PIERCED - A Stepbrother Romance by Maya Hawk Page B

you try to tell them not to do that? Why didn’t you threaten to tell or make them realize they were destroying lives?” She sounds like a broken little girl when she talks, and I realize her pain, though well over ten years old, is still as fresh as the day it all began.
    “I did,” I say. “Your dad clocked me across the face.”
    “That’s how you got that black eye?” she asks, her voice tapering off. “You said you got in a fight with Cody Preston at school.”
    “Nope, that was DeVonn,” I say. “He socked me and told me I could never see you again if I breathed a word to anyone. Shit, Lauryn. I was embarrassed. I didn’t want you to think I was weak or that I couldn’t fix things for you.”
    She leans against my shoulder. I take it as her way of apologizing for being wrong. I accept in silence.
    “Look, I could take the beatings,” I say. “But I couldn’t take not being able to see you. And then that happened anyway, so…”
    She nuzzles against me, breathing me in. “My mom never did remarry. She’s taken a vow of celibacy. For the last ten years, all she’s done is tell me that men are evil and that we’re all better off alone. She didn’t even like James, and let’s face it, at face value, James can be extremely likable.”
    “Fucking James,” I say with a snicker. “You confront him yet?”
    Lauryn nods. “It didn’t go the way I hoped it would. There were no bloody knuckles and broken noses, but I think he leaned a lesson. I’m going to let him squirm for a few days before I call HR and report him for abusing his company card. Bye-bye bonus…”
    “That’s rather generous of you,” I say. “I’m sure you could do a lot more damage than that.”
    “Oh, no, that’s where you’re wrong. Money is everything to James. I’m going to hit him where it hurts. He’s going to miss that bonus, believe me. And he’ll have to explain to his darling Colette that he’s officially jobless.”
    “Remind me never to cross you,” I tease, slipping my hand around her back. I’m holding her, and my heart is racing. It feels good to hold her, to be close to her again. Seeing her smile is reassuring. I’d happily let her cry on my shoulder, but she doesn’t appear to be sad. She almost seems relieved about the whole thing. “You never wanted to marry him, did you?”
    She slinks a single shoulder upward. “I don’t know. I thought I did? I-I don’t know.”
    “It’s hard for you to admit the way you feel about things.” I want to reach for her hands but I don’t. We’re not quite there yet, and I don’t want to scare her away the moment she’s finally warming up to me. “Why is that?”
    “It’s how I survived the last ten years,” she admits. “Never dealing with my emotions. Never dealing with reality.”
    “Which was?”
    “That I missed you. That I was hurting. That as much as I convinced myself that I hated you, I really still loved you.”
    She trembles slightly, as if years of buried emotions are working their way from the deepest parts of her to the outermost parts. It’s difficult for her to be so honest.
    “Loved me like a… stepbrother ?” I test her.
    She blows a breath between her lips. “I hated you as a stepbrother. Let’s set the record straight on that.”
    “But you loved me as…”
    “I loved you as…I don’t know.” She rubs her hands against her jeans, creating warm friction.
    “You can say it.”
    “I loved you as…I don’t know. I loved you . I was in love with you . There. I said it.” Lauryn’s face flushes, and her lips twitch. Her eyes snap to the yearbook in her lap, which she shuts in haste.
    “You should’ve said something when you had the chance,” I say. “I had no idea.”
    “Really?” She turns to me. “You had no idea? After that summer we shared? All the things we did? We were together every single day. Couldn’t keep our hands off each other. I gave my virginity to you.”
    “And it was a fucking fantastic