8. Adam
ADAM
Bourbon tastes like smoke and patience, and I'm running low on both.
The party spreads across the great room like expensive wallpaper—all surface, no substance. Guests cluster around the stone fireplace, their voices mixing with the clink of crystal and the photographer's camera clicking at carefully staged moments of family joy.
The whole production makes my jaw tight.
I track Chloe from my position near the bar, watching the green silk catch the firelight as she moves between conversations.
That dress should be illegal. The way it follows the curve of her spine, leaves her shoulders bare, makes every man in the room look twice—it's a problem I want to solve with my hands.
Before this, I couldn't sit across from this woman at a dinner table without gripping my chair until my knuckles went white. Tonight I had my fingers inside her while our parents ate salmon ten feet away, and the only thing I feel is that it wasn't enough.
Not deep enough. Not long enough. Not mine enough.
Now that I've touched her, the idea of going back makes me want to break something. Preferably something expensive in this perfectly curated mountain paradise that Donald bought to impress people who already know he's rich.
My mother's laugh carries across the room—bright, performative, the sound she makes when she's working a crowd.
Allison has been watching Chloe all night with the kind of attention predators give prey, and every glance makes my grip tighten on my glass.
At sixty-five, my mother still moves through parties like she's twenty-five and competing for a crown. Having a twenty-two-year-old stepdaughter in designer silk apparently feels like a threat.
Donald's doing his usual routine near the windows—holding court with three other men whose names I don't remember and don't care to learn, gesturing with his scotch while he talks about the train that brought us here.
Eighty thousand dollars of luxury rail transport, and he'll mention the price at least five more times before the night ends. Everything's a story for the golf course with him.
I drain my bourbon and set the glass down harder than necessary. The sound draws Chloe's attention from across the room, those green eyes finding mine through the crowd like a magnet pulling true north.
She's standing near the far windows with some woman wearing too much jewelry, nodding at whatever conversation she's pretending to follow. But her focus is on me.
The space between us feels electric. Charged with what happened at dinner and what's going to happen later, once this performance ends and we're alone again.
The memory of her body tightening around my fingers, the way she bit her lip to keep quiet while our parents discussed wine pairings—it's burned into my brain like a brand.
I move through the crowd with the kind of purpose that makes people step aside without thinking about why.
Guests part like water, their conversations continuing while I close the distance between myself and the woman who's been driving me insane.
She sees me coming. The jewelry woman is still talking, something about summer houses in the Hamptons, but Chloe's eyes stay locked on mine. The flush climbs her neck like spilled wine, and I know she's remembering the same things I am.
"Excuse me," I say to the jewelry woman, not bothering to learn her name. "I need to borrow my sister for a moment."
Sister. The word tastes like ash, but it's the story we're selling tonight. The woman beams at us like we're performing family harmony for her personal entertainment and waves Chloe away with perfectly manicured fingers.
Chloe steps toward me, close enough that I catch her scent—something clean and sharp that makes my hands want to grab silk and pull. Close enough that I could touch her waist, her hip, the bare skin of her shoulder, if I didn't care who saw.
"Having fun?" I pitch my voice low enough that she has to lean in to hear me, which puts her mouth near my ear and her body in the space I want it.
"Thrilling," she says, dry as summer heat. "Mrs. Patterson was just explaining why Martha's Vineyard is so much better than the Hamptons. Apparently it has to do with the sailing."
"Riveting." I let my eyes drop to her mouth, then back up to her eyes. "You look incredible in that dress."
Her breath catches just enough for me to hear it. "Thank you."
"I mean it." I step closer, close enough that anyone watching would think we're having an intimate sibling conversation. "I keep thinking about taking it off you."
The flush deepens, spreading across her collarbone like watercolor bleeding through paper. She glances around quickly, checking for listening ears, then looks back at me with something fierce in her expression.
"Are you trying to get us caught?"
"Maybe." The honesty surprises me, but not as much as realizing it's true. "Would that be so terrible?"
She opens her mouth to answer, but a camera flash interrupts us. The photographer has materialized like smoke, capturing another moment of beautiful family togetherness for Donald's collection.
I shift slightly closer to Chloe, my hand landing on her lower back where the dress scoops low. Skin contact. Warm and soft and mine.
"Beautiful," the photographer says, lowering his camera. "The family resemblance is so strong."
If he only knew what kind of resemblance he's actually photographing, he'd drop that camera and run. But he just smiles and moves on to capture someone else's perfectly staged moment, leaving us standing closer than stepbrothers and stepsisters should stand.
Chloe's eyes find mine again. "The balcony," she says quietly. "Five minutes."
Then she turns and walks away, leaving me with the taste of anticipation and the sight of green silk moving through the crowd. I count to sixty, twice, before following.
The balcony stretches across the back of the house, overlooking a valley that disappears into darkness beyond the reach of the estate's lights. Mountain air cuts through the warmth radiating from the party behind us, sharp and clean and cold enough to sting.
But Chloe isn't alone.
Some guy I don't recognize has positioned himself between her and the railing, leaning close enough that she has to tilt her head back to maintain eye contact.
He's younger than me—maybe thirty, maybe less—with the kind of confidence that comes from never being told no by anyone who mattered. His hand rests on the railing next to her hip, casual as a claim.
Something goes very still inside my chest.
I don't run. I don't shout. I walk across the balcony like a man with all the time in the world. People move out of my way without being asked, some survival instinct recognizing predator from prey even in formal wear.
The guy doesn't notice me until I'm close enough to count his eyelashes. Then he glances up, still smiling, still thinking he's the most interesting man at this party.
"Excuse us," I say, reaching past him to put my hand on Chloe's waist. "Family business."
He doesn't move. "Actually, we were just?—"
I grab his shoulder—not gentle, not polite, just enough pressure to make my point clear. "We're done here."
Something in my voice or my grip or the fact that I'm six-five and built like someone who doesn't lose arguments makes him take a step back. His smile falters, then disappears entirely when he reads whatever's written on my face.
"Right," he says, brushing off his jacket like I've left fingerprints on the fabric. "Of course."
He leaves. Smart man.
Chloe watches him go, then looks at me with something between amazement and heat. "That was subtle."
"I don't do subtle when it comes to you." The words come out rougher than I intended, scraped raw by three years of watching other men look at her like she's available. "Not anymore."
The party noise fades behind the glass doors, muffled by distance and the mountain air that carries the scent of pine and snow from peaks too far away to see.
Stars scatter across the sky like thrown diamonds, and the only light comes from the warm glow spilling through the windows behind us.
Chloe leans against the railing, her arms crossed over her chest in a way that makes the green silk pull tight across places I want to touch. "What if someone sees us?"
"Let them." I move into her space, close enough that she has to tilt her head back to meet my eyes. "I'm tired of hiding."
"Adam—"
I cup her jaw in my palm, my thumb tracing the line of her cheekbone. Her skin is warm silk and sharp intake of breath, and when she looks at me like that—eyes wide, lips parted, pulse jumping in her throat—every reason I've spent three years convincing myself to stay away disappears like smoke.
"I'm tired of pretending you're my sister," I say, low enough that only she can hear. "I'm tired of watching other men think they have a chance with you. I'm tired of keeping my hands to myself when all I want is to touch you until you forget every name but mine."
Her breath hitches. "Anyone could look and see?—"
"Good." I lean closer, my mouth near her ear. "Maybe it's time they knew."
Then I kiss her. Not asking, not testing—taking what I've wanted for three years and finally have permission to claim.
My hand slides from her jaw to the back of her neck, fingers tangling in her dark hair, and she melts against me like she's been waiting for exactly this.
She tastes like champagne and sharp edges, like the smart mouth that's been driving me crazy and the soft sounds she makes when I touch her just right. Her hands find my chest, then slide up to grip my shoulders, and when she opens for me I take everything she offers.
The kiss deepens until we're breathing each other's air, until the cold mountain night disappears and there's nothing but heat and hunger and the way she fits against me like she was made for my hands.
Through the glass doors, the party continues—voices and laughter and the clink of expensive crystal—but it might as well be happening on another planet.