Cocked: A Stepbrother Romance (2 page)

“I’m shocked.”

“I know. Your technophobe father has a web presence.”

“Does he wear his tinfoil hat when he touches the computer?”

“Please. He doesn’t do any of it. He makes me take care of that stuff.”

I laughed, nodding. “That makes more sense.”

“But business is doing much better ever since we set up an online shop. He sold three chandeliers so far this month.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Wow. That’s awesome.” Dad’s chandeliers were high-end and expensive as hell, which meant that he only needed to sell a handful every year to make good money. Three in one month was a lot.

“I’m proud of him. But don’t tell him I said it, he’ll get all cocky.”

“Your secret is safe with me.”

She grinned. “Come down for dinner soon.”

“Okay. I just have to finish unpacking.”

She turned and left without another word.

I smiled to myself as I finished putting my things away. I had been pushing my dad to list his stuff online for ages, and he kept making up some excuse. It wasn’t like he didn’t believe in technology or something, but he kept saying that people should do business in person and know the people they’re dealing with.

Which was all well and good, but there wasn’t exactly a market for high-end chandeliers in Hammond, Indiana. He traveled to Chicago sometimes to sell them, but not nearly enough. His shop was also his workspace, and so people had to travel out to him to really see what he was doing.

The Internet could really open his world up. I was glad Lynn had finally pushed him into it, though a little suspicious. I wondered what she used to bribe him, or if she simply took it upon herself to do it all.

I grabbed my phone and checked the time. It was already after seven, and the smell of delicious roasting vegetables wafted up from the kitchen. My stomach did a little grumble, and so I resolved to check Facebook as briefly as possible.

I scrolled through my feed, paying more attention to people I went to high school with. I hadn’t seen most of them in a long time, but since I was home for the whole summer I figured I could try to rekindle some lost friendships. It wasn’t like I didn’t like my old friends, it was just that it was difficult to stay close when you were so far apart.

That was pretty typical. No matter how hard you tried, it was easy to drift when you were far away from people. I hated that I was the kind of person that had “ex-friends,” but it was the truth.

Finished with that, I made my way downstairs. Dad was posted up in front of the TV, probably on his second beer of the night, and Lynn was in the kitchen. I plopped down on the couch next to Dad.

“The Cubs suck,” he grunted at me.

I grinned. “You say that every time I see you.”

“It keeps being true.” He took a drink.

“You got one for me?”

He raised an eyebrow and looked over at me. “Didn’t think you were a beer drinker.”

“Well, I’m of age now. Figured I’d try and bond with you.”

“We don’t need alcohol to bond.”

“According to you.”

He laughed. “Check the fridge then.”

I got up and went into the kitchen, not intending to get a beer at all. I sat down at the table as Lynn bustled around.

“Anything I can do?”

“Nope. You’re too late to help.”

“Darn,” I said.

“Don’t act so upset. You’re doing dishes.”

“You got it.”

I smiled to myself as Lynn began to talk about her job at the hospital. She’d been a nurse for as long as I could remember, and she always had the best stories about the patients and the doctors. It was amazing how crazy it could get in a hospital, and frankly I thought she was a saint for handling it all.

It felt good to be sitting at my kitchen table. It felt good to tease my dad, to hear him say the same old stuff about the same old crappy baseball teams. I realized that for the first time in a while, I felt calm. Life out at Berkeley was one mad-dash day after another, long hours of studying and the occasional long hours partying. But mostly long hours studying, as much as I hated to admit it.

In Hammond, I didn’t have to worry about any of that. I didn’t have to calculate the effects of gravity on passing solar bodies or really think at all if I didn’t want to. I could just sit and be a person, chat about nothing, and feel good for once.

Then the doorbell rang.

I stood up. “I’ll get it,” I called out.

“You sure?” Lynn asked.

“Yep.”

I walked into the other room and headed toward the front door. I smiled to myself, laughing softly at the thought of my dad actually offering to get up off his ass for once and get the door. He hadn’t even bothered.

I turned the knob and pulled it open.

“Hey, Lace,” he said, his face splitting into a cocky grin.

My smile melted from my face. I stared at him, barely understanding. He was the same height, had the same muscular frame, the same arrogant smile and striking green eyes. It couldn’t be him, though. The more I stared, the more I realized that there was something different, something older. I remembered him as a good-looking troublemaker, but he looked more like a smooth-talking businessman. Only the tattoos poking out of the corners of his simple white button-down shirt hinted at his criminal past.

“Camden?” I said softly, my heart racing.

I couldn’t believe it was him. I thought he was dead. I thought he’d never come back. I’d lived my life all these years convinced I’d never see him again.

He had to be a ghost.

“In the flesh. It’s been a while, Lace.”

“What . . . what are you doing here?” I managed to say.

He took a step closer but didn’t move to come past the doorway.

“I was back in town. I figured I’d stop by.” His smile widened. “You look good.”

Camden was home. Camden, the stepbrother that had disappeared, the asshole and the criminal. Actually, he probably didn’t even realize that we were stepsiblings. One day we all thought he was dead, and the next he was ringing the doorbell like it was no big deal.

And holy shit does he look amazing,
I couldn’t help but think. Any sign of adolescent uncertainty was totally gone. The Camden standing in front of me was a man, through and through, confident and gorgeous.

And then the rage came back to me.

Camden left us. He never said a single word. Lynn was a mess after he left, called every hospital, mental ward, and police station in a fifty-mile radius. She organized search parties to comb through the local parks and woods for any sign of him. She even hired a private detective to try to track him down. Even when everyone said hope was lost, she kept trying, calling more and more places, sending out his description online, everything.

Eventually, she was forced to move on. Life got in the way. It wasn’t something that happened overnight, but gradually. Bit by bit she became used to Camden not being around, and eventually she accepted that he was never coming home. The pain was probably still there, but it was less. She could handle it.

And then he showed back up on our doorstep, just like that.

After everything he put my family through.

I was pissed. I was so angry I could barely understand it.

“Fuck off, asshole,” I said.

I loved the look on his face as I slammed the door shut and stormed back into the house.

I
’d had a lot of doors slammed in my face.

Some by ex-girlfriends, some by jaded ex-employers. One or two by victims. But never had it bothered me so much as when Lacey did it.

I meant it when I said she looked good. I hadn’t seen her pretty face in a very long time, though I had thought about it a lot. When you disappeared to Mexico, you didn’t tend to come back. Most people stayed lost.

But I wasn’t like most people.

I left all those years ago to protect my family. Now, well, I guess I hadn’t changed all that much.

I rang the doorbell again, sighing.

“Go the fuck away,” I heard her yell again from inside.

“Open up, Lacey. Aren’t you happy to see me?”

I grinned to myself as I heard her huff and stomp away. I rang the doorbell again and again, glancing around the neighborhood. I had to be careful. I couldn’t draw too much attention to myself. People knew me in Hammond, knew what kind of person I was.

But they had no clue what kind of person I had become.

Finally, after the fifth ring, the door pulled open.

My heart hammered in my chest. “Hey, Mom.”

She stared at me. I hadn’t seen her in four years, not since the day I’d left, but there she was, basically unchanged. I had thought about her a lot over the years, figured I had hurt her pretty badly. But I couldn’t risk contacting her and putting her in danger.

“Camden?” she said softly.

I smiled sheepishly. “I’m home.”

She stared for half a second more before throwing her arms around me. “I can’t believe it,” she said, choking back a sob.

I returned her hug. “I’m sorry,” I said softly.

“I knew you weren’t dead,” she said. “I never gave up on you.”

“Mom, can we do this inside?”

She stepped back and looked at me. “God, you’ve grown up so much.”

“Come on. You can fawn over me inside.”

She nodded and gestured for me to follow.

“Jeff!” she yelled out. “Jeff, it’s Camden!”

“What are you yelling about?” he grumbled as he walked into the kitchen. “And why is Lacey—” He stopped when he spotted me leaning up against the counters. “Holy shit. Camden.”

“Hey, Jeff.”

He stared. “What are you doing here?”

“Jeff,” my mom snapped.

“It’s okay. I’ll explain everything. I promise.”

“We’re just so, so happy you’re back.” Mom threw her arms around me again, hugging me like I was going to disappear any second. I didn’t blame her. She probably figured I was pretty likely to make another break for it. But little did she know that I was back for good, but I wasn’t bringing good news.

“It’s okay, Mom. I’m not going anywhere. I promise.”

“How? Where have you been? Why are you back?” Jeff fired off at me.

I knew they were going to have questions. Hell, they’d be crazy if they didn’t wonder where I had gone.

But the problem was, I couldn’t tell them. Not everything, not right away. It was for their protection more than anything else. It would have been so much easier to tell everyone every little gory detail of my fucked-up life the past four years, but I needed them to trust me. They definitely wouldn’t trust me if they knew where I’d been and what I’d been doing.

So I had to tell some lies.

“Jail, mostly,” I said to him.

He narrowed his eyes. “We checked all the jails.”

“Not here. Mexico.”

He raised an eyebrow. “What were you doing there?”

I nodded at the kitchen table. “Let’s sit down.”

Once Mom was comfortably seated and no longer hyperventilating, I launched into my mostly fabricated tale. I told them about running away to Mexico that night in order to start a new life. I told them about stealing cars in Chicago, about getting caught, and about starting up again across the border. I told them it was my only choice, either I stay or I run.

Then I told them the lies. I told them about getting arrested, about going to jail. I told them about getting out and going back in not long later. And I told them that I was cleaned up, had learned my lesson, was completely done with the illegal shit.

That last part wasn’t true. Not by a long shot. I was knee-deep in illegal shit, though for good reasons.

As I finished, Mom and Jeff stared at me.

“So you really fucked yourself over,” Lacey said.

I looked over and saw her leaning against the doorframe.

“Yeah, I guess I did.”

“Why’d you get caught twice?”

“Stupidity, mostly.”

“Why not run again?”

“The Mexican police aren’t like they are here. They don’t wait for arrest warrants.”

“So what makes you think you’re welcome back here?”

“Lacey,” my mom said.

“She’s right, Lynn,” Jeff cut in. “We have a life now.”

She stared at the two of them. “This is my son,” she said. “Lacey, he’s your brother now. I don’t care what he did. I’m just happy he’s not dead.”

I held up my hands. “Hold on, Mom. They’re not wrong to be angry.” I paused and grinned at Lacey. “Right, sis?”

“Damn right we’re pissed,” Lacey said.

I couldn’t help but laugh. I was glad Mom and Jeff got married, though I wasn’t sure how I felt about being Lacey’s stepbrother. I definitely didn’t think of her like a sister. The dirty thoughts swirling through my brain as I stared at her arms crossed over her breasts defiantly would have definitely been inappropriate even before we were related.

“I don’t expect to be taken in just like that,” I said.

“Good,” Jeff replied. “Because that’s not happening.”

“Stop it, both of you,” Mom said.

“Mom, please. It’s okay if they’re mad. I just wanted to drop by and say hello.”

“You’re not staying?” She looked almost crushed.

“I have a room nearby.”

“But you’ll stay for dinner.”