Back to Ruin My Obsessive CEO Stepbrother

The priest was still talking when I arrived. My Bentley didn’t stop at the gate like everyone else’s. It rolled onto the turf, tires crushing the grass until the car finally stopped a few feet from the open grave. The engine stayed on, a steady low growl that made the fake silence of the Royce inner circle feel even more pathetic. I didn’t wait for my chauffeur. I kicked the door open and stepped out before the car had even finished settling. I wasn’t in black. Black would have meant respect. I didn’t come here to show any. I was in a silk dress, the color of a fresh wound. The red was loud, aggressive, and entirely too short for a funeral. Every head in the cemetery turned. The gasps hit the air like a collective shiver, a ripple of pure, offended shock. I didn't look at the casket. I didn't care about the body of the man who had traded my life for his reputation. I walked straight toward the front row. Leonardo moved before I could reach the first chair, stepping directly into my path. He didn't look like he was mourning. He looked like he was ready to kill. "You aren't supposed to be here," he said, his voice dropping to a low, dangerous register. "The restraining order Richard filed didn't expire just because his heart stopped." "Richard is going six feet under, Leo. He doesn't file paperwork anymore." I leaned in, my lips inches from his ear, close enough to feel the heat radiating from him. "And neither do you. At least, not on this property." He reached out, his fingers locking around my upper arm. It wasn't a gentle touch. His grip was hot, bruising, and lacked even a shred of the Golden Boy restraint the public loved him for. "Don't make me have the security team drag you out in front of everyone," he hissed. "You have nothing left here. No name, no money, and certainly no invitation." I didn't pull away. I looked down at his hand, at the way his knuckles were white from the force of holding me, and then I looked him dead in the eye. I let a smirk spread across my face. "That’s where you’re wrong, big brother." I reached into my clutch and pulled out a single, folded sheet of paper. I tucked it into the breast pocket of his tailored suit jacket, patting it twice. "I don't need a dead man’s permission to stand here." "What the hell is this?" "The deed to the Royce Memorial Cemetery," I whispered. "I bought the holding company an hour before the service started. This entire plot, the grass, the dirt, the very hole you’re about to put him in, belongs to me." Leonardo froze. The polished CEO mask cracked, revealing a glimpse of the volatile predator underneath. "You’re lying," he rasped. "Check the filing. I’m the landlord now, Leo. Which means if you want to finish this service in peace, you’re going to have to ask me very nicely for the permit." I stepped back, watching him scramble for his phone, his breathing starting to hitch in a way that made my blood sing. "Actually, don't bother. I’m feeling very generous today. Finish burying him. Then meet me at the estate in an hour." "I’d tell you to go to hell, Ines," he said, his voice a low, vibrating rasp that only I could hear, "but you’d probably try to buy that, too." He expected me to flinch. I closed the little distance between us, leaning in so that I could feel the heat coming off his skin. "Move, Leo," I said. My voice was flat and carried no emotion. Nothing he could use against me. "I’m not here for the body. I’m here for the Will." Leonardo held my gaze, his pupils blown wide until the gray of his eyes was almost swallowed by black. The heat from his hand was searing through the silk of my sleeve, his grip still tight enough to bruise. He didn't look away. Slowly, his focus shifted. His eyes dropped from mine, tracking the movement of my breathing before locking onto my lips. I didn't move. I didn't give him the satisfaction. I watched as he bit his own bottom lip, his teeth digging into the flesh with a frustrated, s****l hunger that he couldn't mask anymore. The Golden Boy was gone, replaced by the man who had spent three years trying to forget the taste of a beautiful mistake. He leaned in even closer, his forehead almost touching mine, his voice so low, that it barely carried past the space between us. "You’re a crazy motherfucker, Ines," he rasped, his chest heaving against mine. "I f*****g hate you." I didn't blink. I let the corner of my mouth curl into a slow, sharp blade of a smile. I leaned into the heat of his rage. "Likewise, brother." "The lawyers will be at the library in an hour to read the Will," Leonardo said, his voice tight, trying to regain the CEO mask. "Don't be late, Ines. This isn't a cemetery you can just buy. This is the Empire." I stepped closer, my hand flat against his chest, feeling the frantic rhythm of his heart through the expensive fabric. I leaned in, my lips brushing the his ear. "I’ll be there, Leo," I whispered. "But for some reason, one I absolutely hate, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about what it would feel like to have you f**k me on that library table while the lawyers wait outside. I wonder if you’d still sound like a Golden Boy then." I felt his breath hitch, his entire body locking up as the heat between us turned into something undeniable. I pulled back, let my eyes drop to the unmistakable b***r forming in his trousers, and gave him a smile that was pure poison. "See you at the house... brother." I walked away without looking back, leaving him standing over Richard’s grave with a hard-on and nowhere to hide it.