Page 7 of Clandestine

Opening my palm, I catch my spit and brace the other hand on the wall so I can fuck my own hand. The pressure builds in my spine until I’m unsure if I can hold back, but I do. And fuck, a pathetic whimper claws its way from my throat. My pre-cum beads at the tip, and I swipe it down over my shaft and begin stroking again, everything slightly more sensitive now that I’ve denied my orgasm.

My hips thrust into my strangled grip repeatedly while my mind carries images of her from home, running around the house in her little pajama shorts with nipples poking throughher tank top. The memories of one too many summers and her juicy ass devouring her bikini bottoms while the pool water clung to the soft skin of her lower stomach.

I don’t get the chance to deny this orgasm. It tears through my lower abdomen, and I grunt involuntarily, picturing myself painting the walls of her tight little frame with waves of my cum. My breathing is ragged and labored, and the ice-cold shower is pointless now, anyway. Still, I force my lax body under the spray. The water slicking over my chest muscles and creating droplets over each tattoo on my arms, clinging to the hair there. I didn’t need a shower, but I saturate my hair anyway, rinsing my whole body of the awful thoughts that I let take control. She’s my stepsister, and I shouldn’t be thinking of her this way.

I shouldn’t, and yet, I can’t fucking stop.

I couldn’t stop when she was fourteen and I was sixteen, and our parents decided they were in love after all. I couldn’t stop thinking of her when boys began to take note of her figure and their attempts to ask her out for a night. No, I didn’t stop thinking of her as I washed the blood of underclassmen off my knuckles in the middle of the night. And within all of those thoughts, I never stopped asking myself: If we weren’t bound together by the laws of someone else’s marriage, would she even want someone like me? Someone capable of cracking noses and jaws alike. Someone who would disfigure another for saying foul words with her name on their lips?

Fuck. I don’t think I could handle it if the answer was no.

And today, she makes eyes at Sydnee. Sydnee, out of all of us. Not that I should be in the running for her attention, but of course, it would be someone who isn’t tangled as deeply in her life as Jackson and I.

It should be him. He cares for her more deeply than he could admit to me or himself, but it’s in his stupid green eyes. The wayhe looks at her, the way he’s held her hand and been there for her, the way I couldn’t as a stepbrother. I owe him a lot.

If I had to pick anyone besides myself to own her heart, it would be him. And that pisses me off, no matter how much I wish it didn’t.

Looking in the mirror, I curse myself for going on this self-sabotaging spiral. There is, and has always been, a reason I try to keep her at an arm’s length.

The lead signer of Neon Cherry cannot be caught fucking his stepsister. But I’m just not sure how much I care anymore.

SIX

JACKSON

You know, I kind of like having Hale here. The dose of drama is good for the soul. We rarely have anything exciting going on, and I can just feel the buzz of everyone’s attraction to her in the damn air. It’s like we’re all in on a secret, but none of us knows that each other knows.

I’m not going to lie. I fully plan to finally make my move this week. I don’t know how, but I’m done hiding my feelings from Hale. I’m not the one with everything to lose, and my wanting her won’t get the tabloids’ nut. I have no qualms about going after my best friend’s little sister.

Correction:STEPSISTER.

I can hear Hale’s soft voice demanding the correction even in my head. I don’t care what type of sister she is to Colby; it doesn’t stop her from belonging to me.

Hale is…perfect. In the least cliche way I can mean that. I wish I could think of a better way to describe her.

She’s sweet yet sassy at all the right times. She’s funny and witty in the smoothest ways. She’s so painfully kind, and she cansee the best in everyone. Hale is the type of girl to give too many chances because she believes,It’s everyone’s first time living this life.

Hale is the girl you hope to take home to your mom. Luckily for me,she’s already met my mom. She’s known my mom since she was fourteen. That was ten years ago. Ten years ago, I laid my eyes on the girl I knew I wanted to be with forever.

I’ve alwaystriedto hide my feelings for her behind corny jokes, and I’ve held her hand when her idiot brother was being an ass to her once again. It’s always been the three of us, after all. Every summer in the pool, every movie night, every late-night garage practice when she listened to me strike all the wrong chords on my hand-me-down guitar. Colby would sing out and huff every time an off note rang out through the amps.

But she was always there, just happy to be included. A true ray of fucking sunshine. Unfortunately, the bro code exists. And while I’m not sure if bro code applies to stepsisters, Colby’s infatuation withhisgives me no choice.

When Hale comes out of the bus bedroom, her hair is disheveled, and I can’t help but notice the pout of her sleepy lips. How she can sleep on this damn bus is beyond me, but maybe that’s a good thing. I know her being with us for this festival is supposed to be a trial run, but she already seems like a natural. She takes to the tour bus like it’s her new second home, and the fans have been reacting really well to all of the content she’s already posted, too.

“Rise and shine, sleeping beauty.” I pull her groggy form into my chest as she enters the common area.

“How much longer?” her sleepy voice grumbles at me.

“About an hour. You slept hard. I could hear you snoring all the way in here.”

She looks around the bus, making some sort of calculation with a confused look in her eyes.

“Nuhuh,” she says, raising her eyebrow at me. “I don’t snore.”

“Oh, but you do, sugar. Like a freight train. How someone as angelic as you can make those disgusting sounds will never cease to baffle me.” I laugh, teasing her like I’ve missed doing.

“Whatever, I need to get ready.” Rolling her eyes, she takes a sip from her water bottle to chase the ibuprofen she just rifled through the cabinet for. To cure the “nap hangover,” as she calls it.

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