Stepbrother Commands (His Twisted Game, Book Seven) by Chloe Hawk Page A

-- it was more
just a curiosity, a burning need to find out what was going on. Why was Cole so intent on getting
information from DCF? If it had
just been something as simple as a case being opened on us, then why was he so
insistent to find out the details?
    We’d lived the details, every day. We knew what it was like growing up in
a house with an alcoholic father who was prone to bouts of verbal and physical
abuse, what it felt like to have a mother who didn’t care.
    So what was this case, this thing that
Cole felt so strongly about that it sounded like he’d been harassing the
Department of Children and Families, and this caseworker, Hattie Winters?
    I double-checked the dates. The letters had been sent right after
Cole had turned eighteen, and they’d been sent to our house, because that’s
where Cole had been living at the time.
    But why did Gordon have them? Had he stolen them?
    The possibilities swirled around my mind,
tangling together in a tight knot.
    I started to turn the page and read the
next document, but the door to the room opened before I could.
    Cole appeared, takeout bags in his
hands. His eyes locked on mine as
he took me standing there by the bed, the papers in my hands.
    “What are you doing?” he asked, setting
the bags down on the desk. His
tone and his movements were measured, even, with no sign of anger in his
voice. Something about his control
made me more anxious than if he’d been screaming.
    “What are these, Cole?” I asked,
indicating the papers in my hands.
    “You mean my personal property that you
apparently decided it was okay to go through?”
    “Why were you writing to the Department of
Children and Families?” I asked, deciding to ignore his accusation.
    “Avery,” he said, his voice stern. “Leave
it.” He opened the plastic bags that were sitting on the desk and began
unpacking clear containers of fresh-looking food. Salads and sandwiches, bags of sea salt potato chips, and
soft chocolate chip cookies. “Do
you want to watch a movie?” he asked, seemingly dismissing my questions. He crossed the room to the kitchen area and returned with two
copper-colored square plates, which he began loading with food for us.
    I hesitated. Part of me was tempted to do as Cole said and just leave it. Whatever those letters were referring
to didn’t have anything to do with what was happing right now. They couldn’t change anything that had happened
in the past. And Cole was right
– I shouldn’t have been snooping through his things.
    I thought about how it would feel to curl
up on the couch with him, to eat the food he was fixing for me, to cuddle up
against his warm, strong body as we watched a movie. The night wasn’t ruined. I could diffuse the tension, we could laugh and joke around
and have fun. And didn’t we
deserve that? To have just one
night where the two of us could pretend we were a normal couple without having
to worry about our crazy parents, or Jeffrey, or Lucy?
    Lucy.
    The situation with DCF and Cole’s private
documents might not have been any of my business. But Lucy being here was ,
especially after what Cole and I had just done in the hot tub.
    “Cole,” I said.
    He sighed and closed his eyes for a quick
moment, like I was trying his patience. “Avery. Please. It’s been a long night.”
    I set the papers back in his suitcase and
walked over to him, watched as he finished fixing my plate. “Cole, what was Lucy doing here?”
    Finally, I got a reaction out of
him. His eyes flinched just a tiny
bit, his jaw twitching. “How did
you know Lucy was here?”
    The post-it was still in my hand, and I
held it out to him. “I found
this.”
    He took it, read it, then crumpled it up
and tossed it into the wastebasket under the desk. “She was here,” he said like it was nothing. “She came to see me.”
    He picked up the two plates and walked
over to the sleek cream-colored leather couch that was pushed up against one
wall. He sat down and then set