Forbidden Touch: A Second Chance Stepbrother Romance

by Rye Hart

  “Where have you been?” he asked. “We're getting ready for the speeches now.”

  “Sorry, I slipped away to talk to Carter earlier, and then Dylan pulled me aside.”

  “Good work on your stepbrother by the way. I'm impressed,” Dad said, patting me on the back. “Looks like your influence did him well.”

  He thought Carter's cleaner, more put together look was because of me. But honestly, since the night we had sex at the club, I'd tried to keep my distance from him. I needed time and space to think. To figure things out. And being around Carter always clouded my judgment as well as my emotions.

  I excused myself from Dylan's side to take my place on stage. It was then, while I was front and center, that I saw Carter. His tie was removed, his shirt unbuttoned a bit and he was drinking straight from a bottle of Scotch. Jorge Gomez's granddaughter, Sofia, was at his side. His arm was around the woman's waist and the two of them were leaning close together, laughing at something.

  My cheeks burned red as I tried to focus on my speech while my mind was racing, trying to find a way to stop the disaster before it started. But it was with a yawning chasm in my stomach and a deep, dark sense of foreboding, that I realized it was already too late.

  “What the hell is he doing?” my Dad whispered in my ear. “I thought you'd talked to him about getting his shit together.”

  Before I could say anything, let alone defend myself, my father had already summoned security to escort Carter out. I stayed where I was on stage and watched as Chuck and a few other large guys in suits approached him. Carter watched them coming, a look of agitation on his face. He took another long swig from his bottle and then turned and stared up at me, and for a moment, I looked back at him, trying to apologize with my eyes. And he gave me a brief smile that made me think I could fix things, and make things alright between us again.

  I walked off the stage, stepping toward him, just as Dylan stepped up and put an arm around Carter's shoulder, smiling, talking, and obviously trying to calm him down. But Carter being who he was, swung at Dylan and hit him in the face with a closed fist. The sound of his fist connecting with Dylan's nose was loud enough that I heard it from where I was.

  Dylan doubled over, clutching his nose with his hands, blood squeezing out from between his fingers. I hurried over to Carter and Dylan, torn between who to go to, as Carter looked at me and screamed, his face a mask of absolute rage.

  “Everyone in this family is a joke!” he yelled. “Fucking fake ass people!”

  He looked me dead in the eye as he said those words, and I felt my heart shatter into a million tiny pieces. I knew, in that moment, that Carter wasn't capable of changing. He was who he was and he wasn't willing to change that. I realized that this had nothing to do with me, and everything to do with him. In that moment, even though my heart was shattered, I was sad for him.

  “You need help, Carter,” I sobbed, not even bothering to cover my tears. “You need more help than even I can give you.”

  Chuck and the bodyguards had managed to get ahold of him and they dragged him away. I watched as the front doors closed, and he was gone. Standing there, looking at those closed doors, I'd never felt so alone in my entire life. Even though I was surrounded by people, I was absolutely and utterly alone. No one here could possibly understand the pain I was going through in that moment. No one could understand the broken heart I was enduring. Nobody could ever understand what Carter had meant to me.

  Not even Carter seemed to understand that.

  ooo000ooo

  Amy was more than happy to comfort me as I cried on her shoulder that later evening. We had wine and ice cream – more of both than I probably should have – and she let me talk, cry, rage, and rail. Most importantly, she didn't judge me for feeling the way I did.

  “I can't believe I slept with him. Again. I'm so weak,” I sobbed. “He's never going to change. I should have known that. I should have fucking known that. I'm such a goddamn idiot.”

  “Hush,” she said. “Give it a few days and then maybe try to talk to him again. He might just need a minute to calm down.”

  “I can't,” I said, wiping my nose and sniffing loudly. “I'm too weak. I want to sleep with him, even though I know it's a terrible idea. Worse than a terrible idea.”

  As soon as we were in the same room together, we'd naturally flirt and that eventually led us down a dangerous path. As I sat there, sobbing in my wine and ice cream with Amy, I knew that I wanted him still – even after his stupid little temper tantrum.

  “That's love for ya, chica,” Amy said softly.

  I snorted. “I don't love him. Not like that.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Girl, you've loved him from the moment you laid eyes on him. Even back in school when he drove you batshit crazy, it was always 'Carter this' and 'Carter that'. He's all you could talk about, and even when your families came together, that feeling didn't just go away. And if you're telling yourself that, you're straight lying to yourself – and that's never a good thing.”

  “I can’t keep going like this, Amy. It’s killing me,” I said. My phone rang, and Amy picked it up and looked at the caller.

  “It's Dylan,” she said, rolling her eyes and preparing to cancel the call.

  “No, I need to talk to him,” I said. “I need to apologize for what happened at the gala.”

  “Why? You didn't break his nose, Carter,” Amy said.

  I took the phone and answered, trying not to sound as if I'd been crying.

  “Hey, Dylan,” I said. “How are you doing? I hope you're okay?”

  “I'm fine,” he said. “My nose will heal.”

  I cringed remembering the way he looked after we'd cleaned up all the blood. He was a mess. Eyes blackened and bloodshot, his cheeks red and swollen. His perfectly symmetrical face might not be so perfect anymore. At least, not until he got a nose job to correct the damage left by my stepbrother.

  “Listen, I'm really sorry about that. Sorry about Carter,” I said. “I really don't know what got into him and he was obviously out of line.”

  “He was drunk, tensions were high,” Dylan said. “I'm pretty sure he didn't even realize who he was hitting.”

  It looked pretty intentional to me and I think he knew exactly who he was throwing a punch at. But I kept that to myself. I saw no need to throw more gasoline on the fire.

  “Anyway, I was wondering if you'd want to get together for dinner?” he asked. “Just to talk, of course.”

  My stomach dropped. I liked Dylan well enough as a friend and valued him as a strategist. I knew he could do wonders for my career, but I had no interest in dating him. I looked at Amy, biting my lip, and as if she knew what he'd asked me, she mouthed “NO” over and over again, shaking her head aggressively.

  “Uhh – ” I stammered.

  “Just to talk about your career, I mean,” he said. “Nothing too personal, I promise. I just want to help you. I think that together, you and I can accomplish some pretty big things, Vanessa.”

  “Ummm, yeah, okay – ” I said after a long while. “That sounds good. Just tell me when and where and I'll be there. ”

  Amy frowned at me. “You’re going on a date with the guy? Seriously, Vanessa, you are in no shape to date anybody right now. You need to get your head right about Carter first.”

  “He said he wanted to get together to talk about my political career,” I said. “It's not a date.”

  “Sure, yeah. That's what they all say,” Amy said, rolling her eyes. “Girl, you just might be more messed up than I am.”

  “You think so?” I teased. “You're pretty messed up – you're still not over your third grade boyfriend.”

  “Because he's an underwear model now, duh,” Amy said with a laugh. “He looks nothing like he did in elementary school. Trust me on that.”

  “It's still messed up,” I said.

  “Yeah, maybe a little,” she said, popping a spoonful of Ben and Jerry's in her mouth.

  CHAPTER TEN
- CARTER

  Sofia Gomez was still all over me – even after what went down at the fundraiser. I had no idea why she was there or why her father was a guest of honor or whatever it was Vanessa had called him. But whatever it was, she kept calling me nonstop. I would usually avoid her calls, choosing to drink myself into oblivion, all alone in my penthouse. But even that wasn't enough to deter her and she continued blowing up my phone at all hours of the night.

  So when my phone rang, I assumed it was her and rolled my eyes. I planned to cancel the call, but when I looked at my phone, I noticed it was a different number on the caller ID – one I didn't recognize. The curiosity got the best of me, so I picked up the call.

  “Hey Carter?” a vaguely familiar voice said on the other end of the phone.

  “Yeah? Who's this?” I asked.

  “Uh, well, it's Amy,” the woman's voice said. “I'm Vanessa's best friend.”

  “Holy shit, I remember you,” I said, my head pounding, still reeling from my hangover. “Long time. What's up?”

  “You care about Vanessa, don't you?” she asked bluntly, cutting right through the small talk.

  “Of course,” I said. “Not that it matters. She's made her position pretty clear.”

  “Well, she cares for you too,” Amy said. “And you need to do something, dude. Seriously, if you keep this up, you're going to lose her and I don't want my best friend to end up with a dick like Dylan Montgomery. She loves you and you need to get your shit together.”

  Hearing his name filled me with rage, and an overwhelming sense of resignation.

  “Not much I can do about it,” I said. “She seemed pretty into him when I saw them together at that stupid fundraiser the other night.”

  “Yeah, well maybe there is something you can do. And if you can get your shit together for five minutes, I'm willing to help,” Amy said. “But please, whatever you do, don't tell Vanessa I called you. This is totally confidential. When I tell you what I tell you, you have got to pretend like you ran into her randomly, got it?”

  I was confused as all hell, but I agreed.

  “And if I find out you told her that I told you,” Amy said, trying to make her voice low and menacing, “I'll come over to your place, cut your pecker off, and throw it down the garbage disposal. You got me?”

  “Yeah, I got you,” I said, not even close to understanding what she was going on about or why she was threatening me.

  “Fine. She's meeting Dylan this evening for dinner at Moscato,” she said. “She's totally not interested in him, but he's told her he just wants to talk about her career and she bought it.”

  “Just like her father,” I said. “A relationship not of love and feeling, but of political expediency.”

  “Exactly,” Amy said. “And we can both agree that she deserves better than that, right?”

  “Yeah,” I said simply.

  “Good. Then I need you to stop being an absolute shithead and be the Carter we knew back in high school,” she said. “You need to stop taking no for an answer.”

  “What are you – ”

  “I'm saying you need to win her back, Carter,” Amy said. “Because I know she loves you, even if she won't admit it out loud. But you screwed up, buddy. And you're going to have to bust your balls to win her back. But you have a window to do that.”

  My heart raced as she spoke. No one knew Vanessa like Amy did. If she was telling me there was a chance, I had to believe that there was. I sat up in my bed and as the cobwebs in my head started to drift away and a surge of adrenaline rushed through me, I wrote down the time and the address and promised Amy I'd try to stop the date.

  “And don't punch the guy again, please?” Amy said. “Because while that sadistic rage thing might be sexy in the movies, it's a turn off in real life. Believe me.”

  She hung up and I was even more confused than ever. I sat back and looked at my phone, wondering if I'd fallen down the rabbit hole. Had I dreamt that entire conversation?

  Looking at the clock, I realized I had a little less than hour to make myself presentable. For the first time in days, I cleaned myself up, showered, shaved and even put on nice clothes. I looked at myself in the mirror and felt a wave of doubt and self-consciousness come crashing down over me. I took a deep breath and tried to stuff it all back down. I had to do this. For me. And for Vanessa.

  It was now or never, and if Amy thought I had a chance – why the hell should I not roll the dice and try to make it work with Vanessa?

  ooo000ooo

  Not wanting to be too obvious, I picked up Sofia and brought her along with me, pretending we were on a romantic date. As the host took us to our seats, I saw Dylan and Vanessa sitting huddled closely together at a nearby table. Seeing them look so cozy again, I felt the wave of anger welling up within me, and I had to fight to keep it in check.

  Vanessa hadn't seen me, not yet, but Dylan had. He looked over at me, a look of mild surprise on his face and then turned, and said something to Vanessa. She turned around, eyes wide and fixed on me as Sofia and I took our seats. She said something to Dylan and shook her head vigorously, the expression on her face darkening. I had no idea what she was saying, but I knew it wasn't good news for me.

  It was Dylan who stood up and walked over to us, which surprised me.

  I stood up and felt my body tense. I was half expecting him to return the favor from the other night, be instead, he took my hand and shook it, a smile on his face – a genuine smile. Surprised by how friendly he was being after I'd broken his nose – which was bandaged and slightly crooked – I didn't know what to say. I was more than a bit taken aback, to say the least.

  “Hey, Carter,” he said. “We meet again; hopefully on better terms this time.”

  Vanessa walked up behind Dylan and just stared at me, a blank look on her face. She looked over at Sofia and I watched as her eyes fell. There was a look on her face that was not just sad, but heartbroken.

  “I'm sorry about the other night. And about the broken nose,” I said, cringing. “I appreciate you not pressing charges. It was just a bad night. And I genuinely apologize for my behavior.”

  “Water under the bridge,” Dylan said, shrugging it off. “I could see you were stressed, I didn't take it personally. I probably shouldn't have put myself in the line of fire like that.”

  Yeah, well maybe you should have taken it personally, I thought to myself. But I held my tongue for Vanessa's sake. I hated seeing her with him. And the more I saw them together, the more I hated it. The more I realized that she didn't belong with him – she belonged with me.

  Vanessa was wearing a wrap dress that pulled in her tiny waist, and she looked fantastic as usual.

  “You're looking beautiful tonight, Vanessa,” I said, finding that I couldn't meet her eyes. “I'm sorry I missed your speech the other night, I'm sure it was great.”

  “There was no speech after you left,” she said, her voice cold. “Most everybody started to leave, in fact. Watching somebody assault an innocent man tends to have a chilling effect on a party.”

  “Oh, I'm sorry,” I said. “I didn't know.”

  There was an awkward silence as the two of us stared at each other. There was no much I wanted to say to her, but seeing her there with Dylan – a man better suited for her than I ever would be by every measure – made it difficult. The silence between us was growing progressively more strained and awkward. But, it was Dylan who finally filled it.

  “Why don't you and Sofia join us,” Dylan said. “I've never really had an opportunity to speak with Ms. Gomez, though I admire your grandfather's work regarding immigration reform. And I've heard you're following in his footsteps?”

  I looked over at the beautiful Sofia who beamed proudly and nodded. “Yes, sir,” she said. “I hope to one day run the organization, once my grandfather steps down, that is.”

  “Excellent. I'm sure you'll work wonders and continue to do his good work,” Dylan said, motioning for us to follow him to their table. “Well
then, I think we all have common interests, join us. Please.”

  Vanessa put a hand on his shoulder and said, “Perhaps they'd rather enjoy their date alone,” she said.

  “No, I'm good with joining you,” I said a little too quickly. “How about you, Sofia?”

  She seemed game as well, and even though Vanessa looked uncertain, she sighed and didn't fight it any longer. We sat down at their table, and I found Dylan to be a lot nicer than I imagined him to be. He was very social, and obviously forgave me for punching him.

  “So Carter, your stepsister and I were just talking about her political aspirations,” he said. “And maybe it's serendipitous that you showed up tonight. The reason I'm glad you joined us is because I know she's going to need her family's support over the next few years. Running for Congress is a huge step – ”

  “You're running for Congress?” I asked, nearly choking on my water.

  “Dylan thinks I should,” she said. “And truthfully, it's been on my mind for a while, I guess I just needed the push to make it happen.”

  “Wow, I'm impressed,” I said. “Congrats, Vanessa. I always knew you'd be going places someday.”

  The more I listened to her and Dylan talk, the more I realized that maybe I was making a mistake by intruding on their conversation. Maybe Amy was wrong about all of this. It sounded like Dylan could probably make all of Vanessa's dreams come true. And she seemed genuinely excited about it.

  While Sofia and Dylan talked about immigration reform, I couldn't stop myself from stealing glimpses of Vanessa. She was also looking over at me, cautiously, and every now and then she'd give me a soft, heartfelt smile.

  “Excuse me, I have to use the restroom,” she said, slipping out from her seat.

  I watched as she walked away, her tight little ass swishing with every step, her long hair flowing behind her. I felt my body yearning for her. More than that though, my heart yearned for her.