Bewitched by Bella's Brother (9 page)

Bella whimpered, needing comfort, and Sebastian’s

arms went around her shoulders a little tighter. Of course, sometimes, you took what you could get.

Apparently Asa was made of sterner stuff than that—or

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his philosophy was a little sterner, anyway, because

Sebastian had just finished his shower and was lying in the lush, rich bed that he’d been treated to for the past week, when he heard Asa knocking on Bella’s bedroom door.

The walls weren’t particularly thin—a thing Sebastian

never thought he’d miss. (He and Bella used to lie awake at night and roll their eyes at each other from across the space between their twin beds every time Sammy had Chad over to have sex. Chad was pretty good at keeping quiet, but Sammy had a rather predictable repertoire of sex talk, and he tended to shout it in order. On the nights he was particularly vocal, they’d see who could lip sync the best when Sammy had his

“people four apartments down can hear you” orgasm.)

It didn’t matter; he might not have been able to hear the exact words, but he could definitely hear the stretched-thin quality of Bella’s voice, and he knew when Asa gave up for the evening and kissed her goodnight.

He was a little surprised, however, when he didn’t hear

Asa’s tread back in the hallway, but heard his knock on

Sebastian’s door from the bathroom instead.

“Come in?” Sebastian was already in bed, but he was

wearing sleep shorts—that made him decent, right? Even

without the shirt? Shit. Who knew?

“Was that a question?” Asa asked as he entered, and

Sebastian scowled.

“I don’t know—is there a polite way of refusing someone

entry to your room when they’re coming from a bathroom?”

Asa stopped and tilted his head, that shower of gold hair feathering his shoulders. “That’s a good question. Weird, but good.” He shook his head. “Anyway, getting back to the

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her off some more. I….” His blunt, matter-of-fact air

disappeared. “I’ve seen the two of you. You’re beyond friends.

If you back my play, she may go along with it.”

Sebastian sat up and pulled his knees under his arms.

“Uhm… only if it’s good for her,” he said seriously. “I… I wouldn’t hurt her for anything.”

Asa nodded. “I know you wouldn’t. It’s just… she’s

hurting, Sebastian. I know you can see it. I… you know how you told me that this entire horrible bullshit day wasn’t my fault? Well, what’s hurting her wasn’t really her fault, either, and the parts that were, well, she needs to forgive herself, that’s all. Anyway… she’s gonna get pissed at me—just, you know, hold off on punching me in the nose and moving out, could you?”

Sebastian raised his eyebrows. “Have you
seen
how gay I am? Punching somebody is right out.”

Asa’s mouth quirked, in spite of how serious he’d been

the moment before. “My construction foreman is pretty gay, and if he ever decided to slug me, I wouldn’t get up for a week.”

Sebastian shook his head. “Nope—I’m not that butch. I

may be able to manage a bitch-slap, but you would have to really cross the line.”

Asa chuckled a little, and then looked at Sebastian with frank admiration. “How do you do that? You… you just make everything all right with a couple of words.” He blinked those fierce blue eyes and swallowed and looked away. “It’s a good gift. I’m grateful for it today.”

Sebastian flushed and wondered if you could see it all

the way down his neck, like he could on Asa. “I’m glad to help,” he said lamely. “And honestly? The fact that you’re Bewitched by Bella’s Brother |
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still talking to me after a week of seeing me at awkward social savant? Well, I’m impressed. I think anyone else would have gotten a restraining order by now.”

Asa said, “Possibly, but not for that,” and then the skin near his throat went so red it was almost purple, and

Sebastian became acutely aware that he wasn’t wearing

anything but his sleep shorts.

A thick, thudding silence blanketed them both, and

Sebastian looked at Asa, leaning back against the wall in jeans and a button-down shirt, and Asa met his gaze for a thick, fraught moment. Sebastian got a sudden chill; he

knew his nipples pebbled, and his groin grew heavy, and

while Asa couldn’t see one, his sharp gaze fixated on the other for a moment, and then they were back to locking eyes again.

“Asa,” Sebastian asked through the thickness in his

throat, “do you want to touch me?”

Asa licked his lips and took a breath that seemed to

shudder his great, tall body. “Very much,” he said hoarsely.

“But I don’t know how.”

Sebastian nodded, reminded himself fiercely of Bella in

the next room and Jordan across the hall, and wondered

how loud he’d be if he jumped out of bed and forced Asa

against the wall and pulled his jeans down to his knees and thrust the erection he could see bulging against Asa’s thigh as far down his own throat as he could take.

“I’m going to lie down now,” was what he did say—and

he said it slowly, “…and turn my back, and turn off the light.

Anything you do then, in the dark, that’s… that’s between us. And I’ll never tell a soul.”

Asa looked… looked hungry. Sebastian’s self-protective

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instinct was sounding off over his shoulder at full volume, telling him that if Asa had been in the closet this long, this could probably not end well, but… but Asa looked hungry, and Sebastian was feeling like dessert.

He stared blindly into the far reaches of the wood-

paneled room for so long, he was almost afraid he’d fallen asleep in the dark, and Asa had left. Then he felt it—the tiniest stir of air along the curve of his ear… oh God… Asa’s lips—the lean ones that carved smiles out of quiet breath—

were teasing him there. Sebastian let out a long sigh, and those lips moved down to his jaw, and then into the hollow of his throat.

Asa’s hand came down on Sebastian’s shoulder for

balance, and the skin of his fingers was hard and rough on the taut skin there, but his touch was tender as he squeezed slightly, and rubbed a little circle with his thumb.

That long, gold-brown hair shook down from the crown

of his head and tickled Sebastian’s shoulder; he grunted and twitched, and Asa swore and moved it back. The movement

must have brought Asa back to himself, because he went to leave, and Sebastian—still looking into the reaches of the room—caught that hard, workingman’s hand before it could leave his skin.

“Don’t stop—at least not yet. That was barely a taste,”

he murmured.

“Mmmm….” Asa made another nip into the hollow of his

throat and then whispered a kiss to the back of his neck, while that hand traveled to Sebastian’s bicep and squeezed.

Sebastian breathed deeply again and undulated his hips

because his groin was positively
aching
, and Asa moved back to the hollow of his ear.

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“This,” he whispered throatily, “is
much
better than a blowjob from a stranger.”

Sebastian whimpered and was a deep breath away from

turning and taking Asa’s face in his hands and ravishing the man’s mouth like the dominant lover he never had been

when Asa left him abruptly and whispered away, closing the door carefully behind him.

Sebastian barely waited until the door snicked shut to

move his hand under his sleep shorts to his aching cock. He squeezed hard, and stroked, and once, twice, one more time, and remembered the feeling of those lips on his neck, that hand on his shoulder, that voice in his ear….

He came hard enough to see white spots in front of his

eyes, and his body convulsed around his groin. He stayed there, shaking, his hand and shorts dripping with come,

until his breath evened out. As he got up and ran to the washroom to rinse off and change his sleep shorts, the

thought kept hammering through his brain like John Henry on an iron spike.

Oh, Jesus, Sebastian. What in the fuck would you ever
do if he touched you for real?

HE WASN’T sure—but it was definitely fun to think about. It was fun to think about as he and Bella left before breakfast to go count inventory. It was fun to think about at work, as he taunted Mike Greavy unmercifully. It was fun to think about at lunch, as he stole the chicken off of Bella’s Caesar salad. It was a
blast
to think of at Hot Topic, because Julie finally had a day they could go shopping for T-shirts that would make their boss shit his pants. (Sebastian’s read “My Bewitched by Bella’s Brother |
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computer goes down on me,” Bella’s read

“Fruit Fly,” and Julie’s simply read “Straight But Not

Narrow” in rainbow letters.) It was even fun to think about after they got Jordan and went to go swim before dinner.

It was fun to think about right until Asa walked in the

door and all of the oxygen got sucked out of the room by a big vacuum cleaner that seemed to have a direct line to

Sebastian’s nether regions.

Holy Crow—Sebastian had
never
gotten hard just hearing a man’s voice as he came through the door.

And then he heard what Asa was (oh-so-casually) saying

to Bella, and his happy hard-on got sad and small again, because, dammit, here was the other family-drama shoe.

“Bella, I got some tickets to a Giants game on the tenth; would you and Sebastian be interested in going?”

“The tenth?” Bella paused the complicated bit of

chopping she was doing for the pesto she was planning to put on their pasta.

“How about you, Sebastian?” Asa asked, and Sebastian

met his eyes, startled, and realized that this was the “play”

Asa had asked him to back the night before. Oh Jesus. He looked at Bella to see what her reaction was, and then

followed her lead.

“The tenth?” he echoed, narrowing his eyes. Oh gods,

couldn’t the guy give him any warning?

“I don’t go anywhere on the tenth,” Bella said, her voice getting dangerously stubborn, and then Asa pulled out the big guns.

“Hey, Jordan—don’t you want Bella and Sebastian to

come with us to the game?”

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Jordan turned to them excitedly. He was busy playing

with his box of origami bugs; Sebastian had remade the

ladybug with gold and purple paisley, just like Aunt Bella’s room, and the red ladybug hadn’t been mentioned since.

“Would you come with us, Aunt Bella? Please? Dad lets

me bring books and an iPod, but we always cheer when

someone hits. Sebastian, will you come too?”

Sebastian glared at Asa and then looked back at Bella,

who was looking uncharacteristically fragile. “Only if Bella can,” he said softly, and Bella’s expression was agonized as she dropped the knife and murmured, “Asa, could you

finish?” before darting out of the room.

“Nice going,” Sebastian hissed as he passed Asa, and

Asa didn’t back down.

“It is if she’ll tell you why,” he hissed back, and then he shooed Sebastian off to calm Bella down while he moved to go finish dinner.

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SEBASTIAN didn’t bother to knock on Bella’s door; he just barged right in.

“You should learn to knock,” she muttered, and he

rolled his eyes.

“Heifer, if you think I haven’t seen your junk before,

you’re sadly mistaken. I just don’t give a shit.” It was an old discussion—but some bits are just comfort, and he figured she needed comfort right now.

“Seriously, Sebastian—this isn’t the time.”

“Bullshit, Isabella—this is exactly the time. Your brother just went out of his way to piss you off, and I think he did it so I can come in and kiss your boo-boos. It would be
great
if I knew what boo-boos I’m making better, you think?”

Bella blew out a breath and flopped on her bed, tracing

another pattern on the gorgeous comforter. Her braid of

white-blonde hair pooled beneath her shoulder. “Yeah, don’t think I didn’t notice you two doing the old eye-hug, psychic-communication thing when I walked in,” she snapped. “You knew this was coming.”

“I knew
something
was coming,” Sebastian snapped back, coming to sit beside her. “Believe me, if I had a direct line to your brother’s brain, I would have ducked better when he thought of this particular idea.
No one
fucks with your ‘Bella’s day off’—no one. So why is he?”

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Bella shrugged. “He… he’s the only person in the world

who knows what it’s about, that’s all.”

“And obviously he thinks it needs to stop.” Sebastian

sighed and flopped backward next to her, eyeing her from upside down. “C’mon, heifer—there are a lot of things we’d both rather be doing right now. Cooking, eating, watching
The Closer
….”

“Kissing my brother?”

“If it’s on the menu,” he retorted mildly, “but right now it’s not. What’s on the menu is making Bella feel better. How can you be the center of the universe if you don’t feel

better?”

She blew out a breath. “Bitch.”

“Twat. Now spill.”

“It’s an old story,” she muttered. “You know, high school girl goes to party and wakes up pregnant?”

Sebastian blinked and sat up. “It’s only old if she

remembers getting that way,” he said, trying badly to hide his shock.

“Only a little,” Bella said. She was holding her jaw so