Stepbrother Thief(52)

“We didn't discuss protection first?” he asks, finally starting the ignition and pulling out of the driveway. “At least you can rest assured that I'm clean.”

“Always use a condom with your girlfriends?” I ask and he shakes his head softly, giving me another smoldering look that makes me clench the seat with tight fingers. I really am letting him get to me, aren't I? A thirty-one year old woman acting like a teenager. Not particularly flattering. I need to get a rope around these hormones.

“I haven't had many girlfriends,” he admits with a small shrug. “None of them matched up to you.”

I snort and put my forehead against the palm of my hand.

“Would you please stop? This dinner is supposed to be about our daughter,” I say, glancing up in time to see him clench the wheel with tight fingers.

“It is about her. But it's also about us. I want us to be a family again, Regina.”

“Go fuck yourself,” I tell him, the words slipping out before I can stop them. Not very mature, I know, but wow. Really? The nerve of this asshole. A family? He had a family and he tossed it away like it didn't mean shit.

“Speaking of families,” he begins again, clearing his throat a little. “No condom?”

“I have an IUD,” I snap, rubbing my temples in little circles. “I don't plan on having another child, especially not by accident.”

“Not ever?” Gill asks innocently, and I swear, I'm about to reach over and break some of the fingers on his right hand. I'm not usually prone to violence, but really?

“Gilleon, I don't know what's happening here, but it isn't going to go the way you want it.”

“And how's that?” he asks me, his voice dropping a little, into a deeper, more primal sound. “How do you think I want it, Regina?”

“I think you want me back,” I say, and feel my heart start to pound. I look over at him, refusing to be intimidated, and find his eyes half-lidded and focused entirely on the road in front of us. He doesn't even glance my way. The blue lights from the dashboard cast shadows on his face, highlighting those strong cheekbones, that perfectly straight nose, the round fullness of his lower lip. The shading gives him this scary-pretty look, like the strength that's resting just beneath the surface of his skin could burst free at any moment and wreak some serious havoc.

“Aren't you going to say anything?” I ask, hating how nervous I am right now. Whatever he says, it doesn't matter, doesn't change anything about the past or the future. Gill and me, we don't have a future together anymore. We did, but that's all gone now, torn away by a split second decision and a handwritten letter.

“What does Solène know about … me and you?” he asks finally, choosing to pretend my statement isn't sitting in the SUV with us, the proverbial elephant in the room. I decide that I'm just as happy to drop the subject and lean back in my seat, my heartbeat slowing to something much closer to normal.

“She thinks Cliff is her dad,” I say, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. I'm sorry, but life worked out the way it did, and explanations were needed, and Cliff and I did what we thought was best. After all, it was just me and him there at the time and Solène is a smart girl. She looks like me, like Gill, like Cliff. Obviously, there's blood there. She just believes that it's my mother's and Cliff's blood. “She thinks Elena is her mom, that she died right after she was born.” Instead of the four years before that, shot to death right here in Seattle on a business trip away from Paris. “When she says you're her brother, and I'm her sister, she really thinks it. I mean, she knows we're stepsiblings, but …” I pause and trail off before I keep talking and find that I can't stop.

“Did you ever think about telling her?” he asks, and although I want to tell him to mind his own damn business, the natural curiosity in his voice makes me think twice. He is her dad and I didn't tell him about her. True, it wouldn't have changed anything, but I think it's okay, good even, that he's interested.

“Dozens of times. Hundreds, maybe.” I shrug and then sigh, memories flooding my frontal lobe. There were opportunities, plenty of them, but I just couldn't do it. Maybe it was because telling her about me would mean I'd have to tell her about Gilleon, about how he abandoned us both. I didn't want her to feel like her dad didn't want her, and with Cliff right there and ready to help, I didn't have to risk that. “It feels like it's too late now. I'm afraid that if I tell her, it'll break her heart.”

“I wish I'd known,” Gill whispers, his voice laden with regret, heavy and wistful, like he can imagine a different future for us all. I could too, once upon a time. “Regina, I really am sorry. If I could've stayed, I would've.”