Hunted:A Stepbrother Romance Novel
By: Olivia LongMom rolled her eyes and collapsed onto the couch beside me. “Honey,” she indulged me, patting my thigh, oblivious. “You’ll always be my little girl. Honestly, sweetie, you’re twenty-one. We thought you’d take it a little more easily than this.”
My cheeks fumed. “It’s not about that,” I insisted pointlessly. “It’s just that this isn’t how people do it!”
Harry grinned and came to join us on the couch. “And how, pray-tell, do people ‘do’ it?” he asked. “How do people be happy and tell each other they’ll be together for the rest of their lives? Is there any one particular way, Chloe?”
I grimaced. As much as I hated Harry in this moment, he was a pretty likable guy. I could see why my mom was crazy about him, even though he was doughy and bald and hot pink, and I could see how a man like Harry might accidentally raise a jerk like Chase. Sometimes awesome parents accidentally brew terrible children.
“It just feels like it’s awfully sudden, to me,” I explained calmly. Unlike my mom, who never knew quite what to say, Harry was great at bringing the tension in a room down. Running a non-profit was an obvious and natural choice for someone like Harry, and he’d employed both Mom and me years ago. Mom had the shrewdness and organization necessary for event coordination, skills that lovable but occasionally scatterbrained Harry lacked.
“Awfully sudden?” Harry prompted fondly. “Irene and I have been seeing each other exclusively for five years this year.”
I rolled my eyes and nodded. Technically, sure, that was true. Marriage was not the most sudden thing for them.
“I don’t know, then,” I admitted.
“Maybe you mean it feels awfully sudden to you,” Harry suggested kindly, smiling down at me in that doting, kind of therapeutic way that he had. He was really too good of a guy to be Chase’s dad. I couldn’t believe they actually shared genetic material.
“YES,” I agreed emphatically. “YES. It does feel sudden to me.”
“Oh, honey,” Mom cooed. She played idly with my hair, a habit she had which I always hated, and I swatted at her absently. She didn’t notice or stop. She was a little drunk. “You’ll always be my baby. You know that. This—doesn’t mean anything.”
“Thank you, dear,” Harry interjected.
“Oh, Harry!” Mom cried, smacking at him lightly from behind my back. “You know what I mean.”
I grimaced. It was me that neither of them understood ... and how could they? Even I wasn’t exactly sure why I felt so distressed that they were finally doing it. They were getting married ... legally ... this weekend ... and it made me feel sick to my stomach. Why?
I didn’t want to lift that rock and examine what creepy crawly thoughts were really lurking in my subconscious.
“I’m sorry, you guys,” I said limply. There was nothing else I could say. Mom was right. I was twenty-one; I needed to just accept the things I didn’t like but couldn’t change. And Harry was a nice guy. He treated Mom well, and they loved each other, and Harry was right, too; they’d been together for five years, and they’d been living in the same house for over two of them, and it wasn’t like they were—well—twenty-one. “You’re right.” I stood up from the couch and summoned a fake smile to my face. “I’ll ... be throwing rice from the living room, waiting for you to get back. Congratulations. I think you just surprised me. Maybe I just expected to be part of the wedding.”
“Oh, honey!” Mom guffawed. “Of course you’re going to be part of the wedding! You have to come with us! To Hawaii! You have to give me away, sugar!”
I frowned, but tilted my head with mild interest. If there was one way to sweeten this bitter shake, it was Hawaii.
“Really?” I murmured. “You want me to come when you two elope?”
“YES!” Mom insisted. “We’ll pay for your ticket—and Chase’s, too.”
My heart sank. I should’ve known. Of course Harry would want his son to accompany us to Hawaii, and to participate in the wedding, if I was going to be there, too.
