3. Wren
WREN
Why did I say that?
The question crashes through me half a second too late, which is the story of my life tonight.
My phone's dead—has been for hours—and Maxim told me to wait for Lev's signal before I call my mom through a secured line because apparently phones can be tracked, which sounds like something out of a spy movie except people are actually dead and my stepfather is one of them.
But my mom's safe. Maxim said so. Pavel's with her. That should be enough for now.
It isn't, but it has to be.
And here I am on a porch in the middle of nowhere, telling my stepbrother—a man I met approximately six hours ago, a man who just accused me of betraying his family—that I want him to fuck me.
My brain is clearly broken. That's the only explanation.
Except my body doesn't feel broken. My body feels like it's been plugged into a live wire.
I was attracted to Maxim earlier—the easy charm, the way he made me almost-laugh even when everything was falling apart.
But this? This is different. This is want, raw and urgent and completely out of my control.
I've never felt anything like it. I've never wanted anyone the way I want Lev right now, and I don't even know him, and that should scare me but instead it just makes me ache.
He's staring at me like I just set something on fire.
"You don't know what you're asking for," he says, low and rough, and there's a warning in it but also something else, something that sounds dangerously close to surrender.
"Maybe not." My voice shakes. "But I'm asking anyway."
My pulse hammers in my throat, my wrists, between my legs.
The dress I'm wearing is too tight, designed for a wedding reception, not for whatever this is.
The fabric clings everywhere and suddenly I'm hyperaware of it—the way it pulls across my chest, the way the hem sits high on my thighs.
I'm wearing heels and I kick them off, one and then the other, and they clatter against the porch boards.
Lev's gaze drops to my bare feet, then drags up slow. When it reaches my face again, something in his expression has shifted. Locked into place.
"Tell me to stop, Wren."
It's an order dressed up as a request.
"Don't stop." I step closer, close enough that I can feel the heat radiating off him, close enough to catch the faint smell of whiskey and something sharper underneath. "Please. I need this. I know you need this too."
He moves so fast I don't see it coming. One second there's air between us and the next his hands are on my waist, lifting me like I weigh nothing, and my back hits the exterior wall of the house hard enough to knock the breath out of me.
His mouth crashes into mine and it's nothing like I imagined a first kiss would be—no soft exploration, no tentative sweetness.
This is all teeth and tongue and hunger, claiming and desperate, and I gasp into it because I've never been kissed before and I didn't know it could feel like this.
Didn't know my whole body would light up, that I'd forget how to think, that I'd want to crawl inside his skin and live there.
His hands slide up my ribcage, thumbs brushing the underside of my breasts through the dress, and I arch into the touch without meaning to.
A sound tears out of my throat—half-moan, half-whimper—and he swallows it, his grip tightening as he presses his hips against mine.
I feel him hard against my stomach and the realization that he wants me this much makes my knees go weak.
"You're a virgin," he says against my mouth, not quite a question.
"Yes."
"And you want me to fuck you anyway."
Heat floods my face but I don't look away. "Yes."
"Christ." He pulls back just enough to study my face, his pupils blown wide, his breathing harsh. "Do you know how wrong this is?"
"We're not related by blood, so no, I don't care."
"You should." His hand slides up to cup my jaw, thumb pressing against my lower lip. "You should go inside and lock your door and never look at me like this again."
"But I won't."
"No," he agrees, voice gone rough and dark. "You won't."
He kisses me again, slower this time but no less consuming, and then his mouth moves to my jaw, my throat, the hollow behind my ear.
I tilt my head back to give him access and my skull thuds against the wall.
His teeth scrape over my pulse point and I shudder, fingers tangling in the fabric of his shirt because I need to hold onto something or I'm going to fall apart.
His hands find the hem of my dress and shove it up, bunching the fabric around my hips. I shiver. I'm wearing the flimsiest excuse for underwear—lace that barely covers anything—and when his knuckles brush against the fabric, I bite down on a gasp.
"Fuck, you're wet." His voice is all gravel, no smoothness left in it. "Can feel it through the lace."
My face burns. "Lev?—"
"Say my name again."
"Lev."
I don't have time to register the shift before Lev drops to his knees in front of me, the motion so abrupt it steals the air from my lungs.
One moment his massive frame is caging me against the rough timber of the house, heat rolling off him like a furnace; the next, he's eye-level with my hips, those tattooed hands clamping onto my thighs with a grip that promises bruises I'll feel for days.
The possessive pressure of his fingers digging into soft flesh sends sparks racing up my spine.
He hooks two fingers beneath the delicate lace of my panties and yanks them down my legs in one ruthless tug.
The fabric whispers against my skin, and I step out of the scrap on pure instinct—my brain has officially checked out, leaving only the frantic hammer of my pulse and the slick ache between my legs.
"Hold your dress up," he orders, the command clipped and low, vibrating through my bones.
My fingers tremble as I clutch the rumpled fabric of my dress and press it tight against my stomach.
The new position leaves me obscenely vulnerable—completely exposed from the waist down, the lacy garter belt I stupidly forgot about now framing my naked pussy like some filthy invitation.
I'm standing on the open porch where the scent of pine resin and crisp lake water hangs heavy in the air, where anyone could round the corner and see me like this: flushed, dripping, stepsister to the man currently staring at my cunt like it's his next meal.
The perimeter guards idle somewhere beyond the tree line, their engines a distant rumble, and his brothers are inside the house, but none of that matters.
Not when Lev's brown eyes have gone almost black with hunger, tracking every quiver of my thighs, every shallow breath that makes my chest heave.
"Look at you." His palms slide higher, calluses rasping over sensitive skin as he spreads me wider, thumbs framing my swollen folds. The cool breeze licks at my exposed pussy, making me clench around nothing. "My little stepsister, all wet and desperate for her stepbrother's tongue."
The words should scorch me with shame—they do scorch me. But the humiliation twists into something darker, hotter, arrowing straight to my core and making fresh arousal slick my inner thighs. My inner voice is a chaotic spiral: This is insane, this is so fucking wrong, why does it feel this good?
"Please." The word slips out broken and needy.
"Please what?" His thumb grazes just beside my throbbing clit, a deliberate tease that makes my hips twitch violently. I nearly climb out of my own skin at the electric jolt. "Tell me what you want, Wren. Use your words."
"I don't—I don't know." Lies. My mind is screaming it, every filthy fantasy I've buried since my mother dragged us into this world.
"Yes, you do." He leans in closer, his hot breath fanning across my drenched folds and inner thigh, the contrast with the chilly lake air raising goosebumps everywhere. The faint woodsmoke clinging to his hair mixes with the raw, musky scent of my own arousal, and it makes my head spin. "Say it."
"I want—" My voice cracks, throat tight. "I want your mouth on me. On my pussy. Please, Lev."
"Good girl."
The praise hits like a drug, then his mouth is on me and every coherent thought evaporates in a rush of wet heat. This is ruthless, expert devastation—his tongue dragging through my folds with precision, circling my clit before plunging inside me like he owns the taste.
The wet, obscene sounds of him devouring me fill the quiet night: slick laps, hungry groans that vibrate against my flesh, the filthy suck of his lips sealing around my clit. My hips buck forward on their own, chasing more, but his iron grip on my thighs pins me immobile against the wall.
I can only stand there, legs shaking, dress clutched in white-knuckled fists, while pleasure coils tighter and tighter in my belly, a molten wire about to snap.
Holy shit, this is Lev—my stepbrother—eating me out like he's starving, and I'm going to come on his face right here on the porch.
"Lev, I—" The words choke off. I can't warn him. I don't even understand what's crashing over me, only that it's building to something catastrophic, unstoppable.
The orgasm rips through me with brutal force, vision exploding into blinding white as every muscle locks and spasms. A raw cry tears from my throat, echoing off the lake, my nails scraping desperately at the wooden wall behind me for any kind of anchor while my pussy convulses against his unrelenting tongue.
He doesn't stop. Doesn't even slow. He licks me through every shuddering aftershock, drawing it out until my legs are jelly, my breath coming in ragged sobs, and I'm certain I'll collapse if he lets go.
The afterglow leaves me floating, oversensitive, every nerve raw and singing, while his dark blonde hair brushes my thighs and the distant slap of water against the dock seems to mock how completely I've fallen apart for him.
When he pulls back, his mouth is slick, and his eyes are dark, and he looks like sin personified.