “Blake,” Lana said, “Jenna’s leaving.”

  He turned from several yards away where he was waiting by himself, and gave me a curt nod. I responded in kind with a fake smile.

  I later learned that he had visited our parents’ hotel room the next morning and made his case for her to remain single, which went over like a lead balloon, according to my father. They didn’t speak to him until a week before the wedding, three months later. Lana was always nice to me, but I could tell her son’s rejection of Dad bothered her more than she could admit to herself.

  * * * * *

  What followed over the next four years was an awkward wedding with fake smiles in the photographs from Blake and lots of drinks for me at the open bar. Then came the obligatory vacations and holidays typically spent with family and lots of little get-togethers in between, during which Blake and I tried to forget we hated each other.

  When I say ‘tried,’ I mean I tried really hard. Blake tried when he was distracted enough to forget to be an ass.

  At first, I was game to be at every event, ready to forgive and forget if Blake would just be open to the possibility that maybe, just maybe, Dad wasn’t the gold-digging skirt-chaser he had envisioned, and I would be forgiven whatever imaginary schemes he had believed I had attempted.

  That was only partially true. I wanted to prove myself to him. I wanted him to remember the way it felt that day on the High Line, to be so connected and in tune with another person, to let the heat from our bodies consume us.

  It was wrong. I knew it was screwed up, and not just in a “But royal people did that sort of thing all of the time!” way. Dad and Lana had met first and were married by then, and it was selfish to put my heart before the happiness of everyone else, especially when Blake no longer seemed interested in talking to me, let alone dating me.

  Despite this, I couldn’t help wanting him as much as I hated him. I cursed the fate that would let two people so perfect for each other meet and then point and laugh at their misery.

  Lana also didn’t give up on the hope that we would someday warm to each other, so of course every time I wanted to see my Dad, Lana had invited Blake to come. To everyone’s surprise, after the first few times he turned his mom down, he accepted the invitations. All of them.

  And I, the hopeless romantic, made myself believe it was a “sign.”

  Dad, as it turned out, knew me better than I thought, even though his mind didn’t go to the dirty places mine did. If we were hiking, he would find a horse trail nearby, sign all four of us up for a session, and then the tire on his car would mysteriously go flat when he and Lana went on a brief town run to buy gas, leaving Blake and me to do the ride by ourselves. They’d pay for museum passes and Lana would suddenly come down with the flu on the drive there, and Blake and I would end up touring alone. They probably spent almost a quarter of their vacation time trying to return tickets.

  I wish it had worked. If I couldn’t be with Blake, it would at least have been nice to have a two-sided conversation once in a while. He would follow me and stay close but barely said two words a day to me.

  There were a few exceptions. Once, in Yellowstone, a black bear stumbled onto the trail the guide was using. Blake spotted it first and told me to tighten the grip on the reins, but it was his horse that was closer to the bear and therefore his horse that threatened to throw its rider. The bear lumbered off, and I moved to stroke his mare’s neck until she calmed down.

  “You can’t really blame her,” I said, scratching at the mare’s jawline. “The bear totally didn’t have a permit.”

  Blake smiled at that. “I was worried you were going to fly off the saddle and roll down the hill,” he said, and I think he actually meant it.

  “One of the perks in moving frequently as a kid,” I said, “is that you put a little country in the city girl.”

  Blake gave me a skeptical look. I just smiled.

  “I’ve never lived out west,” he said, obviously uncomfortable at admitting this. Darn type A personalities. They just couldn’t admit inexperience. At anything.

  “We were staying in Colorado for a few years before Mom and Dad broke up.” I looked out at the expanse of the hills and mountains, the flatlands almost lost between peaks. Even though it was colder here than near Denver, there were more trees, and I loved trees. Surveying was easier than facing the abrupt attention from him that I knew would only last moments. I didn’t want the sound of his voice to become an addiction.

  “Did you like it? Living there?”

  I sighed. “The air is thinner. It’s harder to sing or run at first. People drive on crazy old roads with no guard rails on the edges of cliffs. Coyotes and cougars can wander through your backyard; I’ve got pictures. I never liked most country music, so I used CDs in our car a lot, and the summer storms scared the shit out of me… but you really can’t beat waking up and staring at the foothills of the Rockies every day.”

  Blake cocked his head. “You didn’t really answer the question.”

  Turning to him with a smile, I said, “Sure I did. I just didn’t say if I preferred it to anywhere else.”

  He took in the view as well. Under the Dundee-style leather hat that didn’t quite pass for cowboy, his hair was growing out. A gust of wind whipped along the trail, ruffling it above his collar. I wanted so badly to touch him.

  Spurring my horse forward, I made to rejoin the group.

  * * * * *

  The last time I had seen Blake almost a year ago, Dad and Lana had invited us to stay in the Adirondacks with them.

  Blake brought his new girlfriend.

  She was blonde and waif-like with curly hair and a tan to rival Malibu Barbie. In other words, she was everything I wasn’t. Worse, she was nice.

  “I’m Cindy,” she said, shaking my hand. “It’s so nice to meet you, Jenna! Blake can’t stop talking about you.”

  “Nice to meet you, Cindy.” He barely even speaks to me! Why would he have anything to say about me except that I’m some femme fatale with an accomplice for a father?

  The confusion must have shown on my face, because she hurried to reassure me. “Only good things, only good things! Seriously!”

  I recovered enough to hide my shock. “I suppose I can forgive him, then.” I looked over at Blake, but his expression was impenetrable.

  “So you run a bookstore! That’s so cool! Do you sit around and drink coffee all day and read your favorite books?”

  She didn’t seem like she was mocking me. I gave her a sideways glance. “Maaaaybe.”

  Wow, she had a loud squeal.

  “That’s awesome! You have got to tell me how you got started! I want to open a boutique secondhand clothing store someday. That’s why I’m going to business school. I want to pick your brain.”

  Cindy more or less dragged me away from Blake, and we spent the weekend hanging out. She was bubbly but pretty sharp a
nd cautiously ambitious. I tried to hate her, I really did. I failed miserably. She even showed me how to fish when we were out in a rickety dinghy in the lake, which was one thing I had not learned while living in rural Colorado. We were having so much fun together, I had a brief moment of panic — was Blake going to topple the rowboat and send us into the water?

  Fortunately, he seemed content to let us gab and sit back and watch. Cindy didn’t know it, but she was helping me to ignore him and the ache in my heart whenever I stared for too long.

  The three of us were staying in a separate cabin from Dad and Lana. Our rooms had one wall separating us. This was a mistake.

  The second night, I heard noises. Moaning, kissing noises.

  Fucking hell.

  I knew Blake was a sexual being. How could he not be, with that built body and gorgeous face? The problem was that thinking about him as a sexual being with anyone else was a form of mental torture.

  That didn’t mean I wasn’t turned on. A girl could dream, right?

  I slipped my hand beneath the covers. I thought about how big his cock was. I had felt him against me; I knew he was big. My hand crept lower and slipped between my thighs. I teased myself, just a light brush against my mons before sliding back up and playing with my belly button ring, listening.

  Little sighs and a stifled groan filtered through the wall.

  I took my nipples between my fingers and rolled them. Blake’s face appeared before me, and I imagined him bending over and tasting my flesh, sucking on each of my breasts until they peaked in hardened nubs. It felt so good imagining it was him doing it to me. I let go of one breast to adjust my pillow, and—

  BANG! My elbow collided really, really hard with the knotty pine wall next to the bed, making a loud sound.

  The noises next door immediately stopped. Pain exploded up my arm from hitting my funny bone. I buried my face in my pillow and froze, waiting.

  “What was that?” Cindy’s voice.

  “Probably just a branch falling. We are in the middle of the woods, you know.” Blake.