Trapped With My Stepbrother novel · Chapter 4 of 6

Chapter 4: The Order

The tent flap was heavier than it should have been, wet canvas dragging against Perry's shoulder as he ducked inside. His clothes were still damp from the forest, from the rain he'd stood in while Reid came apart under his hands, and the cold should have been the first thing he felt.

It wasn't.

Reid was awake.

Sitting up against the far wall of the tent, knees bent, one arm resting on his knee, watching the entrance with an expression Perry had never seen on him before. Not the easy, careless grin. Not the distracted half-smile he wore when he'd forgotten something important. This was something else. Something still and focused and entirely unhidden.

Perry's stepfather lay a few feet away, a mound under the sleeping bag, snoring in long, slow rolls that filled the small space. The fire outside the tent, the one the camp kept burning under its little covering, threw a low orange glow through the canvas, enough to see by. Enough to see Reid's face, the shadows under his cheekbones, the way his eyes tracked Perry from the door to the floor and did not blink.

Perry's heart was already going too fast. It had been going too fast since the clearing, since the rain, since the sound Reid had made when Perry finally let him finish. He'd walked back through the dark with his hands shaking and his chest full of something he couldn't name, and now Reid was looking at him like he'd been waiting.

Like he'd known Perry would come back.

'You're awake,' Perry said. His voice came out rough, too quiet, and he hated how it sounded.

Reid didn't answer right away. He just looked at him, and the silence stretched, and Perry felt the heat of the fire on the back of his neck and the cold of his wet shirt against his chest and the weight of everything that had happened in the clearing pressing down on him.

'Come here,' Reid said.

Low, steady, not a request. Perry's body moved before his brain caught up, before he could think about his stepfather sleeping three feet away, before he could remember all the reasons this was a terrible idea. He crossed the tent on his knees, the canvas floor rough under him, and stopped just short of Reid's reach.

Reid looked up at him. The firelight caught the dark of his eyes, and Perry could see the pulse beating in his throat, fast, faster than it should have been for a man sitting still.

'You followed me,' Reid said. 'Into the forest. In the rain.'

Perry's mouth went dry. 'You knew.'

'I know everything you do, Perry. I've been watching you for two years.'

The words landed like a hand on the back of his neck. Perry opened his mouth to say something, to deflect, to make a joke, but nothing came. The tent was too small. The air was too warm. Reid was too close, and he was looking at Perry like he could see straight through him, like the last two years of careful pretending had never happened.

'What do you want?' Perry whispered.

Reid's lips curved, just barely. 'You know what I want.'

Perry did. That was the worst part. He'd known since the clearing, since the moment Reid had said his name in the dark like a prayer, since the feel of Reid's body under his hands, hot and shaking and completely at his mercy.

And he wanted it too. God, he wanted it.

He moved before he could talk himself out of it. His hands hit Reid's shoulders, and he pushed, and Reid went down onto his back on the floor of the tent, the sleeping bag bunching under him. Perry climbed over him, straddling his hips, and grabbed both of Reid's wrists and pinned them above his head.

Reid's breath left him in a sharp rush. His eyes went wide, then dark, and his chest rose hard against Perry's hands. He didn't fight. He didn't even tense. He just lay there, looking up at Perry like he'd been waiting for exactly this.

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