The Other Side of Greed (The Seven Sins #5) - Lily Zante Page 0,99
mine. My heart bottoms out of my chest cavity. The lies and shame, the reality of the situation heats my skin. I turn hard, and harder still by her sitting on me, kissing me and staring at me with her eyes full of undeserved admiration.
“My heart isn't so good, so clean, so decent,” I caution. She has a vision of me that is the complete opposite.
“You were twelve years old, and you'd had such a bad start, Brad.” She presses her soft lips on mine, injecting hope and goodness in one fell swoop. “I'm so happy that you got adopted and were given a better life.”
“Only because I resembled his dead son,” I remind her.
She chews her lip. “Do you hate him?”
I had reason to hate him, right from the start when, a few months after I'd been adopted, I asked him when we could get my brother.
“You don't have a brother,” he’d snarled, his voice chilling my blood and turning it to ice. “We have one son, Brandon. You don’t have a brother. Do you understand? Never ask me again, or I will send you back.”
His face blurred as tears welled in my eyes, threatening to spill over into rivulets of sorrow. I learned then to never show any emotion. I knew in that moment, that I had to forget my past, even if it meant forgetting the brother I loved more than life itself. I had to survive, and this was how I would.
So, to answer Kyra’s question. Do I hate him? No. Not really. “People react to things in different ways. They do things which seem cruel and indifferent, and are inexplicable, but there’s often a reason for it,” I reply. “I love him, and my adoptive mom. They gave me a good life. I can't complain.” Even though it came at a cost too heavy to bear.
She rests her forehead against mine, her hands bracketing my shoulders. I take all the goodness that seeps out of her and I absorb it, because I need something good to hold onto.
“We don’t have to talk about this if you don’t want to.”
Talking isn’t what I have on my mind right now.
KYRA
He is the best thing to happen to me. The worst thing he could have told me was that he was with someone. Instead, the truth I learned about Brad and his life, makes my heart ache.
He's showing me who he really is, and the shock I felt walking into this place, the fear of deception and lies which riddled my initial reaction, are gone.
Brad has had such a terrible childhood. The pain in his eyes rips me to shreds. When I think back, to all the unanswered questions, and his vague replies, they all make sense now.
“You're just a little rebel, after all,” I say, resting my palm against his face. His brows push together. His member pushes through and I can feel him against my flimsy dress. I wriggle, shifting on his lap, teasing him. “Working on those projects abroad. Was that you wanting to reject your upbringing?”
His mouth twists, he seems unsure. Hesitant to reply. I lean forward and drape my arms around his neck. I take a deep inhale of him, soaking in his essence, and everything he is. He opened his heart to me and told me everything. I want to share myself with him, and tonight there is nothing in the way. We have privacy here. Not a car, or the storeroom, but an entire apartment.
I unbutton his shirt, one button at a time, the heat in my body traverses up from between my legs, through my stomach, to my breasts, making my face flush. I lean forward, like a woman desperate to please, and kiss him for the longest time, as if that might help to make his pain go away,
“There's so much I want to tell you,” he murmurs as our wet lips brush and our breaths mingle. My body is slowly catching fire, heat spiraling and tunneling deep in my core.
“Tell me,” I whisper. “Tell me all.” I'm prepared to listen, even while I’m in a heightened sense of arousal, but then his tongue slips into my mouth and he drops his hand to my breast, massaging it.
In no time at all, he's undone the top buttons of my dress, his deft fingers making easy work of the tiny buttons and loops. He's so fast, the dress falls off my shoulders and in no time at all he’s unclasped