hottie pool boy. Regardless, how am I supposed to go out there now if he’s still hanging around?
I’m able to tiptoe back to my room without seeing anybody including tall, dark, and fucking sexy-looking strangers.
My room, that I forget lacks curtains, looks out onto the pool area to the left. Out there, I’m able to make out four people: My mom who seems a little too tipsy for this time of day, Walter, a chef, and him . I squint, trying to make out his face a little more with my terrible eyesight. This must be my new stepbrother.
Uh-oh.
IV
Perhaps it’s immature of me to remain locked in my room, dressed in a slinky summer dress with a full face of makeup until someone comes to fetch me. Why do I feel a need to impress this hunk so badly? I still haven’t decided how I face him when he’s already seen me as naked as the day I was born. And if he really isn’t the pool boy, that only makes this all that much more awkward.
I reconsider my decision to look my Sunday best and pull a face wipe from my bag. In the mirror, I begin dragging the wet towelette over my eyes leaving a mess of mascara and eyeliner stain along my temples and under-eyes.
Knock-Knock-Knock!
My procrastination on socializing comes to an abrupt but expected end. “J—Just a minute,” I say as I frantically try remove the caked on bluish-black stain from my face.
Knock-Knock-Knock!
“Ugh, just…Just one more second, please!”
Knock-Knock-Knock-Knock-Knock!
I grunt, knowing it’ll be my mom’s tipsy incessancy and open the door to be faced with the last person I thought would come fetch me:
“Ryan,” he says offering me his hand to shake as I stand there like an open-mouthed guppy, avoiding looking up at his face at all costs lest he catches me in my full face of panda makeup.
I fold my arms and furrow my brow, unable to make eye contact in case he sees the mess I just made of my face. “Grace.”
There’s silence for a moment until suddenly I’m pushed back into the room and see Ryan close the door behind him and lock it. He belly laughs and I feel rough fingers gently lift my chin so I look up at him. “Holy. Fuckin’. Shit,” his deep voice rumbles.
I finally look up to properly see my new stepbrother’s face…
Holy. Fuckin’. Shit. is right.
V
“You!” I say with a clenched jaw and a shove into Ryan Caulter’s chest. My fingertips rub aggressively at the skin of my face and I storm back over to the mirror to clean myself off and find my breath again.
‘ It’s him. It’s fucking him ,’ my brain ticks over and over. ‘ Asshole. Asshole. Asshole .’
“Hey, sweetheart. I ain’t the one to get mad at. Our parents are the ones that bunked up.”
“You knew about me?”
“Ha! Only since about two seconds ago. This is priceless.”
“Y—You’re Walter’s son?”
“Nice investigation work, Sherlock. What gave it away?”
When I watch that way that he half-smiles like that, I want to both punch him and have him hold me in his arms again like he did that night. I remember how sexy he made me feel after Gabby’s wedding— The way he lured me into his trap, offered me the best sex of my life, made me feel this weird rolling-boil sensation in my stomach, then kicked me out when another, albeit far-prettier, girl arrived at his apartment door.
“You understand that I have no reason to be nice to you right now? You’re a jerk, you know that right?”
“So I’ve been told far too many times to count,” he seems to enjoy this fact and flashes me a wide grin.
“What do we do? Do I tell the truth and explain how I hate you and actually can’t stand to be around you?”
“Well, you seem to be pretty dressed up for a person you hate, Sis .”
“Ew, don’t you dare call me that again. Look, I thought you were a stranger who just saw me naked! I wanted to make a much more demure impression, if that’s alright by you.”
“Still got that same sass I
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