“I’m just trying to get my head in order,” I said, picking at imaginary lint on my pants.
“Look,” Jeremy said, brushing aside any excuses I might make. “If you were really okay, you’d come by and watch the game with us. It’s Denver-Portland, sure to be a total shit-show.” I laughed.
“I can’t. I’ve got a lot going on here—and man, I just need a shower and a beer, you know?” Jeremy shook his head.
“If you’re really okay, if everything’s all right, you’ll prove it by hanging out with us like always. I’m not the only one over there wondering what happened.” I bit my bottom lip.
“Jeremy, come on. I’m just…I’m tired and shit. That’s all.”
“You’re avoiding us.” Jeremy shrugged. “I don’t know what’s going on with you. I mean, I can sort of figure that it has to do with Jaxon, but that’s all I know. Jax isn’t even going to be there—he’s got a late class. It’ll just be me and the usual guys you always hang out with.” I thought about it for a long moment. Jeremy was right; I had been avoiding them. I’d been avoiding the whole frat house because I didn’t want to have to deal with Jaxon—I didn’t want to run into him, didn’t want to talk about him or to him, didn’t want to think about him.
But I’d missed them. I’d been completely miserable hanging out in the dorms, going straight to class and only hanging out with my roommates. It was so boring—and I thought to myself that if things could just get a little bit closer to back to normal, I would be okay. If I kept avoiding everyone and everything to do with Jaxon, how would I ever get used to him being my brother? I wouldn’t. I needed to relax and hang out with the guys. It would be a good break, and I didn’t even have to worry about running into Jaxon.
“At least let me take a shower first,” I said, grinning. “I’m stinking from practice. No one should have to deal with that.” Jeremy laughed.
“Okay. Get a shower; I’ll hang out here and watch the pre-game commentary and then we’ll walk over to the house and get a few beers in you.”
***
I got a quick shower and changed into a tee shirt and jeans, then Jeremy and I walked across campus together to the frat house. I was tense as we walked through the door—thinking that Jaxon still might be there. But in a matter of moments it was obvious that Jeremy’s offer had been a true one—it would just be me and the guys I always hung out with, nothing more complicated than that. “Mia! Hey guys, our mascot came back to us!” someone joked that they were going to start raiding and searching the other frats to find me—that they were convinced that one of the other groups had abducted me to ransom me back to Phi Kappa, or something like that.
Someone put a beer in my hands and the shit-talking got started almost immediately; everyone was making bets on teams, on individual players, on points and conversions, and I was in the thick of it like I had always been before, laughing and starting to relax.
I hadn’t completely realized just how tense I’d been, just how on edge, until I started to relax. Someone got me another beer and the game started. None of us had a vested interest in either of the teams—no one was a fan—but a game was a game, and just as Jeremy had promised, this one was a total shit-show. I was screaming at the TV right along with them, laughing as the jokes flew back and forth, as everyone got into it. It was so good to be back around the guys I’d been hanging out with so much until things had gotten so weird and screwed up between me and Jaxon.
For the first time in weeks, I was able to completely forget about Jaxon—about him being my stepbrother, about having sex with him. I was surprised at how easy it was; after all, we’d had sex on the same couch I was sitting in the middle of. But I didn’t even really think about it at all. I was so involved in the game, so wrapped up in talking to the guys and having a good time that it didn’t even matter to me what was going on. The best part of all of it was that no one mentioned Jaxon. Everyone either didn’t know or didn’t care—they wanted to hang out with me because I was their friend, I was the girl who could drink with the guys, who liked to watch the game and bitch about the bad calls and make fun of the players.
It was so much fun, and I was getting back to normal before it was even half-time. Everything was exactly the way I’d liked it, and the beer was flowing. If I wasn’t careful, I would end up wandering around campus lost and drunk—but I had to prove that I was just as capable of handling my alcohol as I had always been, and I was more than happy to prove it. Jeremy and Alex argued about which of the women on the cheer and dance teams were the hottest and I threw my vote in; Peter and I argued for a full five minutes about whether something was a foul or a throw. It was just such a relief to be back in the spot I’d occupied, with nothing changed between me and the guys. It was good to have fun, to relax and just enjoy myself without beating my brains bloody thinking about someone I couldn’t have. For a long time I didn’t even think about Jaxon at all—which surprised me when I realized it later. But it was good. It was so good that I stopped paying attention to time, and just let the warm buzz of alcohol and friendly banter wash over me and through me. I couldn’t possibly want anything more.
Chapter Five
I was having such a good time that I didn’t even pay attention to how late it was getting. I should have known better; I should have been at least a little aware of the fact that just because Jaxon had a late class, it didn’t mean that he would be away from the frat house all night. I should have realized that he would eventually come home and that I should be away from the frat before that happened.
But I was so relieved to be thinking of anything but Jaxon for once that I didn’t even consider the possibility of him coming home. It was stupid, but he was a million miles away from my mind. So when he did come home finally, it hit me with a shock like someone dumping a gallon of ice water over me. I didn’t hear the door—I was busy, right next to the guys, shouting at the TV, making fun of the post-show commentary and highlights. There was no way that Jaxon knew I was hanging out either—Jeremy, knowing that there was something between Jaxon and me even if he didn’t know what, definitely wouldn’t have told Jaxon.
“Yo, yo!” the call from the front door, shouted out right before the door closed, sent a jolt through me. For a half-second I told myself it was one of the other upperclassmen getting home from classes, greeting the throng of frat brothers hanging out in the living room—it was exactly the way that any of them greeted the rest when they walked in. But deep down, in spite of my half-second of denial, I recognized Jaxon’s voice. I knew it was him in an instant. The red Solo cup in my hand shifted—I almost dropped it. My heart was pounding in my chest long before I let myself believe who it was.
When Jaxon walked through the hall to the entryway of the living room, any doubt I might have had vanished completely. I realized in a sudden rush that the moment he’d called out to greet whoever was hanging out, everyone around me had gone silent too. Blood flooded into my face as I looked around quickly—every guy sitting around the TV had gone completely quiet. They glanced down at their cups, a few of them glanced at Jaxon, and a few of them glanced at me. I realized that it wasn’t just Jeremy that knew that there was something going on between Jaxon and me. My throat went tight and my mouth went dry.
I wanted nothing more than to run out of the room. This had been a huge, huge mistake. Fuck. But I knew that if I ran away, I could say goodbye to the guys completely; I’d never be able to live down the humiliation of running out of the frat house like a total coward just because Jaxon had shown up. Jaxon’s bright eyes swept across the room and then fell on me, and the blood drained from my face before flooding it again. “Hey, Mia,” he said, smiling slightly.
“Hey, Jaxon,” I replied, somehow managing to keep my voice normal. I felt like I was going to throw up at any moment. Everyone sitting around me suddenly decided to at least pretend to watch TV, to be interested in the post-game commentary. Someone joked that one of the commentators looked like a walking penis, everyone laughed unea
sily. Someone else made a comment about how wrong the other one was about a particular call, and before I knew it, all of the guys couldn’t possibly think of anything more interesting than what was on TV.
I knew that they were still listening, still paying attention to what was going on—the tension in the air wasn’t quite as dense as it had been before, but it still felt thick enough to cut with a knife. I looked at Jaxon; he licked his lips. “Can I talk to you for a second alone, Mia?” he asked, pitching his voice loud enough for me to hear—for anyone to hear—but not loud enough to be obvious.
Shit. Shit. Bad idea. Bad idea. Part of my brain was sounding alarms like the chem lab was on fire; I should not be in a room alone with Jaxon. I should refuse to do it. I should just brush it off to avoid the awkwardness and stay with the guys who had invited me.
But at the same time, I knew it would come to this eventually. We’d absolutely have to deal with each other, one way or another, at some point. I’d been avoiding Jaxon for days and days, and the snowboarding practice had thrown me—in a big way—but I couldn’t honestly tell myself that I could just avoid him for the rest of my life and never be in a room alone with him. After all, our parents were married; even if we could avoid each other on campus, there was no way to never be involved in each other’s lives again. There was winter break, there was spring break, and there would be years and years of more times where we’d have to manage to be around each other.
I shrugged, glancing around me to see how the other guys were reacting. I had a sudden fear; how much had Jaxon actually told them? Who had he told—and who knew about the “situation” just because it was impossible for the frat to keep anything a secret? Did they all know that Jaxon and I had had sex—or was it just that there was something “up” between us, and nothing more? If I went to talk to Jaxon alone, would it be a situation where the moment I left the room they’d be talking about me just like any of the other girls who caught feelings for one of the brothers and came around long after they were no longer welcome?
I couldn’t really imagine them treating me like any other hang-around girl. I mean, Jeremy had invited me, and obviously long before Jaxon had gotten home they’d all known something was up, but they had acted like nothing at all had changed. Until they’d reacted to Jaxon showing up, I hadn’t even known that anyone other than Jeremy knew about it. I was safe. I had a reputation among the guys that had already been in place before Jaxon and I had had anything to do with each other. I took another breath.
“Yeah, sure,” I said, tossing my cup into the nearby trash bin. I stood up on shaky legs, telling myself firmly to stay calm, cool, and composed. If I acted like it wasn’t a big deal, then no one else would feel the need to talk about it.
I noticed as I stepped closer to Jaxon and let him lead the way up the stairs that the room had gone quiet—and then everyone started talking like before. If it’s going to be like this every time Jaxon shows up, what’s the point? I shook my head. If Jaxon and I could sort things out, it would go back to completely normal soon enough.
Jaxon led me through the hall and down to his room, opening the door and throwing his book bag across the floor to land next to his closet before he walked over to the desk and sat down. I almost climbed up onto his bed, the same as I had always done when we’d just been friends, when he’d been tutoring me and nothing was weird between us; but then in a flash I realized that being in or on his bed was the worst possible idea—it wasn’t like either of us needed any encouragement to be attracted or turned on by the other. I leaned against the chest of drawers, feeling uncomfortable and awkward.
In spite of the fact that Jaxon was dressed in regular clothes, in spite of the fact that he was definitely not going down a practice slope, I could feel all the tingling, anticipating feelings I’d had earlier. This was bad. This was a horrible idea. I licked my lips as the silence dragged on between us, feeling my heart beating faster with a mixture of fear and attraction. God, I thought, Jaxon was too hot—I couldn’t resist looking at him, even though I knew it was a terrible idea. I remembered all in a flash what he looked like naked: the rippling muscle under his skin, the way his cock looked, long and heavy and thick, the way his eyes darkened when he looked at me. It wasn’t fair. “So,” I said, clearing my throat to try and get rid of the tight, dry feeling, “you wanted to talk.” I swallowed. It was no good—I could feel my body heating up, I could feel my nipples starting to harden at the memory of Jaxon teasing me, fingering me, licking and sucking me and thrusting hard and fast inside of me. Just the thought of it was enough to make me wet. I had to get this over with.
“I want you,” Jaxon said, blurting it out all at once. He looked at me levelly, his voice flat, only the faintest trace of a smile on his face. “I know it’s fucked up and I shouldn’t, but I do.”
“I know,” I said, clenching my teeth, trying to push down the rising feeling of need that threatened to overwhelm me. “I want you too. Fuck—you have no idea! But we can’t, Jaxon.”
“We could,” he said. “No one here knows about our parents. I’m definitely not going to tell anyone about that stupid shit—are you?” I shrugged. I didn’t really think I would. It was just too weird. “So we could see each other while we’re here on campus. No one’s going to care.” I shook my head.
“We can’t, Jax. I mean, it was hard enough to be around you at Bob’s house and we hadn’t had sex in weeks—we weren’t able to go more than a couple of days without screwing!” I shook my head again. “Imagine how much harder it would be for both of us to have to pretend like everything is fine and dandy and normal and we don’t even see each other that way if we’re seeing each other here.” Jaxon pressed his lips together, looking down at his feet.
“My dad’s oblivious anyway,” he said, smiling hopefully. “And as long as we just give each other space at home…”
“No. Jaxon—if we pulled it off, do you know how it would go? They’d make us spend time alone together and we wouldn’t be able to help ourselves. And then they’d catch us again, and then it would be a big ugly mess again. We can’t do it. You know we can’t.”
“What do you want to do?” Jaxon combed his fingers through his hair, slipping his beanie completely off of his head. It was impossible for me not to notice how good he looked, his hair all mussed. I swallowed and took a deep breath.
“We just have to let it pass,” I said finally. “If we just…if we give each other some space, and time, it’ll go away.” It felt like a lie; but I couldn’t think of anything else to do. I couldn’t deal with having Jaxon as both a brother and a boyfriend—it would just be too much. Too weird. Jaxon looked like he was about to continue arguing; I steeled myself, knowing that it would be hard. That I might have to tell him over and over again and he still might not get it. But the next moment he sighed and groaned, cradling his head in his hands and looking down at the floor for what seemed like five minutes.
“If that’s the way you need it to be—if you think it will work—let’s do it.” He looked up at me, closing his eyes a moment and then opening them again. “You’re right. We can’t do it both ways. At least… at least this way we can still be around each other and our parents won’t flip out.” I laughed.
“Yeah, that’s a silver lining at least.” I fidgeted, picking at something on my shirt sleeve. I hated how I felt, even if I couldn’t really define it. Part of me wanted—so much—to go along with Jaxon’s idea. But it was too easy to see how it would play out. More and more ugliness, more and more stress. It was just better to do it this way. “It’ll be okay,” I said, forcing myself to smile. “You’ll find some sorority hottie and be like ‘Mia who?’ in like, a couple of weeks.”
Jaxon rolled his eyes. “Yeah, sure. I’m all about dating sorority hotties.” He snorted. “I don’t like it—I’m not going to lie. But I know we can’t keep doing this. If this is the answer, that’s what we have to do.” I nodded slowly. I didn’t like it any more than he did—but it was one way, ma
ybe the only way, out of the situation we were in. “Go on downstairs before they come up to find out if we’re trashing the room fighting.”
I rolled my eyes. “Game like the one that was just on? I’m sure they’re all way too busy trashing the teams and not worrying about us. But yeah…I’ll see you around, I guess.”
Jaxon shrugged. “I’ll be around. You know. Can’t be a hermit or whatever.”
“I’ll be around, too.” I wanted to leave but I couldn’t quite make myself do it for a long moment. I decided the only thing to do was to force myself to turn around and just walk out of the room. It felt like someone was hammering nails into my feet, but I turned to the door and I put one foot in front of the other, and in a few seconds, I was out of the room and on my way down the stairs.
Chapter Six
When I went back into the living room, I expected it to be awkward; but I made myself just walk in as if nothing had happened, and asked no one in particular, “What’d I miss?” and everything was—shockingly—completely normal. One of the guys was ragging another about his team, the TV was showing the highlights from a wrestling competition earlier in the day, and someone put another beer in my hands. After the conversation with Jaxon, I needed it.
I kept waiting for the awkward moment to happen—for Jaxon to come down from upstairs and everyone to go quiet again, and the whole situation to unravel. But by the time Jaxon did finally make an appearance—just for a second, to ask what was on while he made his way to the kitchen for a beer—I’d relaxed enough that it didn’t even phase me. I was just happy to be with my friends, happy to have the conversation behind me, happy not to be thinking about the whole stupid mess for a few minutes out of the day.
Jaxon disappeared just as quickly as he showed up, and I had to wonder why he was making such a big deal about giving me space. We’d managed to be in a room—in his bedroom, no less—alone together, without tearing each other’s clothes off, and in spite of the fact that we both knew we were into each other, we’d come to the conclusion to just be brother and sister. We’d done really well; why was Jaxon hiding?
Stepbrother JEEZ! (The Stepbrother Romance Series - Book #4) Page 3