11. Dan
Chapter 11
Dan
One month later, Tuesday, October 17
A new kink
“You’re smart, Daniel. Why don’t you go to college and make something of your life instead of messing around playing poker? You’re not a kid anymore.” My father’s scolding goes through one ear and out the other as he paces around the living room in our Manhattan apartment, late on a Monday night.
I slump into the couch cushions, staring out the window at the city lights. I hear this speech at least once a week since I graduated high school a couple months back, and it’s getting stale.
He isn’t pleased with how I’ve decided to make my money at the poker table, all because it tarnishes the reputation of his and Amabella’s nonprofit organization. I try to keep my business out of the tabloids for my parents’ sake, especially the games that aren’t legal, but the media follow me around like mad.
My father always tells me I should have more direction like my brothers. Killian has moved out of our home and is training to be an athlete, Tyler is studying business with plans to be involved in Dad’s old hotel business and has a serious, long-term girlfriend in Harper, and Felix owns a successful cocktail lounge. Dad is proud of them and the fine example they’re setting in the public eye.
I rub a hand over my mouth, smothering a laugh. If he only knew the shit Felix gets up to beneath that “cocktail lounge” is ten times worse than anything I’ve done. But my oldest brother is better at keeping his vices hidden than I am.
“Are you playing poker just to defy me?”
“Pissing you off is an added benefit, but it’s not why I play.”
“Daniel, I have had enough of your attitude,” he shouts. “I provide you with a home. I sent you to an excellent school. Growing up, you’ve had every luxury you could ever ask for. Yet you don’t appreciate any of it. If you’re so against me, you don’t need my support any longer. I want you out of this apartment within the month. You’re nineteen now. You can pay your own way and take care of your own life. Perhaps this will force you to start acting like a man.”
My eyes dart to him and I sit up straight, snapping back at him. “You think I stay under your roof because I’m reliant on you for financial and parental support? I stay because Ally and Amabella mean something to me. You’re not the incredible family man you think you are. It’s all an act ever since Amabella has come into the picture. If you really cared, you would have been present in my life before you met her. You’ve always had some fucked up issue with me because of?—”
Even in this moment, I can’t bring myself to mention my mother’s death. The guilt is heavy in my chest, knowing that my mere existence in this world has fucked up all the lives around me. The question of what if she’d never died always weighs on me.
My brothers and I would have grown up in a loving household. My father would have been around a lot more instead of running off to deal with his grief. Maybe I would have had a proper relationship with my father. So would my brothers.
“You know what? Fuck this shit. I’ll happily move out.” I turn my back on the argument and head for my room. My father calls after me, demanding I sit back down, but I ignore every word.
As soon as I enter my room, my eyes catch on the neon deck of cards sitting on my bedside table. I lay on the bed and start shuffling, irritated and trying to calm myself. I turn on a neon lamp for its calming effects too, this one a dark purple.
Not even a minute later, the front door of the penthouse opens and I hear Amabella and Ally greet my father on their return from Ally’s piano lesson. He mentions my name to them with frustration but I can’t hear the specifics.
The next thing I know, Ally barges into my bedroom, hands on her hips and glaring at me. Despite the anger on her face, my mind turns to filth, the way it always does when I see her in her school uniform. The knee-high socks and short dress. The pink satin ribbon she always weaves through her blond hair. With the purple neon light emphasizing her silhouette, she looks like a wet dream.
“You can’t move out,” she says. “We’ll never see each other.”
“I’ll take you with me.”
Her anger morphs into shock. The words slipped out of my mouth in haste, the idea of moving out with Ally unplanned but sounding more appealing with each passing second.
I’ll pay for her senior year at school if I need to. I make shitloads from my poker winnings, which my father can’t stand, to the extent that he cut me off from receiving the trust fund I was meant to inherit when I turned eighteen, like he was trying to punish me.
I’m glad I don’t have his money. I don’t want to be indebted to the man at all.
Before Ally can say anything, Amabella’s voice cuts through the walls, startling both of us. “Josh, you are not kicking Dan out of our home.” Dad tries to reason with her, but barely gets a word out. “Dan has become my son too. I don’t even want to think about the impact this will have on Ally. You didn’t see what she was like before she met him. As a mother, it was terrible to witness. Their friendship is the best thing that has ever happened to her.”
Ally and I look at each other. She licks her lips, blushing over her mother’s words. Amabella is an angel for the way she treats me, which only deepens the guilt surrounding my feelings for her daughter. If she only knew how close Ally and I are, I’m sure she’d be all for kicking me out.
“I’m still in school,” Ally says quietly. A plea. “I’m not moving out of my home. Plus, if we moved out together, it would look… wrong. Please, don’t leave me.”
My chest warms at those last words. Please, don’t leave me . When she speaks like that… It’s so vulnerable and desperate and… I am so weak for this girl. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for her.
I’ve never experienced such intense feelings for a girl, as I do with Ally. There are delicate and sentimental moments between us, then raw truths like our conversation at the Boathouse that make me want to uncover how twisted her deepest desires are.
I haven’t pushed Ally for more since that night of the benefit a month ago. I could see on her face how turned on yet embarrassed she was. She’s caught up in what is “right” and “wrong” and I don’t want to make her do anything she isn’t ready for.
I sigh, knowing any plan to move out of home with Ally is far-fetched. She’s right—living together wouldn’t look great. So far, no one has questioned our friendship and “sibling bond.” But they would if it were just the two of us living together. If rumors spread to the paparazzi, they’d have a field day, which Ally wouldn’t handle well.
She’s been slandered in the media a couple of times since joining the Blackwood family. Ally can’t shrug off the negative attention as well as the rest of us can. I suppose it’s a sensitive area, considering the bullying she’s been victim to in the past.
“Fine, I won’t leave,” I mutter, mindlessly shuffling the deck of cards.
“Thank you.”
“But as soon as you graduate, I’m leaving this place.”
She frowns. “I guess all good things have to end.”
Though her words are cryptic, I know she’s referring to this set up we have here, the two of us constantly being around each other. Most nights, secretly sharing a bed.
All of that will disappear once we’re not living together.
I’m not ready to say goodbye to all these moments.
“Siblings do move out of the house together. It’s not that unheard of.” I don’t know who I’m trying to convince here. Yes, siblings can move out together, but often for short periods of time. Not years on end.
Ally doesn’t say anything in response, and I know it’s because she’s not eager to leave home. She enjoys living here with our parents and having a family. Ally likes the stability and love my father gives her. He takes an interest in her hobbies. When I’m not around for Ally to hang out with, she spends time with him and Amabella, doing cutesy little family things like playing charades or having popcorn movie nights.
Ally walks through our shared bathroom to her bedroom, leaving the doors open so we can talk as she unpacks her school bag. “You know I’m auditioning for Juilliard.”
Of course, I know. Studying the piano at Juilliard is a dream of Ally’s. She wants to be a concert pianist. It’s all she ever talks about.
“If I get in next year, I’ll be a full-time student. It’s not an ideal financial situation to be moving out now.”
I step up to her room, leaning one hand high on the doorframe. She’s about to receive the first part of her trust fund from Dad. She could live off that money, but I don’t bother suggesting the idea, knowing she’ll be sensible and leave it untouched.
“I can pay for anything you want,” I say, watching Ally slip out of her shoes.
“I want my own money.”
“You’re asking me to stay here with my father for years? Fuck, Ally.” She knows I’ll do it for her. That’s how whipped I am, for a girl I’ve never even kissed. I groan, rubbing a hand over my face. “I need to go for a drive to blow off some steam.”
“Shuffling cards hasn’t helped?”
There’s a teasing sound to her words. I give a humorless laugh.
“I’ll come with you. I don’t like you driving when you’re angry. Let me change out of my school uniform.”
Before I have the chance to give Ally privacy, she unzips her school dress and lets it fall to the ground, revealing a matching set of pink lingerie beneath. I stiffen at the sight of her near-naked body and how casually she’s treating this moment.
Ally has never undressed in front of me before, at least not with the lights on. I’ve seen her in a bikini but that was different. The whole family was around. This moment, it’s just for us. She’s admitted to dressing for my pleasure, and it stirs up something possessive deep within me, knowing the thong and bra she’s wearing was picked out for me. Her bra is so sheer I can see her nipples.
Exercising self-control, I lean against the door frame and watch Ally search through her wardrobe in silence, the two of us never making eye contact or acknowledging her indecency. After all, this isn’t how step siblings are supposed to behave. I don’t try to hide how hard I am. I just admire the perfect curve of her breasts and her ass in that thong while questioning what the real meaning of this moment is about for her. What it’s about for me.
Ally knows what she’s doing right now is wrong, and I’m certain that’s why she’s doing it. She likes teasing me, that much has been clear for a while. Her intensions aren’t cruel. She’s not falsely leading me on. I can tell the teasing is Ally’s way of expressing her repressed desires. It’s her way of being with me.
This display is taking things to another level, and I file away the image of her body for later when I jerk off. She has to know I jerk off over her. I’m sure she likes that I do.
I told her she has kinks. I’m starting to realize I do too, because I want to fuck her right now but not in the way I’ve fucked other girls. With them, it’s always been just sex. Plain, regular, even boring sex, when I come to think of it.
Watching Ally flaunt herself in front of me, I feel something new within myself. Something I’ve never felt toward any other girl. A possessive, dominant side. I’m so close to telling Ally to lay on the bed and spread her legs, then instructing her to pull her panties aside, showing me how pretty her cunt is. I want to sit back and enjoy the sight of Ally while commanding her, telling her exactly what to do with her body and how to make her pussy feel good. Then I want to order her to sit on my dick because she wants it, knowing how wrong it is. I want to be the one to teach her everything about sex.
She’s slowly exploring her sexuality and learning what she likes. I think I’m learning something new about myself too, and it’s clear I’m developing an obsession with watching my stepsister, pushing her boundaries, and making her do all the filthy things she doesn’t want to admit turn her on.
Ally slips a dress over her head, finally meeting my gaze with an innocent smile, like nothing inappropriate has just happened between us. Fucking little brat. The good girl act only turns me on more.
“Will you zip me up?” she says so sweetly.
I step behind Ally, slowly raising the zip, my fingers lingering on the fabric, on the warm skin at the nape of her neck when I’m done. All the impulses I have with this girl, I shouldn’t act upon any of them. She isn’t ready for what I want to do to her. More importantly, she’s my stepsister and I shouldn’t cross the line with her more than I already have.
Doing the right thing, I grab my keys from my pocket. “Let’s go, Queen.”