by Eden Finley
Hunter wasn’t my actual brother, but he was the closest thing I had to one. He’d always be “Uncle Hunter” to Cody.
“Then maybe you should buy your own damn condoms.” I slumped down on the couch and closed my eyes, my dull headache making me realise I never ended up getting that ibuprofen.
“Whoa, seriously, dude? Did you? Do I have to give you the safe sex talk again? You don’t know where she’s been. She was smoking hot, she could’ve had—”
I shook my head. “It’s all good, she had some. And trust me, Cody is all I need to remember the importance of safe sex. I don’t need another lecture from you, Mum.”
Getting your girlfriend pregnant at nineteen and having to drop out of uni so you could support them both by getting a shitty paid apprenticeship that led to a dead-end job … it was definitely all the reminder I needed.
Hunter smiled. “Now, be a good boy and run along to work.”
I hadn’t realised the time until he’d said that, and I was running late. I stood to leave, but it was as if Hunter’s words only just hit me. “What do you mean, she’s hot? When did you see her?”
Hunter laughed. “When she was trying to sneak out this morning. It was so hilarious. She got all tongue-tied and embarrassed. She even forgot your name. Where did you meet her?”
I pursed my lips and ignored his question. I couldn’t tell him I was at a bar. I’d never hear the end of it.
It pissed me off a little that she didn’t even remember my name, but I guess that goes with the territory of a one-night stand sometimes. “You didn’t say anything Hunter-like, did you?”
“Just to keep the noise down next time.”
I groaned. Thank God, I wouldn’t be seeing Paige again. Although, I do have her number …
No! One night only. That’s the rules.
****
Work was painful but surprisingly short. I guess when the place I didn’t want to be was where I had to go as soon as I knocked off, the day seemed to go faster.
Replaying my night with Paige certainly helped make time go quicker too.
I’d had plenty of one-nighters before, and maybe one or two of them had a lingering effect on me, but none of them had gotten to me like Paige did.
Throughout my shift, when I wasn’t stressing about this stupid dinner I had to attend, I was remembering what it felt like to be buried deep inside her while she moaned beneath me. None of my previous conquests had me hard and begging for more the very next day.
My cock twitched again at the mere thought of her, and I was glad to have my own workstation where none of my co-workers could see my embarrassing situation.
I kept telling myself it was because I hadn’t had sex in over six months and she was extremely good at it. That’s why she was haunting me all day.
Looking at the clock, I only had five minutes left before knock-off time. I never thought I’d be so depressed to leave work.
Apparently, Reece and Cody had been spending most of their time at Dickhead’s … I knew I should’ve started calling him by his actual name so Dickhead wouldn’t slip out at the dinner table, but it was a hard habit to break. They were supposedly at Paul’s a lot, but only officially moved in this week—something I’d only been informed about yesterday. Over the phone, no less.
“Oh, by the way, you should probably know that Paul asked me to marry him. We moved in with him earlier this week. I meant to call, but everything’s been so crazy busy.”
I didn’t see how that was fair. Shouldn’t Cody’s father know where his kid is living?
I wasn’t dumb. I knew it wasn’t a last-minute thing to pack up all their shit and move in with Paul. She didn’t tell me until she absolutely had to. Then she had the nerve to ask me over for dinner, but she also didn’t make it seem like I had a choice. To take Cody for the weekend, I’d need to play nice.
I kept telling myself to swallow my anger. Reece had the power to make it impossible to see Cody at all.
When she gave me the address to their new place, I knew the house was going to be big and expensive as soon as I realised which suburb it was in. Apparently, Paul was some hotshot lawyer and worked eighty hours a week.
“It’s so nice to date someone who’s focused for a change.”
I wasn’t supposed to overhear that a few months ago, but I did.
Our small group of friends, who’ve been friends since high school, still got together every Friday night at our local pub. Of course, back in the day, it was the same nightclub every week, until we got to about twenty-three years old and realised we were getting too old for that scene. Something I’d completely forgotten about last night when I walked into that dive bar.
Anyway, this one particular night, I wasn’t meant to be there because it was my weekend with Cody. Since Reece and I split, we went fifty-fifty in the friends department too. She had her weekend with them when I had Cody, and I had mine when he was with her.
My mum hadn’t seen Cody in a few months, and she begged me to take him for the night. She used to do that when Reece and I were together so we could go out with our friends on a Friday night and be a regular couple who didn’t have the responsibility of looking after a young child. I barely got time to see him as it was, so I said he couldn’t stay the night, but we did go around to her place so she could spend time with him. We had dinner, she played with Cody for a while, but then he fell asleep watching TV. She argued that it would be easier for him to sleep over than having to wake him up to drive home.
I ended up agreeing with her and told her I’d be back in the morning to pick him up. On the way home, I decided to stop by the pub and say hi to the guys. I walked in at the end of Reece saying how great it was to be dating someone focused.
Yeah, I got angry. I sat down next to her in the booth, trying to hold my scowl. I should’ve tried to hold my tongue instead.
“Now if only I could find someone who wasn’t such a prude.”
I knew I was in trouble the minute I said it. Instead of calling me on my bullshit line, she did way worse.
“Where the fuck is Cody? You get a babysitter so you could come and drink? Really? You need a drink so bad, you’d leave your son on one of the few weekends you actually get to see him?”
“Calm down, he’s at my mother’s.”
“If you don’t want the responsibility of being a parent, I can make sure you don’t have to see him at all.”
All of our friends were sitting around the table, their jaws practically in their laps. She rarely played that card, but when she did, it fucking stung.
“Can I talk to you? Outside?” I asked through gritted teeth.
“You don’t have to go outside with him,” Philippa said. Yeah, they all knew what I’d done to Reece the night she left me. Most of the guys’ attitudes towards me stayed the same. They all said it was an accident and could’ve happened to either one of them. But Reece and Philippa knew better. Ever since then, Pip had been wary of me.
“No, it’s fine,” Reece said, pushing me out of the booth to go outside.
I knew I had to keep my anger in check—something that was a lot easier by the fact I hadn’t been drinking.
“Did you really have to say that in front of all of them? You know I’m a good dad, you know I wouldn’t leave Cody for a night just to have a drink. I don’t drink anymore. You know this.”
“Then why are you here and he’s with your mum?”
“Because we went to hers for dinner and he fell asleep. I stopped by to catch up with the guys. It’s Friday night, I knew everyone would be here. Is that really so horrible?”
“Well, what am I meant to think?” she yelled, her breath smelling like a brewery. Clearly she hadn’t laid off the alcohol. Just one of the many double standards she’d handed to me since the breakup. “Don’t think I don’t hear about all those skanks you take home week after week when you’re out with our friends while I’m at home looking after our kid full-time.”
I scoffed. “You don’t wa
nt to be a single parent full-time? Give me more days with him. I’d gladly take him, you know I would.”
She shook her head. “How could I trust you to do that if every chance you get, you’re at a fucking bar?”
“I’ve been sober for two years, Reece. You know that.”
“You’re also a liar. You don’t think I don’t hear about what happens on the nights I’m not here?”
I let out a loud sigh. “Yes, I have the occasional beer, but I always limit myself to just the one. And we both know my problem isn’t with drinking alcohol. The problem is when I have too much.”
“If you truly wanted Cody in your life, you wouldn’t drink at all.”
“Fine. Done.”
“Everything okay out here?” Philippa asked from the doorway. Her best friend, Gage—the guy we all thought she was sleeping with but apparently wasn’t—was standing behind her defensively. And he was certainly not the guy you’d want to piss off. He was built like a brick shithouse.
“You should go home. Tonight’s my night with our friends,” Reece said with a defeated tone, walking off to go back inside the pub.
I managed to keep in line until they disappeared through the door.
“Fuck!” I yelled, turning to punch the brick wall behind me. Pain shot through my hand, and a string of curses left me.
Hunter came barrelling out of the bar, his arm draped around some girl. “Oh, hey! I didn’t know you were here.” He was drunk but seemed to sober up pretty fast when he looked at my hand and saw my knuckles were covered in blood. He turned to his hook-up for the night, “Hey, sweetness, can you give us a minute? I’ll come back inside and get you in a few.”
The random girl nodded and went back inside.
I’d let my anger get to me, and I wasn’t even drunk this time. I knew I was in for a lecture and tried to stop him from talking. “It’s nothing. Just Reece being a bitch.”
“She threaten to take Cody again?”
I nodded.
“She can’t cut him out of your life with no cause. But if you give her a reason to”—he pointed to my bloody hand—“she will.”
“I know, I know.”
Since that happened, I hadn’t touched a drop of alcohol. I also hadn’t slept with anyone. That was, until last night. I didn’t know what would happen if Reece found out about Paige or the fact I was drinking. For all I knew, she’d threaten to take Cody away from me again.
After pulling up to their house in my ute, I stalled for time as I fumbled around on my phone, pretending to check social media. My eyes were looking straight through the screen, though. I couldn’t even concentrate enough to laugh at some lame meme that was trending.
Cody, you’re doing this for Cody.
I finally decided I couldn’t put off the inevitable anymore and made my way out of the car and up their wide porch steps. Their expansive veranda that wrapped around the entire house made me feel small and inadequate.
The whole time I was taking tentative steps towards the front door, I kept waiting for a meteor or something to fall from the sky and crush me. Or maybe I was hoping for it.
Turned out the meteor was inside the house. I rang the doorbell, only to be greeted by the last person I thought I’d ever see again.
Paige.
I don’t know what she said when she opened the door, or if any words even came out at all. All I could see was a flash of her naked beneath me and me driving into her harder and harder. The only voice to fill my ears was that of a memory. “I want you to fuck me, hard.”
4
- PAIGE -
“Can you get the door, Paige?” My soon-to-be stepmother, who was only a few years older than I was, called out. She said something else, but I missed it as I tuned her out.
God, I was awful. I was trying my best to not act all teenagery—I was almost twenty-one and supposedly that meant I had to be all grown-up now or whatever—but it was weird knowing my father was marrying someone not even old enough to be my mother. He was old enough to be her father.
They’d been dating a while, and she and her kid were over at our house often, but it seemed to be that ever since Dad proposed, she’d decided we needed to be friends, or close … or something. She’d been making an extra effort to make sure I was “comfortable” with all the changes, and she wanted to “get to know me.”
What I’d be comfortable with was not living at home with Daddy in the first place, but undertaking a law degree didn’t exactly give me time to get a job to pay for rent and all the other bills that came with living out of home. And while Dad could easily afford to help me out in the rent department, he’d always been a self-made man and believed no one should get anything for free. Except a room in his house—that was free. I wondered if it had everything to do with the fact my brother had moved overseas and he wasn’t ready to let me go yet. Or perhaps it was to keep his only daughter from having overnight guests. The more I thought about it, the more I thought it was the latter.
Maybe I was just crabby after studying all day. I still wasn’t sure how prepared I was for the major exam tomorrow—Saturday exams were always the worst—and all the tension I’d worked out thanks to Hemsworth was back tenfold.
Finally getting to the door, I had no idea who I was expecting, but Hemsworth was definitely not on the list.
My heart pounded in my chest, and my stomach did a flip.
“What are you … how do you know where I live?” My first thought was Holy crap, I have a stalker! But there was confusion on his face too, so I had no idea what was going on.
It wasn’t until Cody came running out, throwing his arms around him and screaming “Dad!” that I realised what actually happened last night.
I slept with my new stepbrother’s dad. I had sex with my stepmother’s ex-husband.
I wanted to shrink back into myself. It didn’t really happen, did it? We have to be in some kind of alternate universe. Like Asgard. That would explain why Thor is here, at my fucking house, looking like the god he is in black jeans and a light denim button-down shirt.
Cole hugged Cody tight but didn’t take his eyes off me. “Hey, buddy. How ya going?”
“Good. Wanna see my new room? We just moved all my stuff in.”
“Of course,” he said, finally releasing me from his stare and looking down at his son. “I’ll be along in a minute. I need to … umm … I forgot something out in my car. I’ll be back in a sec, okay?”
“Okay.” Cody ran back inside, leaving us both standing in the entryway completely silent and completely stunned.
“This isn’t happening,” he mumbled. He started pacing the porch, running his hand through his hair. “Please tell me you’re a babysitter, or a housekeeper, or … fuck, I don’t know. Please tell me you’re not who I think you are.”
My mouth opened, but nothing came out.
“Reece said Paul had a daughter. I just assumed a pimply pre-teen with pigtails. Not … oh, this is not good.” He looked like he was about to hyperventilate. “Did you know who I was?” His eyes snapped to mine.
“What?” I choked on the word.
“Did you know who I was?” he said, slower this time and through gritted teeth. He stepped closer so he was within an inch of me.
His aftershave smelled incredible, and being that close to him made me want to reach out and touch him, kiss the mouth that explored all of me last night. I forced myself to find my voice. “I swear, I didn’t. I wouldn’t have …”
We were interrupted by Reece coming to the door. “Everything okay out here? Cody said you forgot something.”
Cole took a step back and tried to wipe the terrified look off his face. “Yeah, yeah, everything’s fine. Thought I left my phone in the car.” He pulled it out of his jeans. “But it was in my pocket.”
Reece looked at him like he’d lost his mind, but stepped aside and invited him in. “Dinner’s almost ready.”
“Wait … you’re staying for dinner?” I asked and then looked at Reece. �
��He’s staying for dinner?”
She sighed. “Yes, Paige, I invited my ex-husband over for dinner.”
“But he’s your ex …?” I said, confused. I couldn’t remember the last time my mother and father had a meal together.
“And he’s also Cody’s father. We’re technically family. We all have to try to be mature about this, so we’re going to need to make the effort to get along.”
Does having his cock in my mouth count for getting along? Pretty sure I nailed that last night.
Don’t even go there, Paige.
As I followed them both into the formal dining room, I realised Dad and Reece were pulling out all the stops for tonight. We never ate in there unless it was for a special occasion.
I started wondering why Cole was so terrified and if it actually had nothing to do with me and everything to do with having to go to this weird dinner with his ex. Who does that?
I was sure my presence wasn’t helping, though. Yeah, it was weird … and gross. And weird. But it wasn’t like we knew any different at the time. It wasn’t like it was the end of the world. I was pretty sure no zombie apocalypse started because two people who weren’t meant to have sex had sex. I decided to keep running that zombie theory through my head in hopes it’d make me feel less weirded out.
“I’ll go dish out the food,” Reece said, leaving us.
My dad and Cody were already at the table, but Dad stood when we entered. “Hi, Cole, it’s nice to finally meet you.”
Cole nodded his head politely and shook Dad’s hand but didn’t say anything. I think he must’ve still been in shock or something.
Zombies.
He sat next to Cody who was next to Dad at the head of the table, and I sat opposite them.
“Do you mind moving down for Reece, sweetheart?” Dad asked.
I rolled my eyes and made my way to the only other place setting, which happened to be at the other head of the table … right next to Cole.
Zombies.
My heart rate was still pounding from the shock, and there was a knot sitting in the pit of my belly.