Chapter Three
Trace
I should have known from the moment I laid eyes on her that Eva Morales was trouble. No, correction…actually, her name was Evangelina Guadalupe Morales, something I’d learned from the papers I’d signed for her landlord.
She’d been pretty pissed when she’d found out I’d settled her rent, and as far as I knew, she was still angry. I was sitting in my home office doing some research after she had stormed off in the general direction of her bedroom about an hour earlier, her nose in the air and nearly palpable steam emanating from her body.
I’ve already admitted to myself that I enjoyed making her angry just to watch her heated reactions. But it played hell with my cock. Maybe it was sick and twisted, but the hotter she got, the more I wanted to subdue her, use that passion she had in a much better, more satisfying way for both of us.
Did I give a shit if she was angry?
No.
I’d become accustomed to getting what I wanted, and I had needed to take care of her for some unknown reason, and it wasn’t because of some asinine attachment we had because her mother had supposedly married my father. Someone sure as hell needed to help manage Eva’s life, and I’d already decided that person was going to be me. My desire to make her safe and happy was far from brotherly; it was a primitive, far more intimate, gut-wrenching need, one I didn’t quite understand myself.
For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what attracted me to her, but my cock had been stiff since the moment I caught my first glimpse of her, and it had stayed that way. She’d put on a brave front, but I had still been able to spot her discomfort yesterday in my office, sense her vulnerability. The desire to strip her naked and nail her up against a wall, on my desk, or any other solid surface had hit me almost immediately. But as badly as I had wanted to fuck her, every instinct I had insisted that I also…keep her safe.
Those two primal desires were waging war inside me, and even I wasn’t sure which one was going to win.
The fact that she was technically my stepsister hadn’t dulled my desire to fuck her until she screamed my name in climax at all. Maybe that showed I was a total prick, but I didn’t care.
We weren’t even remotely blood related, and I hadn’t known that my stepmother had borne a daughter. But then, how much had any of us known about Karen? She had died almost immediately, along with my father, after their marriage. The private jet carrying my brother, Dane, my father, and Dad’s new wife - Eva’s mother - had crashed. Dane, my youngest sibling, had been the only survivor.
Dane had barely come through the experience alive, and my concern for him was the only reason I had to, needed to, have a woman I was committed to by Christmas. My youngest brother was still scarred, inside and out, from his near-fatal crash, and there wasn’t much I wouldn’t do to keep him from going over the edge.
The sound of a ringing phone on the desk jarred me from thoughts, my eyes flying to the caller ID.
Sebastian.
The bastard hadn’t called me in over a month, probably avoiding the lecture he knew he’d get if he phoned. My middle brother was getting wild, hanging out with a bunch of losers. I’d tried to give him time to find his own direction after the accident that had killed our father, but even though he was now a few years out of college, it appeared he had no moral compass.
I snatched up the ringing phone impatiently. “Where in the fuck have you been?”
“Well, hell, I miss you, too, bro,” Sebastian answered sarcastically.
Dammit! I could tell he was either drunk or stoned, beyond the point where I could even talk to him. “Working. Something you don’t seem inclined to do.” My voice was clipped and angry.
I was pissed off, and I was done making excuses for Sebastian. He needed to grow the fuck up.
“Why should I when I have you to be the perfect, responsible brother who has everything under control? You’re a fucking god, bro. No need to have two of them in the family.” Sebastian’s voice was slightly slurred and filled with antagonistic sarcasm.
Sebastian wasn’t always this way, but the instances where he seemed inclined to irritate me were becoming more and more frequent. “When are you flying in for the holidays? Dane is going to be here the week before Christmas.” I didn’t feel like engaging with him in a verbal battle, not when he was like this. It was pointless.
My brother seemed to sober up slightly. “I’ll get there around the same time. I haven’t seen Dane for a while.”
Releasing the tight fist I was clenching on the desk, I remembered that at one time the three of us had been pretty tight. After the accident, things had never been quite the same. Dane was profoundly different, Sebastian had grown away from everybody in the family, and I had become a major prick because I had to run my father’s business, something I hadn’t been prepared for at such a young age.
“Are you bringing anyone?” I needed to figure out sleeping arrangements, but I was mostly curious as to whether Sebastian was seriously involved with a female. Considering the crowd he was running with right now, I was hoping he wasn’t.
“Nope. I’m flying solo.” Sebastian paused for a moment before asking, “You? Have you found a woman who will put up with your cranky ass for more than an hour?”
Not so long ago, I would have told Sebastian everything. Now, I didn’t trust him. He ran hot and cold these days, and the last thing I needed was for Dane to find out the truth. “As a matter of fact, I have. Congratulate me. I’m recently engaged.”
I waited as the line was silent, knowing Sebastian was still connected, but wasn’t talking.
Finally, he answered. “You got engaged? And you didn’t say anything? I didn’t even know you were seeing anyone.”
Fuck! Now I was feeling guilty because there was an underlying hurt in my brother’s voice. It made me feel like a complete asshole, but there was more at stake than just Sebastian’s feelings.
I can’t tell him. He’s too unpredictable.
“Whirlwind relationship. You’ll like her,” I told him awkwardly, knowing I was a shitty liar when it came to fabrications with my brothers. Most people didn’t know the me who lay beneath my professional demeanor. Hell, I barely knew myself anymore.
“What’s she like? Where did you meet her? Do I know her?” Sebastian was quickly sobering up.
“Nice. No. And no, you don’t know her.” I answered his questions rapidly, hoping he’d let the subject go.
“What’s her name?” Sebastian persisted.
“Eva.” I decided to keep it simple. He’d be meeting her soon enough, and I was uncomfortable talking about her.
Did it matter if Eva was technically their stepsister? Should they know the truth? I didn’t see why they should. They’d never known, and they’d never met her. She wasn’t blood, so there wasn’t much harm in keeping our flimsy ties a secret. Hell, I hadn’t even completely verified her claim yet, but I was already working on that. I did know that even when I did have proof that she was really our stepsister, I wouldn’t tell them. Dane could never know the truth.
“Do you love her?” Sebastian sounded puzzled.
Jesus Christ! I hated lying to him, even though he’d been a fucking jerk for a while now. “Yes.” The word slipped from my mouth easily, the lie complete by uttering one single word.
“Damn. She must be hot.”
“She’s smart, kind, and honest.” I said those words without even thinking, knowing them to be the truth. Eva was everything many women in our circles were not. Maybe that was why I had this unholy instinct to fuck her and protect her at the same time.
“I notice you didn’t say she was hot,” Sebastian mumbled.
“Touch her and I swear I’ll put you in the hospital,” I growled, unable to stop visions of Sebastian acting inappropriately with Eva.
“Holy shit, bro. I think you really are in love. And she really must be beautiful. I might be a dick, but you know I’d never touch another man’s woman, especially my brother’s.” There was some anger in Sebastian’s voice.
Yeah, I knew that. Sebastian had good reason to be testy about the subject. “I know.” But when you’re intoxicated, you’re a different person from the brother I knew and trusted. I didn’t add those thoughts to our conversation.
“Is Dane bringing Britney?”
I recoiled at the mention of her name, not because she meant a damn thing to me anymore, but because Dane was, in fact, bringing the woman I’d once cared about. Neither of my brothers knew I’d been intimate with Britney—in the biblical sense, or why she was now pretending she was madly in love with Dane. I knew she didn’t love my brother because she wasn’t capable of love. Britney was a user, a manipulator.
“He’s bringing her,” I replied flatly.
“Now there’s one hot woman,” Sebastian whistled appreciatively.
Britney was beautiful, but as attractive as a poisonous snake to me now. “On the surface, perhaps she is.”
“Are you jealous?” Sebastian’s voice was more quizzical than teasing.
“No. But I don’t trust that she’s with Dane for the right reasons.” I wanted Sebastian to see the truth for himself since I couldn’t tell him.
“You think she’s jerking his chain? That she only cares about his money?” Sebastian’s voice became clearer, and slightly hesitant.
“I guess we’ll figure that out eventually.” I was noncommittal because I needed to be. “But I don’t trust her.”
“You know something I don’t, Trace?”
“No. It’s just instinct,” I lied.
“The last thing Dane needs is more pain,” Sebastian grumbled. “But it makes sense. Dane is scarred, and it’s going to take a good woman to look beyond that to see who he really is.”
I wished Sebastian hadn’t been telling the truth, but he was. And Dane needed a far better woman than blood-sucking Britney. “We’ll see what happens.” My youngest brother was a far better man than either me or Sebastian. Kinder, gentler, at least he had been in the past.
My plan was to get Britney out of Dane’s life without causing him any heartache, but I wasn’t certain that was possible.
“I gotta go, bro. I ducked out of a party, but there’s a good whiskey calling my name.”
Dammit! I’d do anything to keep Sebastian from drinking himself into oblivion, and a sense of helplessness invaded my gut because of the physical and emotional distance between us. I didn’t want him driving, didn’t want him to get himself killed. Yeah, he was an adult and a dick most of the time, but he was still my brother. “Sebastian, you don’t have to do this. Where are you?”
“Don’t start with the bullshit tonight, Trace. I just wanted to hear your voice.”
The last thing I wanted was to be my brother’s conscience or his moral guide. Fuck, I knew I wasn’t qualified. I just wanted him to be okay. I wanted all of us to be okay.
Truth was, I wanted to hear his voice, too, and I wanted my damn family back.
“See ya in a few weeks.” Sebastian disconnected, and I was left with very few options but to hope I could talk sense into him when he got here.
After slamming the phone back into the charger, frustrated, I got up just as the doorbell rang.
I smiled as I moved toward the door, knowing more deliveries were here, knowing I was going to piss Eva off all over again—if she’d ever gotten over the first time.
Thinking about it, I didn’t care. I’d rather see her angry than looking lost, alone or scared.
I was more than ready to be preoccupied with Eva and her protests.
Ultimately, I knew I would win.
I always did.