Risk: A Military Stepbrother Bad Boy Romance Read Online Free

sister?”
     
    “I don’t know. I haven’t seen her all day.”
     
    He scowled. I saw the anger beginning on his face.
     
    “This is a family dinner and she’s part of the family.”
     
    “Dad, I didn’t know it was going to be a… Special occasion,” I said, feeling my stomach clench as the anger burned brighter and brighter on his face. I looked at Damien and then I looked down at my plate of lasagna.
     
    “You’re always on your goddamned iPhone and I pay through the nose for it every month. Why don’t you text her and find out where she is?”
     
    “I thought you had a rule against phones at the dinner table.”
     
    He scowled. “I don’t appreciate the lip, young lady.”
     
    “If you had told anyone that I would be home today, maybe Dakota would have known to be home for dinner,” Damien cut in. “I don’t think it’s Sarah’s fault.”
     
    “Boy, I respect what you’ve done in the service, but that don’t mean it’s your place to tell me how to raise my girls.”
     
    “Ain’t nothing about telling you how to raise your girls. It’s about you keeping it a secret, apparently, from my sisters that I was coming home,” Damien replied coldly.
     
    “Is the lasagna too spicy?” Maria cried out. “I know Damien like it spicy since he was a little kiddo.”
     
    “It’s great, ma.”
     
    “Yeah, Maria,” I put in. “Really tasty. Like always.”
     
    I liked Maria, but she tended to be pretty distant at home. She worked long hours and she had to cook and clean at home too. I had no idea why she and my father ended up together, but she didn’t seem to like him much. But she was a whole different person when Damien was home.
     
    The men cooled off, but I could tell that the tension which had just been on the verge of erupting was still present, still ready to explode all over my life. Dinner proceeded as if nothing had happened, except for the dark looks on their faces.
     
    After dinner, I was assigned to take Damien to his new room. It used to be Christina’s room, back when she still lived with us. It had been years since she lived there, but her stuff was still there.
     
    “This is my room?” Damien asked with a casual drawl, raising an eyebrow as I showed him his new home. Christina wasn’t a girly-girl by any means, but it was very obviously a girls’ room: an old Justin Bieber poster over the bed, several framed photos of horses, pink curtains, half a dozen Gossip Girl books still scattered over the desk.
     
    “Yeah… Yeah, I guess it is,” I said with a shrug. He hadn’t brought much of anything and I couldn’t think of anything I could tell him to make it better—he didn’t have anything with him to redecorate with.
     
    “Whatever,” Damien said with another sigh. “It’s better than a tent. Or barracks.”
     
    He stripped off his jacket and tossed it on the bed. I felt a shiver go up my spine as I saw his muscular, tattooed arms.
     
    “So, what do you say…” Damien started to murmur, drawing near to me, but I never got to hear what he had in mind. Shouts and yells had already begun to drift upstairs.
     
    “This is the last fucking time, Dakota…” my father was yelling.
     
    “Dad, you don’t fucking own me…” Dakota slurred back at him. I heard Maria’s sobbing. A usual night.
     
    “What the fuck?” Damien asked, turning to me. I shook my head, sadly.
     
    “It’s the same old shit… They do this all the time. Dakota stays out late, comes home drunk, dad screams at her, but nothing ever changes.”
     
    “Jesus Christ.”
     
    We heard the hollow slap of my father’s hand colliding with my little sister’s face.
     
    “Fucking hell…” Damien muttered and started downstairs.
     
    “No, you’ll just make it worse!” I cried, grabbing his arm. God, but it felt strong. He pushed me off.
     
    “I’m not going to let my little sister get pushed around like that,” Damien growled and before I could do anything, he was