Anti-Stepbrother (14 page)

He had a beer in hand, his jeans riding low on his hips. His tattoos peeked out from under his shirt. It was nothing except a simple white T-shirt, but holy goodness—it was a sight, hugging his body. I could see every stomach muscle he had. They bulged, stretched, and shifted as he lifted that beer to his lips.

I licked my lips, and I even knew I’d licked my lips.
Goddamn
.

Then I clued in to one simple fact: the annoying Kevin flutters were gone.

Caden laughed bitterly, moving around me. “I thought you would at least lie, but no. Gotta hand it to you, Stoltz. You’re honest to a fault.” He moved past me and glanced down with a half-smirk. “Thanks for that.”

“Wait.” I turned with him, following him down the hallway and out a back door. “What do you mean?”

We crossed the backyard, and I followed Caden inside the shed. It was like a mini apartment. A coat rack hung to my left with a bathroom right in front of me. The first part of the room was a living room, with a sectional couch in front of a large projector screen. The kitchen was against the back of the shed, and as I stood there, taking everything in, Caden set his beer down on a counter and ducked behind the bathroom into a bedroom. He left the door open as he reached up to pull his shirt off.

My heart jolted.

Holy mother of—desire like I’d never felt before rushed over me. It started low and exploded. I should’ve looked away, but all restraint was gone. I found myself tracing every part of him, even the muscles leading down into his jeans, which, as he finished tugging a shirt down, dipped even lower.

Primal lust rippled in me, taking a dizzying hold, and when Caden lifted his head, his eyes finding me, he saw it. I knew he did. He paused, his eyes darkening in response. Then that damned smirk was back, and he came toward me.

My heart leaped to my throat.

He was going to touch me…nope. He didn’t. He went right past me, his arm grazing mine as he asked, his breath teasing my ear, “Want a beer?”

Then he was gone, moving a safe distance away.

The refrigerator opened behind me. I didn’t move. For a second, I stood with my back to him and tried to get control of myself. I raked my hands through my hair and silently cursed. My hands were trembling.

I’d always been in control around Kevin. Always. I might’ve been delusional, seeing things that weren’t there and convincing myself he was half in love with me too, but the entire time, I’d had total and complete control.

I saw Caden with his shirt off, and I damn near wet my pants. Literally.

I drew in a ragged breath.

“I know I’m hot, but don’t get ahead of yourself.”

This was so embarrassing, but I forced myself to turn around. He held a beer out for me, his smirk too suggestive and cocky for his own good.

He added, “It’s called the rebound. It’s a knee-jerk response.”

I took the beer. It was cold. I wrapped both my hands around it and was half tempted to rub it over my face. “What are you talking about?”

“I don’t know what Matthews did to you, but it’s obvious he broke your heart.”

The lust was fading…kind of…it was on a low simmer now. “On a scale from one to ten, where ten is being blatantly billboard kind of obvious, where do you place me?”

He studied me for a beat. “An eight.”

I sucked in my breath. “Are you serious?”

He sat at one end of his couch and kicked his feet up on the coffee table. I took the other end, sitting sideways so I faced him.

“Just because of the first night. If I hadn’t seen you that night, I’d never know.”

“Really?” I could breathe easier.

“You’re attracted to me because I hurt the person who hurt you.”

I gave him a dubious look.

“Or not?” His eyes narrowed, thoughtfully.

“Have you seen yourself?” I blurted.

He’d been lifting his beer for a drink. His hand froze in mid-air and his eyes widened a fraction before he shook his head. The smirk morphed into a smile. “Why are you wasting yourself on your stepbrother?”

“What?”

He put his beer down and leaned forward, moving his feet to the floor. “No bullshit. I took you to Diego’s last night. You made me laugh when I normally would’ve stayed angry and screwed some girl I didn’t give a shit about. So no bullshit between us now. Got it?”

I bobbed my head. “Got it.” I grabbed the top of the couch and held on, unsure what was coming at me.

“Your stepbrother is a dick. Why do you have feelings for him?”

I had no answer for him. I just knew I was really afraid of letting those feelings go, though at the same time I desperately wanted to. I couldn’t explain any of it. But there was a different something else going on with Caden and me, something underneath the layer of words and moments of honesty between us. I didn’t know what that was either, but it held me suspended. I didn’t breathe. I didn’t formulate a word or a thought. I was just feeling, and I felt myself pulled toward him.

His eyes darkened again, almost smoldering, but he didn’t close the distance. His head remained tilted toward mine as he waited for my answer.

“Um…” I tried to remember the question.

His voice softened. “Why do you have feelings for him?”

Because you can’t control who you love. And I have to, or— I stopped myself. I couldn’t finish that thought.
I lifted a shoulder, holding it against my cheek for some reason, like it was keeping me grounded.

“Sometimes you can’t choose.” I was too lost to even try talking about whatever else was happening.

Caden’s gaze left me, and so did whatever storm had been going on. I felt released somehow.

He murmured, almost to himself, “I suppose.”

My teeth sunk into my lip, and then I remembered my reason for coming in the first place. Scanning his face and hands again, I noted, “You don’t have any bruises on you.”

“Like your stepbrother could touch me.”

“He said you probably had to go to the hospital.”

His lip curled into a slow smile. “That’s funny.”

“So you didn’t? You’re okay, I mean?”

He glanced to me, his eyes warming. “I’m okay.”

“What happened?”

“Kevin walked into a fight that wasn’t his, and he made it his. He started mouthing off.”

“You hit him?”

He nodded, looking down. “He walked into my fist. A few times.” He sighed. “And I’d been wanting to hit him for a really long time, since last year when he hurt a friend of mine.”

My ears perked up. “A friend of yours?”

“I think she was the second girlfriend? He had quite a few last year.”

My mind was going, trying to remember what Avery had said about Claudia. Was she girlfriend number three or two? Did that mean Claudia and Caden were friends?

“Is her name Claudia?”

“No. And I’m not telling you her name.”

“But it wasn’t Claudia?” Claudia who was gorgeous, tough, and a bitch because she trying to be strong for her friends. When he shook his head, I explained, “She’s the first one who made a big deal about you. It would’ve made sense then.”

“A big deal out of me?”

The knots, whether formed from desire or something else, were beginning to loosen now, and I sank back into the couch. My chest felt looser too.

“When you gave me a ride home after that party, Claudia couldn’t believe it. She told me something about how you weren’t known for dealing with underclassmen, and certainly not freshmen. She said you weren’t mean, but not that nice either.”

“She told you that?” He leaned forward. Slowly.

My neck stiffened, but I nodded. “Yeah.”

“Then she’s a bitch, and she doesn’t know me.” The corner of his mouth curved up again. “I have nothing against giving freshman girls rides.”

I would’ve rolled my eyes, knowing it was a joke, but Claudia’s assessment of me still stung. I couldn’t hide it. Caden watched me. I knew he’d figure it out, and a moment later, the couch shifted. He reached over—my stomach twisted—and tugged me next to him. He pulled me into his side, his arm draped over my shoulder.

I sagged into him. I couldn’t help myself. He was warm, strong, and fast becoming an addiction.

“I don’t know why she said that to you, but I’ve had people around me all my life who judge and misperceive things. I have a reputation. I know that, and some of it is true, but most of it isn’t. One of the truths is that I am picky about my friends.”

“Yeah?” I looked up.

He tapped the cleft in my chin. “And for whatever reason, you’ve become one of them.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

We sat like that. It felt nice. It felt right. We watched television, and every time Caden got up for a beer, he brought one back for me and resumed our position. Eventually he laid down on the couch. I shifted so I was half sprawled on top. I was three beers in by then, and with the feel of his arm over my back, holding me in place, and my cheek resting against his chest, hearing his steady heartbeat, I fell asleep.

I woke once when he carried me to a bed and pulled the covers over me. He asked when I had to get up the next morning, and then the light streaming from the door darkened.

The sun shone into the room, and it took me a few moments to realize where I was. I didn’t recognize the king-size bed, or the black sheets, but then Caden walked past the open door and all the memories flooded into place.

I slept at his place.

I glanced around the bed… I slept in his bed!

“Your alarm’s about to go off in ten minutes,” Caden called from the doorway. He had a cup of coffee in hand and wore only jeans.

I tried to keep my eyes front and center, but I lost. The tattoos were a nice little zig-zag pattern, pulling my gaze down, all the way down. Caden’s slow, smooth chuckle told me he knew what I’d just done. My cheeks only warmed a little.

I shot him a look, falling back to the pillow. “I feel like this should be the first skip day of my school career.”

“You’ve never skipped before?”

I shook my head, rolling it side to side on the pillow. “Am I missing out? Should I embrace my inner deviant?”

He smirked. “You can skip a class for any reason in the world. It’s your life.”

I sat up, eyeing that coffee. “You were supposed to be the bad influence.”

His eyebrow lifted. “I’m not selling it enough?” He lifted his cup. “You want some coffee?”

“I’m wondering if today is the day I try coffee too.”

“You’ve never had coffee?”

“I’m beginning to think I’m lame.” I thought about it. “Really lame.”

“You slept at some guy’s house last night. Think of it that way.” His smirk was back. “Not so lame now.”

I could do one better. “I slept at a
fraternity
house.”

“
And
you drank beer.”

“It was the second night in a row that I drank beer.”

“See? Not so lame after all.”

“You’re right.” I sat up. “I’m halfway to total badass.”

He grinned. “We cuddled last night, and you could think of it as dry humping. You almost got some last night.”

Except I hadn’t, and we were in the friend zone. Why were my hands curling around the covers into tight balls? I glanced down and forced them to loosen, then shrugged, trying to be the nonchalant badass I was.

“You carried me to bed. Almost the same thing.”

Suddenly, the joking was gone, and his eyes burned. I could feel his heat from across the room, and my body reacted, instantly warming even before he said a word.

“Nothing’s the same as sliding inside,” he murmured after a moment. “The feel of being in there, feeling that clench around you, knowing you can push as deep as you want, as hard or gently as you want. Nope. I’ve gotta step off the joke train for a moment here. Nothing is remotely the same as that feeling.”

Fuck. My pulse spiked.

He tossed me a look. “Maybe I’ll cop a feel the next time.”

I pretended to groan. “One more notch on my badass peg. You better cop a feel next time.”

“Is that all I am to you? A notch on the bedpost? I feel so used, Stoltz.”

Okay. My last name. We were back on familiar ground here. But my grin was still a little shaky.

“Get used to it, Banks. I’m only disguised as this plain Jane. Inside there’s a wild woman just waiting to be let loose.”

He didn’t reply.

He stared at me for a few more seconds, then straightened from the doorway. “There’s nothing plain about you, Summer. Don’t let some dickhead like your stepbrother make you think like that.” He saluted me with his coffee. “I’ll make you something special. There’ll be no turning back for you after this morning. You’ll be a coffee lover.”

He left, and I felt a tiny bit faint. “Only a coffee lover?”