All Chapters of Dirty Stepbrother: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

"You think I'm stupid?"The words came first, and then his hand landed harshly on my cheek and my back hit the freezer door before my brain caught up… Manager Cole's fingers tight in my collar."I didn't touch the register." My voice came out steady and firm. "I promise you, I wouldn't take your money."Cole's grip tightened. "Six hundred dollars doesn't walk out by itself.""If you don't believe me, then check the cameras.""Check the cameras," Cole mimicked in a high, whiny singsong, and then let go so suddenly that I stumbled. "You think I have time for that? You think you're worth that, you little dick?" I said nothing.Cole pulled the envelope from his back pocket. It was my pay for the week… and he started removing some bills."One fifty," Cole said, stuffing the rest into his own pocket. "Consider the rest interest."My jaw tightened, and the split in my lip from earlier… the one my manager had caused on a different night for another stupid reason… pulled open again. I tasted b

"I will take you home. You're badly injured."I pushed myself up from the pavement I'd been sitting on. Everywhere in my body hurt… my ribs, my elbow, my fucking soul… and I hated that Sebastian seemed to have noticed all of it."What were you doing out here?" I asked. "Following me?""I was leaving." He shrugged. "Saw you run out like your ass was on fire. Wanted to find out what happened.""Nothing happened."Nothing happened. Just twenty minutes ago, I agreed to strip for money. Ten minutes ago, I found out my girlfriend had been playing me for a fool. And now I was standing on a wet street with my stepbrother, injured and bleeding, while the city went on around me like I didn't exist.Why the fuck does my life have to be this way? Why can't it just go normal like everyone else's?"I need to go home," I said."I will take you home. Just let me know the location." He nodded at his car, parked a few feet away from us but closer to the bar. The black Mercedes shone under the streetlig

Sebastian's hand was still on my jaw, his thumb moving in slow lazy circles against my cheekbone, and I couldn't fucking breathe.He was staring at my mouth."Tell me no," he said again, quieter this time.I didn't.Then he kissed me.His lips were soft at first and I felt the warmth and then he tilted his head and everything changed. His bottom lip caught mine and pulled a little and my mouth just opened and then his tongue was there. Just touched mine. And my toes curled in my shoes.I made this sound. I didn't mean to.His hand went to the back of my neck, fingers in my hair, and he pulled me closer. His other hand pressed into my shirt then slid around to my lower back and pulled me against him. My hips hit his and I felt how hard he was through his pants, felt it against my thigh, against my stomach, and I made that sound again, louder.He bit my lower lip. Soft. Then tugged it. Then licked it."Sebastian," I said. His name came out shaky.He pulled back and looked at me. His eye

The lights were still burning on my skin when I walked off the stage. My hands were shaking, not from nerves this time but from something else like adrenaline or the way those old men looked at me like I was a piece of meat, so I grabbed the cash off the edge of the stage — maybe fifty dollars this time — and stuffed it in the waistband of the boxer briefs because I didn't have anywhere else to put it. The red room felt smaller on the way out or maybe I was just done pretending I was okay with any of this.I pulled on my jeans and hoodie in the dressing room and the other guys were already gone so it was just me and the smell of sweat and that floor cleaner that doesn't clean anything. I didn't look at myself in the mirror again because I already knew what I'd see, a nineteen-year-old kid with bruises on his ribs and a split lip that kept opening up and a face that looked like it hadn't slept in a year.I walked upstairs, and Archer was leaning against the bar, nursing a whiskey. He s

Mom called on Tuesday.I almost didn’t pick up. My thumb was over the red button for a full three seconds before I finally picked up, because some part of me, the part that still remembered her humming in the kitchen when I was a kid, before Archer, before any of this, never really learned how to ignore her.“Jae, baby.” Her voice came through soft, warm, as she’d practiced it. “I feel like I haven’t seen you in weeks.”“I’ve been busy. School.”“I know, I know. That’s why I’m calling.” A pause, just long enough to make you fill it. “Come for dinner tonight, just us. Archer’s got some business deals, Sebastian’s out with friends, so it’ll be quiet. I missed my son.”The thought lingered for a while. I had a shift at the club in a few hours, homework I hadn’t touched, and a stepbrother I still hadn’t figured out how to look at without my whole chest going tight.“Yeah,” I said. “Okay. What time?”“Seven. I’ll cook your favorite.”She hung up before I could ask how she still remembered