by A. J. Moran
Royal Pain
A Step Brother Romance
A.J. Moran
Copyright © 2021 A.J. Moran
All rights reserved
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Cover design by: A.J. Moran
Printed in the United States of America
This book is dedicated to my sister, who taught me so many lessons in life and was my best friend. R.I.P. I know you would have loved this book and supported me a million times over in reaching for my dreams. I wish we had more time in this life together. But what we did have I treasure. 'In my heart there rings a Melody.'
Chapter 1
Marcus
Mom had just dropped a bombshell on us. She had fallen in love with the guy she was dating, and they were moving in together. The ‘they' included us too, my brother and me. Wade sat back in his chair and tossed his napkin onto his half-eaten plate of food. I glanced over at him and watched as a vein popped out on his jawline as he clenched his teeth. I looked back at our mom’s hopeful expression and tried to smile at her.
“Well… uh…” I couldn’t find the words they clogged my throat and closed it off.
I was happy for her. Wasn’t I? She couldn’t grieve forever. Right? The therapist had helped me along with that when my mom first mentioned she was dating someone. It had been tough for us to take. Wade still sometimes struggled with it. But the guy wasn't horrible, and he treated our mom great. Moving in together though—I couldn't wrap my head around it. Wasn't it a little fast? They had only been dating for a few months. Three tops.
“Isn’t it a little soon? You don’t want to rush it do you?”
“Marcus-“ she let out a disappointed sigh as her hand ran through her hair and I wanted to take my questions back.
She deserved to be happy. I wanted her to be happy. We all lost Dad. Some of us were guiltier of that loss than others, although my therapist keeps trying to tell me that it was no one's fault, I still don't buy it. My mom was innocent in all of this either way though. I had to support her. We had to support her. I looked over to my stoned faced brother and nudged him with my sneaker under the table. He looked up at me, and I gave him a look I knew he could read, it said let's do this, and then I looked back over at mom with determination.
"It's okay mom. We want you to be happy. If this is what you want, then we will support you. But if he hurts you… or you decided you're not happy anymore then we need to move on." A watery smile from my mom cemented my words. We can't turn back now. I swallowed back any more words and pasted on a smile that wasn't 100% fake, maybe only 60% fake tops.
“Yeah…uh… we want you to be happy.” Wade echoed me after I hit him with my heel under the table and gave him another ‘encouraging’ look. He would adjust. It would be fine.
"Thanks, boys. I knew I could count on you. I know this change might be challenging. You'll have to start at the private school his daughter goes to. But she is your age too so she should help you adjust. I've heard so much about her. She sounds like a doll, although she has been going through a rough time with losing her mom. I'm sure it will be an adjustment for all of you. You both supporting my decision means a lot to me. It means so much to me." Her face lit up with her happiness.
"What's her name?" Wade perked up at the mention of a daughter. I snickered at him. He was such a player. He wouldn't be able to play someone we were living with, but that wasn't a conversation I was having with him in front of mom. She would drag us both out of this restaurant by our ears.
“Her name is Taylor. She is 17—or she might be 18 now. She’s planning on going to Stanford for college. At least that’s what Dan said. So she is pretty intelligent too.”
Mom had always wanted a girl, so I was sure she was going to be in heaven this year if they grew close and she got to do the girly stuff with her. Not that she'd want to replace what she lost or anything. That wasn't my mom.
“When do we meet her?” Wade leaned forward his arms resting on either side of his unfinished meal. Mom had his full attention. She should have led with that fact. Leaning back in my chair, I reach for my soda to cover up a grin that was currently spreading across my face.
I can't wait to see the look on his face if she turns out to not be what he was expecting. Wade had a type as much as I did. He liked them tall and curvy. I was more into the more in-depth stuff, like personality.
Gasp.
But that didn’t mean I didn’t like to have fun while I was looking. I wasn’t looking to settle down right now. College was right around the corner, and I had other things to think about.
“A week from next Friday. Dan has invited us over for dinner. It will be fun.” Her gray eyes twinkled with her excitement. At least I had a little over a week to adjust to the idea of meeting Dan’s daughter. And to the fact that probably sometime soon we would be cohabitating with each other. “We will be starting to move our stuff the Saturday morning after our dinner.” She added as if that wasn’t the most important news of all.
“Less than two weeks?” The words burst from me in a croak before I could bite my tongue to hold them in. So much for making her think I was 100% behind her on this.
“Mom, come on.” Wade followed up my outburst with his own and slumped back in his chair crossing his arms over his chest.
Bewildered mom looked between us, a slight crease between her eyebrows and a small frown turning down the sides of her lips. Great. We hurt her all over again. Damage control. Stat.
"It is just really fast. How long ago did you decide to do this?" How long did she keep it from us? I said the words softly so as not to add more hurt to her face. Wade looked across the restaurant and clenched his jaw again. I wasn't going to get his support this time. "It is going to be okay mom. We just need to adjust to the idea. That's all." I promised her. A soft smile played on the edges of her mouth, and the twinkle started to glimmer a little bit again.
“Oh honey,” her hand rubbed the back of mine, “I know. I wish I had told you sooner. It’s just we weren’t sure how fast it was all going to happen. We thought there might be a little more time to break you into the idea. But everything fell into place so quickly. It just feels right.”
Her warm look shot our way made the remainder of my questions dry up. They weren't that important. It didn’t matter that football season was just starting and it was my year for the scouts. It didn’t matter that I had all the classes that I needed to get into the right school. None of it mattered. If I needed to pay this price for her happiness I would, I knew best that I was the one to take it away from her before.
My lips tilt to return her smile, and I respond with her favorite quote, "You do always say everything happens for a reason.”
Wade exhaled and shot me a death glare. He expected me to be with him on this. But I was the reason we were in this situation in the first place. I was the reason my dad was dead and not here. I was the reason our family was no longer complete. The reason our mom had found love with another man.
◆◆◆
“Look we need to support mom in this.” I looked towards Wade as soon as our bedroom door shut behind me. He had been sulking for the past three days. I could see the wheels turning in his eyes, thinking of a way we could get out of this.
“I don’t want to do this in the first place. Come on. Move to a city over an hour away and away from all
of our friends? How is any of this fair to us? She is just thinking about herself. It’s not right.” He swung himself up onto his top bunk and flopped backward onto the bed dramatically. I think he missed his calling. "Who's to say this thing is going to last? What if it is just a crush?"
“Wade.” I sighed. "You know I would love to stay here as much as you. I don't want to leave. I don't want to start over in my senior year of high school. But I highly doubt she is only thinking of herself. She needs to be happy. What is she going to do without us? When we go to college, who will take care of her? At least now we can keep an eye on things for a little while. We can protect her from it all if it goes bad. It's the least we can do for her." My meaning was clear. She had done everything she could for our happiness for our whole life. Yes, she was Mom, and that was her ‘job.' But we were her sons and our job was to make sure she was taken care of. It was time to step up.
“You’re right.” He grumbled. “Why are you always right Marcus?”
"Because I'm older than you. It means I'm wiser than you too."
“Bullshit.”
“You know it’s true.” I snicker at him as he tries to launch himself at me and misses, face planting into the floor instead with a loud thud. “You know Mrs. Norris is going to be banging on the ceiling in 3, 2, 1.” I hold up my fingers as I count down and shortly after the sound of the end of a broom being banged against our floor from below echoes through our room. “Wiser, stronger, better.” I point at myself as he launches himself at me again and tackles me into our dresser. More banging against our floor follows the crashing of our stuff to the floor.
“Boys!” Mom called through the door. “Don’t make me come in there. Mrs. Norris is on the phone and says you sound like a pack of animals in there.”
“Sorry.” I apologized over my shoulder as I pressed Wade into the floor seconds before he had me on my stomach with my arm wrenched behind me. “Uncle.” I groan into the floor while tapping out to indicate I gave in.
"You may be wiser, but I'm stronger than you. And you are definitely not better.” The laughter lit up his eyes, and I slapped his hand out of the way as I climbed to my feet. Considering he is a linebacker and I am the quarterback on our football team, it makes sense he would be stronger. It didn’t stop me from wrestling with him. He was my ‘little’ brother after all.
“Wade you almost killed my throwing arm.” I rotate my shoulder in a 360 to check the damage. I’ll live.
“Not like you’ll need it in the new school. Do private schools even play football?" His smile slipped a little, but he gave a halfhearted laugh and pushed me away.
"Guess we will find out in a couple of weeks." I shrug like it's no big deal. But football, basketball, baseball and really anything with a ball are my life. I don't know what I would do without sports. It is the one thing I held onto with both fists clenched when our dad died. But Wade knew that already.
"Maybe we could go to public school if it doesn't." Wade's voice was full of false confidence as he shrugged like it was no big deal. We were both liars. Without our sports, we would lose everything.
“Maybe.”
Chapter 2
Taylor
“Now honey, Taylor, just calm down.” My dad said leaning over and patting my clasped hands. The same hands that wanted to punch a wall out of frustration. His face was pale and full of concern. It was the realist emotion he had shown me in months. Too bad it was about this.
“Calm down! You just told me you are moving some hussy into our house and I’m supposed to calm down!” I almost yelled the words at him, but I held back, barely. He was making a mistake. He would come to his senses, anytime now. He was sensible if nothing else.
I kept my hands together on my lap, and I could see the pale white where my fingertips were gripping too hard. The bright light from the window slashed across my clasped hands. I focused on the colors of my skin, the pale white from the pressure of my fingers, spreading into a light pink, and then finally into my deep tanned skin still patted by my dad's hands. There was a ringing in my ears. Disbelief ran through my veins. It was like a hurricane had ripped through my life and dad thought I would happily pick up the pieces.
"Her name is Claire, and she is a very nice woman. She has two boys around your age, maybe you will find some common ground—" He trailed off his voice uncertain and laced with what he avoided saying. I knew he didn't want to say what he was thinking. He didn't have to say it. I already knew.
"Mom has only been dead less than a year, and you've already moved on. You are already moving someone into her home. Our home.” I released the death grip on myself and crossed my arms over my school uniform and felt a sick satisfaction at his grimace. It served him right. My heart felt like it was being ripped from my chest and stomped into the ground, I'm glad he was feeling even part of what I was feeling.
"She knows what it's like to lose someone she loves. We met in grief counseling after all. We are what we both need to move on. Please understand that. She makes me see the light again. My life—our life has been so dark since your mother passed away." He pleaded with me. His hands no longer had anything to pat now that I had crossed my arms and hid my hands from him, so he put them down on his lap helplessly. "Her boys may be able to help you cope. They've been through it too. Losing a parent-" He trailed off waiting for me to respond. Like losing a parent would make me be besties with the hussy's brats. "They are good kids."
Right.
I held in a very unladylike snort and leaned back in the chair and glared at him. He was in love, with a woman I hadn’t even heard about before now. How was that even possible? How could he do this to mom? How could he do this to me?
Up until nine months ago, we were a happy, carefree family and then she went for a check-up at the gyno and bam she had stage four cervical Cancer with only months to live. Cancer that is 100% treatable if caught early enough had claimed her life not even six months ago.
All the money in the world couldn't save her, and we tried. We tried every crazy ‘cure,' the supplements, the drugs, and chemo, everything until she begged us to just stop. She said she couldn’t do it anymore. She had lost her fight. I had to watch her waste away in a matter of months. Her insides fell out into her bedpan in gray clumps as they decayed. Her comforting scent of vanilla and honey turned to the smell of death. She went from vibrant and alive to a shell of her former self in a bed watching TV about crime solvers for hours.
And now my dad was doing this.
I felt angry and helpless.
Unwanted.
I felt lost. A giant chasm of pain cracked open inside of me. I blinked back the tears that wanted to fall. My jaw clenched so hard I felt it in my temples.
I watched as his jaw set to mirror my own and then he gave me the ‘dad’ look and said, “You will be pleasant to Claire and her sons. You will be welcoming. They will be over to meet you for dinner this Friday. They move in on Saturday, and this is not a choice or discussion. You will be leaving for college in a little over a year, and I need to think about living the rest of my life. Your mother wouldn't want either of us to hold ourselves back from finding happiness.”
Then he stood up and brushed off his designer jeans as if he could brush the unpleasantness away and walked out of the room without a backward glance. I watched silently through blurred eyes. My eyes were swimming with unshed tears. He wasn't always like this. He had been warm with me before. Before mom was gone, he tried. It just wasn't the same. It would never be the same again.
I stared at the empty doorway in shock. My Dad was going through with it. By this weekend I would have new housemates.
Chapter 3
Marcus
The night of the dinner arrived swiftly. As we pulled up to the mansion of a house, through wrought iron gates and everything, I drew in a steadying breath.
Wow.
Adjustment?
It was going to be a whole new world. Moving from our tiny little home into this house that could f
it at least 50 of our apartments. I knew from the neighborhood with all the houses so far apart and a few with guard houses out front that it was going to be an adjustment, but this was crazy.
“Wow.” Wade echoed my thought of a moment ago. “Only two people live in this…” He gestures at the house in front of us at a loss for words.
I feel you brother, I feel you.
The driveway wraps around a massive fountain before circling back to the gates. Another drive wraps around the side of the house leading to what I would assume to be the garage. The home, if you can call it that, has giant pots filled with every color flower leading up to the double wide doors. It looks straight out of that old movie my mom watches all the time, Annie, where that rich dude adopts that little redhead. His name was Daddy Money Bucks or something.
Mom stops our little beat up dodge neon parallel to the massive steps and shuts off the engine. “Soon to be five people.” She glanced back at him with a nervous smile. “This is going to be our new home, tomorrow." With that, she pushed her door open and climbed out of the car. The front door swung wide, and Dan stood in the doorway with a welcoming smile on his face. With a house this huge I had expected a butler or something.
“Hey boys. Claire." He walked quickly down the stairs to meet her halfway and kissed her. I had to look away. I avert my eyes and find Wade doing the same. Suddenly the flowers are fascinating. That I may never get used to, there is no adjustment period for a guy to see his mom making out with anyone. Gross.
"Where is Taylor?" My mom looked past Dan to the doorway. Her expression is hopeful. I turn my attention back to Dan now that it was safe to do so and shove my hands into my pockets as Wade steps up next to me to listen to his answer too.