Chapter 5
Chapter Five
“Yeah, yeah, I know. Dinner at six for Mom’s birthday next week.
I’ve had it on the calendar since you mentioned it last time,” I told my brother Mark as I jotted down the time and place.
I was absolutely pitiful at keeping up with events in my real life.
Reality and fiction blurred too often, but I wasn’t as “unreliable” as my brother claimed. I was just . . . lost in my own mind.
Anna wasn’t my mom, but she was an excellent stepmother and deserved that birthday dinner. Mark also wasn’t my biological brother. My mother died and my father remarried a woman with a son.
It always felt weird to call Mark my brother once we became adults and moved from beneath the same roof.
The feelings of sibling familiarity drifted further away the longer we were apart, but the moment I saw him whenever we got back together, all the memories of Christmas mornings and all the trouble we got into as kids rushed back to me and reminded me that he was my brother regardless of the distance.
That’s why the next book made me anxious.
A forbidden stepbrother romance. It hit pretty close to home, but it was a trope I was desperate to try, even if I was certain I wouldn’t like it.
I wanted to wrap myself in the blanket of a taboo fantasy.
I wanted to feel the tug of doing something wrong when it felt so damn right.
I lifted the book. The young, shirtless, tattooed man on the cover intrigued me. Curiosity outweighed the guilt I felt for reading the story after getting off the phone with my stepbrother, and I couldn’t wait any longer to rip into that fantasy.
I took the book to the couch, cracked open the cover, and began to read.
While Michael busied himself with the yardwork he loved, I would disappear into a new, exciting world.
The curl in my lip shifted to a tilt of my head and then a rise in my eyebrow.
Discomfort became comfortable in ways I never expected—ways that made me feel emotions from every direction.
I separated my life from the one on the page and let myself slip into the land of taboo romance.
The doorbell rang and I threw the towel onto the counter with a frustrated breath that forced the hair off my forehead.
I’d been volun-told to host Thanksgiving this year, and I was the worst cook.
The last thing I needed was for my father and his wife to arrive early and see my disaster, giving my stepmother a reason to take over my kitchen.
In retrospect, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if Martha handled it because I sure as fuck didn’t want to.
It meant cleaning the house from top to bottom, cooking dishes and sides and desserts until my feet and back hurt, and forcing a smile until the last guest left. Then I’d have to clean all over again.
I ripped the oven mitt from my hand and went to the door. When I saw the peek of wavy blond hair through the window, a long exhale showcased my relief. Theo had arrived to save the day. I tugged open the door and met his big smile with a hug.
“Zoey,” he cooed. He was younger than me—tall and strong—and when my brown eyes met his blue eyes, it reminded me we weren’t biologically related.
“Where’s Allison?” I looked behind him for his fiancé, expecting the blonde pixie cut to pop up at any moment.
Theo pulled out of my grasp and held my arms. “We broke up a little while ago.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I hoped we’d get back together. Didn’t want to start drama for nothing.”
I sighed. “Her loss.”
It was true. Theo was only twenty, but he ran a successful startup company and already made more money than me.
It made me a bit insecure that I was in my twenties and living in a shitty apartment when he could probably pay cash for a house by now, but Theo deserved the world.
He’d worked hard, and I didn’t begrudge him his success.
“Are Mom and your dad here yet?” he asked as he looked beyond me.
“Not yet, thank fuck,” I said as I stepped aside and let him in.
Theo hung his jacket and walked into the kitchen. He glanced around with a disappointed look on his face. Yeah, I had colossally failed at Thanksgiving based on his expression.
“I’m fucking trying, Theo,” I snapped before he could say anything.
“You need to chill, Zoey. I think I’ve arrived just in time to help you relax a bit.” He tugged a plastic bag from his pocket.
I cocked my head. “What are those?”
“Edibles. Should get us through this holiday.”
I laughed and waved him off. “I have wine, which should also help us get through this family dinner.”
“Done and done,” Theo said as he handed me a gummy bear.
I rolled it between my fingers before eating it. As he popped two into his mouth, I grabbed the wine from the fridge and poured the crimson liquid into two glasses.
By the time the oven timer rang out, we were a bottle deep and the edibles had kicked in. The heaviness of the day lifted, and it didn’t matter that the food would be shitty. It didn’t matter that our parents would soon arrive. It only mattered that Theo and I were together again.
I moved out at his age, which meant I left him when he was still a teenage boy.
Theo grew up and went on to college, giving up school soon after his business took off.
He became more of a stranger with every holiday and family dinner I came home for, and soon he had a girlfriend who was now his fiancé.
Well, was his fiancé. His life moved forward while mine remained stagnant.
Not even the edibles helped with the dread of the lonely apartment.
“What’s the matter?” Theo asked, his big blue eyes sparkling as he sat at the island and snacked on cheese and crackers.
“What happened to you and Allison?” I changed the subject because my thoughts were bringing down my high.
“Don’t ask me that,” he said with a shake of his head. “It’s embarrassing.” He popped another cheese square into his mouth and dropped his gaze.
“We’ve been through some embarrassing shit.”
Theo shook his head, his blond hair brushing his forehead. “Not like this.”
I put my hands on my hips and gave him the face I used when we were younger and he’d stolen something from me and I just wanted to hear him admit it. That’s all I wanted.
He rolled his eyes. “Fine. She said I couldn’t make her come if her clit was the size of the cell phone I never put down. Something like that.”
My jaw dropped. “Harsh,” I whispered. The edible took over and I accidentally let a hearty laugh follow the word.
He stared at me as I doubled over and couldn’t stop laughing. His lips tightened but soon drew into a smile and before long, he was laughing too.
“Fuck off, Zo,” he said through his laughter. “It’s not funny!”
“It’s kind of funny.” I forced myself to sober. “I’m sorry, you’re right. It’s not. I just don’t believe it for a moment. Sounds like an excuse to leave.” I poured myself another drink and sat beside him.
“It’s not. She was impossible to get off. Or I sucked. Either way, no one was happy.”
I stared at my glass as I thought about the time I saw Theo masturbating to a picture of me when we were younger.
I never thought much of it because you can’t put two hormone-filled teens together and not expect at least some weirdness sometimes.
I’d snuck a look before I ripped my gaze away, and I saw what he had in his hand before I averted my eyes.
He’d have no issue pleasing a woman. So yeah, I still didn’t believe her excuse.
“What do you think?” His voice pulled me from my memories. I’d missed the rest of the conversation.
“About what? Sorry,” I said.
His eyebrows furrowed. “What were you thinking about?”
“Nothing,” I said much too quickly.
“Tell me.”
“Absolutely not.”
Theo stood and put his hands on his hips, throwing me the same judgmental glare I’d given him moments before. Maybe it was the drugs or the alcohol, but I decided to answer him.
“Fine,” I said. “I was thinking about how I caught you choking your chicken when we were younger.”
“You saw?” His mouth gaped and he let out a laugh. “Oh god, that’s horrifying.”
“Well, that's why I think she was lying,” I said in a matter-of-fact tone.
As he sat quietly for a moment, a sly smile eased onto his face. “Can I admit something to you, and hopefully we won’t remember it tomorrow?”
I nodded. “You know you can.”
“I had the hots for you when we were growing up. Then you moved out and I didn’t know what the hell to do with myself. So I dated Allison.” His cheeks flushed red.
“She was your consolation prize?”
“Well, I sure couldn’t have you, Zo. You’re my sister.”
“Stepsister.”
“Same thing.” We went silent as I chugged my drink and he stared into his. “I shouldn’t have said anything,” he whispered as his finger swirled around the rim of his glass.
“If it makes you feel any better, I didn’t always consider you the annoying little brother I never asked for.”
The oven timer blared and broke the silence between us. As I checked the food and basted the bird with more butter, the heat from the oven toasted my cheeks. When I turned around, Theo was staring at me.
He cleared his throat before speaking. “What if we made it more weird? And then definitely forgot about it tomorrow?”
“What are you asking?” I thought I knew what he was asking, but it was fucking insane, and I needed to make sure.
Theo stood and walked toward me, cornering me in the kitchen. The heat of the stove warmed my left side, and I felt the lip of the countertop stab into my lower back. I’d never seen his eyes such an intense blue.
“What if we fucked?” His hand wrapped around the back of my neck and the heat of his palm burned me more than the stove.
I swallowed hard. “Theo . . .” I shook my head. “We can’t do that.”
“Why not, Zo? We’re adults now.” I watched his full lips move as he spoke.
“Because you’re my little fucking brother.”