A Promise to my Stepbrother Read Online Free Page B

“Hey, you’re the one who said she was pretty.”
    “Anyway, I grabbed her hand and kind of laughed it off, saying something like there was plenty of time for that later.”
    “Oh that was a mistake.”
    “Wait, why do you say that?” He looked at me, his face full of confusion.
    “Because now she’s probably thinking that you’re inviting her to a hotel room or something for a big finale.”
    “Omigosh, that’s pretty much exactly how she reacted.”
    “Rumor has it that I’m a girl and that I know girl things.”
    “So she says to me, with this really desperate whisper, ‘I could start you here and we could finish somewhere more intimate later,’ and then I swear to God she winked at me and grabbed my zipper with her hand.”
    “So what’s it like to get a blowjob?” I asked, smiling sweetly.
    “Shut up, you jerk.” He was smiling when he said it, so I knew that we were totally attuned to each other on the mood of the conversation. “I told her that it was too early to talk about stuff like that.”
    “You sound like an altar boy.”
    “That’s what she said!”
    I shoved my shoulder against his. “Girl. Knowing girl things.”
    “Yeah, well anyway. I’m driving her home, and she’s still running her hand up and down my thigh, and before you say anything, no, it was not sexy or arousing.”
    “Noted.”
    “I walk her up to her house, and I figure that I should at least kiss her goodnight, so I lean down to kiss her, and she grabs my hair and smashes her face against mine. She was running her tongue against my lips trying to get it in my mouth, but I just clamped them shut and pulled back. I don’t know who was more embarrassed, her or me. I kind of muttered a goodbye, and as I walked away I was wiping her saliva off my lips and chin with my sleeve, and I glanced back and she was watching me .”
    “Oh man, that’s bad.”
    “Yeah, her last sight of me after our date is me furiously wiping her kiss off my lips.”
    “Well, look at the bright side, you still have my promise,” and the moment I said it, all the air got sucked out of the room. We had not talked about the promise since we made it, and I had assumed that Max was glad of that. I was his sister, and he didn’t think of me that way. Sure, stepsister, but still. His cold reaction to everything had been clear enough. But now I brought it all up again. I wanted to just disappear.
    “Oh,” he replied. He looked at me, and there was something different in his eyes. Not the cold analysis I expected, but something warmer. “I just thought that with you and Jeremy…” His voice trailed off.
    “Me and Jeremy?” It took a moment, and then I added, “Oh my gosh, no. We haven’t done more than just kiss on the lips.”
    “I thought you two were pretty close.” That look in his eyes again.
    “Actually, he doesn’t know it yet, but I’m going to break up with him.” Up until that moment I hadn’t decided to do that, but something was changing, and the awkwardness and anger of my not kissing him with the passion he wanted suddenly became a deal breaker for me.
    I looked at Max. He was smiling and shook the fringe of his hair out of his eyes. Yes. It was only too clear. I was going to wait until our eighteenth birthday, and then I was going to kiss him like he’d never been kissed before. For the first time I had an inkling he felt the same way. It was nothing more than the aftermath of a bad date, but it was something.

7
Max
    I didn’t want to ruin it, so I played it cool. When Katie mentioned the promise I changed the subject to her and Jeremy, but inside I was a mess of emotions. I could never get my mind of Katie. She was the most beautiful girl in school. No, I had to agree with Jeremy on this one—she was hot. And she was my best friend. It was the kind of combination that wasn’t supposed to exist, but it not only existed, it was my life.
    The only trouble was that I didn’t think Katie felt the same way. I was her