Addicted: A Bad Boy Stepbrother Romance(64)

I stormed out of my place and to Metroflex for a workout, needing to work off some rage. Randy, the manager on duty, was normally one of the guys I like to hang out and chat with, but that day I was just too pissed off. Thankfully that day was back day, which meant being pissed was good. Pissed off rage combined with a dose of Nano Vapor for my pre-workout meant I tore into my deadlifts like a demon. Even some of the pro lifters, a couple of IFBB juice monkeys and a powerlifter who had more tattoos than me stopped to admire my work and even cheered me on.

I like Metroflex. For one, it's one of the few places in the entire Los Angeles area where nobody gave a shit what my last name was. To the regular crew, I was JC. Sure, a couple would mention when I got my face in the paper or on TMZ, but they didn't give me any drama. They would bust my ass over my lifts, or when my diet was off and I came in looking like a fatass, but there was respect, and there was the unspoken acknowledgement that I could bust their chops just as much. Hell, when one of the IFBB guys offered to hook me up for a cycle of steroids, he took no offense when I turned him down. In fact, the next day he was cheering me on and cussing me out during squats just like everyone else. The regular guys at Metroflex, they were almost like my family.

Finishing up my deadlifts, I went straight into my normal secondary lifts, finishing with a killer set for my shoulders that left me gasping and my rear delts on fire. As I set my mind aside to not focus on the pain, I thought about what I could do to really fuck up my father's wedding. Showing up drunk? Nah, too trite and easily dismissed. Causing a scene and going on a rant would probably do the same thing. He'd just look at me with those blue eyes of his, boredom and dismissal competing for first place, and then go back to the ceremony.

On the other hand, I could always go for the throat. It was a trait I'd inherited from him after all. In business, nobody could be as ruthless as Johnathan Castelbon if you crossed him. Well, my father had been crossing me for nearly twenty years, ever since he threw Mom out on her ass. But how to go for the throat?

Suddenly it came to me, while at the same time my left shoulder muscle said no more, and the chains I'd been using dropped to the ground. Krystal! The way my father had spoken about her, the tone of voice, he was smitten with the girl. He'd told me many times growing up that he wished he could have had another child, a daughter. "Looks like you're going to get your wish, Dad."

At the counter, Randy called out my name. I came over, and he held out his hand. "Great job out there today man! Listen, one of the members, they're a freelance photographer who's done some work for Men's Fitness, and wanted to know if you wouldn't mind letting him take some photos next couple of workouts. He was impressed, and you could use the good ink, he said. I dunno what the fuck that means, but he said you'd know."

I laughed and nodded. "Yeah, it means something to put me in TMZ without it being attached to the words police, scandal, or starlet. You get his name?"

"Yeah, he dropped off a card. You want it?"

I thought about it for a moment, then nodded. "Sure, why not? Gotta look at least somewhat respectable half the time."

Randy got the card, and handed it over to me. "So is everything cool now? You came in ready to tear the fucking doors out of their hinges."

I thought about it, and the word Krystal flashed in my mind again. "Yeah, it's cool. Everything is Krystal clear."



Chapter 2

Krystal



My hand ached, and my fingers were almost numb after chopping and slicing vegetables for seven hours, but I kept at it. I'd been busting my ass for too long to screw up this close to breaking onto the line, regardless of if Mom was marrying Johnathan or not.

"Aksoy!" the sous chef, a German man named Horst, called over. "I'm checking your station!"

"Yes Chef!" I yelled back. In a professional kitchen, it's really the only acceptable answer. Is your food ready? Yes, Chef! Are you listening to me? Yes, Chef! Did you really just put peanut butter in the beef Wellington like a brain dead zombie? Yes, Chef!

Once, when my best friend Kimberly asked me what it was like working in a professional kitchen like the one at Alinea, my reply left her wondering if I was crazy. "Go watch Full Metal Jacket," I told her as we toweled the sweat off of ourselves. It had been the end of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu class, which I may add is a great way to get rid of stress. "Watch the first half from the beginning until they go to Vietnam. Replace Marines with chefs, and rifles with cooking knives. That's kind of my life" I said laughing, but was dead serious.

I could understand why Kim thought I was crazy. I mean, my father, Danyal Aksoy, had been one of the first Middle Eastern chefs to try and make it big in the United States. When he married my mother, Sandra Hepburn, they'd both found their soul mates. Between her business skills, backed by her family's old money, and Dad's culinary skills, they took his single little kebab shack in the east side of St. Louis and built it into one of the largest food companies catering to the Jewish and Muslim populations in North America. While Dad himself wasn't a practicing Muslim, and I'm pretty much a non-service attending agnostic, he had grown up knowing nothing but halal foods. He built off of that, and by the time the cancer took him when I was fourteen, he'd become a multi-millionaire by his own hand. After his death, Mom continued to build the company for a few years before selling it, and putting a large chunk of the proceeds into a trust fund for me. Last I checked, my yearly interest alone on the fund would be enough to let me live an upper middle class life without ever doing a damn thing.