Score - A Stepbrother Romance (31 page)

A
s I stood there waiting
for an answer from Drew, my heart hammered like crazy. I looked at him, watching him try and fail to slip on that mask that gave nothing away. I had a strange, heavy feeling in my chest; one that I hadn’t felt in years. A warning that I was about to be let down. About to be hurt.

Suddenly I was mentally transported back to being seven years old again, and my school teacher was telling me that my Mom had fallen down the stairs and was in hospital. I’d had that exact same feeling then - a deep sense of foreboding about going home. I’d known the real reason Mom was in hospital, and I’d also known that I’d have to be alone in the house with my Dad while she was gone. Without her there to try and shield me, I was going to be a target for his drunken rages. Yep, it was a really shitty feeling knowing that you were probably about to be hurt but not being able to do a damn thing about it.

As Drew rubbed his head and opened his mouth to say something, Caleb grinned.

“Good luck, man. Car’s outside if you still wanna collect your reward,” he said, slapping him on the back before looking at me and winking. “I gotta get myself another drink. Don’t worry, babe. I’ll be back for you in a sec.”

He was slurring his words, obviously very drunk, and Drew’s jaw twitched. His right hand curled into a fist, and before I could try to stop him, he’d delivered a massive blow to the left side of Caleb’s face. I screamed for him to stop, and Caleb staggered backwards, blood pouring from his split lip. He spat on the ground before wiping his mouth off and looking back up.

“Fuck you, man. It was all a joke.”

“It’s not a joke where Sophie’s concerned, fuckwad. Now get the fuck outta here,” Drew said, lips curled into a snarl.

Holy shit. Whatever this ‘dare’ business was, it was obviously pretty serious if it was enough to make Drew punch his friend in the face. The two talent scouts were staring at us now with their eyes wide, and a small part of my mind figured that Drew had just totally blown his shot with them by openly fighting in front of them like a complete idiot. Two surly-looking bouncers were heading towards us, and Drew grabbed my arm and pulled me out of the club through the side entrance.

“Hey!” I protested. “Let me go!”

“We were gonna get kicked out anyway,” he said, stopping in the dim alley beside the club. “Look, let me explain what happened back there.”

I folded my arms again. “Oh, finally. I’ve only been waiting for a hundred years! So what the hell is this dare thing? And what’s this about a car?”

He sighed. “Look, like I said, the whole thing was stupid. It didn’t mean anything. Caleb dared me to sleep with you ages ago. He said he’d give me his Atlantis Phantom if I managed to do it.”

What the
hell?
My heart plummeted into my stomach. That’s what he thought I was worth? A bet over a shiny new car. Nothing more.

I didn’t speak for a full thirty seconds. Drew just stood there, waiting for me to react.

“Oh god…this is why you suddenly started being nice to me a few weeks ago, isn’t it? I knew you were up to something!” I finally choked out.

“It started out like that,” he admitted. “But then…”

I interrupted him. “And then what, it was just easier to keep sleeping with me? I mean, why call up one of your skanks when I’m just across the hall, right?”

He didn’t say anything and just let me rant for a moment. I think he was lost for words for once in his life.

“So none of this was real. I was just part of some stupid bet so you could get your dream car? Well, I hope you’re happy with your new ride!” I said, my voice hot with anger.

“No. You know it’s not like that. This
is
all real. Yeah, I was being nice at first because of Caleb’s thing, but I realized how shitty that was pretty fast. After that I swear it was all real. And besides, the first night you saw me at Mint…your friends dared you to sleep with me too. I wasn’t all that mad when you told me about that. Can’t you just look at this from my point of view?” he said. “Can’t we just move on?”

“I’m really trying to see things from your point of view, but I can’t seem to get my head that far up your ass!” I replied.

He did have a small point, as much as I hated to think so. I was kind of being a hypocrite, because my friends
had
dared me to hook up with him, but this felt different. I hadn’t been doing it to get a freaking car, and I hadn’t planned on leading him on for weeks and weeks, pretending to be all nice and in a committed relationship…which is exactly what it felt like he’d been doing to me. All for the sake of a
car.

“For fuck’s sake, just listen to me! There’s a hundred girls I could call tonight, but I only want you, and I’ve only wanted you since you came back into my life. Doesn’t that tell you anything?”

“All that tells me is that you’re a man-whore with a Rolodex,” I hissed.

“Jesus, Sophie, calm down! You’re carrying on like Tom Cruise at a couch sale.”

Seriously? He was trying to make jokes at a time like this? Hell no.

“God, what do you expect, Drew? It’s just one thing after another with you! I keep thinking you’ve become this great guy…then wait, suddenly you decide to crap all over things again!” I replied. “How many times is this going to happen? How many more secrets are lurking around the corner?”

He held his hands up. “None! I swear.”

“Bullshit. It never ends with you.”

“Are you quite finished?” he asked. “I’m trying to tell you that I…”

I cut him off. “Oh yes, I’m finished. And so are we.”

I turned on my heel and marched away. Maybe I was overreacting. Maybe I was being dramatic. But I wasn’t waiting around to be hurt again. All we did was fight, make up, argue again…rinse and repeat. It had been like that from the minute we re-entered each other’s lives. Our idea of a relationship wasn’t healthy at all. It was total bullshit. Perhaps our childhood friendship should have been left where it belonged – in the past.

Drew called out after me, and I didn’t turn my head back to see if he’d followed me at all. Mostly because I was afraid he wouldn’t.

I
t had been
six days since I found out the real reason Drew had initially started being nice to me, and the sting hadn’t lessened at all. He’d claimed that everything we’d gone through was real, but how did I know that was true at all? He’d kept the whole car dare thing from me for long enough, and for all I knew, he’d also been keeping tons of other stuff from me. I had no way of truly knowing. The kiss in the forest. The way he’d gotten rid of Dan. The way he’d helped me when my Dad came back into the picture. Was any of that motivated by real feelings for me, or was it all part of his initial plan to get that stupid car?

I should have known not to trust an arrogant man-whore. I should have known not to fall for him.

I’d been avoiding him like the plague, only seeing him at dinner every night, and my Mom had noticed the tension between us. She’d pulled me aside and asked if we’d had a fight, and there was no way I could tell her what really happened. She’d been disappointed in our behavior because she’d been so pleased to see the two of us getting along so well recently, just like old times, and now we were barely speaking. I couldn’t imagine how she’d react if she found out that the only reason we’d been getting along was because we’d been screwing each other’s brains out like bunnies on steroids.

Tonight, Tony had decided to take us all out for dinner to celebrate us having gone three whole weeks without any further contact from my father. At least
that
whole situation had been resolved.

I was on my way out of my room when I bumped into Drew on the stairs. He’d just been working out, judging by his outfit. His skin glistened with sweat, and his chiseled features seemed to mock me with their perfection. Dammit, why did I still find him so attractive? If anything, the anger I felt towards him made me want to rip his clothes off even
more.
I guess the mind can really be a weird thing sometimes.

“Hey,” he said. “We have that dinner thing in a few minutes.”

“I know,” I said, my voice curt.

He hesitated for a second before speaking again. “Right. Well, I need to go and get changed outta this.”

“Yeah, why don’t you go and slip into something more comfortable?” I replied. “Like a coma,” I added under my breath.

He rolled his eyes. “I heard that. Can you just stop with this grouchy shit? I’ve done all I can to explain this to you. I care about you. I always have. I just didn’t realize it for a while. That dare meant nothing. I didn’t even accept the fucking car.”

“Uh-huh.”

I spun around and headed downstairs, and I heard him sigh behind me before going into his room and slamming his door.

When we all arrived at the restaurant half an hour later, Drew was seated directly next to me, and I almost jumped out of my skin when he accidentally dropped his napkin and brushed his hand past my leg to grab it.

“For god’s sake, Sophie, at least try to act normal,” he hissed. I almost laughed. Normal? What in the hell did that even mean? My life was so far removed from normal that the word was barely in my vocabulary. I had a crazy criminal of a father who’d just extorted over a million bucks from my Mom, and I’d spent the last few weeks sleeping with and falling for my stepbrother…hmm, yeah, neither of those things were normal.

The dinner seemed to crawl by, and even Tony seemed to have picked up on the frostiness between me and Drew.

“Is everything okay, kids?” he asked, one eyebrow cocked. “You’re both being very quiet.”

“Uh-huh,” I said with a nod.

“I’m just tired,” Drew said. “Really killed it in the gym today.”

“I suppose you do have to keep yourself looking fit. After all, you did just book that campaign in New York.”

I almost dropped my knife and fork. “What campaign?” I asked, my voice a little more shrill than I’d wanted it to be.

Tony smiled. “Some talent scouts spotted Drew in a club last week. Apparently they liked his style. They’ve booked him for some new sportswear line. For MMA fighters, or something like that. What’s it called, son? Bad Dog?”

“Bad Boy Sportswear,” Drew said.

Wow. When he’d punched Caleb the other night, I thought the scouts would have lost all interest in him for being an immature idiot. But no, apparently he’d been offered a contract instead. The fact that I hadn’t even heard about it made me realize just how far I’d removed myself from his life in the last few days, even though our bedrooms were only feet away from each other.

“I thought you would have told Sophie,” my Mom said with a frown. “Aren’t you leaving tomorrow?”

Drew smiled. “She didn’t ask. And yeah, tomorrow.”

I mustered up the best congratulatory smile I could, but on the inside, I was a mess. I was still so mad at him for everything he’d done, but hearing that he was leaving for New York for god knows how long suddenly made me feel a little ill.

“I don’t feel well,” I said, standing up and pushing my chair in. “Sorry, I think I should go.”

“But honey, we just ordered dessert,” Mom said.

“I know. It’s cool, I’ll catch a cab home.”

She and Tony looked disappointed, but they didn’t stop me, and by the time I was halfway home, I felt even more nauseated. The whole situation with Drew was eating up my insides like a gutful of piranhas. I wished I could just go home to my old house, but seeing as we’d already moved our things to Tony’s place, it made sense to stay there, seeing as it wasn’t all that long until I’d be moving again for college.

I locked myself in my bathroom as soon as I made it upstairs and crouched near the toilet, certain I was going to hurl any second.

“Sophie? Are you in there?”

Drew’s deep voice called out to me from my bedroom, and I mumbled a response.

“Are you okay?” he said. “I was worried, so I came home early too.”

“Mm. I’m fine. Probably just that carpaccio I ate.”

“Well, I’m gonna wait out here for a while. Call out if you want me to come in.”

I wasn’t fine, but I didn’t want his sympathy or help, as comforting as the thought of his big arms wrapped around me was right now. I heard him linger in my room for about twenty more minutes, and then he was gone. When I finally emerged from the cool tiles of the bathroom after what felt like an eternity, I tried lying down for a while, but that didn’t stop the churning in my guts at all. Sighing, I got up and headed over to my desk. If I couldn’t rest, then I might as well have another read through the draft manuscript of the story I’d written about the girl and her stepbrother. It was only a second draft, but when I’d printed it yesterday, I’d thought it had all come together quite nicely.

I hunted around on my desk, and my eyebrows creased in confusion. Strange. I could have sworn I’d left the manuscript sitting right next to the ceramic vase that sat on the left side, but it was gone. After searching through every part of the desk and even on the floor around it and behind it, a horrifying thought occurred to me. Drew had just been in here. He’d been dying to read my writing ever since I told him about it, but I’d been too embarrassed.

The whole time he’d been sitting out here, waiting for me while I was in the bathroom…he could have started reading it. He could have taken it with him when he left. Crap, crap, crap. If he had, I was going to murder him. I was proud of the story, but that didn’t mean I thought it was good enough for other people to read. At the same time, I was cringing with shame. It was obvious that the main characters in the story were based on us, so if he had read it, then he’d know exactly how I felt about him. He’d know everything that I’d been trying to deny to myself.

He’d never said he loved me in the time we were together, and now he probably knew what I’d never told him either – I’d loved him, and goddammit, a huge part of me still did.

Ignoring my nausea, I dashed out of my room and across the hall.

“Drew!”

I hammered on his door, but he didn’t answer. I tried turning the handle of his door to see if he’d locked himself in, and it swung right open. The room was empty. Shit. He’d gone, and he’d taken my story with him.