“You’re sure that’s a good idea?” I ask, stabbing the tines of my fork into some chicken. “Who is chaperoning you?”
Lula wrinkles that adorable nose at me. My cock swells so swiftly, I have to grit my teeth. “No one is chaperoning us,” she enunciates. “Since we’re all legally adults.”
“Yeah? Well bears don’t check ID, Lula,” I fire back.
And she laughs. It starts out as a snort. She tries to muffle the sound with her hands, but the giggle bursts out of her and the craziest thing happens. I start laughing, too. I can’t recall a single other time in my life that I’ve laughed at this dinner table. No, I’ve been lectured and shouted at and reprimanded. There was no mirth whatsoever until now.
Until her.
“I’m sorry,” she gasps, fanning the tears of laughter in her eyes. “I’m just thinking of a bear on his hind legs asking to see my driver’s license!”
She doubles over and Jesus, is that my own laugh booming through the dining room?
I mean, there is no way in fuck she’s going camping without me there to protect her. But even I have to admit, a bear checking identification is too funny for me to stay pissed. And that’s when I notice that my father and stepmother aren’t laughing along with us. In fact, my stepmother seems more annoyed than anything over Lula’s giggling fit.
Me? I’d like to seal the sound into a jar. Save it forever.
“Lula will be fine. She’s a frequent camper,” drones Vanessa. “She finds balance in nature or something. I don’t know where she gets it. Certainly not from me.”
“It’s the simplicity of wildlife,” Lula says hesitantly, as if she’s not sure her opinion will be welcome at the table. “I can’t teach people how to find their quiet place if I don’t stay well acquainted with my own.”
My father rolls his eyes. “Generation Z and their all-important self-care. Lula thinks she is going to make a career out of it.”
“Then she is going to make a career out of it,” I snap, gripping the fork until it hurts. “She’s good. And I’m pretty sure her methods are better than bottling up your aggression for decades until you’re nothing but an angry prick all the time.”
We square off, my father and I, him chewing his bite slowly, jaw grinding.
This is not how I was taught to speak to my father. As a child, a statement like that would have earned me a backhand across the mouth. But it will be a cold day in hell before anyone speaks to my sweetheart stepsister that way and gets away with it. And it feels good, too. Not saying the exact right thing. Saying exactly what is on my mind, instead of following the humble soldier script that seems to have been written for me.
My father laughs unexpectedly, slapping a palm off his knee. “Looks like the SEALs did their job and put some fire in him. He’s definitely not quiet and introverted anymore, is he?”
“No, certainly not,” Vanessa agrees quickly, visibly happy to have the mood lightened. “We have blueberry pie for dessert. Then I thought we could all watch a movie in the den. Won’t that be nice?”
Chapter Four
Lula
After dinner, I go upstairs to brush my teeth and put on a pair of fuzzy socks—a required movie viewing accessory, since it’s cold in the den—and when I come back down, everyone has already taken their spots. My mother is curled up on the love seat with her mini poodles, Tamsen and Boo Boo. My stepfather is reclined in his easy chair, frowning down at the remote controls. And Vale is on the couch, watching me beneath hooded eyelids.
The only available spot in the room is beside him.
Truthfully, there is no other place I would rather sit. I’m just so confused by what’s happening between me and my stepbrother, the idea of two hours beside him turns my stomach into a trampoline for nerves. After what happened in the shower earlier, I thought I had the situation figured out. Vale is lonely and starved for affection after being away so long. In such perilous circumstances.
I’m still pretty sure that’s the case. I’m just convenient.
A warm body to slake the urges of a big, testosterone-laden warrior.
But the way he stood up for me at the dinner table, the protectiveness he displayed for me when he found out about camping…it doesn’t add up. Is it possible there is more happening here than meets the eye?
Swallowing hard, I cross the floor of the den and sit down on the couch to Vale’s right.
He’s leaned back, one elbow resting on the arm of the couch, his magnificently thick and corded thighs spread in the pose of a man who can and does handle hard situations. After his shower, he changed into sweatpants and it’s an effort not to look there. At the apex of his thighs where there is a clear outline of his manhood, fat and definitely not contained by underwear. Oh yeah. My stepbrother is one hundred percent free-balling it.