Stepbrother Trouble_A Taboo Stepbrother Romance Read online

  The mention of Daniel in her mind made her stomach turn. The expanding of her brain had done nothing for intelligence. She slowly dipped through blurry and half-blacked out memories to find the source of the uneasy feeling she’d had over Daniel. She knew that something had happened. She’d gotten drunk too often and had woken up with too many regrets to not recognize the sickly turning in her stomach.

  She stopped trudging through memories when she found the one that she was looking for. She’d been on the beach with Daniel. They’d been talking about someone. She thought hard. They’d been talking about his ex. What had happened after that? The memory was filled with black holes and plot drops. How drunk had she been? How many bottles had she managed to finish before she’d jumped from the side of the boat?

  The image of the railings in her mind took her somewhere new. She’d been standing on the deck with Daniel. He’d whispered into her ear and she’d felt his hot breath brush against the side of her neck. With her eyes closed, she could almost recreate the feeling. The uneasy turning returned, and she went back to the beach. The conversation about the ex, the jealousy she had felt, the excitement when his face had gotten close to her, and finally, the kiss.

  Crap, she thought as she sat up straight. Her head spun with the sudden movement, but it didn’t have enough of her attention to send her crashing back to the mattress. What had she done? Why had she kissed Daniel? How had she managed to mess things up so badly? Her mom was never going to believe that she’d changed if she heard about the kiss. There was no chance that she would be allowed to stay at the house if they found at that she hadn’t curbed her partying.

  A knock at her door vibrated through the room. She tried to place it, but she couldn’t. “Who is it?” she called out without inviting them in.

  “It’s Daniel.”

  “Oh crap,” Lucy said under her breath. She could feel her eyes widening in panic. What did he want? Why was he at her door?

  “Can I come in?” he asked when she’d failed to reply.

  “Um, yeah, sure.” She pulled the covers over her, even though he’d already seen everything that she had on display.

  “How are you feeling?” He walked into the room with a big grin across his face.

  “Rougher than you, by the looks of it.” She glared at him for being so cheerful.

  “What can I say?” He shrugged. “I bounce back from a hangover pretty well.”

  “Lucky you,” Lucy said dryly without lessening her glare.

  “There’s no need to be such a sourpuss.” Daniel gave her a teasing kind of frown.

  “There’s every need to be such a sourpuss,” Lucy disagreed with him. “I feel like my brain is trying to break out of my skull.”

  “Well, that’s what you get for a good night.” He sat down at the edge of her bed. The mention of the night before threw Lucy off. What was she meant to say? Did he want to talk about the kiss that had happened between them? “Did you have a good night?” He peered at her with his leafy green eyes.

  “Sure, I think so.”

  “You think so?”

  “I’m not sure that I remember all of it,” she explained.

  “Oh.” He looked a little concerned. “I didn’t realize you’d had that much to drink.”

  It was Lucy’s turn to shrug. “What can I say? I had the bartender’s attention.”

  “How much of it do you remember?” Lucy could tell that he was trying to see whether she remembered the kiss.

  “Some of it,” she told him vaguely. She could tell that it was getting to Daniel that she wasn’t admitting to remembering, but she also knew that it was for the best. If she didn’t bring it up, then she was sure that he wouldn’t. It was her “get out of jail free” card. All she had to do was act as though it had never happened, and it wasn’t like she wasn’t well practiced in that already.

  “That’s a real shame.”

  “Is it?” Lucy asked him curiously. He looked really disappointed. She wanted to believe that it was because of the kiss. She wanted to believe that it was because of her, but she knew that was probably just wishful thinking.

  “Yeah.” He stood up. “It was a really good night.”

  “Well, I’m glad that I went then.” Lucy smiled at him.

  “I’m glad you went too.” Daniel met her eyes and held them. Lucy could feel him reaching into her again. It was like he was unwilling to accept anything she showed on her surface. His forehead pulled into a soft frown and, for a moment, Lucy felt panicked. Did he know? Did he know that she could remember what had happened between them?

  “I guess I’ll see you around.” He took his gaze away and opened the door.

  “Wait,” she called after him, before he had a chance to walk away. “Can I talk to you about something?” She had taken away their kiss. She owed him some small sliver of truth, even if it wasn’t actually about what had happened between them.

  “What’s up?” Daniel asked her curiously.

  “Close the door,” she said quietly. She was going to tell him the truth, but she couldn’t risk anyone else finding out. “Last night, I made you a promise that I wouldn’t tell anybody about your ex,” she told him.

  “You remember that?”

  “Yeah, I remember that.” She nodded. She could see him trying to work out whether that meant she had the memory of them kissing stored in her brain too. “I don’t remember anything after, though, I just sort of remember telling you that you’re an idiot.”

  “Oh, right.” He nodded. “Yeah, that happened.” He shifted on the spot he was standing on and then walked back over to the bed and sat down. “Is that what you want to talk to me about?” he asked her curiously.

  “No.” She shook her head softly. “You told me a secret. That means you trust me, right?”

  He nodded. “I guess so.”

  “So, that means that I can trust you?” She kept her eyes fixed on his. She couldn’t risk missing any signs of a lie.

  “Sure, you can trust me.”

  “I need you to promise that what I’m about to tell you won’t leave this room.” She held his eye contact.

  “Okay, I promise.”

  “I got kicked out of college.” Her words hung heavy in the air between them. “That’s why I’m here. I didn’t have anywhere else to go and I haven’t told my mom yet.”

  Daniel frowned. “Why haven’t you told her? My dad could probably get you a place somewhere else midterm. There’s no point in wasting any time.”

  “I haven’t told her because I can’t tell her,” Lucy said seriously.

  “I don’t understand.” Daniel could see the guilt rushing up into Lucy’s eyes. He thought about pulling her closer to him, but he wasn’t sure how she would react.

  “They didn’t just kick me out for skipping classes,” Lucy said quietly. “What I did was bad. It was really bad, and when my mom finds out—” She hesitated. She’d imagined a hundred different ways that her mom might react to the news. “She’s probably going to kick me out, at the very least.”

  “What did you do?” Daniel asked, because he had to.

  “That doesn’t matter.”

  “I think it does.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” Lucy said shortly.

  “Then why have you told me about any of this?” Daniel asked. He was frustrated. He couldn’t understand why she’d only go so far in the story.

  “I really needed to tell somebody,” Lucy admitted. “I haven’t been able to talk to anybody about it since it’s happened. My mom keeps asking me about when I’m going back there. What am I meant to tell her?”

  “You could tell her the truth?”

  Lucy laughed bitterly. “If I do that, then everything is over.”

  “If you don’t, then she’s going to find out anyway. You can’t stay here forever.”

  Lucy shook her head. “I know that.” What was she going to do? Daniel was right. It wasn’t going to be long before her mom started to push her for ans
wers. “Maybe I could just go?” she let her thoughts tumble freely from her mouth. “I could just say that I want to go back-packing or something. You know, life experience.”

  “You know you can’t do that.”

  “Actually, I’m pretty sure that I can,” Lucy said firmly. “I mean, why not? There’s nothing keeping me here. I could tell her that I want to take a gap year, go traveling, and when I come back—no,” she corrected herself, “if I come back, then I’ll just say that college isn’t a part of my plan anymore.”

  Daniel didn’t say anything. He was just looking at her with big green eyes filled with concern and strain. “Lucy,” he said finally, when they’d both sat in silence for five minutes or so. “What did you do to get kicked out of college? If you tell me, maybe I’ll be able to help you.”

  “You can’t help me,” Lucy told him quickly.

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because, if you knew, you wouldn’t want to help me,” she told him with a certainty that only pulled at his curiosity more.

  “I doubt that.”

  “That’s because you don’t know.” Lucy could feel her back being pushed up against the wall. Daniel wanted to know, and he wasn’t letting go of it. “I shouldn’t have told you anything,” she said finally. “I don’t know why I did.”

  “I’m sorry you feel like that.” Daniel looked down at her sheets. “I guess we both know our secrets are safe now, though,” he said, to try to lighten the mood.

  “I guess so.” Lucy smiled tightly. “Can you leave me to get some sleep now?” she asked, because she wanted to be left to herself.

  “Sure,” he said, standing up. “I’m sorry if I’ve upset you.”

  Lucy shrugged. “Don’t worry about it.”

  ********

  Chapter 11

  Talking to Daniel had taken more out of Lucy than she thought it would. Her body was still aching from the two-day hangover she was carrying around with her. Her brain hurt. The thoughts of what had happened on the last night at college were pressing against her skull. She’d been ignoring them for too long. They were angry and wild. They wanted to tear her apart from the inside out. They possessed her like demons that were unwilling to let go. The truth was going to come out. She wouldn’t be able to hide it for much longer. What was she going to do?

  She stood up from her bed. She couldn’t deal with it. She couldn’t deal with any of it. Soon, the truth would come out and it would be impossible to ignore, but that hadn’t happened yet. She needed to hold on to normality for as long as she could. She needed to hold onto her old life for as long as fate would let her, because she had no idea what would happen when she let go.

  The mid-afternoon sun was warm, but the breeze rolling in from the ocean was keeping the air cool. Lucy walked out into the back garden. The gentle humming from the pool’s automatic system told her that there wasn’t anybody swimming. It was too quiet. She didn’t head over to the pool, though. She walked away from it and over to the willow trees that were growing at the bottom of the grounds. There was something about the way their long, elegant branches danced with the wind that was enticing her over.

  She sat down under their shade and looked back at the house. It gleamed with the sun in an unnaturally clean kind of way. Lucy turned her head over her shoulder when the sound of rustling leaves pulled her attention away. Her hands hit the ground, ready to push herself up. She wasn’t sure what was breaking its way through the bushes, but it sounded bigger than a fox. “Oh, hey,” Josh’s head poked through the thick tree line. “What are you doing down here?”

  Lucy shrugged. She wasn’t in the mood to answer any more questions. She examined Josh, who was standing on her side of the tree line now. His normal, perfect presentation was gone. His clothes were dirty and torn from brambles. He looked hot and sweaty, like he’d been doing a day’s hard work. “What are you doing out here?” she turned the question back to him.

  “I was just walking in the woods.” He brushed down his pants. “I took a bit of a fall earlier.”

  “Oh.” Lucy nodded. Well, that explained his appearance.

  “Are you okay?” he asked when she didn’t say anything else. “You look kind of stressed.”

  “I’m fine,” she lied quickly.

  “Are you sure?” Josh pressed. “You don’t look fine.”

  “Well, I am,” Lucy insisted. She watched as Josh walked over to her. He sat down and looked back at the house. “I was fine on my own, you know.”

  “I’m sure you were.” He nodded. “Nothing wrong with a bit of company, though.”

  “I think that depends on the company,” she was curt. She wasn’t meaning to be. She was sure that Josh was just trying to help her, but she didn’t want his help. She didn’t want Josh’s help and she didn’t want Daniel’s. It wasn’t like they could help her anyway. There was nothing that could be done to save her.

  “What happened to you at the party last night?” The silence between them was uncomfortable.

  “I jumped off the ship.” Lucy glanced at him. He looked surprised.

  “You jumped off?”

  “Sure.” She dipped her head. “It looked like fun.”

  “You know, that was probably really dangerous,” he said with disapproval. “Daniel should have known better than to let you jump.”

  “It wasn’t up to Daniel.” Lucy glared at him. “I make my own decisions.”

  “I wasn’t saying that,” Josh retracted quickly, but it was already too late.

  “You know, Josh, sometimes the danger is the fun part. Sometimes it’s good to stand on the edge of something, knowing that you’re going to take the plunge. Sometimes you have to let go and just see what happens.”

  Josh frowned. “But, what happens when that all goes wrong?” he asked quietly. “What happens when someone gets hurt or you go too far?”

  He was expecting an answer. The question hadn’t been rhetorical, and Lucy was speechless. She didn’t know what to say. “You work it out, I guess.” She shrugged. That was what she was going to have to do. That was what was going to happen when her family found out about what had happened at college. Her cell phone vibrated, and she thanked the heavens for the interruption. “I better get this,” she told Josh as she pulled her cell out and stood up. “I’ll be back,” she lied as she walked away.

  “Lucy.” The voice filled Lucy with dread from the moment she heard it through the speaker. “Lucy, I know you said that you don’t want to talk to me, but I got the court date through today and, I don’t know, I had to call you.” It was Logan, her ex.

  “You got the court date?” she asked him, ignoring everything else that he’d said. “When is it?”

  “It’s in a couple of weeks.” He waited for Lucy to say something, but she didn’t. “What did your mom say when you told her?”

  “I haven’t told her,” Lucy admitted.

  “You haven’t told her?” He sounded surprised. “You know you’re getting called onto the stand as a witness. How are you going to explain that? How are you going to explain not going back to college?”

  “That’s my problem to work out,” Lucy snapped. “Shouldn’t you be worrying about what’s going to happen to you?”

  Logan snorted. “I’ve got a good lawyer.” The cocky, laid-back way he said it made Lucy’s blood run cold. She couldn’t understand how he could be like that after what he had done. She couldn’t understand how she had ever loved a person who was clearly so evil.

  “I’m not going to lie for you,” she told him quietly.

  “Lucy, we talked about this.” Logan sounded suddenly tense. “We talked about what happened. It was an accident. You know that.”

  “Well, if it was an accident, then I don’t need to lie, do I?”

  “Lucy.” He sounded angry now. “I get that you don’t want to be with me, but if you go into the courtroom and tell them the truth, you’re going to ruin the rest of my life. Can you really do that?”

  “I gu
ess you’re just going to have to wait and see.” Lucy hung up.

  ********

  Chapter 12

  A week had passed since Logan had called Lucy. She could feel each day adding more weight to her shoulders. She was getting to the point where she could barely walk under the pressure. She had no idea what she was going to do. She’d told Logan on the phone that she wouldn’t lie for him, but she didn’t know whether that was true. Her thoughts lingered on the last thing he’d said to her. If she went and told the truth, then his life would be ruined. Could she really do that? Hadn’t enough negativity come from what had happened?

  These thoughts were so loud in her mind that she didn’t hear the voices that were being carried from the kitchen until she’d walked in.

  “Oh, hey.” Daniel looked uncomfortable as he looked over at her. It took Lucy a second to realize that his arms were wrapped around a skinny, brown-haired girl with ruby red lips.

  “Oh my god.” The girl’s lips broke into a smile. “Is this your sister?”

  “Um,” his eyes shifted between them both, “yeah, that’s Lucy.”

  “It’s so good to meet you!” She held out her arms and walked over to Lucy. The stunned look on Lucy’s face went ignored, and the girl’s arms wrapped around her. “I’m Sophie, Daniel’s girlfriend,” she explained when she’d pulled away from the overly friendly embrace.

  “Oh, right.” Lucy tried to smile. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

  “I hope it was all good,” Sophie joked, walking back over Daniel.

  “Sure.” Lucy avoided looking at Daniel, even though she could feel his eyes burning into her face. “It was all good.”

  “You’re just the best, aren’t you?” Sophie turned to Daniel and kissed his cheek. “You know,” she said, turning back to Lucy, “you’ve got a real good brother here.”

  Lucy tried not to flinch over her use of the word “brother.” She knew that technically that was what Daniel was to her. It wasn’t how she saw him, though. It wasn’t how he saw her, either. The uncomfortable feeling in the room wasn’t just coming from her. “I know.” She smiled tightly.