Shackled: A Stepbrother Romance Novel

by Arabella Abbing

  I couldn’t help but to smile as she accepted the crown with an ecstatic grin.

  This is how it should have been.

  I nearly began to clap for her until the microphone stand faded away and a desk appeared in its place—looking suspiciously familiar although I couldn’t figure out why. Fiona straightened her crown before demurely sitting down on top of the desk—then spread her legs wide as Chuck moved to stand between them.

  Oh, fuck no. No, no, no!

  I pushed myself through the crowd of faceless people, watching in horror as their clothing melted away like the microphone had and Chuck pushed himself inside of her.

  I roared in outrage when I finally reached the stage—moving to jump up and pull him off her when Clarissa gripped me from behind and yanked me back down. Two faceless guys each took hold of my biceps, leaving me no other option than to watch Chuck screwing Fiona on the very same desk that I had fucked Clarissa on.

  There was a cry from somewhere behind me, followed by a maniacal giggle. I turned to see Clarissa laughing as she pointed at the show on stage, then turned further to find Fiona—the real Fiona from that night—looking at me with tears in her eyes.

  “How’s it feel?”

  The crowd of people erupted in cheers before I could speak and I turned back just in time to realize that Chuck had pulled out for the money shot. I closed my eyes for a moment before turning back around, the real Fiona nowhere to be found.

  “Like a knife to the heart,” I whispered to the empty spot she had been standing in.

  * * *

  Awakening from the nightmare was a surprisingly gentle experience—my eyes flew open and my body tensed as my heart thud wildly against my chest.

  Just a dream, just a dream, just a…

  I instantly relaxed when I felt heat pressing against my chest and snuggled closer to it. Something in the back of my mind warned me that the source of my comfort was Fiona—a likely hostile Fiona, at that—but I couldn’t bring myself to care. Not after the dream I’d just endured.

  Fucking hell, that was torture.

  I tightened my arms where I had locked them around her waist and buried my face against her hair, taking a deep breath and smiling at the scent of her.

  God, I had missed her.

  The more awake I got, the more aware I became of her movements and mumbling, which was nothing new for Fiona. She muttered something angrily in her sleep, and then pressed backwards into me.

  I wasn’t thinking fast enough to stifle the groan as her ass ground directly against my morning wood and within seconds, I felt her body go stiff in my arms. She was obviously awake and very much aware of exactly what was pressing against her backside.

  Deciding not to take the coward’s way out this time by feigning sleep, I sleepily murmured, “Good morning.”

  She didn’t say anything right away, but her body relaxed a fraction and a small smile formed on my lips. Maybe last night had put us one step closer to getting back on good terms.

  “Morning.”

  “Sleep well?” I asked, knowing that I was pushing my luck but hoping for the best.

  “No.”

  Oh, well. Was worth a shot.

  “Need the bathroom?”

  There was a short pause, then—

  “Yes, please.”

  I grumbled a little and relaxed my arms, stifling a sigh of disappointment when she immediately rolled away and stood beside the bed. I rolled over as well, the sound of the chain rattling yet another reminder of the fact that nothing was right between us.

  Even after my apology last night, it wasn’t enough. Not that I really expected it to be.

  As I waited for her outside the bathroom, I considered the only other confession I had left to give. She obviously didn’t want a full blow-by-blow explanation of what had happened on prom night, but there was something else I could tell her if she’d give me the chance.

  But that wasn’t something I was willing to whisper into the darkness and hope she could hear the honesty in my voice. That was something that required the right moment.

  The sink in the bathroom turned off and she came bursting out, staring down at the floor as she muttered, “Your turn.”

  As I walked into the bathroom, I took a glance back at her miserable face and wondered if we would run out of time before I found the moment I needed.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Fiona

  Waking up in Jonathan’s arms was like something out of a dream.

  Or a nightmare, depending on which day you asked me.

  He was holding me tightly against his chest, the warmth radiating through my whole body and making me feel weirdly safe.

  Which was pretty ironic, considering I trusted Jonathan about as far as I could throw him at this point. Still, there was something to be said about being in the arms of someone you love.

  Loved.

  Another thing that entirely depended on the day I was asked.

  Today, it was pretty clear that my heart was already starting to come back around and warm up to him. Not that I was planning to let it happen without a fight. Even though I had been able to hear genuine regret in his apology and I was beginning to consider forgiving him, I didn’t think it was possible for me to ever truly forget the heartache he’d caused me.

  How could I ever be with him without worrying that history would repeat itself? He admitted himself that screwing things up was what he was best at. We had been friends for over a decade when he hurt me the first time. Why would it be any different if we were romantically involved?

  My biggest fear in letting him back into my life and my heart was that I would constantly be second-guessing every word he said, always waiting for the next betrayal. Could I really live like that? Just waiting for the day that he got bored and walked away?

  I didn’t know if I could, but I knew I didn’t want to. I deserved better than that.

  “Breakfast?” he asked after coming out of the bathroom with a small, almost bashful smile on his face.

  I nodded and followed him to the kitchen, sitting down while he went searching for something for us to eat. I watched as he dashed around the room, the tether between us jangling with every move he made. While his back was turned, I allowed my eyes to trail over his bare torso and an idea came to life in my head.

  Would it really be so wrong of me to push past my issues and sleep with him just this once, while I still had the chance? Because even if I could bring myself to forget what he had done, our parents were about to get married. Surely, he knew as well as I did that nothing serious could ever happen between us now.

  And I knew Jonathan well enough to know that he’d likely be up for some fun of the tension-relieving variety. Especially given what we had almost done last night. I still didn’t know where the strength to push him away had come from, but now a small part of me was wishing that I hadn’t.

  Maybe sleeping with him would be exactly what I needed to get him out of my system once and for all. Or maybe if I gave him what he wanted, he would lose interest and leave me alone. Let me out of this damn shackle so I could call Brenda and go.

  The uncertainty of my future was still weighing heavily on my mind and the sooner I got back into town and started applying for jobs, the better. Even if ditching Jonathan at the cabin raised my mom’s ire, getting a job should help calm her back down. I hoped.

  So surely I could sacrifice my body just one time for that greater good. Not that I could really consider sleeping with him a sacrifice. Despite all the problems between us, I could at least admit to myself that I did want him.

  The more I thought about it, the better my idea started to sound.

  “Toast good with you? There’s peanut butter.”

  I snapped back to reality, looking up to find him looking at me with a tilted head and a questioning smile. I swallowed hard and shook the thought of jumping him right now out of my head.

  Seducing him likely wouldn’t be a problem, but I wanted to wait until the
right moment. In the meantime—

  “Toast sounds great.”

  Jonathan beamed at me and I felt myself automatically smiling back. That in itself was alarming, but I shoved the nagging doubts to the side. My plan was going to work.

  It had to.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Jonathan

  I had no idea what happened between waking up and breakfast, but something had definitely changed in Fiona during that time.

  For the rest of the day, things between us were oddly normal. We weren’t nearly as friendly as we had been in the past, but I could sense her trying to get us back to that point. Her smiles came easier and she even cracked a few jokes, mostly ones at my expense. Not that I really minded.

  The only problem was—it seemed like she was trying to get us back to way back when.

  Back before she had feelings for me.

  Back before I had them for her.

  She was pointedly ignoring the elephant in the room while I was searching for the right moment to address it. It was making things… well, awkward would be a bit of an understatement. Despite it, the day wasn’t entirely unpleasant. It was nice to hear her laugh again, even if it was slightly stilted.

  “You want to watch another movie?” I asked as the credits began to roll.

  I stood up and moved to the entertainment center to switch the DVD to whatever she wanted to see, shaking my head to myself when I realized I couldn’t even recall what we had just watched. I had been too caught up with watching her.

  She shook her head and leaned back into the couch, propping her feet up on the coffee table and giving me an excellent view of her bare legs. I tried hard not to look between them as her knees drifted slightly apart, but even with my good intentions, my eyes still caught a flash of red up her skirt and my dick twitched in my jeans at the sight.

  It almost felt like she was teasing me on purpose, but something in my gut told me it was more than that. That she was playing at something. I just couldn’t for the life of me fathom what it could possibly be.

  It was making me fucking crazy.

  “What I want is to take a shower, but…” She trailed off, lifting her wrist and letting the rest go unsaid.

  Of course, my mind immediately pictured what it’d be like to lean against the sink and watch as she showered, much like I had watched her both this morning and last night when she changed her shirt. Just imaging her soapy hands gliding over her body was enough to get my dick on board with the idea, but I wasn’t willing to risk another slap in the face by telling her that.

  “You smell pretty good to me,” I said casually as I remembered how good her hair had smelled this morning.

  She giggled—legitimately fucking giggled—and that was a sound I couldn’t ever recall hearing from her. It was that womanly giggle that was typically reserved for teasing in the bedroom, and damn it if that sound wasn’t enough to get my motor running.

  Even as the logical part of my brain warned me that there was definitely a game being played here that I wasn’t catching on to.

  “It’s getting late,” she noted, tilting her head to the front window and the darkness outside. “Bedtime?”

  “If you’re tired,” I agreed with a shrug, mentally going back through our day and frantically searching for any other red flags in her behavior.

  She stood up and giggled again, alarm bells ringing loudly in my head as she slowly began backing towards the bedroom while gripping the chain between us and acting as if she was dragging me there.

  As if she had to drag me anywhere. I’d follow her willingly. But I played along and dutifully unlocked her shackle when she presented it to me after we got to her bedroom.

  The last thing I expected was for her to pull her top off while she was still within grabbing distance, then unhook her bra and push down her skirt right after. She was left standing before me in only a tiny pair of lacy red underwear, ones that would have made my mouth water if I could’ve managed to drag my eyes away from her tits.

  “It’s hot in here,” she said with a shrug before lifting her wrist within my line of vision. “I’m just going to sleep like this tonight.”

  “You sure you want to do that?” I asked even as I absentmindedly clasped the steel around her wrist and snapped it shut.

  “Absolutely.”

  I chanced a look into her eyes and what I saw there floored me. She had been playing at something, and I’d finally figured it out. Or at least I thought I did.

  If I had been a smarter man, I probably wouldn’t have taken the bait. But the way she bit her bottom lip and widened her eyes was more than enough to weaken the last remaining shreds of self-control I had left. Before I even realized what I was doing, I dug my fingers into the soft flesh of her hips and pulled her body flush against mine.“If that’s what you want.”

  “You’re what I want.”

  Fucking hell.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Fiona

  I could feel the warning signs the moment our lips met again. Hell, if I was being honest with myself, I’d felt them long before I took my top off.

  They’d started somewhere after breakfast, as his smiles had gotten bigger and more relieved and my own became devious and teasing. The way he’d looked at me at dinner was the most alarming part of the day—after my subtle teasing and fluttering eyelashes, I had caught him frowning at me, searching my face for signs of foul play.

  Like he knew I was playing a game.

  Like it wasn’t a game for him.

  That was the most nerve-wracking part.

  And now, as he kissed me like he was a man dying of thirst and I was the finest-tasting drink that had ever touched his lips, the warning signs became big freaking bells, ringing loudly and telling me that this was a terrible idea. There was no way this was going to end well. It was way too big of a risk to take with my heart.

  Jonathan pulled away, breathing heavily while he pressed his forehead to mine. I wasn’t surprised to feel my own breath coming out in pants, my lips still tingling from the delicious pressure.

  “I want you so much,” he murmured, dragging his lips softly down my cheek and jaw until he reached my neck. The resistance that was growing in me weakened when he began pressing light kisses all over my skin, pausing to nibble at all the spots that made my breath catch in my throat. “You’re so fucking beautiful. You know that, right?”

  “Jonathan…” I whispered, something between a whimper and a sigh quickly following it. Despite the internal war that was going on in my head, I still craned my head back to give him better access.

  The chain jingled noisily as he lightly ran the pads of his fingers down my sides, goosebumps breaking out on my flesh from the light touch. The kisses on my neck turned into sucking and biting as his fingers came back up to ghost around the undersides of my breasts.

  Without thinking, I arched my back, trying to press myself into his palms. When he began to pull away, I reached up and curled my arms around his neck and desperately pleaded, “Please don’t stop.”

  Jonathan chuckled and shook his head. “I’m not, baby. Hold up.”

  He gently untangled my arms from around him and reached for the key, unhooking both of our cuffs before letting the metal fall to the floor with a loud clatter. We looked up at each other at the same time and I could see the wariness in his gaze.

  “You won’t run away from me?”

  “I won’t,” I promised, cursing the way my voice wavered.

  He smiled then, the corners of his eyes crinkling for a moment before it faded away behind the desire. He circled his arms loosely around my waist and walked slowly forward, easing me back until my thighs hit the edge of the bed. Once there, he lifted me up and playfully tossed me on the bed, grinning when I laughed.

  His eyes stayed locked with mine as he gripped my hips and pulled until my ass was on the edge of the bed, then slowly kneeled down until his face was hidden from my view. I propped myself up just in time to watch as he nuzzled my i
nner thigh, pressing a light kiss there before he sloppily licked at the damp center of my panties.

  Oh my fuck.

  I squealed with pleasure when he yanked them to the side and licked up my slit—all thoughts about why this was a bad idea leaving my head instantly. He sought out my clit with his tongue, swiping over it again and again until I couldn’t help but to clench my thighs around his head and drop back, calling out his name to the ceiling while he brought me to the edge and abruptly stopped.

  “No, no, no,” I whimpered, reaching to twist my fingers in his hair and hold him in place. “Please don’t stop.”

  The low chuckle against my core was like torture—pleasant in sensation but nowhere near enough to bring me back to the edge.

  “You want me to make you come?” he asked, moving his hands to tug at the underwear on my hips. I lifted up enough for him to get them down, sighing when he trailed kisses all the way down my left leg, then up my right. “Tell me.”

  I nearly rolled my eyes, wondering why on earth I’d thought he’d be anything other than commanding in the bedroom when I knew he was the same way out of it. I could feel myself blushing, but my need won out over my embarrassment.

  “Yes, I want you to make me come. Please.”

  “Tell me how.”

  I growled in frustration and ground my teeth together when I heard him chuckle. He was working his way up my body, stopping at my chest to kiss everywhere except my tight nipples.

  “You’re such a tease,” I whispered.

  “Me? And what would you call what you’ve been doing to me all day?” he asked, amusement coloring his voice before he took a nipple between his lips and sucked.