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“And I missed my brother,” he admitted, his tone held a vulnerability his stoicism would never betray. “Stepbrothers,” I corrected.
Ahh everything makes sense
The truth was, if it wasn’t Daniel getting the scraps of me, it would’ve been someone else, because my heart wasn’t whole. I’d left the other half of it back in Seattle, and now it was here, right in front of me, staring into me as if nothing could keep us apart. Not even my vows.
I wondered how he could speak with his mouth hard-pressed to Cole’s ass.
I didn’t want to win him like this. I didn’t want him more broken than he already was, because I loved him more than I wanted him.
I loved him as a person first and foremost. No matter how imperfect he believed himself to be, there was no denying just how perfect he was to me.
I was giving up my opportunity to have him, but in his current frame of mind, taking Jasper would only serve to prove I was a better lover than Daniel. It would do little to prove I was a better man than him.
One word from him and I’d make it so he’d never have to lay his beautiful eyes on Daniel again. Whatever the cost may be. There was no price I wouldn’t pay.
I gaze at Jasper who sits studying the eclipsed moon with fascination. I’ll never understand why it takes so little to please him. Why he lacks imagination. My parents are right, I think, standing straighter, toughening my spine, sealing all the cracks. “Don’t worry,” I say into the room. “I know what I’m doing.”
Get fucked, Daniel
I pointed toward the windows of Macy’s department store. “You should see how many people show up when they unveil their Christmas display.
Me. I'm one of those people
The move should remind him of all the trouble I went to, and hopefully it’ll make him feel like he owes me something. I was a great attorney for a reason. I needed a yes from him.
Ew
No more running, no more pushing him and this thing brewing between us away, no more pretending the decision to risk it all was a hard one.
Yes. That was our safeword, because we both loved it when he ignored my no’s.
Daniel 3 years, 8 months ago
I have a bad feeling we'll get a POV of him knowing Jasper and Cole before New York...
Something moves in me, then, but not enough. Not enough to make a difference.
Bro Daniel totally knows
He fingered the pearl-sized bead of precum from my stiff cock before letting it fall into his own coffee. He chanced a gulp of the steaming liquid, his eyes closing as he groaned in ecstasy. “Who knew a pinch of salt made everything better.”
C.P. HARRIS STOP RUINING FOOD FOR ME
He offered me a sip of his cum-laced coffee to ease the bite of rejection.
I hate it here
Cole laced his fingers through mine, rolling his thumb over the deserted spot where my wedding band should’ve been.
Y'all being messy
Daniel’s small talk almost always included Jasper;
Because he knowsssss
“I called you,” I said, prying my teeth apart. “Sorry, I didn’t hear the phone ring.” I got the sense he was lying and an even stranger feeling that he’d wanted me to know it.
“You don’t come in here and demand to know what’s going on. You don’t get to fuck my life up, no matter how fucked up you think it already is. Not here, Cole. You can say and do what you want anywhere else, but you leave any destruction that may happen in my home to me.”
“Oh, and speaking of favors, stop paying my rent or I’ll quit.” And without another word he was gone.
God I love Leland
But still he holds you, and I imagine you pretending it’s me, and while that soothes my ego, it does nothing for my fracturing heart, because whether you’re pretending to want him or not, whether it’s my face you’re seeing instead of his, he does in fact have you. And the sad part is, he doesn’t even appreciate it.”
I’ve experienced more happiness here, even during moments of private misery, than I have in all the years I’ve spent without you.”
“Yes, I want more than you can give me right now. Yes, it kills me that it isn’t my ring you’re wearing as I make love to you in our bed. But there isn’t anything I can’t love you through, Jasper.”
“How can he love you when he doesn’t even know you?” Cole had asked once. “He knows me,” I’d shot back at him. “No,” he’d said. “He knows who he wants you to be, but I know how beautiful you already are.”
“And hey,” he said, twisting my way, one foot on the first step, hand on the railing, “at least when you can’t keep the lights on, because defending lowlifes who can’t afford to pay you doesn’t cover the bills, you can always pull at your brother’s purse strings.”
Daniel deserves every bad thing in the world
Don’t ever quit your daydream. Love always, Cole. And on the other side it read: Jasper Des Moines Esq.
“Screw you, Daniel,” I said, astounding even myself.
'Bout time
“Have you met your stepbrother-slash-no longer brothers-slash-friend-slash-lover-friend?”
Yikes
Jasper and I couldn’t be friends. We hadn’t even gotten the science down on how to be brothers. Our romantic love would get in the way of all of it. It was either everything or nothing with us.
Leland was waiting for me when I got home, leaning against the wall with his feet crossed at the ankle as he investigated his cuticles, completely pulling off the “you haven’t returned my calls, but I’m so not worried about you” look.
Love him
I even made my famous chicken Florentine you love so much. It’s keeping warm in the oven.” God bless him and his horrible chicken Florentine.
“Is that gin? You can afford to use aged Chateau Lafite’s as mouthwash, yet you continue to drink gin?”
What's with the anti-gin rhetoric in all my recent reads?!
“Can’t you have a proper bar like normal rich people?” he asked, walking backwards. “Bars are gaudy and send a bad message,” I said, falling into our usual banter. “What? That you’re an alcoholic?”
“Dad, what are you doing here?” I asked. Glass shattered in the kitchen, followed by Leland’s muttered curse, and my father’s head swiveling sharply in that direction. “I’m alright!” Leland called out.
OH SHIT OH SHIT I JUST LOOKED UP WHAT BOOK 2 IS ABOUT OH SHIT
I was grateful he couldn’t see my expression as I poured the chicken Florentine into the trash.
JUSTICE FOR LELAND'S CHICKEN FLORENTINE
Daniel 4 Years Ago
Here we fucking go
“It’s okay, ’Fia. I don’t expect you not to be friends with Cole.” I sort of did, because of the whole if-I-can’t-have-him-no-one-can thing, but I wasn’t so far gone that I’d actually verbalize it.
Lmao so real
“I think I’m ready to leave him, ’Fia.” She didn’t waste words on asking me who. “For Cole?” “No,” I said. “For me.”
“I remember she’d let me eat cereal for breakfast and dinner for the rest of the week. I thought she was being a cool mom, because I loved cereal, but she must have spent all the grocery money on that cake.”
Oh, my heart
“I’ll love and support you through anything, Jasper. Or die trying.” I closed the book and my eyes. Those were the words. Those were the words I’d needed to hear.
“I’ll fuck you in the rain, angel. I promise.” He’d proceeded to tap my ankle with his foot, asking me to widen my stance, and then taking me again while standing. “The first day of summer,”
Have a feeling that'll be the epilogue
I’m lying here, unable to help but wonder if the thing I’d done last, the hurtful words I’d said last, will overshadow all the times I’d said and done the right things.
“Do you still want me?” “Yes,” he said, as if it were the dumbest question in the world. “I’ll not only have you, I’ll swear to never let you go.”
“Not until my stomach is pumped full of your cum, angel. It’s been too long,”
Jesus
“Fuck me like you miss me, Cole,” I whined at the back of my throat, needing him to do his worst. “Mark me, tear my flesh from my goddamn bones.”
“Take me, angel.” His words were garbled, eyes flinty, dick making a point. “I will,” I said, teeth accidentally cutting into my tongue from the sheer force of him. “Never leave me,” he warned. “Never,” I promised,
“You! Always and–and only you, Cole.” “Good. Now take that fucking ring off.”
I twisted the band, getting it about halfway off when Cole impatiently said, “Keep fucking me. Keep up the pace.” And then reached around to pop the ring off all the way, essentially declaring it null and void, sending it tumbling across the floor.
