Page 23 of The Stepbrother 2: Noah

I had sat up all night worrying about my grandmother and plotting my revenge. Keeping my child from my family woulddevastate them, especially Noah. He’d have to deal with not seeing his child and not telling anybody it was his, but he’d do it because he knew I could make life unbearable for Maine if I chose to. We might share a father, but my mother was mine, and I knew I could sow discord between them. I’m sure Noah realized that too. Who would Maine have beside Noah if I made it uncomfortable for her to be around? Not her momma. Tiffany didn’t give a fuck about them. Noah would do anything for Maine to be happy because he was always trying to compensate for their deadbeat momma. For DJ's sake, I hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

"Yes," I finally answered. "This is what I want to do."

Tempest shook her head, her face contorted. "You look like your momma, but you're as spiteful as your daddy. I hope none of this backfire," she said, just before her front door slammed open.

We both turned our heads in the direction of the noise just in time to see her father stride in. It was ten in the morning, and I knew for a fact he had nowhere to be. But he dressed in an expensive black suit. He looked damn good in it too, with his big muscular body and salt-and-pepper hair. Old Creed would have been on some taboo, "fuck-your-best-friend's-daddy" type shit. The new me dropped my eyes and pushed away the nasty thoughts before they took root.

"Hello, Father," Tempest greeted cheerfully. She didn’t say a thing to him about busting into her house with his face fixed in a near scowl.

Mr. DeMarco was interesting. I wasn’t sure where he fell on the spectrum, but I knew he was somewhere on there. Or maybe he had a personality disorder. Unlike most people with issues, he didn’t mask himself. The only person who could make him smile was his wife, Momma Nova. And she took pleasure in getting areaction out of him. Even though she wasn’t there, I did what she'd recently taught me to do when he walked into a room. I got up and walked right up to him, offering a side hug. I looked up at him, putting on my best puppy-dog eyes, and called him Grandpa.

Tempest burst into laughter.

His scowl softened a bit. I knew he liked me. He had offered to kill for me. He and AJ had replaced ‘I love you’ with, ‘who do you want dead?’

When they said little girls looked for men like their fathers, Tempest was the perfect example. AJ was exactly like DeMarco. Though his father was the opposite of DeMarco. Mr. Atticus was a peculiar blend of smooth criminal mafia type, and country boy all in one. It didn’t make sense. He and his wife, Grace. They mostly lived in their hometown of Moss Point, Mississippi, but he spoke fluent Italian and had a villa in Northern Italy. AJ said he'd tell me his daddy's story one day, but something told me I was better off not knowing. AJ talked more than DeMarco, even more than Mr. Atticus, but usually about gruesome shit no one wanted to hear about. I teased Tempest about him being a serial unaliver. When I first met him, that was my best guess, but he turned out to be an FBI agent. Tempest's entire family was an odd bunch, but I liked being around them.

Mr. DeMarco stepped out of my embrace. "Creed," he said—his way of acknowledging my presence.

Then he turned his attention to his daughter.

"Your mother didn’t think a phone call would be enough. She wanted me to lay eyes on you personally." He shoved his phone in her face. "She's on FaceTime." With that, he walked off.

I excused myself to let Tempest speak with her mother and stepped onto the terrace overlooking the beach. Immediately, my mind drifted back to my situation with Noah. Was I being unreasonable? I didn’t think so. He played a role in fucking up my life. I should return the favor.

My cell vibrated in the side pocket of the strapless maxi dress I was wearing, interrupting the background laughter of Tempest's phone call with her mom. I pulled it out and saw that Devon was calling me. I let it ring, and as soon as it stopped, a text message came in: "I'm outside Tempest's condo. I know you wouldn't go anywhere else. Can we talk?"

A sigh escaped my lips as I scratched my scalp in annoyance. I had to go down and talk to him. I didn’t want his stupid ass to do anything dumb and end up missing because he upset Tempest.

When I walked back into the house, Tempest was still on the phone, laughing with her mom. Mr. DeMarco was staring at her feet in disgust. I knew as soon as his wife couldn’t hear him, he would say something blunt that could be interpreted as an insult. But Tempest would just laugh it off. She understood how her dad and husband were—honest to a fault.

I signaled to Tempest that I'd call her later before stepping into the elevator and taking it downstairs. Devon was standing next to my car. Just looking at him irked my nerves.

"Get away from this girl’s house before her husband gets back," I hissed, my words laced with warning. Tempest didn’t like him, so AJ didn’t either. I didn’t want AJ fucking him up in my honor.

He reached out to grab my arm as I tried to sidestep him and reach for the driver's door. "Let’s go somewhere and talk," he urged, his fingers tightening around my arm.

I snatched my arm away. "There's nothing to talk about. You fucked my sister. You were actively fucking her during our relationship and have a child with her."

"But that's not what happened," he countered.

I couldn’t help but laugh at his whiny tone, but I also cocked my head, curiosity getting the better of me.

He ran a hand over his hair, a nervous habit of his. "Maine told me she liked me before graduation. I always knew, but I never saw her in that light. I made it clear to her that I was interested in you."

He let out a sigh. "That last night on the beach, when I woke up the next morning, you had left without a word. I figured you weren’t interested. I was disappointed, but I wasn’t going to bother you again."

I dropped my head, recalling that morning. I had gotten up before everybody so I could wash Noah's scent off me and his cum out of me.

Devon continued after another sigh. "I got up from the beach, went to the hotel to take a shower and pack. Maine walked into the bathroom, completely naked. She claimed it was a mistake. Then told me how you told her you weren’t interested in me. She kissed me, and I kissed her back. It escalated. We fucked. I didn’t think I did anything wrong. You and I weren’t together. When you called to invite me to your parents' fourth of July party, I planned to tell you what happened. You didn’t even come down. I left, thinking I’d never see you again. In Atlanta, I tried to tell you, but you told me to leave past relationships behind. I took the out. It wasn’t until a year after we’d been together that I found out about DJ. Maine convinced me it wasn’t a good timeto tell you because you were still hurting from losing Compton. I never touched her besides that one time."

I frowned. "Jason said it was last year when he caught you two having sex."

"That’s complete bullshit. It never happened," he spat vehemently. "I put that on my momma. You know Jason will do anything if Maine tells him to. After I found out about DJ, I was pissed. I didn’t want to interact with Maine at all. I had my mother pick DJ up from Maine’s so my family could spend time with him, and when I was in town. I haven’t been in a room alone with Maine in five years."

Taking a moment, I processed everything he’d said, feeling both lost and exhausted. I didn’t know who to believe anymore. Everybody had lied, twisted the truth, kept secrets. And now Devon was standing here, trying to convince me that he’d just been caught up in the middle, that he’d only messed up once. But how could I trust any of it?

After a deep breath, I shrugged. "In the end, it doesn’t matter how it happened, Devon. The fact remains that you lied to me. You let me build a life with you, knowing all along that DJ was yours. That’s something I can’t forgive."

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