CHAPTER 9
PIERCE
It didn’t start all at once.
Not the way people think obsession works.
It wasn’t some instant, violent thing. It grew. Like something sinking its roots into the ground before anyone realizes it’s there.
Harley was eleven when he first moved into the house. Small. Sharp-eyed. Curious about everything. He followed me around like I was something interesting, something new.
“Why do you read so much?” he asked me once, sitting cross-legged on my bedroom floor, flipping through one of my books upside down.
“Because I like it,” I told him without looking up.
“That’s boring,” he decided.
I almost smiled.
At first, he was just… there. My stepbrother. Annoying, persistent, always asking questions, always watching my every move. But then he got older, and things started to change.
Adrian was seventeen at the time, and I was twenty-six.
That’s when I started noticing.
The way his voice shifted. The way his body changed—longer limbs, sharper angles, something softer underneath it all. The way he looked at me sometimes. Like he was trying to figure me out. Like I was something he couldn’t quite reach. And I hated it. Because I felt the same way.
I remember the first time it really hit me.
He was standing in the kitchen late at night, stealing something from the fridge. Just a T-shirt and sleep pants, hair messy, eyes half-lidded with sleep.
“Couldn’t sleep?” I asked.
He startled slightly, then relaxed when he saw me.
“No.”
A pause, then he smiled. That same smile he gave me this morning unaware of what it did to me.
“You?”
“Same.”
We stood there for a second. Too close. The kitchen suddenly felt smaller, quieter. And then—
I don’t even remember who moved first. Just that suddenly he was right there. And I—
I should have stopped it.
I should have walked away.
He was younger. He was my stepbrother.
This wasn’t something that was supposed to happen.
But I didn’t stop. I couldn’t. Because the moment our lips touched—
Everything else disappeared – every doubt, every reason, every consequence.
Gone.
There was just him.
It didn’t stop after that. It got worse. Stronger. More dangerous.
We were careful. We had to be. Late nights, locked doors, quiet touches in passing, stolen moments that felt too intense for something that wasn’t supposed to exist.
And I knew—
I knew it couldn’t last.
Things like this never do.
And I was right.
The night it ended—
It was my fault. I should have been more careful, more controlled.
But obsession doesn’t work like that.
It makes you reckless. And I was reckless when it came to him.
Our, well, just his parents now, found out. Not everything, but enough.
The shouting started immediately.
Both Harley’s mother and my father looked like they wanted to kill me right there.
“You’re sick,” she said.
“You’ve been taking advantage of him.”
I laughed. I shouldn’t have but I did.
Because they didn’t understand. They never would.
“He’s not a child,” I told them.
“And I didn’t force him to do anything he didn’t want or was comfortable with.”
That made it worse.
My father stepped in then.
“You’re leaving.”
I looked at Harley. He was standing at the top of the stairs, watching. He looked hurt by what he had just heard.
And for a second—
I almost said something. Almost told him. But I didn’t. Because if I did…
They would’ve destroyed him. And I couldn’t let that happen. So I left. Without saying goodbye, without explaining.
I walked out of that house and never looked back. At least that’s what everyone thought.
“Pierce?”
His voice pulls me back, back to the present, back to him.
He’s sitting across from me, watching me carefully. Like he knows I went somewhere else.
“What are you thinking about?” he asks softly.
“Us.”
“I had feelings for you too,” he says quietly.
The words hit harder than I expected.
“When?” I ask.
“Back then,” he admits.
“Around the same time, I think.”
My chest tightens.
“I just…” he exhales, running a hand through his hair.
“I didn’t understand it at first. But I knew it was something.”
A pause.
“And when you left…”
His voice cracks slightly.
“I thought you didn’t feel the same,” he continues.
“Or that you just… got bored. Or found someone else.”
My jaw tightens.
“No.”
“Yeah,” he huffs softly.
“That’s what I thought.”
He looks down for a second.
“They told me you just left. No explanation. Nothing.”
“I blamed myself,” he admits quietly.
“Thought maybe I pushed too far. That it was my fault.”
“It wasn’t,” I say firmly.
“It was never your fault. You, my sweet little cupcake, is the one I want. It was always you, and that’ll never change.”
He stands slowly, walks toward me. And then –
He sits on my lap.
My hands come up automatically, settling on his hips. He looks at me for a second, then he leans in, and kisses me.
And this time—
There’s nothing, and no one, stopping us.