My lips twist into a pleasured grin.
I did that. I chose to do that.
Me.
Who knew my body could do something so amazing?
Choice is a beautiful thing.
CHAPTER 9
Jensen
“Missed you last night, Waverly.” Mark unfolds his newspaper at breakfast the next morning. His face is scrunched, scrutinizing his second oldest daughter as she eats her scrambled eggs in silence.
She’s been awfully quiet this morning, and I’ve opted to leave her alone. I think I pushed her too hard the night before, and I’ve still got five months left of living here. My end goal—graduating high school and moving to California—is way more important than convincing some prudish virgin to finger herself.
I stifle a laugh, my gaze snapping to Waverly. Her cheeks flush and she reaches for her juice. She won’t make eye contact with anyone.
Oh, my God. She totally did it.
I kick her leg under the table.
“Hey.” Bellamy shoots me a dirty look.
Oops.
“Sorry,” I mutter, lowering my head so she can’t see the shit-eating grin on my face.
“I was just tired last night,” Waverly says to her father. “Went up to my room and did some homework, and then I went to bed early.”
Fuck. She’s a terrible liar. Must be hard being habitually honest. She couldn’t tell a lie to save her life.
“Hm.” Mark is studying her like a book. Wonder what he’d think if he knew his precious, virginal daughter, the apple of his eye, his pride and joy, fingered herself last night while she thought of her new stepbrother? “Went looking for you. You weren’t in your room after dinner last night.”
“I did some laundry,” she says, shrugging a shoulder.
“Oh, Mark, did I tell you? The HVAC technician is coming today around ten to tune up my furnace,” Summer interrupts.
Mark mumbles something to her, but his gaze is still transfixed on his red-faced, fidgeting daughter.
The man is not stupid. He’s not naïve or blind to a damn thing that goes on under his three roofs. I know this because any man who uses religion as a weapon or a manipulative tool is a freaking mastermind. What man could convince three women to marry him, have his babies, grow their hair long so they can wash his feet with it in Heaven, serve and satisfy him, and make them feel like they’re the ones benefitting from this arrangement?
Waverly pushes her chair out from the table and takes her dish to the sink. She grabs her backpack and slinks it over her shoulder.
“Leaving early?” Bellamy asks.
Their mom, Jane, surveys in silence. She has “opinionated” written all over her face, but she seems to keep them all to herself—at least whenever I’m around.
Waverly glances at the clock on the wall. Her face reads like she’s trying to come up with an excuse, but she’s so flustered nothing’s coming together in time. “Yep. Leaving early.”
She’s gone.
Just like that.
I shovel the rest of my breakfast in my mouth and stand to leave, keeping my dirty dishes on the table because I don’t feel like being yelled at for not letting the women clean up after me.
House rules are house rules.
I grab my jacket and keys and run outside. Waverly’s sitting in her car, letting it warm up, and messing with her radio. I rap on her window, grinning as she jumps up in her seat.
She rolls her window down. “What?”
“So…” I’ve got a smile a mile wide. “You did it.”
She shifts her car into drive, and it lurches until she puts her foot on the break. She’s staring ahead now, opting not to make eye contact with me a second longer than she has to.
“You’re glowing.” I rest an elbow on the inside of her window.
“Stop.” She rolls her eyes.
“Stop what?”
“Gloating. You’re acting like you… like you made me… like you gave me the…” She can’t say it.
It’s probably not a word in her vocabulary, so I’ll say it for her. “Orgasm.”
Her face whips toward mine, freshly-washed, sandy hair spilling down her shoulders.
“You can say it, Waverly. Or-gas-m.” I smirk. “And I kind of did give it to you. I mean, not literally. You did all the work. I can’t take any credit for that.”
I glance up toward the main house to find Mark standing in the living room window, casting a hard stare our way. His mouth forms a hard line. I smack the top of Waverly’s car and tell her to get going, giving Mark a friendly wave and a thumb’s up. He doesn’t return anything other than a stone cold stare. If he asks later, and I’m sure he will, I was just checking on her. Making sure she was okay. Just being a good stepbrother.