Stepbrother Affairs (The Monroe Family Secrets Book 3)

STEPBROTHER AFFAIRS

Lauren Branford

First Edition, November 2014

Copyright ©2014 Lauren Branford

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

The Monroe Family Secrets

Book III of III

Table of Contents

One Week

Missing

Brother and Sister

Mending

Moving the Queen

Stepmother Secrets

Brick House

The Waiting Room

Tapes

Epilogue

Audrey

(This chapter is previewed at the end of Book II)
 

              A fresh linen towel was rolled under my arm as I glanced over my usual spot on the top of the hill. The grass had dry spots now that the summer pressed on and less appetizing than it had been in the previous weeks. Surveying the grounds, it was clear to me what the reason was. The pool sat motionlessly, except for the trickle from the water fountain that rested on the north edge. Sebastian must have taken Darla out to see the rest of the property before she left this week. Without my stepbrother swimming in the pool, I decided to take up residency.

I was only a week away from my world excursion. My friend Rebecca from boarding school decided to spend the first month with me in Europe. Though the initial thought of the two of us trekking across the world seemed enjoyable, on this day, however I didn’t feel excited. In fact, I felt nothing. Just like the waning summer, I had lost my enthusiasm.

Though Sebastian and I ended our tryst, I still thought of him nearly every minute of the day. Somehow, he had cast a spell on me that couldn’t be lifted, even by common sense. It was difficult to know what about him captivated me. Perhaps he was the muscle-bound lover that got away. Still, I felt that his smile was the most bewitching. Men with the smiles of mischievous boys always knew how to sink their arrows right inside of me.

I, however, felt that this summer had not vain. As a woman, I had grown. In boarding school, if a girl like Darla came along and threatened the object of my affection, I would have sent her screaming home. Sometimes it was just an embarrassing photo of her that leaked from her cellphone. Other times it was replacing her shampoo with hair remover. I’m not proud of what I did, but boarding school was a savage place, and I had to be the fiercest cat in the cage.

“Sebastian!” I heard Lydia call out from inside of the house. “Don’t!”

“Fuck this shit!” Sebastian screamed. Then I heard the crash of something large breaking inside of the hallway. Suddenly, my afternoon of tanning had been ruined.

              “Calm down!” Lydia screamed. I leaned up in time to see my father and brother running from the croquette course.

              “What’s going on?” my father yelled to me.

              “I don’t know,” I said with a widened expression. Something had made Sebastian extremely angry.

              “AH!” Sebastian yelled as the two front doors flew open. He ran shirtless into the car park where he stumbled onto the median of grass. Sebastian’s face was bright red and veins pulsated from his neck. “What the fuck?”

              “What’s going on, Sebastian?” my brother Michael asked as he ran over to him. As soon as Michael touched Sebastian’s shoulder, he hit his hands away in a fury.

              “Don’t fucking touch me!” Sebastian yelled as he fell onto the grass. Now he was sobbing uncontrollably.

              “It’s Darla,” Lydia said as she walked with arms folded outside of the mansion. “She’s missing.”

Michael

              “What do you mean?” my father asked as he ran into the house. I walked away from Sebastian after he smacked me on the hand. Though it was obvious my stepbrother was in pain, it seemed as though we were not close enough for me to comfort him.

              “Robert, don’t go in–“ Lydia said as she rushed back into the house. However, it was too late.

              “Who did this?” my father bellowed from inside the house. I glanced inside of the doors to see a large glass statue knocked onto its side. With a piece of the broken art in his hands, my father ran back outside toward Sebastian was who kneeling down in a stupor on the grass. “Did you fucking break
my
statue?”

              “Robert!” Lydia yelled as she raced toward him. “He was upset!”

              “You are a guest in
my
house,” my father was enraged. I had seen him like this a handful of times in the past. However, it always frightened me back to the time when I was just a boy, and he would tower above me. “You don’t get to come in here and destroy
my
possessions!”

              “I don’t give a fuck!” Sebastian sobbed. “Fuck your shitty art!”

              Without another word from his lips, I saw pure rage strike like lightening into my father’s eyes. Suddenly, he swung back his arm with the broken glass in it, and then hit Sebastian on the underside of his jaw. Sebastian jolted as a spray of blood spattered onto the concrete.

              “Robert!” Lydia screamed as she rushed toward Sebastian, who was lying with his face on the pavement. Her white dress was almost see-through in the bright day as she ran to the aid of her son. “Don’t hit him!”

              “He needs to learn respect,” my father defended himself. He noticed that the piece of glass had blood all over it as it rubbed against the palms of his hands. Quickly, he tossed it onto the grass and stormed back into the house. During all of the commotion, my sister Audrey sat by the pool as everyone tried to help. As usual, she was completely useless in a dire situation.

              “What happened to Darla?” I calmly asked Sebastian.

              “She left!” he sobbed with a mouthful of spit and blood. Lydia shot me a glance as she tried to lift him from the grass by the arm. I stepped onto the other side and helped her lift the miserable fool onto his feet.

              “She sent him a text last night,” Lydia said softly. I noticed her eyes looking me up and down as she spoke. Even during her own son’s tragedy, she was thinking about my cock. I would have been offended if I also weren’t so turned on by her insatiable needs.

              “After she fucking drugged me!” Sebastian yelled.

              “She drugged you?” Audrey chimed in as she walked over to where we were standing. My sister was wearing a tiny string bikini that barely held together over her frame.

              “Yes,” Sebastian replied. He glanced at her through the side of his eyes with a look that I couldn’t quite place. “I found a bottle of pills next to my bed. Read this.”

              Sebastian reached into his pocket and whipped out a cellphone. After punching in the code with his thumb to unlock it, he handed the device to my sister.

              “Sebastian,” Audrey read softly. “All of this was too much pressure and I need to go. I know you’d stop me, so I mixed some sleeping pills into your glass of water. I’m so sorry… good bye.”

              “That’s what she wrote you?” Lydia scoffed. “That little bitch.”

              “Mother!” Sebastian yelled. “Can’t you see that she was put off by all of this?”

              Sebastian’s arms widened as he pointed to the mansion and the pool. Darla, as I understood, came from a humble beginning. I could understand how a quiet girl such as herself might felt overwhelmed. Still, with a body like she had, it seemed to me that she knew what cards she was playing.

              “I’m so sorry,” Audrey said as she moved over to Sebastian. With her nearly naked frame, she wrapped herself around him. He embraced her back in a grasp that made me feel queasy. Audrey seemed to be playing another game with Sebastian. It wouldn’t surprise me at all to learn that she had helped Darla disappear.

              “Let’s go inside so that I can get you some ice,” Lydia said to Sebastian. With that, they walked toward the house. Just before entering the doorway, Lydia shot me a look that made my dick hard.

Audrey

              In order to keep compliant with our agreement, Michael and I spared no time appearing that our sibling affection had grown. The day following Darla’s vanishing, we shared a horse together, riding bareback down the path. I looked above to see that the sun was blocked by an onslaught of gray clouds.

              “It’s getting quite stormy,” I said to Michael.

              “The cold fronts are mixing with the warm,” he said staring at the sky. “Thunder will soon sound.”

              I could hear the smugness behind Michael’s tone. He always tried to spew the little amount he knew about science, politics, and more just to prove that he was eclectic. I resisted the temptation to put him in his place.

              “So sad to see Sebastian like that,” I added.

              “Spare me,” Michael said with an emotionless tone. I took offense to his demeanor.

              “Explain,” I demanded tersely.

              “I bet your are tingling between your legs with excitement now that your competition is out of the way.”

              “Competition?” I laughed. “Darla was hardly that.”

              “So now it’s okay to speak ill of her.”

              “It’s not like she’s dead, Michael,” I retorted.

              “Still,” he warned. “You’ve got to be careful that they don’t discover the two of you.”

              “I could say the very same to you, brother,” I reminded him. Michael was clearly trying to get ahead in our discussion. While I would allow him to spew some of his mindless drivel, I wouldn’t permit him to find a higher platform.

              “You are incorrigible,” Michael looked back at me with a glare. “Furthermore, you don’t frighten me, sister.”

              “I wasn’t attempting to scare you, Michael,” I replied. “But I know that father was.”

              “How do you mean?” Michael asked while obviously attempting conceal his worry at this new piece of information.

              “Yesterday,” I began. “His display toward Sebastian was likely to show
you
who is the man of the house.”

              “Hardly!” Michael scoffed.

              “I’m serious,” I continued. “He wanted to show that he was stronger than Sebastian.”

              “What does that have to do with me?”

              “Sebastian is a built man, Michael. I’m afraid that I can’t say that you compare to him in strength.”

              “Fuck you!” Michael yelled. I could see that I was finally drumming a nerve.

              “Get as angry with me as you’d like, brother,” I concluded. “However, this wasn’t just about our father’s quick temper. He may seem out of the loop on social connections in which he isn’t directly involved, but that is hardly the case.”

              “So do you think that he knows about you and Sebastian?”

              “Don’t try to play that one on me.”

              “No, Audrey, don’t
you
try to play this on
me
,” Michael scolded. “I know how manipulative you are when you want something. And you
always
want something; especially if you’ve been told that you aren’t allowed to have it. Sebastian is just another pawn in the great chess board of Audrey Monroe.”

              “I’m so glad that my brother can attack my character with such ease,” I said. “You’re a piece of work, Michael.”

              “We’re cut from the same cloth,” he replied. “Don’t you remember?”

              “Let’s go back to pretending that we enjoy each other’s company,” I said in an attempt to diffuse the unfolding situation. “We have a week left and I’d rather not end it with me remembering why I despise you.”

              “Likewise,” Michael agreed on each level. I could hear the stuffy sound of his arrogant thoughts coming out in just that one word. As soon as I went to take a deep breath to forget about all of this, Michael yelled. “Holy fuck!”

              “You’re going to spook the horse!” I screamed as our ride began bucking her head. “What are you freaking–“

              “Shut up, Audrey.”

              “No, Michael, you are–“

              “I think I’m going to be sick,” he said.

              “Come now, what are you–“ I couldn’t finish my sentence. Suddenly, I saw what caused my brother to stumble off of the horse and rush away from the trail. I grabbed onto the hanging reins just in time to hold myself back from screaming. Laying face up in a riding outfit away from the dirt trail was Darla’s fly covered corpse.