Sleeping With My Billionaire Step-Brother

Chapter Seven

Fiona:

The front doors burst open before I could even reach them. A woman emerged, her perfectly manicured hands pressed to her chest in theatrical concern. She was smaller than I'd imagined, more fragile looking, but there was steel in her brown eyes.

"Fiona! Oh, sweetheart, you're finally home!" Her voice dripped with honey, but I could taste the poison underneath. She rushed toward me, arms outstretched like we were long-lost family.

I stepped back sharply. "Where is my father?

Her smile faltered before she recovered, gesturing toward the house. "He's in the living room, dear. He's been so worried about you."

I brushed past her, my heels clicking against marble with each determined step. The house looked different. Softer. Where my mother's bold artwork had once lined the walls, now hung gentle watercolors and she and my father's pictures.

They'd erased her. Erased us.

"Fiona." My father's voice boomed before I could cross the threshold. There he stood, silver hair perfectly styled despite the late hour, but something harder in his eyes now. "Is that how you greet your mother?"

The words hit like a physical blow. Mother.

"My mother is dead." The words came out sharper than intended. "Or have you forgotten?"

His jaw tightened, that familiar storm brewing. "Robert, please." The woman's voice floated from behind me, soft and placating. "She's been through so much. Maybe we should—"

"Don't." I whirled to face her. "Don't pretend to know what I've been through. Don't pretend to care when you've spent the last ten years playing house with my father."

The silence was deafening. The woman's face went white, her hand fluttering to her throat.

"That's enough." My father's voice went deadly quiet. "I won't have you speak to Carmela that way in my house."

So her name was Carmela. I filed that information away.

"Your house?" I laughed bitterly. "This was my mother's house too. Until you decided your new family was more important."

"You left!" The words exploded from him. "You walked out and disappeared for ten years. Ten years without knowing if you were alive or dead."

"I was fifteen and grieving! Instead of helping me, you brought home a replacement and her son. You expected me to smile while my heart was bleeding."

"Carmela didn't replace your mother. No one could."

"Then why does she sleep in Mom's room? Why are Mom's pictures gone? Why is her son living here while your actual daughter was on the street?"

"You chose to leave."

"Because you chose them over me!"

We stared at each other across the room, two people who'd once been everything to each other, now strangers bound by blood and broken promises.

Carmela cleared her throat. "Maybe I should go upstairs—"

"No." My father's voice was firm. "You're family. You stay."

Family. Another slap in the face.

"If being rude is all you came here to do, then you can leave the same way you came. I won't tolerate disrespect in my home."

My home, he'd said. Not our home.

"Fine," I said quietly. "I'll go upstairs. But don't mistake my silence for acceptance."

I walked toward the stairs, spine straight, head high. The upstairs hallway was dimly lit, lined with photos of Carmela's son at younger ages. School pictures, graduations, family vacations I'd never been invited to.

“Why does that face look familiar though?” I thought, but dismissed it immediately, “it's not like I ever looked for the bastard, or met with him before.” I said angrily. I was so pissed.

My old room was at the end of the hall, but I noticed another door across from it standing slightly ajar. His room. The golden boy who'd inherited everything that should have been mine.

I pushed open my door and felt my breath catch. Purple walls, white furniture, even my old stuffed animals. Like a shrine to my teenage years, preserved while everything else had been scrubbed clean of my family's history.

But there were fresh flowers on the nightstand. Clean sheets. Someone had been maintaining this room, waiting for my return.

My phone buzzed. A text from an unknown number.

"Hope you made it home safely. Still thinking about last night."

Heat flooded my cheeks. ‘Him.’ Somehow he'd gotten my number.

I stared at the message, pulse quickening. The smart thing would be to ignore him, focus on rebuilding my life. But sitting here, surrounded by memories while my father's new life played out downstairs, smart was the last thing I wanted to be.

I wanted to feel alive again. Wanted. Worth something.

"Home is a relative term," I typed back.

His response came immediately: "Sounds like you could use a distraction. I'm a phone call away."

I lay back on my childhood bed, staring at the ceiling. Downstairs, I could hear my father and Carmela talking in low voices. Across the hall, that empty room waited for their precious son's return.

My phone buzzed again.

"Whatever you're thinking about, stop. It's making me crazy, and I'm supposed to be working."

Despite everything, I smiled. A real smile, the first in days.

Maybe dangerous was exactly what I needed. I closed my eyes and let my mind wander to forbidden places. Images flooded my thoughts: his hands exploring every inch of my body, steam rising around us in a hot shower, our bodies pressed together with nothing between us but desire and desperation. The fantasy was so vivid I could almost feel his lips on my neck, his fingers trailing fire across my skin.

"Fiona!" I gasped aloud, my eyes flying open. "You are absolutely insane." I laughed at myself, but the heat between my legs told a different story. My body was already betraying me, responding to thoughts of a man I barely knew.

A knock at my door shattered my dangerous reverie. I crept to the door and peered through the peephole. Carmela stood there with a food tray, looking annoyingly domestic. The sight of her brought every angry emotion rushing back like a tidal wave.

I stepped away from the door, determined to ignore her existence.

"Fiona, I brought you some snacks. I thought you might need something after such a long day." Her voice drifted through the door, sweet as poisoned honey.

I retreated to my bed, memories of my mother flooding back unbidden. Mom used to bake the most incredible cookies, and we would take them to the garden where Dad would spread out a blanket for our family picnics. Those were the days when we were whole, when love filled every corner of this house instead of resentment and replacement.

Tears burned my eyes as the memory consumed me. God, how I missed those perfect afternoons.

"Fiona, I am still here."

"What? This woman refuses to give up?" The thought made my skin crawl, but her persistent presence outside my door was making me increasingly uncomfortable. Against my better judgment, I yanked the door open.

"I am fine. I do not need any of your cookies." The words came out sharper than broken glass. "Carmela, if we are going to coexist in this house without bloodshed, I suggest you stay far away from me. I really mean it."

"Fiona, I am not here to fight with you. I see you as my own daughter, someone I would love to care for since I was not able to for the past ten years." She held the tray steady, her voice gentle but determined.

Even though fury coursed through my veins, something softer stirred in my chest. Damn her for sounding so sincere.

"Fine! But do not ever do this again." I snatched the cookies from her hands and slammed the door, but she was not finished.

"Your father wanted me to tell you that your brother is almost home. You should prepare yourself to meet him. He is coming home specifically to see you."

"Can I not have even one moment of peace in this house? Why is Dad forcing these people on me?" My anger was reaching a boiling point when my phone buzzed with a message that made my breath catch.

"I cannot stop thinking about how good you taste. Dinner Friday so I can remind you what you are missing?"

Heat flooded my entire body. The boldness of his words should have offended me, but instead they sent liquid fire straight to my core. I could practically feel his tongue on my skin again, the memory so intense it made me dizzy with want.

"How bold of him to text me something like this." I said the words aloud, but my voice was breathless rather than angry. Part of me wanted to throw the phone across the room. The other part wanted to beg him to come over right now and finish what we had started.

My fingers moved across the screen before I could stop myself. "If you are this bold, why not tonight?"

I expected him to back down, to reveal himself as all talk and no action. His response came so quickly it made my heart race.

"You are killing me. Any other night and I would already have you on your way over, but a family emergency has me tied up tonight. Friday I am going to make you forget you ever had to wait."

My knees went weak. The promise in his words was unmistakable, and my body responded with an ache so intense it was almost painful. I pressed my thighs together, trying to ease the throbbing need he had awakened.

"This man is absolutely dangerous." The thought should have scared me. Instead, it thrilled me to my very core.

“Well, I think everyone has family problems.” I thought remembering he mentioned family as well. Just what I was going through.

I decided not to respond, even though every fiber of my being wanted to beg him to abandon his family emergency and come claim me right now. I could not let him know how desperately I wanted him, even though the evidence was written in every racing heartbeat.

"Fiona, you should be downstairs now. Your brother is almost here." Dad's voice boomed through the hallway, commanding and impatient.

I wanted to ignore him, but I knew defiance would only make things worse. Reluctantly, I made my way downstairs to meet the almighty Velmera son, the golden boy who had stolen my place in this family.

The dining room had been transformed into something resembling a celebration. The table groaned under the weight of an elaborate spread that would have fed a small army.

"Are we throwing a party, Dad?" I could not keep the sarcasm from my voice.

He barely acknowledged me, but Carmela jumped in with her practiced sweetness. "We are celebrating your return, dear Fiona." She reached for my hands, but I pulled away before she could touch me.

"She does not deserve it, Fiona, because you have been nothing but trouble since you walked through that door. But Carmela wanted to celebrate your homecoming anyway." Dad's words cut deep, but before I could respond, the front door opened.

My heart lurched in my chest, anticipation and dread warring within me.

"Rafael has arrived." Dad stood immediately, his face lighting up with the kind of joy he had never shown for my return.

"Rafael," he called out, but a stranger walked through the door instead.

"Good evening, Chairman." The man was impeccably dressed in an expensive suit, every inch the professional messenger.

"Mr. Velmera was on his way here, but he received word that our partners are reconsidering a deal we had closed. He had to go directly to the clients to handle the situation."

Dad's face fell, genuine disappointment flickering across his features before he composed himself. "It must be important business if Rafael would miss tonight. He never misses family occasions. We will eat without him."

The messenger disappeared as quietly as he had arrived, leaving us in awkward silence.

"Thank God he did not come." The relief flooding through me was so intense I almost laughed out loud. I was not ready to face the person who had replaced me in my father's affections, the son who had gotten everything that should have been mine.

We ate in tense silence, the celebration reduced to the sound of silverware against china and the weight of unspoken resentments. But underneath it all, my phone seemed to burn against my leg, carrying the promise of Friday night and a man who could make me forget all about family disappointments and stolen inheritances.

The anticipation was already driving me wild, and Friday could not come fast enough.