I give him a look. “You two assholes are the last people who can help me with this.”
“Hey, fuck you,” Byron goes. “I’ve always been better at chicks than you.”
I scoff. “That’s an outright lie and she’s not a fucking chick.”
“So she exists,” Ark concludes, smirking. “And there’s trouble in paradise.”
Yeah, there is. And that trouble is me and the lengths I went to,willgo to, to get my hands on her.
Even if we put everything I’ve done up to this point aside for a second, not that we can but for argument’s sake we do, what kind of a lowlifebastardasshole takes a girl’s virginity up against a tree? Not only that, what kind of a lowlife bastard asshole doesn’t stop when he realizes how much blood there is? And there was a lot. I could feel it then, dripping down my dick. In the back of my head I was cursing myself for doing that to her, all the while thinking maybe the silver lining was it could be used as lube to make things easier for her.
Seriously, what thefuck?
“I fucked up,” I find myself saying, my gut tight, my chest tighter.
“Fucked up how?” Ark asks.
I flex my fingers around the beer bottle, clench my jaw, wonder how the fuck do people do this. How the fuck do theytalkabout their problems? Then, “I did something I shouldn’t have done.”
“What the fuck did you do?” Byron asks from the other side.
Took a girl’s virginity up against a tree. Who also happens to be my stepsister. I mean technically she is but not really. Even after she said she trusted me and felt safe with me. I should’ve stopped and talked to her, but I didn’t. I fell on her and hurt her and made her bleed. But the worst thing I did was to come inside her. Without protection.
Yeah, I did that too, didn’t I?
That was my second realization. After I surged inside her like a starved, obsessed maniac, it hit me. That I was bare inside her. That for the first time ever I’d actually felt the inside of a pussy without that thin layer of latex. It was like losing my virginitytoo, I thought to myself almost poetically. But instead of sliding back out and repairing the damage, I stayed inside. I helped her adjust to me, to my brutal invasion, instead of having a talk with her about protection and all that responsible, adult stuff.
She’s so young. So delicate. Sogood. She deserved that from me. But I knew I was clean; being a famous manwhore has its perks, meaning I get tested regularly and I do not go near a girl without protection. And I thought it was safe to continue. Not that anyone would’ve been able to tear me apart from her in that moment, but still. I should’ve told her that.
I should’ve also told her something else. Because that’s not the only concern when it comes to not using protection. There’s something else. There’s something much more dire than that. And ever since I felt the soft walls of her cunt, I haven’t been able to forget that consequence. I haven’t been able to put it out of my mind. How I canusethat consequence.
How I canusegiving her my baby to my advantage.
Look, it’s not my proudest moment. Coming inside herknowingwhat it could lead to. Knowing that this would complicate things even further. With our families. With the media. Even her dreams. She just started college. She’s just started to dream again. And I know, firsthand, the toll an unplanned pregnancy takes. Callie had one, and although she’s extremely happy now, as her big brother, I would have wanted her to not go through those uncertain, difficult times. And while this could affect my career too, it’s way down on the list of things this could affect.
But look at it from my perspective—she keeps running from me. She’s been running from me since the first moment she saw me. She’s been running from me since the first momentIsawher. And she has a habit of overthinking things, worrying about stuff—all noble stuff, genuine stuff—but also the stuff that keeps her away from me.
This will tie her to me permanently. This will keep her in my life always and forever and fucking ever. Because the truth is I’m not letting her go. The truth is she’s here to stay. Stay in my house. In my family. In my life.
And a baby with her? Jesus, I’d fucking pass out from joy. I’d fucking touch the sky with elation. It fills me with so much purpose, so much determination, happiness that I’ve never felt before. I’d spoil it rotten, our baby. I’d love it—her because I’d love a girl—so much she wouldn’t want for anything in her life.
Because thefuckingtruth is, all of this may have started because I wanted to move on from my twin brother’s girlfriend, but it’s not about that anymore. I’m not sure when it changed but I realized it the night I was driving around, supposedly angry about Stellan’s engagement to Isadora—there, said her name and felt nothing—that I’ve moved on. I’ve finally fucking moved on.
Jesus, I can’t believe I’m saying that. I cannotfucking believeI’ve moved on.
But somehow, over the last few weeks, I haven’t thought about Stellan or Isadora even once. Every thought I have now, every feeling, has become about her. About my Little Strawberry, and losing her is not something I’m willing to do.
“I…” I begin, trying to think how much I can tell them; I’m not fucking telling them everything because it’s none of their business, but maybe I can tell them the basics. “I had sex. With… With a girl. And I need to find a way to apologize to her for it. And tell her that I wanna do it again.”
Bare and raw and without any fucking protection.
When they don’t say anything for a few seconds, the back of my neck starts to heat and prickle. My fucking cheeks start to heat up and prickle too and I swear to God, if this is what blushing is, I’m going to burn this whole goddamn club down with these two assholes in it.
Byron’s the first to break his silence. “Apologize for sex because you didn’t make her?—”
“Fuck you, yeah?” I straighten up and snap and they both smirk like the shitheads they are. “Fuckingfuckyou, all right, because who the fuck do you think you’re talking to? And because there’s no way I wouldn’t. Not to her. She gets it all from me. Everything. It’s just that…”
“Just what?” Ark inquires, still amused.
