My Hot Stepbrother: A Second Chance Romance

by Aria Ford

  She was invited to his apartment for Christmas this year, if she and Sal weren’t going to booze it up and drunkenly exchange gift cards. He stretched out on the sofa and reclined with Francesca’s manuscript. The working title was Dream Catcher. It was about a woman that dreams of her long lost children that she can’t remember giving away due to a fatal accident.

  Not much of a hopeless romantic. But that suits her. Francesca was logical and refreshing. There was a small part of him that felt silly for the whole affair. He had barely been out of a seventeen-year marriage when they began seeing one another. Francesca had suggested that she may be a rebound relationship for him, and maybe it had started out that way, but it had truly blossomed into something else.

  And at least the book was good, and she hadn’t just vomited up what she thought sounded deep.

  It could sell, but not if we just throw it at the publishers.

  His phone sang a jaunty holiday tune and he smirked.

  Speak of the devil.

  He leaned over and his fingers barely grasped his phone on the glass table. Jesse’s face flashed across the screen and he felt a surge of both disappointment that it wasn’t Francesca, and happiness that it was his daughter. He touched the green ‘accept’ key.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, Dad! How’s your first Christmas in New York?”

  “It’s alright I guess, but I sure do miss you, sweetie. How have you been?”

  He could hear some shuffling in the back as she repositioned herself. “Sorry. Micah wants to walk all of a sudden; I was putting his leash on. So, you like New York?”

  “A lot, yes. I feel like the students in my classes are really benefiting from my lectures. Did you do the play?”

  “Yeah, I’m an extra in the ensemble for the mid-winter play. For the Christmas play, I’m the elf with the most singing parts.”

  Adam laughed with zeal. “That’s wonderful, baby. I wish I could get away to see it, but I’m insanely busy. I’m meeting a lot of writers here.”

  “Do you have a girlfriend yet?” she suddenly blurted. Her tone wasn’t accusatory or remotely hesitant.

  He decided to be honest with her. “Something like that, truthfully. She’s a writer. I like her a lot but I don’t know if she wants something serious.”

  He could hear her Yorkshire Terrier yipping in the back. “Well, I miss you. You should come see us soon, bring your maybe girlfriend if you have to.”

  “Well, I was hoping that you would come to New York, maybe even look at some of the colleges.”

  Jesse squeaked. “I would love to! I’ll tell Mom, it’s going to be so much fun! Maybe I can meet your girlfriend.”

  “Maybe, sweetheart.”

  ******

  Adam slid his second glass of rum onto the coffee table. His limbs felt wobbly and loose. The manuscript was in his right hand, folded in half. After he had gotten off the phone with Jesse, he dove back into his reading. While he was ecstatic that Jesse had finally called without being prodded, hearing her voice had created a dull ache in his chest. He couldn’t resist the urge to try and drown the ache out with rum.

  He was entertained, at least. The climax of Francesca’s book had been electrifying and it was melting into a satisfying conclusion. He took his phone out of his pocket and selected her number from a list of most recent conversations.

  The phone rang five times before she picked up. “Yes?” Her tone was expectant.

  “I’m almost finished with your book.”

  He could hear her shuffling around in the back, probably sitting up. “Go on,” she said.

  “It’s good, really good. I have to say, a lot of people have asked me to read their stuff and I’ve just bitten my tongue and swallowed horrible writing for three hours of my life, but I’m actually entertained.”

  She was silent. “You don’t think the main character’s personality is awful?”

  “She’s uniquely terrible in some ways, and brilliant in others. However, she has been through a lot.”

  “She has! I hope the readers see it that way.”

  “Speaking of readers, I know that you wanted my opinion on your manuscript because I’m published, but I don’t think that I should just push this to someone at the publishing house.”

  “What? Why? Push it to them, I don’t care.”

  “That’s the thing; sure, your book could be in chain bookstores and in some libraries but that would be like shoving you down the reader’s throats. I think that there’s a smoother approach to this that we should take.”

  “What’s smoother than a book deal in two weeks?”

  “Being a bestselling self-published author in days.”

  “I suppose that I could push it to the online market and make it available on e-readers,” she said.

  He could hear the faint sound of her laptop being turned on. He swung his legs out and ignored the woozy sensation that came with it. He sat upright and said, “Sure. In addition to that, you’ll let me post a review of your book on my blog.”

  Francesca gasped.

  “And I’ll pay to have a few thousand copies published in print soon after, and then I’ll put them in some independent bookstores.”

  “I never expected you to do any of this, you know.”

  He chuckled; his eyes searched the room for the rum bottle. “I’m not offended that you’re an opportunistic woman, Francesca. You went after what you want, and you might just get it; along with a horny old man for good measure.”

  She giggled. “You’re not that old Adam. Horny, yes. Old, not so much.”

  “Would you like to come over after I make the post on my blog? We can watch your explosion into the literary world together.”

  “Yes. Absolutely. It’s better than watching Sal checking his ex’s profiles online to see if they’re single on Christmas too.”

  Sal’s muffled complaint could be heard in the background, “It’s healthy, it is a normal thing to do, it will help me pick a better partner in the future!”

  Adam rolled his eyes as he swished some more rum around on his tongue. “Get over here.”

  Chapter 9

  Adam sighed as he sipped on his unusually sweet choice of coffee. He decided that he may as well try a fancy coffee to shake him out of the funk he was sliding into as classes resumed.

  He wiped a bead of chocolatey liquid off of his lip and Dean Green nodded at him as he power-walked down the hall. Adam nodded back, but Dean Green turned around and fell into step beside him.

  “Good morning, Professor Houston.”

  “Good morning, Dean. How was your Christmas?”

  “It was wonderful, we got my daughter a puppy but she decided that a Yorkie just wouldn’t do and we had to exchange the poor thing for a Labrador.”

  “That’s a shame,” Adam replied.

  They walked into Adam’s classroom and Adam set his things down on his desk. He gestured at his coffee cup. “You ever try this from the campus store? It’s like a hot chocolate but they put three coffees worth of caffeine in it.”

  “I’m not here to talk about coffee, Adam. I’m actually here to talk about Professor Reynolds.”

  Adam nodded and sat in his chair. “Is that right? Well, what about her?” He grinned as he looked into Dean Green’s eyes.

  “Well, some photos have been brought to my attention by a staff member-”

  “Do you mean Professor Scylla?”

  “I am not at liberty to say who they were from. Suffice it to say that they were very intimate photos of the both of you. You spent the holidays together?”

  “Professor Martin and Professor Loney golf together each spring, what’s wrong with spending the holidays with a colleague and their roommate when you’re new to the city?”

  Dean Green grunted in frustration. “The problem-” he took out his phone and his screen lit up as he searched for the evidence he was talking about. “The problem is when photos like these make it on a social media site, especially where other memb
ers of my faculty can see them.”

  Damn it, Sal, Adam thought. The photo was of himself and Francesca under the mistletoe, Francesca was snuggled up in a bright red Christmas sweater, her tongue firmly planted in his Adam’s mouth.

  Adam scratched at his beard and asked, “What would you like me to do about this?”

  “Cut off whatever it is that you guys are calling this. Normally, I would even consider suspending a professor that had done something this inappropriate, but you’re valuable to this university.”

  Adam smiled. “That’s right. I am. It’s almost like I’ve given this school a generous donation of half a million dollars that you know would only grow if I put some years in here. If I received tenure, you could probably afford to remodel half the buildings.”

  “This isn’t about your donations, this is about how students really value your lectures,” Dean Green retorted.

  Adam hummed in agreement. “And when students value my classes and they grow in popularity, what does that do for the university? The classes certainly aren’t being held for free, are you following, Dean?”

  “What are you saying, that you’ll resign? Are you threatening me?”

  Adam laughed. “I don’t think that I need to go that far. However, I know that Professor Reynolds and I will be fine. You’re going to tell Professor Scylla that you’ve handled the matter and that will be the end of it.”

  The first few students started to trickle in.

  “I have to teach class now, Dean. Are we done here?”

  Dean Green’s face contorted into an angry, red tomato. “It would seem that way. Enjoy your class.” He left out of the teacher’s exit and the door slammed behind him.

  A few students peered at the situation curiously and Adam waved them off. “Nothing to see here folks.”

  *****

  “Holy shit.” Francesca said as she folded her legs to comfortably seat her laptop on her lap. Her bedroom was dark and she had been hunched over the computer for three days now. Sal had tried and tried to get her to come out for fresh air and a shower, but she only indulged his company once to say, “Take that damn picture of Adam and me off of your page!”

  She had watched for three days, as the comments and new posts rolled in about Dream Catcher. Adam had been right. His clever and eye-catching post about the book had captured the attention of thousands of his blog’s followers. By the time the eBook royalties paid out, there would be an additional $3,000 dollars in her bank account at the rate that the digital copies were selling.

  They aren’t just buying it because Adam said to. They really like me. She chewed on her fingernails and clicked through the comments, most of them showering her book with praise and asking why the author hadn’t released any other work.

  Her mother, whom she spoke to sparingly, had called her and asked if she had published a book. Dream Catcher’s popularity had somehow made its way under the rock that Cynthia Reynolds inhabited in Columbus, Ohio.

  I should really go to work soon, before I get fired, she thought. She had canceled class three days in a row, obsessed with her book and blogs. Though things were looking good for her future, she couldn’t afford to quit teaching just yet.****

  Francesca shut the door and grinned at Adam, who was sprawled out on his sofa.

  “I can’t believe this, Adam! It happened exactly how you said it would, I can’t even begin to explain what this means to me.”

  He held up a hand. “You did the work, honey. I just financed spreading it around.”

  She laughed in awe, and fell on the sofa next to him. She snaked a hand around his waist. “Who gave you permission to come into my life, tear it apart, and make it ten times better?”

  “You did. When you approached me, you ambitious snot. Could you pour us some wine?”

  She nodded and stood up, and stretched. For once, her shirt didn’t rise past her belly button. Her success with writing allowed her to finally own clothes that were nice, and not just for work. She walked over to his alcohol cabinet and pulled out a white wine in a curvaceous bottle. She held it up and asked, “Is this expensive?”

  He spared a glance. “Yes. $900.”

  “Good! We’re celebrating!” She slid her fingers between two champagne flutes and brought them back to the sofa.

  Adam sat up and held Francesca by the waist. She passed him a flute filled with the bubbling white wine and he said, “To Dream Catcher!”

  Francesca smiled and took a large gulp . “Not just Dream Catcher. To us, to life, and to my resignation at Wright.”

  Adam’s eyes became the size of saucers and he asked, “You’re going to resign?”

  “I never wanted to teach. But, no one pays you to be an unpublished writer with dreams, and this was the profession that I could stand the most.”

  “Wow.”

  She sipped some more wine and set the glass down on the table. She swatted his thigh. “Oh, don’t be like that. I’m resigning at the end of the semester, and I have valuable experience now.”

  He took her hand and squeezed it. “Will you be resigning from anything else?”

  “You’re so subtle. No, I think you’re here to stay.” Francesca filled up her glass and leaned back on the couch with him. She raised his hand to her lips and placed a small kiss on it. “I want to see where this goes.”

  *********

  “I’m going to pretend to be over the fact that you just moved Aislin in here once I resigned from the University.”

  Sal and Aislin wore a guilty expression as the four of them sat around the table for the meal that Sal prepared.

  “Hopefully this meal makes it up to you. Come on, it’s not like you wanted to spend your nights in dirty underwear in that bedroom once you quit. Especially not with him living in that gigantic apartment by himself,” Sal said, as he spooned some pasta into Adam’s bowl.

  “I guess it’s the principle of the thing,” Adam said, and Francesca nodded as she stabbed her fork into her noodles.

  “Don’t get me wrong, I love you, Aislin. Sal was having a really rough time bringing home girls that didn’t look like they partook in sharing heroine on the weekends.”

  Aislin giggled and sipped some of the wine that Francesca and Adam had brought with them.

  Sal poured himself some wine. “How’s the next book coming along?”

  “Who’s book?” Adam and Francesca asked simultaneously.

  “I didn’t realize you were writing again Adam,” Sal said with a wink at Francesca.

  “It’s coming along great, I really love my decision to not go to a publishing house. I can talk to everyone that’s reading the books because of my blog.”

  Aislin passed Francesca the basket of rolls. “How do you like living in Adam’s part of town?”

  “I love it. I never thought I’d want to live in such an affluent part of New York, but I don’t have any complaints. We have enough space for Jesse to come hang out with us for a month.”

  Adam finished chewing his food and said, “She’s crazy excited to meet you, she read the book, and I’ve never seen a girl more excited about her Dad’s girlfriend.”

  Francesca slid her fingers between Adam’s underneath the table. “I’m excited to meet her. Hell, I’m just excited about life!” she exclaimed.

  Sal chuckled. “How about a toast to us before Francesca starts bawling?” Everyone laughed as they all held up their champagne glasses.

  Adam said, “To Francesca and I, to Sal and Aislin, and to Dream Catcher and the work in progress that I’m not allowed to know any details about. I’m grateful for this past year and all of the wonderful things that have come of it.”

  Sal said, “I would have just said ‘to friends’ but that’s what happen when you invite writers to dinner.”

  THE END

  Here’s a Peak of: Touch Me Doctor

  CHAPTER ONE

  Matt

  “Things are coming together,” I said, looking around my new office. “Still not perfect by any
means, but it’s in good enough shape to start seeing patients on Monday. Wouldn’t you agree, Janelle?”

  “Of course, sir,” she said, standing in the doorway of my office. “It’s been ready for a while now. You just can’t see it because you’re too hard on yourself, Matt. You have been since I began working for you.”

  “That’s not true,” I said, frowning. “Well, maybe I am. But maybe that’s what it takes, right? That’s what it takes to get things done the right way. High standards and an exacting eye are what it takes to succeed.”

  I sat down behind my new desk and ran my fingers over the rich mahogany wood. Janelle hovered anxiously in the doorway. I bit my tongue to keep from saying something I shouldn’t. Sitting behind this desk gave me all the power when it came to the relationship between doctor and receptionist. Taking advantage of that power dynamic was wrong. I would never do it, but sometimes Janelle made it so damn difficult. She’d been my receptionist for almost four years now and still didn’t seem any more comfortable with the role than on the day she’d started. It frustrated me, and I had to force myself not to take those frustrations out on her, just because she was my subordinate.

  She was so jittery all the time, always wringing her hands in front of her or else tucking her hair compulsively behind an ear. She always told me exactly what I wanted to hear, and although that was something every man wanted some of the time, no man wanted it all day, every day. It bored me and exhausted me, all at the same time.

  “It’ll be fine, at least for now,” I said in answer, standing and stretching before moving to my office window and peering out at the perfect mid-June San Diego day. “It’s all we’ve got to work with for now.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “I mean what I said. What else could I mean?” My patience with her wore thin. I couldn’t keep the edge of annoyance from my voice.

  “I’m sorry,” she answered hesitantly, using that wounded bird voice that always made me cringe a little. “I can see how that sounded like a stupid question. I only meant—”

  “The study?” I interjected.

  “Well, yes, Dr. McCormack. The study was exactly what I was thinking about.”