Hard: A Step-Brother Romance

by Sosie Frost

  He popped the button on his jeans, removing the little foil packet before kicking them away.

  “SEALs are like boy scouts?” I didn’t fault his assumption. I was glad he had the foresight, even with the pill I popped every morning.

  “Just wishful thinking.”

  He pulled me to the end of the couch, but I stopped him before he spread my legs. I slid to the floor and pushed him to sit instead.

  “Oh, fuck, Shay.”

  He didn’t have time to protest or ask for anything more. I hadn’t tasted his cock in weeks. There was only so much a girl could take, especially when he teased me with it every damn day.

  His cock throbbed in my hand. I curled my fingers over it. They couldn’t touch over his shaft. A thin tease of arousal trickled from the tip. I greedily lapped it up, watching as Zach collapsed against the couch, hands behind his head. His cock twitched.

  He tasted so good. Looked so good. Every muscle in his body tensed as my lips lowered over his cock. I drew him in deep, pumping with my hand to watch the quiver of his hardened abs with the teasing tug. He groaned as I swallowed as much of his length as I could, which wasn’t nearly enough. We both knew it. My body superheated at the thought of stuffing every last inch of him within me. He hardened even more.

  My lips popped from the head. I lazily licked the underside, feeling the heat rushing through the most beautiful cock I had ever seen. He curled his fingers in my hair and drew me away.

  “Got something better for you,” he said.

  I believed him. The foil packet ripped open as I settled over his lap. He hadn’t expected me to get on top, but I didn’t trust him not to screw around. I needed him. I needed it. My body trembled with shivers so painful I feared I’d collapse on his chest and weep. He let me take control, repeating his profanity as I lowered myself onto his slick cock.

  The head nudged at my entrance. I held my breath and wiggled.

  Bigger than I remembered

  So much bigger.

  But absolutely perfect.

  I sunk down and forced my body to take all of him in a single, deliberate, beautiful thrust. My gasp threaded into a shocked mew. Zach’s whisper was the same. His hands clutched at my hips, fingers digging into my skin too roughly. I didn’t care.

  Nothing else mattered except the absolute filling of his cock. How I stretched. How I made room for the only man who ever stirred me to such a quick passion.

  My hips bounced. Zach groaned.

  I was lost.

  His hard, pulsing thickness overwhelmed me. I rose up only to sink back down as quickly and deeply as I could. I clutched at his shoulders and collapsed upon the solid definition of his chest. He held me just as tightly. Rocked his hips to meet mine. Moaned the same words. Breathed the same panting relief.

  I had denied him for too long, knowing full well exactly how it would end and how wrong it was and how much heartache it could create.

  But now? Just for a moment—just for a perfect few minutes of beautiful agony, satisfaction, and comfort—I’d take him.

  I forgot that he was my step-brother. I ignored the inheritance and will. I even remembered the day he first approached me. He admitted to realizing who I was only once he buried inside me, but who in their right mind would stop?

  No one ever desired me that much. No one ever admitted to such attraction, such passion.

  And I never felt the same for anyone else.

  All I wanted was a quick romp, another mistake to regret in the morning.

  I ground against him. Forced him deeper. Cried out his name. This was more than a mistake. I had no idea if I’d ever regret it.

  My motions slowed. Zach refused to stop. He stood without pulling from me, balancing my weight against his waist and easily carrying me, completely impaled on his length. I gripped him tighter. He grinned, moving my hips in a feat of strength that nearly made me explode right then and there.

  But he growled. It wasn’t enough for him.

  Zach tossed me onto the couch, grabbed my ankles, and spread my legs. I hardly had time to whimper before his thickness sliced inside me once more. He leaned over my body, letting my hand run over the bulging muscles in his arms, chest. He sunk against me, stealing a kiss as he thrusted as deeply as he could stuff his cock.

  Again and again he took me, bringing me to a brink of utter intensity. His thrusts slammed through me, and I eagerly arched to offer him more. My breath panted his name.

  “Shay…come with me.”

  The greatest words anyone ever spoke to me. I didn’t have to nod, think, or act. I was already there, coasting that fine line between pleasure and insanity. I gripped him, held him, welcomed him as he jerked his hips.

  One solid pound was all he needed.

  All I needed.

  We broke together in a blended, perfect ecstasy. His kiss muffled my words, and that was good. I had no idea what I would say if he had let me speak, let me think the words, let me feel not only what stretched and pleasured and filled, but what warmed deeper in me.

  I gripped his shoulders and pressed him harder against me. His cock wasn’t enough. His tongue circled mine. I crested with him over me, holding me, inside of me in ways only he could fill. My heart surged. My muscles rent.

  And nothing so perfect had ever layered me in such bliss.

  It was as though a gentle curtain of serenity pulled over us. Sound faded. The lights dimmed. And everything that teased me amplified into such crippling pleasure I nearly wept against his hardened body.

  Zach held me close, guiding me through the shivers, murmuring his own words that I couldn’t hear even if I wanted.

  Anything we said to each other would reveal too much. Such a raw and uncompromising passion exposed everything.

  And so we laid in a quiet peace.

  Rested in the others’ arms.

  And damned the consequences for another time.

  A time that would come all too soon.

  My vision haloed, blurred, then went black.

  I dropped the barbell. It crashed into the carpet. Didn’t shatter the cement beneath, but I couldn’t be sure.

  I couldn’t see. Anything. At all.

  “Fuck.” I groped for a towel. “Damn it!”

  The rough terrycloth brushed my fingers. I gripped it in a shaking fist and ground the towel against my face. Didn’t do shit, but I pressed hard against my eye sockets. It hurt almost as much as the fucking headache. At least my eyes were still there.

  Christ, this was bad.

  Fucking bad.

  “Son of a bitch!” I pitched the towel across the room. I didn’t know where it landed. Didn’t care.

  The migraines sucked, but this was something else. Shitty luck and shittier timing. I blinked hard. That helped. Another rub to my eyes, and the nothing shifted into grainy shadows. At least I wouldn’t fall on my ass trying to get to the bench with my stuff.

  I downed half of my water. The rest dunked over my head. I was probably overheated or some shit. I pushed myself hard. No doubt I fucked something up lifting too much weight. I acted like a jackass.

  My vision slowly returned. No need to bitch like a baby. At least the men in the squad weren’t around to witness such a weak-ass moment. I’d never hear the end of it.

  Christ.

  I could bluff a guy holding a four pair with just an ace high in my own hand, but I couldn’t fool myself. Hell, maybe it wasn’t worth fooling myself.

  I imagined that something was still fucked in my head from the accident. But I wasn’t ready to face what happened after I confessed it to a doctor. I could either go in for help, or I’d damn my future chances at getting back to my squad.

  All my training, the recovery, and the strengthening would mean fucking shit then. Twenty-four years old wasn’t the time to visit the VFW and collect my pension.

  Son of a bitch.

  My vision cleared. I could see enough of the machines and barbells to make it out of the gym. My headache disappeared the inst
ant I hit the hall.

  That worried me more than my faded sight. I could lie to a doctor if I had double-vision. And I’d get corrective surgery if the recurring blurriness was my body bullshitting me into nearsightedness. A headache like that was harder to hide.

  By the time I reached the stairs, everything was normal. No pain. Not even a haze or fog clouding my sight. It was like nothing happened. Like I was perfectly fine. I used to argue nothing was wrong with me. No one believed me during physical therapy.

  Fuck. Now I didn’t believe myself.

  I wasn’t the type of man who took easy days. If I had it my way, all my workouts would focus on legs. I’d exhaust myself with exercise if it meant I’d get back to my job, where I could punish the real assholes. I’d destroy my body to protect my friends, family, and country. That was the meaning of sacrifice, and I’d give every part of me.

  If the SEALs would take it.

  But if I had another episode even half that bad and they found out? I wouldn’t be able to convince a child I was fit to serve. That’d be a problem.

  A big fucking problem.

  Headaches weren’t the worst of it. I still tried to rationalize last week, when I had a hard time keeping my eyes open. I wasn’t tired, and it was only the left eye, but my eyelid just…drooped.

  It went away in a few minutes, but hell if I knew what that meant. Googling my random symptoms would only self-diagnose me with headaches and testicular cancer.

  The doctors warned head injuries had a long recovery. We knew this. I expected it. Any complication was just a bump in the road back to the service. And if they got too big? I’d forge my own damn path. Use those parachuting skills for something besides trapping my ass in hostile territory.

  I ran a shower, leaving the water cold. No sense overheating myself, especially when I stripped from a sweaty shirt and pants made sweatier in the moment of ball-clenching terror when my vision faded.

  The water felt good. Not pool good, but it was a damn paradise compared to one minute showers of recycled rainwater in the field. The waterfall showerhead delivered a good spray. I pressed my hands into the wall and let the shower cascade over me until the tension rolled from my shoulders.

  I knew a much better way to de-stress. It didn’t include a shower, but it was done naked. Again and again, just like my night with Shay in the theater. I took her four pulse-thumping, spine-shattering, ball-draining times.

  But, by morning, she was gone.

  I expected nothing less, but I hoped for something more. The words she said, the way she looked at me? Damn. Our cupid didn’t use arrows. He packed shotgun shells, and they stung a fuck-ton more than pixy dust when fired point blank.

  Shay had a rough day, one she hadn’t planned on sharing with me. But she’d let me hold her. She dropped her guard and talked to me, revealed her innermost fears and dreams. I wasn’t used to being the emotional support for anyone—especially a woman. I’d firebomb the asshole professor who was given the power to crush her so completely, but that would get her a warrant, not a degree.

  Shay needed someone to talk to. Even though she lived in a mansion and inherited more money than she could spend, her ambition in life was to help others. She wanted to work with kids, hold their hands when times got tough.

  And they fucked her over.

  I saw enough of that in my line of work. Good men, innocent people, got punished. I enlisted to stop those injustices. If I could help when I was overseas then nothing would stop me from protecting her at home.

  Except she didn’t believe I was sincere. Shay shared her desires, but she didn’t stay long enough to figure out what happened next.

  I didn’t want it to be another one night mistake. None of that bullshit where we fooled around in the dark to avoid our gazes in the light.

  I told her I wanted a chance.

  I proved I could take care of her body. Next up was her heart. I’d get that too. I wasn’t about to lose a girl that damned special.

  And beautiful.

  Sexy.

  Passionate.

  The things that girl could do with her lips, her body, her tightness. I salivated at the memory—too raunchy to waste during peacetime. Those memories were best saved for those oh-shit moments in the field when I needed a reason to stay alive and return to the sexy piece of ass waiting at home.

  I ran my hand over my abs and lower. The water warmed me enough. I gripped my cock and pumped.

  Nothing.

  Another tug.

  Nothing.

  “Jesus, what the fuck?” I stared between my legs.

  There it was. My namesake. A constant source of pride. Still impressive but lacking that certain spark that made it godly.

  Fuck. I winced.

  The headache was back.

  What the hell was wrong with me?

  I shut off the water and wrapped a towel over my waist. The mirror had no answers. Everything looked normal. Bags under my eyes, but that was expected after a night of sex and the swelling headache.

  I had woken up with a headache the past three nights in a row. Hadn’t let myself think about it. Bottom line. It was happening more often.

  I had two options. Ignore it and lay down until it went away…or I could take a chance and find Shay.

  I was tempted to ask what she thought. I needed to explain this shit to her anyway.

  She deserved to know that my military leave wasn’t as temporary as I let her believe.

  Except that would piss her off. I’d replace the headache with her foot up my ass as she kicked me from the house.

  Lay down and suffer alone or suffer in the arms of a beautiful woman?

  Well, one of us had to make the first move after our night. I tugged on a pair of pants and searched for her in the usual spaces—kitchen, theater, library. She wasn’t hiding where I could find her easily, which meant she holed up in her room, the sanctuary where I promised I wouldn’t encroach.

  But I spent the night buried to the hilt in the most beautiful woman in the world. That much pleasure earned a momentary right to trespass. But I was still a gentleman. I knocked before twisting the knob.

  Shay wore a pretty little camisole, but she pulled her blouse over her shoulders and buttoned it before I got close enough to see anything good.

  She tried not to look at me, but she loved my muscles as much as I loved her curves. Helpless to resist, stupid to refuse. The motto served me well for years.

  “Hey,” I said.

  “Hey.”

  Shay busied herself with her makeup and applied a layer of lip gloss over her full lips—lips which had tugged over my cock, parted with pleasure, and softened with my kiss.

  It was idiotic to envy a tube of lipstick, but the girl had me hard up for anything. A smile. A sigh. Any sign she wasn’t going to ignore what happened between us.

  “Going out?” I asked.

  “Yep.”

  “With who?”

  She shrugged. “A couple girlfriends. Nothing important. Need a chance to get out of the house.”

  And away from me. I crossed my arms. The headache faded in her presence, and her touch was the sort of balm I’d apply directly to the forehead—and everywhere else.

  If she’d just look at me.

  If she’d take the fucking chance to think about what might have started.

  Sure, I fucked it up in the beginning—built the inferno before we gathered the kindling. But stepping backwards was harder than getting her into the sheets.

  “You okay?” I asked.

  “Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?”

  “Lost your job. Douche-bag advisor. Graduation delays?” Listing her insecurities was probably a bad idea. Too bad I was her biggest one. “Fucking me.”

  Her compact snapped shut. She closed her eyes. “Zach.”

  “You enjoyed yourself.”

  “That’s not the point.”

  “What is?”

  “That I need time to process what happened,” she said. “I ne
ed to…figure things out.”

  “Why don’t we do it together?”

  “Because I’m not sure if there is a together, Zach. Don’t you get it?” She tried to stare at my forehead instead of in my eyes. I wasn’t having it. I snapped her focus to me, and her voice softened. Progress, at least. “This is all so complicated.”

  “It doesn’t have to be.”

  “But it is.” She stood only to grab her purse. “I came to you for comfort. Twice. And you pulled me from my problems in the best way a girl could ask. I’m grateful, Zach.”

  Grateful.

  That wasn’t what I wanted. I didn’t fuck her so she could feel better about herself. I fucked her because I couldn’t imagine a world where I wasn’t inside of her, feeling her, experiencing her.

  This woman was rapidly becoming the center of my goddamned universe and she didn’t even realize it. Worse, telling her would only ruin every chance I had.

  But what if I needed to be fucking comforted?

  My expression twisted. Shay backpedaled, but my disgust didn’t aim for her.

  What the hell was wrong with me? So I got a fucking headache. Since when did I whine about it to the one woman I was trying to impress?

  What did I think would happen? She’d listen? She’d care?

  Shay couldn’t figure her own shit out. I wasn’t dropping mine on her too. Revealing any of my shame would blow my shot with her. I didn’t need her to help me feel better. I wasn’t a damned child.

  Besides, she wasn’t ready to talk to me. Why would I unload on her? Obviously she didn’t trust me yet.

  Christ, that hurt worse than the headache.

  Didn’t matter. She was scared. It wasn’t worth fighting and frightening her more. If she wanted space, she’d get it. If she wanted fucked…

  My cock stirred as she bent to grab her shoes.

  There it was. Back from its fucking slumber.

  That was a scare I didn’t need. The headache pulsed harder, but at least if Shay wanted comfort again, I’d give it. Then maybe she’s realize what a fucking mistake she made by not letting me actually help.

  I surrendered. I needed a nap and a stiff drink. I waved a hand.

  “Have a good time,” I said. “I won’t wait up.”