The cool metal of the truck chills my skin, even as Jefferson sets me on fire. Just as I had imagined, there’s no preamble with him. No gentle building of intimacy. No time to catch my breath. He kisses me deeply and fiercely until I’m breathless and gasping. His hands find my breasts like they belong to him, his thumb rubbing my nipple until it aches for his mouth. His other knee nudges between my legs, his thigh pressing up against my pussy so hard I gasp. It’s exactly what I need to silence my internal voice
‘Fuck,’ Jefferson mutters, his mouth against my neck, the hardness of his cock digging into my hip. Even through his jeans, I can feel how big he is. Big enough to make me feel it. Big enough that I won’t forget it. I’d fuck him right here, hard and fast with nothing between us. I’d absorb all his rage.
‘Don’t stop,’ I say, my fingers running over the velvet of his short-cropped hair. Everything about him feels right until he does exactly what I told him not to do.
Just like in the club, he pulls away from me like he’s been scalded. It’s like there is a part of Jefferson driving him forward and another pulling him back. He’s torn.
He wipes his hand over his mouth, trying to erase what we just did, even as both our bodies are still showing the evidence of our arousal. ‘Go back inside,’ he says.
‘No.’ I take a step forward, but he turns away from me.
‘Do you ever listen to anything anyone tells you to do?’ There’s a pain in his voice that I wasn’t expecting.
I place my hand in the middle of his back, and his shoulders jerk up, but he doesn’t pull away. ‘You don’t have to feel like this is wrong,’ I say. ‘Or that it’s your fault.’
‘It is wrong, and it is my fault.’ The certainty in his voice says that he isn’t going to listen to a word I say. He’s made up his mind, and I shake my head, thinking his complaint about me can be directly applied to him. Stubbornness is a trait we share.
‘If that’s how you feel…I guess there’s nothing I can say…’
The way back to the club feels longer. My feet are pinched in these ridiculous heels, and my heart is heavy. I feel Jefferson’s eyes on my back the whole way. I don’t bother to tug down the skirt of my dress from where his thigh pushed it up. I sway my hips so he can see exactly what he’s missing.
The bouncers don’t even acknowledge me as I pass. The alcohol in my system has burned down, and I need a top-up. I’m going to make this night a blast, with or without my stepbrothers.
Brad is there to mix my cocktail. He grins wickedly as I suck it down in a flash. If he wasn’t stuck behind the bar, maybe I’d dance with him. Maybe that could make me feel better.
But I deep down I know it won’t and I don’t know what will. Everything feels like a Band-Aid over a wide, open wound.
‘There you are,’ Brayson says as I turn from my drink.
‘Why did you get so mad with Jefferson?’
He blinks with surprise. ‘He shouldn’t have kissed you, Sara. We’re supposed to look out for you, not take advantage of you.’
‘You talk about me like I’m a child who’s incapable of making my own decisions. I do what I like when I like it. Do you understand?’
Brayson isn’t like his twin. He doesn’t thrive on confrontation. His shoulders slump, and he runs his hand over his tattoos in the same way his brother Carson rubs his injured knee. ‘We promised Dad,’ Brayson says.
His eyes are just like Jefferson’s in color, but they hold optimism where Jefferson’s are clouded with dark memories. His soft light brown hair is styled in a way that makes him appear preppy. The only thing he’s missing is a sweater draped casually over his shoulders. They are yin and yang—two parts of what could have been one person.
I touch his arm, following the winding script in Greek letters that are interwoven between a goddess figure, hearts, and angels. It’s so beautiful that it could come from a classical painting. ‘What does it say?’ I ask.
‘It’s by Homer,’ he says, as I stroke a feather that looks almost real and see the hairs rise on his arms. ‘There is the heat of love, the pulsing rush of longing, the lover’s whisper, irresistible—magic to make the sanest man go mad.’
I don’t know much about love, but I know plenty about longing.
How are Brayson and Jefferson so different? One who’s marked himself with love and the other with doom.
‘It’s beautiful,’ I say. ‘And sad.’
‘Sad, how?’ Brayson asks.
‘Love and madness…it just seems tragic.’
‘Or just two sides of the same coin,’ Brayson says. He pushes a stray curl behind my ear tenderly.
‘Like you and Jefferson?’
Brayson shrugs. ‘We’re not so different,’ he says. ‘At least, we didn’t use to be.’
‘Until?’
Brayson shrugs. ‘Some things need to be buried for us to carry on. Dredging up the past…well, it works for some people, but not for others.’
‘But Jefferson isn’t really moving on, is he? Not truly.’
Brayson rests against the bar as though the conversation is weighing heavy. ‘What Jefferson needs most is someone who can help him feel optimistic about the future. Someone who won’t let him down. Someone who’ll show him that so much of what he thinks of people isn’t true. When he finds that person, the past will lift.’
His insight into his brother is profound. He’s right, of course. Our greatest realizations come when our deepest held beliefs are proven to be untrue.
A lump forms in my throat, even as the alcohol swims through my veins. I’m not that person. I don’t stick like Maisie. She found her men, and that’s it for her. I just never feel that I can trust myself enough to let go like that. The fear that Jefferson has about people, well, I have it too. We’re a dangerous combination, too similar for our own good—an explosion waiting to happen.
‘But he knows that he has you guys. He knows that love doesn’t have to hurt because you’re a constant in his life.’
Brayson frowns, his fingers tapping on the bar as he thinks. ‘But all of that is about to change. We’re on the precipice of stepping out on our own. The draft will no doubt spread us all over the country …that’s if we’re lucky enough to get selected. If not, we’ll still be stepping out on our own into different careers. The family unity we’ve had for more than a decade that is so important to Jefferson is on the edge of breaking up. I think that’s why he’s so angry all the time. He’s grasping at something that is slipping away. He’s angry that there’s nothing he can do to stop it.’
Maybe there is, I think. Maisie’s stepbrothers were worried about the same thing. The McGregors who featured in that reality TV show were also driven by the same fear. Close families want to stay together. All the things that can pull them apart are the enemy. I can see why crazy big polyamorous relationships can form and why they can work. But they need girls who have roots, girls who can be the glue strong enough to prevent the splintering.
I’m not the glue. My parents fractured apart despite my arrival. My mom spent all of my childhood trying to find another person to stick our family together but never did. We were like two ships passing in the night. Nothing like a family should be. I don’t know how to be the person Jefferson needs.
My throat burns with unshed tears, my past clawing at my heart, and I start to panic. I don’t want to cry in the middle of this club. I don’t want Brayson to see my distress.
So I do the only thing I know how to do when emotions threaten to overwhelm me. I stand on my tiptoes and kiss my stepbrother on the mouth, and then I walk away.
