CHAPTER THREE

Samira

The entire house smelled like Mama’s food. If I didn’t think it was weird, I’d totally put my face directly in the pot of yellow rice I took off the stove. A quick glance around proved that I was alone so…hey, why not?

“Yo, Sammie. I’m home. Smells fucking amazing in here.” Santana’s deep voice made my spine go upright. I yanked my nose from the pot of rice and wiped my hands on the apron tied around my waist.

I poked my head around the corner to see a brutal scowl marked him as he headed for the kitchen. The chiseled angles of his face looked more dramatic than usual when he fell to the stool at the island. Something raised his hackles.

I untied my apron, laid it on the counter and sat beside my brother. He was a brooder so I knew he needed to stew and vent. Rinse and repeat.

“What’s wrong, hermano?” Finally, his dark eyes met my gaze. I loved watching him soften in my presence.

“Marco,” he grunted out.

“Santana, I told you to behave,” I frowned.

“You heard what the fuck he said to you, right? He was disrespectful.” His jaw flexed and I traced the way it jumped beneath his stubbled jaw. Was his jaw always so defined and sharp?

Without much thought, I skimmed the pads of my fingers across his jawline and he glanced up at me. I offered him a small smile and he shook his head.

“I’m used to hearing shit like that, especially after last summer. Guys seemed to have lost their fucking minds. It’s something in the water.” I waved my hand in the air dismissing Marco and all the other thirsty men who seemed to have taken notice of me in the past year.

I was used to guys smiling in my face and giving me whatever I wanted because I was pretty and I was Papa’s daughter but after junior year, the attention turned harsh. It went from compliments and gifts to cat-calls and offers for them to put their tongues in my pussy.

The way Santana’s nostrils flared told me that he knew the reason behind the sudden shift. He studied my face then my body and rubbed the back of his neck and said, “I know I’ve been in and out since going off to school but you’ve grown up Sammie. Shit, just last year you were still my bean pole now…” I watched his Adam’s apple bob in his throat. I was stuck there for a few extra seconds. I peeled my stare off his corded neck and looked into his dark eyes.

“Now what?” I asked, folding my arms under my breasts. They were heavier and much fuller than they had been the last time I’d seen my brother face to face.

“You filled out,” he remarked with a sigh. His voice was lighter than it was a few moments ago. He was relaxing. He was calming down. Good.

“So did you. Last time I saw you, you weren’t all…buff,” I laughed, shoving him so I could feel how hard his shoulder was exactly.

It was hard as fuck.

I reached my hand out and squeezed his bicep pretending that I could wrap my hand around it. Santana, always the show-off, flexed his muscles for me and I giggled. Tingles rushed up from the base of my throat until they took over my flushed cheeks like my laugh was carbonated.

“That’s why I told you to put some clothes on and I hope to God that you didn’t wear that shit when you went shopping, Sam.” Something dark flashed across Santana’s onyx eyes. It was like looking into a pitch-black pool. I wanted to climb inside and wade in it.

I looked down at my distressed denim shorts and white tank with an innocent shrug. It was starting to get really warm outside and I hated clothes. He knew that.

I sucked in a breath and grabbed a spoonful of yellow rice for him to taste. I had to keep him calm with food. I said, “I did wear this and look, I got home totally fucking unscathed.” I popped the spoonful of rice in his mouth before he could respond.

“Damn, that tastes just like Mom’s.”

“I know, right?” I grinned.

“Still doesn’t mean I’m letting you off the hook for going out in those tiny ass shorts, Sammie. I’m going to have to shadow you around town, I see. I hate motherfuckers like Marco thinking they can talk to you recklessly.”

“What did you do to him, Santana? I know you. You don’t leave things alone.” I shook my finger at him and narrowed my gaze to laser beams.

“I gave him a little love tap,” he smirked.

“Bullshit. You fucked him up, didn’t you?” A dark thrill sliced through my belly letting shadows spill into my core. I rushed to the space between Santana’s open legs and took his hand in mine. His knuckles were red and angry but not bruised.

“Fuck, Santana,” I marveled. I tucked my lips between my teeth and shook my head. My brother the hot head.

“I don’t play around when it comes to you.” He touched my cheek then kissed my forehead. “So, if you could go return all those curves to whatever store you bought them from, that would be great.”

“Sorry, no refunds. I guess I’m just a late bloomer,” I reasoned.

“Clearly.”

“Oh, I was supposed to make brownies. Shit.” I rushed over to the pantry and started to pull out ingredients.

“You have a horrible mouth,” Santana laughed.

“I learned it from you, okay?” It was the truth too.

“Me? You’re blaming me for your foul language?” He shook his head disapprovingly and I flipped him off.

If there was anyone I could be myself around, it was Santana. He understood me better than anybody else in the world. Our bond was crazy.

“Yes, and you know why.” I measured out flour, sugar and cocoa powder before turning to him with a smile that I could barely contain. “When I was five and I had that cute teddy bear that recorded what I said then played it back, you took it and recorded yourself cursing. When I told you I was going to tell Mama and Papa you told me to go ahead because you didn’t give a fuck.” I paused at the memory and smiled a little before pouring oil into my measuring cup.

“It was the first time I’d seen you be rebellious and dark,” I remembered with a thick knot in my throat. That moment was when I realized I liked taking a walk on the wild side.

Well, I was five so I didn’t even know a wild side existed. Hearing my big brother curse like that made me tingle with something I couldn’t identify. “I wouldn’t say it was dark. I was just bad as fuck.” Santana laughed and it lit up his handsome face.

“It was dark for me as a five-year-old,” I laughed too. I stirred together the ingredients and inhaled the sweet smell of cocoa.

“There’s nothing wrong with being dark though. If that’s who you are, what’s wrong with embracing it? Fighting it will only get you in trouble. Don’t ever fight who you really are inside, Sammie.” His words held more weight than I expected. I paused in my stirring and let the sound of the whisk scraping the sides of the mixing bowl fall away.

Something pushed the air from my chest. I turned to look at my brother, my lips parted with the plan of speaking but nothing came out.

“That’s why I got kicked out of school. I ignored who I was. Don’t make that mistake, Samira.”

“What happened?” I asked him. My voice was a hair above a whisper.

“I was being reckless on campus,” he said vaguely.

“What the fuck happened, Santana? I don’t want the PG-13 version. Cut the shit.”

“I was selling weed and molly,” he admitted. I don’t know what I was expecting but that wasn’t it. I blinked at him as if it would force his words to elucidate themselves. It didn’t.

“Wait, wait, wait,” I chuckled, pinching the bridge of my nose. “You? My brother?” It wasn’t totally outside of the realm of possibility. Santana had never been the straight and narrow type of kid growing up. That was my job.

Or at least it was on the outside.

Inside, I was jealous that my brother had the freedom to be a problem child. Meanwhile, I always went with what was status quo so I didn’t make waves in our calm family ocean.

Still, I never pictured Santana Alvarez selling drugs and on campus no less. After the band-aid was ripped off, the thought made me break into a fit of giggles that had my brother glaring at me. I clapped a hand over my smiling mouth and looked at him.

“Wow, I can’t believe it. More than that, I can’t believe Papa didn’t knock your fucking head off. All he did was yell at you a little then give you a job as grill cook in the restaurant? Like…what the fuck?” Now, that part did leave me scratching my head. It was totally out of character for my father to let anything of that proportion go without some serious consequences.

Santana rolled his shoulders and looked past me, pivoting his body away from mine. “Santana,” I snapped my fingers in front of his face and he blinked back to life.

“Yeah, sorry…Pops is taking it easy on me right now, that’s all.”

“Why though? You got kicked out of school for selling drugs. Do you know how goddamn huge that is? Did he have to get you from jail or…” I stared at him for an answer but all I saw was a cloud of agitation surround him.

“Yeah. He got me from jail.” Every word was clipped and landed heavy on the floor at my feet like birds with broken wings.

“I’m surprised he didn’t leave you in there for a while,” I mused.

“Let’s not talk about Pop, okay?” He huffed and stood up, his tense body inches from mine. I could feel his warmth and smell his familiar scent. He was freshly washed denim and deodorant with the yummy smells of Papa’s restaurant clinging to his white t-shirt.

“What else did you cook? Let me taste.” He made a beeline to the stove and began taking tops off pots and sticking his nose inside. I slapped at him and he shoved me out of the way, making me laugh like when I was a little girl.

My job was always to guard the kitchen against the boys because Mama knew they’d steal food. They always did. Even if it was a tortilla from the warmer, they stole something.

“Drink some water,” I insisted, grabbing him a chilled bottle from the fridge.

“I don’t want water. I want whatever you cooked. I need to test you out…” His dark eyes flashed something at me again and it tugged on an invisible line tethered to my stomach. What the fuck was that?

“Test me out? Are you saying my skills are in question? I can cook my ass off. Mama taught me. Plus, I still have her recipe cards,” I stuck my tongue out at him and he lifted an eyebrow at me.

“I’ll be the judge of that. We can’t trust Pop because he’s happy to eat anything he didn’t have to cook,” Santana joked with a smile worthy of a full page Crest ad.

“Hey, I’m home now. I don’t need my own kids talking trash about me,” Papa called as he came in the front door. My eyes widened and I rushed into his strong arms for a hug. “Mija, if your mother were here to smell the air in this house…” He shook his head and cast his gaze to the floor. The lights shone on his thick chocolate mane of hair.

He was so handsome that nobody ever questioned him being Santana’s biological dad. Everyone assumed that we were a family joined by blood and not marriage. We never bothered to correct anyone because in our eyes we were a blood family.

“Does it smell good, Papa?” I asked. The smile on my face made my cheeks throb.

“It smells amazing, princess.” He kissed my forehead and made his way into the kitchen.

“Yeah, princess,” Santana leaned over and snorted in my ear. I slapped his impossibly hard bicep and he threw a playful punch in return.

“You two…” Papa warned with his back to us as he poured over the food on the stove.

We sat at the family dining table, just the three of us, and I couldn’t pretend that I didn’t feel the absence of Mama. God, I missed her. Looking at Santana made me feel the ache in the pit of my stomach even more.

Instead of moping through dinner though, I told myself that Mama would be proud of me for fixing all her staples and having both her men sit down at the table to eat. She would probably be prodding Santana to figure out what he was hiding too.

I knew he was hiding something but I didn’t know what. It was my duty as his little sister to figure out what it was. I laughed and talked all through dinner but I watched him too. I watched his interaction with Papa and I saw the way they carried on like best fucking buddies.

By the end of the night, I was absolutely certain that my brother and father were hiding something. I resented them for not telling me. Was I supposed to let it go without so much as a mention? They both knew me better than that.

Or they should have.

Once dishes were in the dishwasher and Papa was upstairs for the night, I found my way into Santana’s room. He was in bed texting and I invaded his space without a second thought. “Who the hell are you texting? Your girlfriend?” I quizzed, taking his phone. He tossed his arm around my waist and pressed his warm lips to my temple.

“Nah, you’re my only girl.” My stomach fluttered to life at his words. I was such a sucker for Santana.

“I better be.”

“Yeah, and I better be the only man in your life. Especially since you wanna grow up on me and get titties.” He poked them and I squealed, covering my chest with my forearm. “Sammie, are you still a virgin?” Santana sat straight up and looked at me. His lips pressed into a line. I swallowed thickly and pushed the bouncy nerves in my belly down somewhere else. Talking to my brother about my sex life was ten times harder than talking to Papa with him I could gloss over it.

Not with Santana.

He knew me as well as I knew myself.

“Sammie.” He knew I was stalling and thinking up bullshit in my head.

“Huh?” I forced a grin but he wasn’t buying it.

“Come here.” He motioned to his lap and I straddled him. His lap was always warm and he smelled so good. My brain turned to mush for a moment. “You’re supposed to tell me the truth always, right?” His voice was gentle that time.

“Yeah…”

“Okay, so are you still a virgin? You promised to let me know when you lost it.”

“You mean when I gave it away? I didn’t lose anything,” I protested. Santana tipped his head back and sighed, tightening his grip around my waist. It made me buzz all over. I felt something dark spark inside of me but I pushed it away before it could bloom.

“You didn’t lose anything, you gave it away?” He repeated slowly. It took me less than a second to realize he trapped me and I looked stupid as hell. I rolled my eyes and tried to get off of him but I had no idea how strong he was. His fingers dug into my hips and his obsidian eyes drilled into my green ones.

“Tell me, Sammie,” he insisted.

“Fine. I’m not a virgin anymore, Santana. Happy? Shit.”

“When the fuck did that happen?” His eyes softened and his gaze flitted all over my face as if he were committing me to memory or at least who I was before I lost my virginity.

“Right after you went back to school last summer. I was at a party. I didn’t tell the guy I was a virgin. I wanted to get it over with. It wasn’t special and I didn’t want it to be,” I explained. I rushed my words together in hopes that if I laid everything out quickly, he’d go easier on me.

Santana’s mouth turned down and his eyes grew distant. I hated that look. It reeked of disappointment.

“I don’t regret it,” I told him, hoping to soften the blow. I never looked at my virginity as something precious. To me, being a virgin was the lack of sexual experience.

When I wanted to experience sex…I was done being a virgin.

“You don’t regret losing your virginity at a party to a guy you don’t even talk to anymore, Sam?”

“No, I don’t. He served his purpose. I’d rather have enjoyable sex with someone I care about. The first time sucked and it was insanely uncomfortable. When I find a guy who knows what he’s doing, I want him to show me too. I want to learn without everything hurting.”

Santana pushed out a sigh and looked up at me, curling his long fingers around the base of my neck. “Was he gentle with you at least?” He asked.

“He didn’t have to do anything. I was on top.” A smirk danced all over my face. This time when the corners of his mouth turned down it was due to him being impressed. A soft blush heated my neck.

“Little Sammie got on top her first time? Shit. That takes some balls. I’ve heard girls complain about how bad their first time hurts and I’ve heard them complain about being on top even when they’re not virgins so…you’re pretty badass.” For some reason, that compliment took flight in my chest and stomach and I couldn’t stop smiling.

“Have you ever taken a girl’s virginity?” I asked, draping my arms around his neck.

“Once. I didn’t want to though.”

“Yeah…sure, Santana. Some chick spreads her legs for you and begs you to take her virginity and you’re like nah…I’m good.” I tipped my head back and painted the room with laughter. It made Santana laugh too.

He tugged on my ponytail and I pouted a bit. There was that thing I couldn’t put my finger on again. It flared to life in his eyes and I couldn’t be certain but it might have flared to life in mine too.

“I didn’t want to take her damn virginity. When you take a girl’s virginity she gets clingy.” He reflected on the entire situation like it left a sour taste in his mouth. Not sour like a lemon but like bad milk.

I frowned by default.

“I didn’t get clingy with the guy that took mine,” I countered.

“You’re different. If I took your virginity I probably wouldn’t have minded.” I could hear brakes screeching to a halt in my mind and the same thing must have been going on in his too.

His eyes went wide but he recovered quickly. “I mean…you know I didn’t mean it like that,” he finally said.

“Mean what like what?” I quizzed with my eyes trained on his every move.

“Nothing, Sammie.” He groaned, rubbing his forehead. Something about his words made the dark spark inside of me smolder though. I tried to snuff out the heat but it wouldn’t budge so I ignored it.

“So, you’ve taken a girl’s virginity before…how come you never told me?” I pushed my fingers through his silky black hair. He shrugged his broad shoulders and slid his palms down my sides.

“I didn’t want to do it in the first place,” he told me.

“You’re not a fuck boy though, Santana. You wouldn’t have sex with a girl then leave her high and dry. Now, which one of your girlfriends was it?” I quizzed. I studied the thick cords in his strong neck while he decided if he wanted to divulge the answer to my question or not.

I couldn’t help sliding my fingertips down his throat, letting them glide over his Adam’s apple. He pulled my hand away and nipped at my fingers, making me laugh. “It was Maria,” he finally said after what seemed like eons.

“Maria? Oh god, she was like a puppy dog following your ass around. Now I get it,” I said, tossing my hand in the air. Santana wanted to break up with her so bad but I never knew why.

“She was crazy clingy. I couldn’t take it. I was scared I was going to have to marry her.” Santana was laughing. I wasn’t. The thought of him marrying anyone made me uncomfortably hot and I hated it.

“Marry her? What the fuck for?” I blurted.

“Because I felt like shit dumping her because she was clingy. You know I have a soft spot for women…especially pretty ones.” He touched my cheek and stared at me.

Okay, it worked.

I smiled.

“I just realized something,” I said, hopping off of him. His features crumpled into a frown as he looked at me.

“What?”

“You can’t get married. Ever.” I smiled and he laughed.

“You’re insane and overprotective. Did I mention that, hermosa?” He stood and followed me to the doorway where he hovered in front of me until my back was flat against the door.

“Me?” I took his giant paw in my hand and held it up so he could see where his knuckles were still angry and red. He folded with a knowing smile.

“Marco was out of fucking line.”

“You’re worse than me. I’ve never punched anyone in the face over you.”

“Well, you shouldn’t have filled out the way you did, Sammie. That’s your fault. You were always the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen but now…”

“I’m bad,” I winked at him and jiggled my boobs a little, making him groan with annoyance. “You can say it. I won’t tell,” I giggled.

“You’re okay. Just make sure you keep some damn clothes on, please.” He shoved me out of his room and I laughed a little before heading down the hall.

My mind was a mess of thoughts but the one that stood out amongst the rest was the fact that sitting on Santana’s lap, shooting the shit was the most relaxed I’d felt in months. Even though he was hiding something and he’d gotten expelled from school, I was elated to have my big brother back.

I hopped in the shower and let the water rush over my body. I stared down at my curves and wondered exactly how much they’d filled out since Santana saw me last. I knew my tits were bigger but looking down, I saw that my hips were fuller and so were my thighs.

Was that what he noticed when he looked at me?

My throat closed with the seemingly innocent question.

My eyes fell shut as something unseen urged my hand between my thighs. I tucked my bottom lip between my teeth as my fingers slid across the surface of my aching clit. When had I become so turned on?

I couldn’t get out of the shower without coming. I had to pleasure myself until I was trembling beneath the spray of hot water. I was so wound up that I needed a release.

Wasn’t I relaxed sitting on Santana’s lap just moments ago?

What changed?

The mere recollection of being in his room, on his bed, and in his lap sent me hurtling toward another orgasm.

It was slick and coated in dark sin.

I blinked away the fog of lust, hitting the knob to turn the water off. Somehow the silence roared louder than the shower. On wobbly legs, I walked to my room.

I stared out of the window at the star-speckled sky and swallowed the lump in my throat. Things always turned dark at night. Clearly, that included my thoughts too.

I needed the sun to rise so whatever I was thinking about in the shower would turn to vapor and go the hell away.

It had to.

***