Stepbrother Dearest(76)

For the first time since we arrived at the casino, thoughts of Chelsea were completely buried by the intensity of my feelings for Greta. Needing to know if she felt it, I looked down and at that same exact moment, she looked up at me. I was losing my ability to breathe. I touched my forehead to hers and just knew. That was the moment I stopped lying to myself. I was still in love with her. I didn’t know what to do about it because I loved Chelsea, too.

Before I could think it through, Greta pulled away and started running off through the darkness of the crowd.

“Greta, wait!”

Within seconds, I’d lost her. I made my way to the exit and ran toward the elevators. The doors were closing, and I stuck my arm through the opening to stop them.

She was crying. God, what had I done to her?

“What the fuck, Greta? Why did you run from me like that?”

“I just need to go back to my room.”

“Not like this.”

Without thinking, I pressed the stop button.

“What are you doing?”

“This isn’t how I wanted our night to end. I crossed a line. I know that. I got lost in the moment with you, and I’m so fucking sorry. But it wasn’t going to go any further because I won’t cheat on Chelsea. I couldn’t do that to her.”

“I’m not as strong as you are, then. You can’t dance with me like that, look at me like that, touch me like that if we can’t do anything about it. And for the record, I wouldn’t want you to cheat on her!”

“What do you want?”

“I don’t want you to say one thing and act in a way that contradicts it. We don’t have much time left together. I want you to talk to me. That night at the wake…you wrapped your hand around my neck. It felt like for a moment you were back in that place where we left off. That’s sort of how I feel around you all of the time. Then, later that night, Chelsea told me what happened after you got home.”

What was she talking about?

“Exactly what did she tell you?”

“Were you thinking about me? Is that why you couldn’t perform that night?”

The fuck?

I had no words. The fact that Chelsea told Greta about that private moment actually pissed me off. I was speechless.

“I want you to tell me the truth,” she said.

She couldn’t handle the truth, and I couldn’t handle these feelings for her. But I was pissed that they’d been talking like that behind my back. On top of that, my whole life felt like it had been turned inside out in one night.

So, I lost it.

“You want the truth? I was fucking my girlfriend and could see nothing but you. That’s the truth.” I moved toward her predatorily, and she backed away. “I got into the shower that night, and the only way I could finish the job was to imagine coming all over your beautiful neck. That’s the truth.”

It should have stopped there.

Instead, I locked my arms around her as she leaned her back against the wall. I kept going. “You want more? I was going to ask her to marry me tonight at her sister’s wedding. I was supposed to be engaged right at this very moment, but instead, I’m in an elevator fighting the urge to back you up against this wall and fuck you so hard that I’ll have to carry you back to your room.”

My chest hurt. I dropped my arms. “Everything I thought I knew has been turned upside down in the past 48 hours. I’m questioning everything, and I don’t fucking know what to do. That’s. The. Truth.”

I released the stop button because any more time in here would have been detrimental, although being brutally honest for once felt like a huge weight had lifted off of my chest.

When we got to our floor, we both went back to our separate rooms.

Alone in bed, guilt started to really set in and prevented me from sleeping.

I was torturing myself by going through my pictures of Chelsea again.

She didn’t deserve this.

I’d tossed and turned, alternating between thoughts of Randy, guilt over Chelsea and my personal favorite: carnal thoughts of Greta. If I didn’t care about hurting Chelsea, I would have gone to Greta’s room that night. I knew with all of our pent-up frustration, it would have been the best sex of my life. But I wasn’t a cheater, and I wouldn’t go there. So, I let my imagination experience it.

At one point, the sexual fantasies had gotten so vivid, I tried to undo my sins with a text to Chelsea at 2 A.M.



I love you.



Immediately after, I sent a text to Greta.



If I knock on your door tonight, don’t let me in.



***



The cab was approaching my destination, so I thought that was as good a point as any to stop the story since I was going to have to greet my friends soon. It was painful to put it down.