Oops My Stepbrother and His Rival Want Me

I'm three vodka sodas into ignoring my organic chem final when the night decides to ruin itself anyway. Rida's bar on a Thursday is supposed to be the one place in this city where nothing happens. That's the whole appeal. Viper's name on the lease means nobody outside the club tries anything stupid, and everybody inside the club is too scared of him to start something themselves. Theo picked tonight specifically because of that. Low stakes. Cheap drinks. No drama before my exam tomorrow. So much for that plan. Eight bikes roll up outside, engines cutting at the exact same second, like they practiced it. Theo's fingers dig into my arm hard enough to leave a mark tomorrow. "That's not us." His voice goes thin. "Those aren't our colors." "Obviously." I don't move. A free drink doesn't fix itself. He's not lost. That's the first thing I clock when the chain on the door gives out and he walks through like he already owns the place, all black, no patches showing, which somehow makes it worse, because half this room would recognize that face with a bag over it. Somebody two stools down whispers his name like it costs them something. "Rezo." He's not here by accident. Five years of Rida and Voss carving this city up block by block, and everybody in this bar knows exactly which line he just stepped over on purpose, looking for exactly one person. "Where's Viper." Marco wipes down a glass that's been spotless since before Rezo's bike cut its engine outside. "This isn't your territory." "Wasn't asking whose territory it was." He's over the bar in one motion, fist closing in Marco's collar, slamming him into the row of bottles hard enough that two of them tip and shatter against the floor behind the counter. The gun comes out a half breath later, barrel flat against Marco's temple like drawing it cost him nothing at all. "Where. Is. Viper." "He left, man, an hour ago, I don't know where—" A guy near the pool table starts edging toward the back hallway, and Rezo doesn't even look at him, just says, "Sit down," without raising his voice, and the guy sits. Doesn't argue. Doesn't even finish standing up first. Three more of Viper's guys are scattered around the room, and not one of them moves either. That tells me everything about who Rezo actually is, more than his name or his bike or the gun currently pressed against Marco's skull. Grown men who'd throw a punch for Viper without blinking, and none of them willing to test this one. I should be doing literally anything other than sitting here with my drink half finished, watching a man hold a gun to my coworker's head like it's a Tuesday. Instead I just watch. Most interesting thing that's happened to me all semester, and I'm including the chem final in that math. That's when he looks up. Finds me. My stomach does something ugly and immediate, a pull that yanks tight and low and has nothing to do with fear. I grip my glass harder instead of doing anything useful with my face. "You." His voice drops, slow, deliberate. "Name." "You first." I don't know where that comes from. It just comes out, mouth running ahead of better judgment, same as always. "Manners exist even for guys holding guns." Something shifts behind his eyes. Not anger. Curiosity, and underneath that, something a lot more sure of itself than curiosity has any right to be. Marco makes a sound like he's choking on his own pulse. "Don't, man, leave her alone, she's not part of any of this—" "Then what is she." "Viper's stepsister." It rushes out of Marco like a confession he's been sitting on the whole night. "His stepsister. She's got nothing to do with the club, just go, please—" The gun comes down an inch. I watch it happen and something in my chest folds in on itself, quiet and sudden, like a door closing somewhere down a long hallway. "Viper's sister." Rezo says it like he's turning it over, checking the weight of it. Whatever brought him through that door in the first place just stopped being the point. He lets Marco drop, crosses the room toward me instead, unhurried, like there's nowhere else worth being tonight and he's already decided that for both of us. Behind him, Marco slides down the back of the bar and stays there. Theo's gone dead silent next to me, which might be the most frightened I've ever seen him, including the time campus security caught us climbing the library roof. I don't move. Out of principle, mostly. "You point guns at people who work for my brother a lot?" I tip my chin up rather than crane my neck like some kind of bystander. "He's not going to love that." "Let him hate it." "That's the whole plan? Let him?" I laugh, short, with zero warmth behind it. "You don't even know him." "I know him better than you'd like." He stops close enough that I catch leather and gun oil and something underneath both, something that makes the back of my neck prickle in a way I'm choosing not to examine right now. "Came here for him. Found you instead." "Tragic for you." "Wasn't complaining." "Wasn't an offer, either." "Didn't need one." His gaze drags down, unbothered, thorough, the way you'd look at something you already plan on owning. "I take what I want. Asking's optional." "Bold for a guy who walked into the right club and still managed to get the wrong sibling." "Wrong sibling." His mouth curves, no humor in it anywhere. "Better one, though." "You don't even have my name." "Don't need it tonight." Flat. Certain. Like stating the time. "I'll have it eventually. I'll have plenty else by then, too." "God, has anyone ever actually told you no?" "Once." Something passes behind his face and disappears just as fast. "Didn't stick." "Shocking." I roll my eyes hard enough to feel it. "I'm sure it was a real loss for both of you." "You've got a mouth on you." "And you've got a gun you forgot to put away, so I guess we're both walking around with something we shouldn't." I nod at his hip, where the barrel is still hanging loose in his grip like an afterthought. "Want a holster, or do you just like the attention?" For a second, something almost like a real smile threatens the corner of his mouth before he kills it. "Careful." "Or what." "Or I'll start enjoying this more than I already am." "Tragic for me, I guess." "You'll survive it." He finally holsters the gun, slow, deliberate, like the decision belongs entirely to him and nobody else's nerves factor into it. "Most people do, around me. Eventually." "That a threat?" "That's a fact with a better attitude than most threats." He tilts his head, studying me the way you'd study something you've already decided is worth the trouble. "You always this much work, or am I getting a special version?" "You held a gun to my staff's head ten minutes ago. I think I'm being generous." "Could've been worse." "Could've been a lot of things. Doesn't make this fun." "Didn't say it was fun." His voice drops again, that same half octave from before, low enough that it's clearly only meant for me even with half the bar still watching. "Said I'm enjoying it. Different thing." I open my mouth, something sharp enough to leave a mark already lined up behind my teeth, and the front door slams open hard enough to crack the wall behind it.