The Stepbrother Bargain (Book 1) Read online

  “So? You’ll stay at the Copley. You shouldn’t have been staying at the house anyway, Grace. Those two will drive you fucking crazy.”

  “Yeah.” I bit my lip and turned to look out the window, not wanting him to see that I was upset. How the hell was I going to pay for a hotel room? I hated not having money, and hated even more that everyone around me just acted like money was of no consequence. They all seemed to think it was my fault I had none. And, I guess when you really got done to it, it was. I’d made choices in my life to get me to where I was. And I didn’t regret those choices, but they were choices.

  “Hey,” Cage said. “Have you noticed? Has that car been following us the whole time?”

  I glanced in the side view mirror at the black sedan that was behind us. I shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  Cage adjusted the rearview mirror and pushed on the accelerator, speeding up.

  “Why?” I asked. “What’s wrong? Is someone following you?”

  “It’s nothing.” But his tone sounded like maybe it was something. Whatever. I didn’t have time to think about whatever he had going on. Probably paparazzi. Cage was enough of a celebrity that people were interested in seeing pictures of him. I’d poured over them myself, usually late at night when I’d had a particularly hard day at work and had a couple glasses of wine in me. He was always with a different woman, although lately he’d been with just one – Aria Wittington, heiress to a hotel fortune. She was elegant and tiny – more Kate Middleton than Paris Hilton. I wondered if she was coming to the wedding tomorrow, if she was going to meet him here.

  We pulled into the Copley Hotel a moment later, and the black sedan went speeding past down Route 15.

  Cage guided his car into a parking spot and turned it off.

  I sat there, not quite sure what to do now that we were at the hotel and I had no money for a room.

  Cage got out, went to the back of the car and pulled out our suitcases.

  “You coming?” he asked, opening my door for me.

  I got out and stood there, still not sure what to do. I shifted my weight nervously from one foot to the other.

  “What?” Cage asked, sounding exasperated.

  “I don’t… “ I swallowed the humiliation that was forming in my throat. “I don’t have money for a room.”

  If he felt sorry for me, he didn’t show it. Instead, his eyes raked over my body again, lingering on my tits. I crossed my arms over my chest, blocking his view.

  But he set our bags down on the concrete and grabbed my arms, pulling them down and pinning them to my sides.

  “What are you doing?” I demanded, struggling to pull away from him. But he held me tight.

  “Looking.” He grinned as he kept checking me out. “Don’t be shy, Grace. You’re body is fucking sexy.” He pushed himself up against me, pinning me against the car. “You never looked this good when we were growing up, did you?”

  I wanted to fight against him, wanted to push him away. But I loved the way he was talking to me, loved the way his hands felt around my wrists. I even loved that he wanted to see my body, that he was making no excuses for the fact that he was openly ogling me.

  My breath hitched in my chest as he leaned in close to me, his breath tickling my neck. “Because if you had, I would have fucked the shit out of you.” He pulled back, lust burning in his green eyes. “You would have liked that, huh, little sister?”

  I was frozen, not knowing what to say. But apparently, he didn’t require a response. Because he let my wrists go and started walking toward the hotel. “Come on,” he called over his shoulder. “You can stay with me.”

  ***

  “Oh, hell no,” I said five minutes later when we walked into his room. The room itself was gorgeous – all shiny and new and modern, with abstract paintings on the walls, crisp white bedding, and a full bar in the corner. But there was only one bed. “There’s only one bed.”

  “So?”

  “So that’s weird,” I said. “Sleeping in bed with you.”

  “Why?” he asked, setting our bags down on the floor. He grinned at me. “Are you afraid of what might happen?”

  “No,” I said, rolling my eyes. But the truth was, I was afraid of what might happen. He was my stepbrother. My older, domineering, jerky stepbrother. The thought of sleeping in bed with him flooded me with desire and fear.

  “Good. He glanced at his watch. “We’re going to have to hurry if we want to be downstairs in time. Do you mind if I shower first?”

  “Whatever,” I said. I sat down on the bed and picked up the remote, turning on the TV and flipping to a Sex and the City rerun. Cage disappeared into the bathroom, and a second later I heard the water running.

  I leaned back into the pillows and tried to calm my racing heart.

  Cage couldn’t possibly expect us to sleep in the same bed, could he?

  I would have fucked the shit out of you.

  His words echoed through my mind, and I couldn’t help but imagining him do just that, his cock hard and thick as he slid into my pussy. My whole body started tingling, and an ache began pulsing between my legs.

  I wiggled around on the bed, trying to get it to go away.

  But it wouldn’t.

  All I could think about was him.

  I would have fucked the shit out of you.

  Is that what would happen if we slept in the same bed? I hated that he was in my head already, messing with me. And he had to be messing with me. He’d never shown me any kind of interest or attention when we were growing up.

  Of course, I was quiet then. Bookish. My hair had been lanky and brown, before my new neighbor Brynn had given me blonde highlights while practicing for her cosmetology license. I’d been thirty or forty pounds heavier, probably because I stress ate from living in a house where I knew my stepmother hated me.

  I hated Cage for leaving me.

  Hated that I’d always been in love with him, and he’d treated me like an annoying little sister.

  Hated that now he was back here, having this effect on my body, my thoughts, my emotions, and there was nothing I could do about it. It was like every time I was around him, I was helpless.

  I would have fucked the shit out of you.

  I imagined him sliding inside of me, his body on top of mine, his weight pushing into me as he moved in a rhythm, his hips bucking. What would it feel like to fuck my stepbrother, to have his dick inside of me, to feel him come?

  I’d never had sex before.

  I was a twenty-one-year-old virgin. I wasn’t waiting for marriage or anything like that –it was just that I’d waited so long that now I felt like it would be stupid to just give it away randomly.

  Although sometimes I was tempted.

  Sometimes I was so horny, my pussy so wet that I wanted to fuck, wanted to feel a dick inside of me. Like right now.

  I laid back on the bed, making sure I could still hear the shower running. As long as the water was still going, I was safe.

  I unbuttoned my shorts and slid my hand into my panties, gasping as my fingers found my clit – I was wet. Wetter than I could ever remember being.

  My fingers moved in a circular motion, and I thought about Cage, his breath hot on my neck.

  I would fuck the shit out of you.

  The bathroom door opened.

  I pulled my hand out of my panties quickly and buttoned my pants, my face flaming.

  Cage came into view, wearing nothing but a towel around his waist. I tried not to stare as he crossed the room. It wasn’t as if I’d never seen Cage without a shirt on before– we’d grown up together, after all. That day he was playing basketball was just one of the times I’d had a chance to see him shirtless. There’d been trips to the beach, days by the pool, times he’d just been lounging around the house in the summer.

  But those times, even though he was devastatingly handsome, he’d still been a boy.

  And now, Cage was a man.

  His body glistened with water, his skin slee
k and taut. The planes of his chest were smooth and defined, his abs a perfect six-pack of ripples that seemed to have been chiseled out of stone. His shoulders were cut and broad, his biceps hard and muscular.

  A line of hair started at his belly button and disappeared under his towel. I imagined my hand following it down, and I started to feel breathless.

  “I left the water on for you,” he said. “So it wouldn’t get cold.”

  “Thanks.”

  I got off the bed and walked by him into the shower, trying to calm myself down. There was no way I needed to get all worked up over Cage Croft. Not again. He’d already broken my heart once when he left our family and never came back.

  I didn’t need it broken all over again.

  ***

  Thirty minutes later, I was ready for the rehearsal dinner, and already regretting my choice of outfit.

  I’d picked out a black cocktail dress from Macy’s, springing for the one that was a hundred dollars because I was determined to wear the right thing, but now it seemed a little too revealing and not sophisticated enough for a rehearsal dinner. All of my parents’ friends would be there tonight, stuffy, self-important people who would ask me what I’d been up to.

  They would expect me to be doing something amazing with my life.

  When really, I hadn’t done anything. I was twenty-one, and I’d only completed one year of college. I had a crappy job at a publishing company which sounded important until you realized I was only an assistant. And not the kind of assistant that got to do cool things like find manuscripts to publish.

  First of all, my company didn’t find manuscripts. They published textbooks, finding academics to write books on subjects they’d already come up with. And even if they had solicited manuscripts from writers, it wouldn’t have been my job to look through them.

  My title may have been assistant, but I was more of a glorified receptionist. I answered phones, got coffee, sent out packages… I suspected the only reason they’d slapped the assistant label on me was so they could justify making me do whatever they wanted.

  I sighed and was about to head back out into the room when I heard Cage’s voice through the bathroom door.

  He must have been on the phone.

  “No,” he said. “No, I’m not going to tell anyone. They’ll put the pressure on. No, I’m not sure they were following me… Of course they know where I am, they always know where I am…. ”

  He must have started pacing around, because his voice began fading in and out, allowing me to hear only snatches of the conversation.

  I stayed in the bathroom, not wanting to intrude.

  But a couple minute later, Cage knocked on the door. “You almost ready?” he barked.

  “Yes,” I said, giving my lips one more swipe of pink gloss.

  I opened the door.

  Cage stood there, wearing a suit – dark grey, with a crisp blue shirt and grey tie. His hair was still damp from the shower, but instead of making him look messy, it only made him look fresh and put together.

  He was so beautiful he took my breath away. I wondered what it would be like to go through life like that – being so good-looking that people would just stop and stare.

  His eyes raked up my body, taking in my full hips, my breasts, my legs.

  His gaze both turned me on and made me feel uncomfortably exposed at the same time.

  Then his phone beeped with a text, and a shadow moved over his face as he read it.

  “Is everything okay?” I asked gently.

  “It’s fine,” he said, sliding his phone into the inside pocket of his jacket. “Just paparazzi.”

  “Oh.”

  But something about the way he sounded led me to believe it was more than that. Whatever it was, his mood had darkened considerably.

  He pushed past me to the door of the room and opened it, then motioned me to walk into through into the hallway.

  I hesitated, not sure how I felt about the two of us going down to the rehearsal dinner together. It seemed more of a boyfriend/girlfriend thing to do than a stepbrother/stepsister thing.

  Stop. You’re just being silly.

  You’re letting him in your head again.

  I took a deep breath and followed Cage out of the room.

  We waited for the elevator in silence, Cage tapping his foot impatiently.

  As soon as the doors opened and the car had started its descent, he pushed the button to stop the car, and it lodged between the third and fourth floors, stopping with a sharp grinding sound and a lurch that made my stomach drop.

  “What are you doing?” I demanded, reaching over to hit the release. But Cage grabbed me, his hand tightening around my forearm.

  “No.”

  “What do you mean, no?” I asked, trying to wrench out of his grasp.

  But he held me firmly and pushed his body up against mine, so that my back was pinned against the side of the car. His eyes burned with lust, the frustration that had been there replaced with a look that was almost crazed. One hand was on my waist, and the fingers of his other brushed over my cleavage. “You are driving me crazy,” he said. “Do you know how fucking hot you look in this dress?”

  Longing filled my body, the result of years of pent-up desire for him. But I knew why he was doing this now, had seen it play out a million times before. Whenever Cage got upset or frustrated, he’d bury his sorrows in some poor girl. He’d have sex with her or take her out and hook up with her, then discard her as soon as he’d worked out whatever was bothering him.

  And I refused to be his distraction.

  But my body involuntarily responded to his, blushing under his touch.

  His lips were millimeters from mine, and I longed for him to kiss me.

  His hands moved to the back of my dress, pushed it up until he was touching my bare ass. I’d let the saleswoman talk me into buying a thong to go with my dress, and so my cheeks were exposed, giving Cage full access to my bare skin.

  I sucked in a breath. “Cage…” I said. “I can’t….”

  “You can’t what, little sister?” he asked, his mouth settling into that cocky grin I knew so well.

  “We can’t do this,” I said. “It’s not right.”

  “That’s what makes it fun,” he breathed. “Come on, Grace, don’t you want to be a bad girl for once?”

  I felt my resolve melting. My mind was screaming at me to push him off, that he was bad, that I should hate him. He’d left me, gone and made a life for himself in New York. He’d never offered to help me, never even been in touch.

  But my body was drowning out my mind’s protests, my skin flushing, every sense on high alert. A moan escaped my lips.

  “I know you want me,” he said. “I know you want to fuck me. You always have.”

  I tilted my head back and his lips brushed against my collarbone. My legs went rubbery, and I felt like maybe they wouldn’t be able to hold me up. Cage’s hands pushed my dress up even further.

  “I could slide inside you right now, little sister,” he breathed. “I could take that pussy and make it mine.”

  I didn’t even pretend to try to stop him as he pushed my dress up even higher, so that it was bunched around my waist, my panties exposed. His hand moved from my ass to my thigh, and he grabbed my thong and pushed it to the side.

  The cool air of the elevator hit my clit, which was already swollen and hard.

  Cage started to undo his belt, and my heart sped up, my head swimming.

  He was going to fuck me. My stepbrother was going to fuck me, right here in this elevator.

  “Wait,” I said, as he unbuttoned his pants. “Cage…”

  “What?” he demanded, his green eyes bright with lust.

  “I… I just … I want you to know I’m a virgin.” I wasn’t sure why I was saying the words, why I would want him to know something so humiliating. It was probably my natural inclination, already making excuses for why I might be bad at something. Cage had been with tons of women, beautiful wom
en, the kind of women who had perfect bodies and knew exactly how to please him.

  He pulled back and smirked. “Good try, little sister.”

  “No, seriously,” I said. “I’ve never… I’ve never done this before.”

  Doubt clouded his face and I saw a bit of the lust flame out of his eyes. “You’ve never done what before?”

  “Had sex.”

  My skirt was still bunched up around my waist, my panties still pushed over to the side. The want for him still pulsed inside of me, but now it was tempered.

  He frowned. “What kind of sex?”

  “Um, any kind.” I wasn’t going to pretend I was one of those girls who had done ‘everything but’, the kind of girls who went around giving blow jobs left and right but had never had actual sex and so therefore still considered themselves virgins. Not that I judged those girls – but I didn’t want Cage to think I’d had any kind sex when I hadn’t. What if I was bad at giving blow jobs? Like I said, Cage had plenty of experience, and I wanted to warn him that I might be a disappointment.

  But it turned out I didn’t have to worry about letting him down.

  Because he released me, his hands returning to his pants and buttoning them back up.

  He reached out and punched the button on the elevator, letting it start its descent back down to the first floor.

  I rushed to readjust my clothes, pulling my dress back down and shifting my underwear back over.

  “Cage – “ I started, but the elevator doors opened, and he walked out into the lobby before I could finish.

  I watched as he disappeared into the throng of people, leaving me staring after him.

  ***

  When I found the banquet hall, there was a hand-lettered gold sign outside that indicated the room was for the Sutton/Croft rehearsal dinner. The room was smaller than I’d imagined – I figured my dad and Renee would have gone all out and invited as many people as they could get away with.

  I rummaged through my purse and pulled out my phone, checking the time. 8:00. The exact time dinner was supposed to start, and yet there was no sign of my dad or Renee. Of course they would decide to be fashionably late for their own dinner.