Semua Bab The Playboy Stepbrother's Rules: Bab 51 - Bab 60

The second day after the choice started the same way as the first: careful, quiet, and slightly off-balance.Alex came downstairs to coffee already made. Troy was at the counter with his phone, scrolling through email. He looked up, nodded, and didn’t ask where Alex had been in his head all night.“Morning.”“Morning.”Alex took the mug. For a few minutes the kitchen held only the ordinary sounds of a house waking up. Bridget passed through with a scarf in her hand and a reminder that she would be out until evening. Silas had left earlier. When the front door closed behind her, the space narrowed to the two of them again.Troy locked his phone. “I have a partnership call at eleven. Stolas will be on it. His father too. It’s schedule and deliverables only.”Alex kept his voice even. “All right.”Troy watched him for a reaction. When he didn’t get a visible one, he added, “I’ll take it in the study. You don’t have to be anywhere near it.”“I wasn’t planning to sit in.”Troy’s mouth tigh

The house settled after Kevin left, but it didn’t soften.Alex stayed in his room until the light outside started to fade. He heard Troy move through the hallway once, then go back downstairs. No knock. No demand. The silence had a different quality than the old punishments—less strategy, more someone giving space because he’d been told to.Around early evening Alex went down to the kitchen. Troy was at the table with a glass of water he hadn’t touched. He looked up when Alex entered and waited, as if the next move had to come from the room itself.Alex took a glass from the cabinet and filled it. “You said we talk when you’re back. You’re back.”Troy nodded once. “Sit. Please.”Alex sat across from him. The table between them felt wider than it was. For a few seconds neither of them spoke. The refrigerator hummed. Somewhere in the house a clock marked the time like nothing important was happening.Troy spoke first. “I asked for your phone like I still owned the right to it. I did it

Paxton was already at Kevin’s place when Kevin got back from the Morrison house.He had a key. He’d stopped pretending he didn’t use it. When the door opened, Kevin found him on the couch with his elbows on his knees and a look that said he’d been waiting long enough to get past polite.“You went over there,” Paxton said.Kevin shut the door. “Alex texted me. He sounded wrong. I wasn’t going to stay home and guess.”“You walked into Troy’s house and took inventory of whether Alex was still allowed to make decisions.”“Yes.” Kevin dropped his keys on the table. “And I’d do it again. If that bothers you, say it plainly.”Paxton stood. The apartment felt too small for the kind of honesty they were about to have. “It bothers me that every time Alex flinches, you look at me like I’m an extension of Troy’s worst instincts. I’m not his keeper. I’m not your enemy either.”Kevin’s jaw tightened. “You’re the person who still gets his calls when things go bad. You’re the one who told me Troy was

The partnership meeting was scheduled for late morning in a glass conference room on the Harrison side of the building.Alex hadn’t expected to be needed in person. A last-minute request from Silas put him in the chair next to Troy with a folder of risk notes and a pulse that refused to stay steady. Stolas sat across the table, two seats down from his father, expression professional and unreadable. When their eyes met at the start of the session, Stolas nodded once—civil, brief—and looked back at the agenda.The meeting ran on schedules and deliverables. Alex spoke when spoken to. Troy contributed in short, precise points. Stolas did the same. No personal current crossed the table in any way a stranger could have named. When it ended, people stood, gathered devices, and began the usual post-meeting drift toward the elevators.Troy’s hand brushed the back of Alex’s chair. “I need two minutes with Silas. Wait for me in the lobby.”Alex nodded. Troy moved off with Silas toward a smaller

They went downstairs the way Silas ordered—Troy first, Alex after, space held between them like a drawn line.Bridget was already in the living room. She had picked her scarf up from the upstairs floor and was holding it in both hands like something that might keep her upright. Her eyes were red. She still hadn’t found a full sentence. When Alex entered, she looked at him and then away, as if the sight itself asked a question she couldn’t survive answering cleanly.Silas closed the living room doors. The sound was soft and final.“Sit down,” he said to Alex.Alex sat on the edge of the sofa. Troy remained standing near the fireplace until Silas’s gaze pinned him.“You will pack a bag,” Silas said. “Tonight. You will leave this house. You will not sleep under this roof again until I decide otherwise—if I decide otherwise.”Troy’s face went tight. “You’re throwing me out.”“I am removing you from a situation you created.” Silas’s voice was controlled only on the surface. Underneath it s