TEASE ( A Stepbrother Romance ) By Caitlin Daire

20

Chapter 20

Rayna

"Liar."

I woke up to Jace whispering in my ear, and I rolled over and grumbled. "Huh? What did I lie about?"

He grinned. "You said you weren't going to get much sleep. But you've slept for hours. Look at the time."

I tried and failed to stretch; I was simply too exhausted from the crazy time I'd had last night. "Just tell me what it is," I murmured, closing my eyes again.

"It's ten A.M."

That was enough to make me sit bolt upright in bed and open my eyes wide. "Crap! I have to get to my own room!"

"In case our parents see us?" he said, one eyebrow arched.

Everything he'd told me about his father last night suddenly came flooding back to me in a deluge of bad memories, and my shoulders slumped. "Oh. Right. We're not going to be family for much longer...but still, we should keep this to ourselves until we at least tell my Mom about your Dad, right?"

He nodded. "Good call. We don't want to upset her even more. But don't worry, I got up earlier and checked, and she's not even home. Apparently she went out shopping for a few hours."

The window was open, and a cold morning breeze blew through it, causing goose bumps to pepper my skin. I pulled the blankets up around myself, and I looked over at Jace as he walked over and shut the window before turning a heater on. He was only wearing a pair of shorts, and as I watched him fumble with the heater switch, my eyes traced the long pink scar on his back. It wasn't ugly; it was simply part of who he was, and I was glad he'd finally told me all about how he'd obtained it. It'd been a nasty story, but apparently it had inspired him to be a better person, and I was proud of him. Maybe he'd done bad things in the past, but he'd learned from his mistakes, and every day he was taking steps towards being a good man.

"Jace," I called out. He turned around, and I smiled. "Thank you. For everything. Especially last night. I don't know what would've happened without you there."

Jace walked back over to the bed, a deliberate nature to his step. Then he took my face in his hands and stared deep into my eyes, his brooding expression almost causing me to fall apart there and then. "You never need to thank me for stuff like that. I'll always be there for you, no matter what."

"Well, I wanted to thank you anyway," I said. "I...um...I..."

I didn't know how to say the words I so desperately wanted to, even though it should've been simple. Three words, eight letters. Not that hard.

Jace must've sensed my nervousness, because he kissed the tip of my nose and then whispered in my ear. "I don't mind going first, babe. I love you."

My heart leapt, and I thought I'd never be able to wipe the grin off my face. "I love you too."

"Good," he replied with a gentle smile. "After last night, I was kinda worried you'd hate me."

"The sex wasn't that bad," I joked, and he chuckled.

"Very funny. You know that's not what I was talking about."

I nodded, the smile finally slipping from my face. "I know. You meant the Roy thing, and the stuff you told me about your Dad. So what are we going to do about it?"

"Well, first things first. We need to go to the police to give our statements about Roy-I called the nearest station and set up interview times for us while you were sleeping, so we need to be there in two hours-and after that, when your Mom gets home, we need to figure out how to tell her about Dad and sort out that whole situation. I already have a vague idea, but you might not be keen on it."