Beautiful Brute (Court University 3)

I tried not to growl at the woman he cheated on my mother with, the one who ultimately ripped my family apart. My father was a slimeball, point-blank, but now, he hugged me like time hadn’t passed.

Like he hadn’t left my ass when I was eleven.

I pulled back with a smile now, making myself. He held me out, just looking at me, and I was well aware I was basically this guy’s clone. We had the same jawline, strong and with an intensity to his eyes that contrasted his relaxed expression. He liked to smile a lot, just like me.

Usually.

He tapped my neck. “Why didn’t you tell us you got here?” he asked, then passed a look over to stepsis. “Cleo?”

Nothing from her direction, and honestly, she hadn’t known. I didn’t tell her. That had been a delight of my own the minute I’d realized my stepsister and I had been at the same club last night. I had flown in early, stopped by to see a friend. My buddy LJ was attending a wedding in Miami, and after stopping and catching up with him, I left with a couple of bridesmaids. They’d been local so we checked out the scene, headed to the club.

Cleo tugged on her hair like Rapunzel, literally that long. “I, um…”

Tell them. I dare you.

I wished she would blow this shit right out of the water, tell them what went down and how I’d fucked her into an oblivion last night. Honestly, she may have been just figuring it out herself. That she’d slept with her stepbrother.

And that she’d enjoyed it.

I had her

ass wriggling last night, like a true virgin, and how easy she’d let me take it.

Hair fell from her fingers. She started to say something, but bio dad had more of his focus on me. He started saying a bunch of shit completely lost on me, a mantra of “when did you arrive” and “how good it is to see you.” Nodding with a smile, I told him the same.

Too easy.

He made it so, wanting it to be easy. He wanted me standing here and forgetting about the past. He wanted his second chance with me, and I was giving him that by being here.

But that didn’t mean it wouldn’t be without cost.

My pockets were a little empty from his payout, but I wasn’t talking about money. I was talking about time and need for payment from the past. My biological father, Rick, dropped his arm around me. “Well, I’m just glad you’re here. Maggie?”

He waved stepmother bitch over, basically Cleo’s clone. They had the same height, same body type and everything. I had to admit my father’s family was hot, and since he wasn’t a hopeless case, after all, half my looks unfortunately did come from him, I supposed that’d been the reason why he’d been able to nab them.

“I want you to meet your stepmom,” he said, but didn’t look nervous. He looked almost proud to introduce me to the woman he’d ruined our family for. He grinned. “My Maggie.”

His Maggie.

She came over to me, taking my hand and I had another moment. One where I had to slowly check myself. I could end all this right now.

Don’t be fucking stupid.

“Good to meet you, Jaxen.”

“Good to meet you,” I forced and good as hell at it. I’d prepared for this.

I was ready for this.

But stepmom didn’t let go of my hand, beaming a hundred watt smile at me. If Mary Sunshine had a whore sister, this woman would be it, blinging her pearly whites at me. She had my father’s money and his arm, something I or my mother never needed. My mom had been successful in her own right, didn’t need his shit.

Unlike this bitch.

She obviously relished in it, their fancy-ass house and that big fucking diamond on her finger. Stepmom grinned. “Oh my goodness, Rick. He looks nothing like those old pictures you’ve shown us. Wow, I never would have recognized you. You’ve obviously grown up and so handsome.”

Rick shook my shoulders. “Of course, he is. He’s my son, isn’t he?”

Another pulse in my stomach that I had any biological connection at all to this man. I checked myself again. “Genetics are something, huh?”