Hard: A Step-Brother Romance (16 page)

None
of this made any sense. I didn’t do anything wrong. Did they really think I was
flaunting my money by
not
flaunting how fortunate I was?

Did
they even know how ridiculous it felt to get my father’s fortune? It was
random—like a lottery I didn’t enter. I hardly knew Dad, and what I remembered wasn’t
great. He was a man who lost his temper with Momma most nights at dinner and a
father who missed his child’s every recital, school function, and birthday.

And maybe
they were right. Maybe I shouldn’t have cared where the money came from.

Except
the ache in my heart was a loneliness that cash and investments couldn’t heal. Momma
was gone. Dad had never been around. I had no real family, and my friends couldn’t
understand just how deep the scars ran.

Only
one person ever saw through my pretense. He’d felt the same way, tried to
comfort me, and was either my last bit of family or the beginning to a scary
and exciting relationship.

So
why did I keep running from him? I wouldn’t blame him if he gave up on me. He
asked for a chance to make something happen, moments beyond shamed nights when I
needed comforted. He came to talk to me, and I hadn’t listened. I took what I
needed and left.

I
wouldn’t do that to him again.

Zach
was either my step-brother, which made him family, or he was…

I
didn’t know what else he could be, but I hoped for something amazing.

I
drove home and braced myself for the relationship talk of all talks. Epic
levels of mushy-stuff, heart-to-hearts, and every cliché the French ever
discovered. My stomach twisted. This was the one conversation I couldn’t afford
to mess up.

I parked
in the garage, checked my makeup, and hurried into the house. Zach wasn’t in
the gym or theater. I dropped my purse on the kitchen counter. A bottle of
aspirin overturned on the island. I tucked it in the cabinet.

And
froze.

Two
wine glasses rested in the sink.

One
smudged with the barest pink of lipstick.

My
heart knotted itself into a pretty little bow of innocence and naivety.

Was
I that much of an idiot?

Her
voice carried from the parlor. I didn’t know what I expected to find or why I
didn’t just turn around and walk out of the estate.

I
rounded the corner into the parlor. Zach laughed on the couch—fully-clothed, a
goddamned miracle. He spread his legs wide, and the pretty little blonde who
owned the red Porsche sat on the coffee table. She smiled and patted his knee.

I shouldn’t
have been surprised, but my heart pounded itself into a million flaking pieces.

It
hadn’t even been twenty-four hours since I hopped into his arms, and he was
already sexing up some other little tart the
instant
I left the house?

Her smile
faded as she spied me in the doorway. She gestured to Zach.

He
turned, those striking green eyes capturing me in a wide-eyed blitz of panic.

“Shay!”
He swore. “I…didn’t know you were back.”

Son
of a bitch.

What
was she doing home so early?

“Shay.”
I stood. “I thought you’d be out for a bit longer.”

“Imagine
that.”

Shit.

She was
pissed, and her anger was another vice trying to crush my head from the inside.

I
called to her when she retreated from the room. “Shay, it’s not how it looks.”

She
tried to be mad, but her words trembled instead. Her lip quivered. Fuck. I’d
kick my own ass for hurting her.

“Save
it,” she said. “I should have known better.”

“Let
me explain.”

“There’s
nothing to explain,” she said. “It’s not like…like we were…”

Dating.
Exclusive. Made for each other. Fucking perfect together.

“Shay!”

And
she was gone. Storming upstairs.

Why was
she back so goddamned early?

And
how was I supposed to reveal who Gretchen was without fucking everything up?

I
groaned. I’d paint the bulls-eye on my ass now. Shay would kick me to the curb,
and I didn’t want her aiming too low.

“The
little missus is jealous.” Gretchen leaned on the coffee table. It didn’t help
that she was
all
fucking leg in the skin-tight cocktail dress she wore
for the house-call. “I’m assuming you haven’t told her about me.”

“What’s
to tell?”

Gretchen
shrugged. “I’m always trying to drum up business.”

“Stick
around. She’s loading a shot gun. You can stitch me up.”

She
stood, tucking a blood-pressure cuff into her bag. “You’re lucky I like you, Zach.
Please
promise you’ll take care of yourself. No more working out for
four hours a day.”

“Two.”

“Zach.”

“Three
and a half.”

“You’re
healing
,” she said. “I know you refuse to believe it, but you aren’t one
hundred percent healed yet. So use your brain and be glad it still works
right.”

“I
am.”

“No,
you aren’t. If you had an episode that scared you bad enough to call me during my
date
.” She wagged the doggy-bag from the Italian restaurant. “Then you’re
overdoing it.”

“The
appeal is in two weeks.”

“All
the more reason to
rest
. I already lost my brother in this war. I’m not
going to lose his best friend too. Okay?”

“I
hear you.”

“Go rest.”

Gretchen
shouldered her purse and bag. “And, for Christ’s sake, go talk to Shay. Tell
her what happened. She won’t judge you for getting injured overseas. She looks
sweet…as long as she doesn’t rip your innards out first.”

“If
she hasn’t yet…”

Only
one way to find out. I escorted Gretchen to her car to delay coming clean to
Shay. Even if she forgave Gretchen, she wasn’t going to be happy about my
condition or the truth about my extended leave.

I
knocked outside her bedroom.

No
explosions. No gunshots. So far so good.

She didn’t
answer, but I didn’t expect her to welcome me with open arms and legs. I knocked
again and edged inside.

“So…you
came home early…”

Nothing.

The
room was empty. Bathwater hummed from behind the partially closed bathroom door.
I watched as Shay shifted at her vanity, but I didn’t say anything. Just stood there
like a damned idiot, without a single fucking idea of how to start my apology
or explanation.

The bathroom
door opened. Shay shrieked.

She
hadn’t tied her silk bathrobe, and the pink graced her dark curves with a hypnotic
beauty.

I
stared. Who the fuck wouldn’t?

The
softness caressed her full breasts, and the hint of her slit peeked between the
short pleads of the robe. She wasn’t quick enough to hide from me. Even better,
she missed the hem of the robe and revealed more. She screeched and turned to
tie it. The pink silk barely kissed the bottom curve of her perfect ass.

“Zach!”
She pulled the robe’s belt tight, either to shield her nudity or because it’d
be a felony to knot it around my neck. “
Knock first
!”

“I
did. You didn’t hear.”

“Then
don’t come in!”

“Let
me explain.”

“Don’t
start with me.”

Shay
wove her curls into a quick bun, a little too violent for the clip she jammed
against her head.

“I’ve
had a
horrible
night,” she said. “I don’t want to hear any excuses. You’re
free to hump whoever you like.” Her eyes widened, dark and brimming with tears.
“But my father
ruined
his family because he strayed bed-to-bed. Don’t
you dare make me into some
other woman
.”

“Other
woman?” Christ, she thought I was
dating
Gretchen? I took her hand
before she escaped to her bath. “Gretchen isn’t my girlfriend.”

“I
don’t need the specs on your petty officer’s latest mission.”

“She’s
my
doctor
.”

Shay
stilled. I pulled her business card from my wallet.

“Dr.
Gretchen Mahoney,” I said.

“Internal
Medicine?” Shay flipped the card over. Her voice softened. “Why did you have a doctor
in our living room?”

Our
living room.

Fuck.
I snuck into her heart with all the subtlety of a boot to the door and a flash
grenade. If I blew it now, I’d wish the shrapnel had finished the job on me.

“It’s
a long story,” I said.

She
stared at the scars on my arm. “I want to hear it.”

“I wouldn’t
dream of interrupting your bath.”

Shay
hesitated, holding my gaze for any reason to stay. I held my breath as she
returned to the bathroom. The faucet turned off. My chest ached in relived
agony.

She
leaned against the doorway. I knew she debated if she could trust me. No reason
to lie then.

“I
gotta come clean,” I said.

She
swallowed. “I figured that was coming.”

“I’m
not fucking around with Gretchen. She’s just a friend, helping me because I
served with her brother. She took on my case as a favor.”

“Your
case?”

I
sat on the bed and patted next to me. Shay’s eyebrow rose like I unzipped my
pants and offered her a seat on my cock.

Why was
this so hard? It wasn’t like I was still in the hospital, pissing through a
tube and waiting for them to glue my skull back together. I made it out of the
fucking desert alive. I healed. I
survived
.

Would
she see it as a miracle?

Or would
she see the same man I saw in the mirror?

Weak.
Frail.
Aimless
.

“I’m
not on leave.” The words stung. My hands curled into fists. Six months ago, I couldn’t
even do that. Progress. “I was medically discharged.”

Shay
frowned. “You said you were going back to the SEALs in a few months.”

“I know.”

“You
lied?”

She
bit the word. It felt like a slap across the cheek.

“I
am going back,” I said. Hope healed more than the migraine meds Gretchen tried
to shove down my throat. “Now that I’ve recuperated, I’m appealing the
discharge. I’m meeting with te doctors for a physical in two weeks. If they believe
I’m fit to serve, they’ll issue me a medical waiver. I’ll reenlist.”

“What
do you mean
recuperated
?” She asked. “What happened to you?”

Like
she hadn’t seen the scars. I could pack muscle on top of more muscle, but all people
saw were the purple, fading scars where my guts tried to blast out of me.

“IED.”

Shay
edged closer to the bed. “So you were…hurt.”

An
understatement. “Yeah.”

“How
badly?”

“A
couple fractures short of entering a classified Navy SEAL cyborg program.”

“Zach.
Talk to me.”

I
sighed. Shay slipped to my side. I smiled as she tugged the robe over the
sinful darkness of her thighs. That little silky reveal was enough to refuel me
for another tour.

“It was
bad,” I said. “I’m…not at liberty to tell you where I was or what I was doing
there.  I can say I’m damn lucky that I made it back to the helicopter. I
should be another bloodstain in the sand.”

Her
eyes widened. She traced a shiny scar over my wrist. “But you’re okay now?”

“Of
course,” I lied.

“Why
didn’t you tell me you were on a medical leave?”

“Because
there’s a chance they won’t grant me that waiver. They might not clear me to re-enlist.
If that happens…”

I
eyed the master suite. The estate grew on me. I still couldn’t find my way
through it in the dark, but a man got used to living every day as a fantasy.

Especially
when the most beautiful woman in the world caressed a scar that came from a fireworks
accident when I was fifteen, not the explosion that nearly ripped my skull
apart.

I
brushed her hand with mine. The simple contact was better than any morphine
they shot in my veins at the VA hospital. “Last night, you asked me what would
happen if the one thing you wanted in life was taken from you?” I met her gaze.
“I understand that fear. Completely.”

“You
want to go back to the SEALs?”

“More
than anything.”

“But
it almost killed you.”

“It’s
my life. Wanted it since I was a kid. I didn’t have much of a family, and I thought
my dad was a soldier. It seemed a natural life for me.”

“Do
you like it?”

“I
did,” I said. “I liked the travel and excitement. Never had a reason to stay at
home.”

Until
now.

I
didn’t say it. Probably should have.

“I’m
sorry.” Shay looked away. “Oh hell. I sounded like an idiot downstairs.”

“I
didn’t tell you Gretchen was my doctor when you first met her. I didn’t want
you to know I had been hurt overseas.”

“That
was dumb.”

Yep.
Especially after I realized a girl didn’t get that jealous for nothing. “I
promise. Nothing’s happening between me and her.  Gretchen’s engaged. I have
more to worry about than you.”

“Why?”

“Well…”
I grinned, grateful for the conversation change. “She’s a lesbian.”

“That
is a relief.”

“Should
I be concerned?”

Shay’s
playful tone amused me more than her robe slipping over her shoulders. “No, I’ve
been very satisfied lately.”

“Just
satisfied?”

She
hummed. “As much as can be expected.”

“I’ll
have to work harder. No one’s ever accused me of being
adequate
.”

Shay
didn’t want to play. She tucked a falling curl behind her ear. I wished she let
me do it for her. A brush to her cheek tempted me more than night between the
sheets. Every second she allowed me to touch her cocoa skin was a gift, a
blessing second only to her smile.

So
why did her smile fade?

“You
came back early,” I said. “Everything okay?”

She
nodded. I didn’t believe her. I took her hand.

She
let me hold it.

I’d
explode just imagining her lithe, gentle fingers pumping my cock.

“It was
a rough night,” she said. “My friends…weren’t acting like my friends.”

“What’d
they do?”

“Asked
for money.” Her eyes rose to mine, honest and desperate. “And I would have
helped, I would have. But…I don’t have the trust. And they got mad...”