Risk: A Military Stepbrother Bad Boy Romance (14 page)

She smiled.

“How did you know?”

The band assembled onstage. Lance gave Sarah her single can of beer, which she drank slowly, like a goblet of sacramental wine.

“Damien, introduce us,” Lance hissed at me as he joined us on stage, taking his place at his drum set, surrounded by gleaming steel, much as he had been surrounded by steel while deployed in Afghanistan as a tank commander. I wondered if there were a connection between his love for the drums now and his previous career as a guy who climbed into a steel cage and made loud booming noises with a cannon—I’d have to ask him about that.

I got up from my seat, slinging my guitar over my shoulder, and took hold of the microphone.

“Uh, hi, everyone. Thanks for coming out to see us. Great to see such a big, friendly crowd here at Riley’s tonight.”

Scattered applause greeted me. Christina and Sarah were easily the most enthusiastic, as was Lance’s wife, Jessica, who had just arrived.

“This is our first gig as a band, I guess, so don’t be too harsh on us. We’re called…”

And then I paused. I realized our band didn’t have a name. I glanced back at Lance. He shrugged at me. Time to make something up, I guessed.

“We’re called Homecoming. ‘Cause, I guess, Laramie is our home—for better or for worse,” I said, surprised that I was able to come up with something sounding halfway decent right on the fly like that. It got some smiles and applause from our small audience.

We launched our first set: just acoustic songs, standards: Simon and Garfunkel, some other folk music. Things you would totally expect to hear some guys with beards playing on guitars.

The entire time we played, I watched Sarah’s face: I devoured her eyes, the slope of her cheek down to her chin, the way her hair framed her beautiful face. God. I couldn’t believe I got to have her.

But for how long?

Suddenly, I felt like I was back in that shit hole of a bar near the base. I was in a different world, a completely different place: it was a Saturday night and I was near black out drunk, watching Jenna make out with a guy I didn’t know—big guy, covered in tattoos, the kind of guy who left his motorcycle parked outside.

I finally roused myself to my feet, wobbled over to them. The dark room was spinning, everything smelled of beer, and it was strangely humid—the sensation of hundreds of young, sweaty bodies packed into a small room, all drinking, all horny. All wanting satisfaction.

And I wanted satisfaction right then and there.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” I remember slurring, growling at my rival for what I thought was my girlfriend’s affections.

“Beat it, you piece of shit,” the tattooed punk growled, looked up from Jenna’s wasted, withdrawn face. She was too far gone to know what she was doing, I told myself, hoping against hope that somehow she didn’t know, didn’t understand—didn’t know that she was hurting me.

“Fuck you,” I growled, grabbing the guy by the shoulder. He pushed Jenna away and she clattered into a handful of people gyrating to the shitty DJ’s tunes. She just giggled, stumbling to her feet and then falling back, throwing out her hands as one of her breasts popped out of her top, her pink, pierced nipple gleaming in the dim lights of the bar.

The biker swung and hit me hard. His fist collided with my jaw, knocked me into another group.

“Fight! Fight! Fight!” the cheer rose up as a crowd formed around us. My world was spinning even faster than the booze had made it before. I struggled to stand but somehow, I found it in me to get up.

“Son of a bitch,” the biker growled and threw an uppercut into my belly. I felt my hips rise a full inch off the floor and I pitched over, feeling all the beer I had consumed over the course of the night come rushing to my mouth. This wasn’t going to end well if it kept up like this.

But I had no intention of allowing it to. Even as he swung at me once more, aiming for my head, I was ready for him: I ducked the blow, leaned in, ending up inside of his guard. I threw two fast upper cuts to his gut and he gasped: he hadn’t seen those coming. As his hands flew down to his gut to protect himself, I grabbed him behind the head and forced his face down into my ascending knee.

I felt the hard, dull crack of victory as I broke his nose—just as they had taught us to in basic training. I threw another knee and then another and then another, faster and faster, hopping from foot to foot as I decimated his face. When they pulled me off of him, his teeth were scattered on the floor, some of them even embedded in my knee. He had bitten me several times, apparently, but I hadn’t even noticed. I never once felt it.

As you might have imagined, I got kicked out of the bar after that. And rightfully so. But damn, it had felt good.

I mean, it had also sucked. Emotionally.

And suddenly, I was back at Riley’s. My knee was aching, strangely, ghostly, as if it had only just been bitten recently rather than years ago. The set was over. I had zone out during the entire thing. Played the entire thing. Everyone was clapping. Sarah’s face had broken into a smile and she hugged me when I came down off the strange.

“You were incredible,” she squealed, and pressed her lips to mine. I leaned into the kiss, my hand reaching down instinctively to her ass.

“So, you two want to tell me what’s going on here?”

Fuck. Christina.

“It’s none of your business,” Sarah said hotly.

“I think it’s plenty of my business,” she growled, glaring first at her sister and then at me.

“I’m an adult now and…”

“I don’t think that gives you the right to make out with your brother.”

“Stepbrother,” I put in.

“Stepbrother. Fine.”

Christina rolled her eyes.

“Does anyone else know? Maria? Harry?”

“No. And don’t you dare tell anyone,” Sarah all but screamed, drawing a few confused looks from other bar patrons.

Christina sighed.

“Listen, dummy, you know I’m not going to tell anyone. I wouldn’t do that to you. Just… Keep it under wraps.”

“That’s the idea,” I said stiffly. I could use another drink right about now. Fortunately, Riley was quick with the beers, patting me hard on the back as he stuck a PBR under my nose.

“You guys are pretty solid, kid,” he grunted. “A lot nicer than the usual punk trash we get in here. I could see this becoming a regular things.”

Sarah’s eyes widened and she smiled, a smile stretching across her cheeks.

“Uh… Much obliged, sir,” I murmured, falling into the ways of speaking common to all military men at some point in their careers.

“He’d love to be a regular here,” Sarah injected on my behalf. “He practices all the time. He’s really good. As you can tell.”

Riley laughed. He was a big man, standing well over six and a half feet tall, and I swear to god, he was nearly as wide as he was tall.

“Well, if you keep this up, we can talk about all that. All I know is, no one’s walking out right now and damned if that ain’t a good thing.”

“I could even see more students coming around, if you had music like this more often,” Christina offered. Maybe she felt bad for her outburst earlier? Well, I wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

SARAH

Damien’s next set was just as nice as the previous one. I’m not that into music, myself—sure, I listen to the Top 40 stuff that everyone else at school listens to, but I don’t really pay much attention to music besides that. And even then, it’s only what’s on TV—in commercials, shows, movies, anything like that—that I really remember. But this… This was different somehow.

This felt more real, more passionate. Like it was coming from the heart, and not a computer. It was intoxicating, in the same way that making love to Damien was intoxicating. I wasn’t even drunk—I had only had one beer, after all—but I felt giddy and light-headed as I ran up to him after the final set.

“That was great,” I squealed. “Are you going to take me to the dance now?”

“Sure, sure, sure…” he murmured, finishing his beer. “Just let me change first, all right?”

And he disappeared into the bathroom with his bag to change.

Christina saw her chance and grabbed me, sitting me down across from her.

“I have so many things. So many things to talk to you about,” she stuttered. She would do that, sometimes, when she was overwhelmed—start to sputter, start to chatter and stutter uncontrollably, as if her mind was working faster than her mouth could ever possibly hope to move.

“Okay, chill out, come on—first things first,” I said, taking her hands, hoping she would calm down. She took a deep breath.

“Your stepbrother? Jesus, Sarah, OUR stepbrother?”

“It just sort of happened,” I said lamely. “I don’t know. There’s something about him. But god, Christina, he’s so nice. He’s so nice to me. He’s so good to me. He’s been so nice and supportive and sweet these last two weeks. Since…”

I could barely say the words. I felt my throat close up but then I closed my eyes and forced myself to say them.

“Since Mitch died. Since he killed himself. Christina, I’ve been a mess. I haven’t gone to school or anything. And Damien, he brought me my homework, he sat with me in my room while I was practically—god, I was basically catatonic, I was a vegetable! And he took care of me!”

“And so you decided to fuck him to repay him?” Christina asked, rolling her eyes. I hated when she did that. I had hated it ever since we were kids and I still hated it now. It was one of those things between sisters that I could always see coming—both Dakota and Christina rolled their eyes constantly, though I guess the habit ha skipped me—for whatever reason.

“No, it’s not like that…” I grumbled. “First off… Well, we were already sleeping together by then.”

“What?! How long has this been going on?!”

“A few weeks…” I murmured. “Really… Almost since the beginning of school. Since Damien came to live with us.”

I blushed.

“There was something there from the beginning, Chris. I can’t explain it. It was like, the second I met him, I knew…”

“Okay, listen,” Christina said with a heavy sigh. “Forgetting the fact that this is your stepbrother, this is also your first boyfriend. Ever. You’re eighteen years old. Don’t go and get crazy ideas.”

I narrowed my eyes.

“What kind of crazy eyes do you think I’m going to get here?”

“Jesus, I don’t know. We Logans, we’re… Prone to excess. Harry, Dakota, me…”

“Not me,” I scowled. “I’ve never done anything. I’ve never had any fun. You were always the smart one and daddy rode you hard and you would scream at him. Dakota does whatever she wants—she has boys fawning over her, who do whatever she wants. But me? I’m just boring old Sarah. Now, finally, I have something that makes me happy—really, truly, honestly happy, Christina, and you’re telling me that it’s not real?”

Christina’s face softened.

“Sarah, I didn’t say that… I didn’t mean that.”

“Well, what the hell did you mean?”

“I just don’t want to see you get hurt. Or throw your life away.”

“Throw my life away? What the hell do you mean?”

“Incest is a serious issue. It’s a crime. If something happens… You might not go to college. You might be stuck here.”

For a brief moment, the idea of being stuck in Laramie seized hold of my heart with its icy cold fingers, terrifying me. But I forced it out of my mind. No. There was nothing that would keep me here, nothing that would hold me back, hold me down.

Hold me here.

“No. Never,” I hissed, my voice cold, cold as ice and sharp as daggers. “And don’t you fucking dare suggest that. Just because I didn’t cut off all communications with dad doesn’t mean I’m not trying to get out of here. It doesn’t mean I’m weak.”

“I didn’t mean that…” Christina sputtered again, trying to backtrack.

“Then, what did you mean?”

“Just be careful,” my sister said finally, putting her head down and burying her face in her arms.

“Duly noted,” I said, my voice sour and harsh.

“The other thing I have to tell you is…” Christina started up again after a moment. Suddenly, she looked up, as something caught her eye. I turned and saw what had so enraptured her attention.

It was Damien.

He was wearing what seemed to be a new suit and, my god—did it fit him well! I felt shivers go up and down my spine as I gazed at his tight, powerful build. His flesh seemed just barely contained by the dark, almost black fabric—as if he could burst out at any moment.

That wasn’t to say that the suit didn’t fit him—rather, Damien just exuded a kind of power that seemed incapable of being contained by any cage, whether it be steel or wool.

All of that was combined with a freshly starched white shirt and a silver-gray tie. He had washed up a bit and as he neared us, a slight scent of citrus hit my nostrils—cologne.

“God, he cleans up well,” I heard Christina mutter. “I take it all back. Go for it, kiddo.”

“Well?” Damien asked, taking my hand. “Shall we?”

“It was, uh, good to meet you,” Christina stuttered, still obviously start struck. I stood on my tip toes to kiss Damien’s sweet lips, inhaling his cologne—the intoxicating scent that I intended to have covered me tonight.

“Great to meet you too,” Damien said, his voice cool, confident, and smooth—enough to drop anyone’s panties. “Don’t you be a stranger.”

“You too. Uh, I mean, I won’t.”

Christina turned to me.

“We still have more to talk about. But you two have fun.”

We left the bar, climbed into Damien’s car, and we were off. We parked at the school, in practically the same parking spot as before, at the last dance—the place where I had lost my virginity to Damien. I got goose-bumps as I remembered that night, and thought of the one to come.

“Are you ready?” he asked with an easy smile.

“Damn straight,” I said, returning his smile with a grin of my own. He took my hand and we strode down the lines of parked cars and smoking teenagers like we were walking down the red carpet.

And when we strode into the gymnasium, I swore everyone was looking at us.

I felt eyes turn to me, to Damien. I realized we didn’t look like high schoolers anymore—I guess he never had, but I certainly didn’t—the fifteen or twenty pounds I had lost while depressed and locked away had brought out my cheek bones, made me look older, yet definitely hotter. I had never really been all that worried about my body before, but now I was almost… Proud of it?

Of course, it was one hell of a shitty way to get in shape for a big dance and I definitely don’t recommend it. But if Mitch could see me now…

I imagined how happy it would make him: to be there, to see Damien and me walk into the dance like we owned the goddamned place, like it was Studio 54 and we were new royalty, come to take our rightful place on the throne.

“Everyone’s looking at us,” I whispered to Damien as we stood, frozen in place for a moment in the alternating pink and orange shadows and spotlights cast by the balloons and lights the planning committee had put up.

“I know. Own it.”

I bit my lip and hung close to him as we stepped out onto the dance floor. A few girls in my calculus class skipped over to me.

“Sarah, is that you? Oh my god, you look incredible!”

“You look like a model!”

“Are you okay? Were you on vacation? Are you back at school now?”

I cast my eyes down to the floor for a second but then I felt Damien squeeze my hand and I looked them all in the eye.

“Yeah, I’m back. I was sick for a while. After…”

I took a deep breath.

“After Mitch killed himself.”

I saw from the looks on their faces that it wasn’t something anyone wanted to talk about. But I was going to talk about it, and anyone who didn’t like it could go to hell.

“And he killed himself because of how shitty this school and this town is, but I didn’t want to let it kill me too, so I’m here.”

The girls clearly didn’t know how to respond. Fortunately, we were saved from further awkwardness by the introduction of more awkwardness.

Teddy. Mitch’s bully.

“Um, hi,” he murmured, walking up to us timidly. My eyes narrowed involuntarily. His face was puffy and bruised. I saw his eyes flit to Damien. My eyes did the same. Damien just nodded, as if giving him permission to speak.

“I, uh, talked to my dad. I came out to him. He kicked me out of the house.”

The girls had already left by the time he said this, clearly eager to get away from me. Not that I cared.

“So, those bruises aren’t from me?” Damien asked. Teddy smiled weakly.

“Yeah, not all of them, at least.”

“Where are you living now?”

“With my aunt. She’s… I guess she’s more accepting of stuff like this. I think she’s always known. Every since I was twelve and she caught me jacking it to Channing Tatum.”

And finally, I put it all together.

“You and Mitch…”

“It was my fault. Partially, I guess. I was too scared. I couldn’t tell anyone. I felt like I couldn’t tell anyone. I still haven’t told anyone at school. I’m not there yet, I guess.”

He turned back to look at the gaggle of football players and heavily tanned, heavily mascara’d girls giggling and rough housing and dancing, asses rubbing against adolescent crotches, off to the side.

“I don’t know what’ll happen when I do. But… I wanted to let you know I’m getting there.”

“If anyone messes with you, tell me right away. Don’t pussy foot around. I’ll end it,” Damien growled. “And I’ll do a better job for you than I did for Mitch. My mistake there was not smashing in the teeth of every single person in this school.”

Teddy grinned and I saw that two of his teeth were missing.

“I don’t know if you have to go that far but…”

He turned to me.

“I just hope that, you know… You can forgive me. I don’t really deserve it.”

“You’re right. You don’t,” I said with a sigh, but I leaned in to hug him. “But I’ll forgive you anyway.”

I saw tears brimming in Teddy’s eyes.

“Th-thank you…” he stuttered.