* * *
“Girls, this means so much to me,” Mom said as we left the spa later that morning. “You have no idea.” Her eyes began to water as her peppy façade faded. “I know I wasn’t the best mother, but I want to make it up to you. And I know you never knew your father, but Vince is willing to step in. It’s a little late in life, but he wants to be there for you. We both want to make this family work. And it means so much to me to have your support.”
Coco and I exchanged looks, practically reading each other’s thoughts. Was this another act? Did she mean it? Was she really turning over a new leaf?
“Love you, Mom,” Coco said, wrapping an arm around her before I followed suit.
“Vince and I will be in the city a few more days,” she said. “If you want to get together again, just let me know. He’s got a few sights he wants to show me, some special evenings planned. But I’d like to see you girls again before we leave. You never come home anymore.”
It was true. We avoided Darlington like the plague, especially Coco.
“Anyway, I’ll let you know about Florida,” she said, plastering a smile on her face. “I can’t wait.”
Mom hailed a cab as Coco and I walked off in the other direction, waiting until we were far enough away to start dissecting our morning with Tammy Lynn.
“So that was… fun,” Coco said as we briskly headed south from Midtown.
“She seems happy.”
“She always seems that way. Give it more time. As soon as the newness wears off, she’ll be airing all their dirty laundry and filing for divorce. You know the drill.”
“This one seems different though, Co.”
She shrugged. “Honestly, I don’t have the time nor the energy to give two shits about mom’s love life anymore. It’s exhausting, and we’re grown now. It’s no longer our concern.”
“Easy for you to say.” My phone buzzed in my pocket. I didn’t have to look at it to know who it was. He’d been messaging me all morning, begging me to come over so we could talk. I pulled my phone out to read his latest appeal.
“Oh, my God.” Coco glanced over my shoulder and read the text. “I thought you were going to end it with him.”
“I am. He’s just having a hard time accepting that we’re done,” I lied. I was having just as hard of a time as he was.
“End it, Addison.” Coco shoved her hands in the pockets of her skinny jeans as her stiletto boots clicked on the pitted cement. She could be cold and hard sometimes, like frozen concrete.
I wanted to tell her it wasn’t that simple. It wasn’t going to happen overnight. I almost told her I wasn’t sure I was strong enough to walk away from the best thing that had ever happened to me. Instead I gave her my best “I’m working on it” before saying goodbye and heading straight for Wilder’s apartment.
* * *
My first words when I saw him were, “This has to stop.”
My body wholeheartedly disagreed, though.
I wanted to throw myself onto him, wrap my legs around his body, and fall softly into the comfort of his soft bed sheets. I wanted to feel him deep inside me, taste him, smell him, lose myself in him.
But I didn’t do any of that.
I imagined there was an alternate universe somewhere where the two of us were laughing and playing like two carefree lovers. Addison and Wilder were living their happily-ever-after fairytale romance somewhere, just not in the here and now.
“Get your hot little ass in here, now,” he growled in the low, sexy voice that instantly made my panties melt.
He’s your stepbrother!
He led me inside as the elevator doors closed behind me and pushed me up against the wall of his foyer. He leaned down and took my bottom lip between his teeth. Wilder was never that aggressive, and I supposed the thought of losing me for good had done a number on him. Maybe it’d made him hungrier for me?
I teetered between giving myself to him one final time and standing my ground. “I mean it. We can’t do this.”
“No,” he seethed. His breath quickened, forcing itself in and out of his nostrils like a raging bull. “I love you, Addison. I fucking love you. I’m not letting you go. You’re mine.”
His hands flew to the sides of my face, holding it still as he forced another kiss on my lips.
“I don’t think of you as my stepsister. You’re not. You’re my girlfriend. You’re the only person in this whole fucked up world who gets me.”
I didn’t recognize the man standing before me, the man clinging so desperately to me like a shipwrecked sailor clinging to a sinking lifeboat. Wilder backed away from me, running a hand through his hair and tugging on the ends. His bloodshot eyes suggested maybe he hadn’t slept the night before, though I couldn’t blame him. I hadn’t, either.
I was better at hiding those kinds of things. I’d become a polished rock on the outside, able to hide the imperfections deep inside me so no one could see when I was broken. When all I wanted to do was crumble into pieces, the rest of the world saw a girl who appeared to have her shit together. I was a fraud.
“Look at me and tell me you feel nothing,” he demanded.
My bottom lip trembled. I said the words in my head first, as if I needed to practice them. They were a lie, and I knew that. “I feel nothing.”
His aqua eyes glassed over. “I don’t believe you. Two days ago, you were mine. Now you feel nothing. Fucking liar.”