Free Fight: A Stepbrother Romance Novella by Stephanie Brother Page B

past, and it amazed me Mia seemed to accept it all with equanimity. Perhaps it was because it was my past. I didn't think she would be so blasé about me having been a male prostitute if I was still in the trade. Honestly, if I hadn't found a way out about life with Lila's help, I probably would've been dead by now anyway, so it would have been a moot point.
    Afterward, we dressed, me loaning her the muscle shirt I'd worn earlier. Since she was more petite and a lot smaller than me, it hung to mid-thigh on her and looked more like a strange dress, or new fashion statement, than an oversized shirt her boyfriend wore.
    I drew myself up short at that thought. I wasn't her boyfriend. I wasn’t anyone's boyfriend, and I never had been. I never would be. I had dated a few chicks for more than two weeks or so, but we had never labeled it, and when we had moved on or drifted apart, I certainly hadn't felt more than a niggle of regret. If I kept entertaining these kinds of dangerous thoughts, I'd feel a whole lot more than regret when it was time to walk away from my stepsister.
    As I followed her out of the gym, tiptoeing back to her room, where she insisted on taking me to her bathroom to clean up my torn hands, I wondered if it was already too late. Had I started to fall for Mia?
    ***
    Mia
    I guess I should have been shocked by his revelation, but I'd sort of assumed that had been the way he had survived on the streets. His UFC biography was scant and vague, leaving a whole chunk of years unaccounted for, and I guess I was relieved it wasn't worse than he’d revealed. Having to have sex with strangers for money was pretty damn bad, but at least he hadn’t been a drug addict, a criminal, or a murderer. He hadn't been in jail, or doing a thousand things worse than having to sell his body.
    It was in the past, and though I didn’t like the idea of someone touching him—okay, I hated the idea of any other woman having her hands on him, or any man—I didn't let it consume me. Telling myself we were in a short-term fling helped, even though I knew and refused to acknowledge my feelings were deepening a lot more than they should for someone I was casually screwing.
    I bandaged his hands, pressing a tender kiss to each knuckle, before I let him leave my room. I couldn't have stopped him anyway, and I think he needed some time to process everything that had happened.
    Throwing myself onto my bed, I acknowledged I did too. I understood what had driven him to make the choices he had, at least in a vague, intellectual way. I couldn't actually imagine how he had ended up in that situation, or what it had been like, but I could empathize. Maybe I should examine why I was so understanding of the idea, when I guess a lot of people would be repulsed. I thought about it for a moment, and then shrugged. It didn't matter why I didn't care too much about what he’d done, as long as I genuinely didn't care.
    Probing deeply, I found only residual jealousy of the other women who had been in his life, which I knew was a silly reaction since they had paid for his time. Except Lila. He spoke of her with such affection, and perhaps love. Was it the kind of love between friends, or maybe mentor and mentee, or was it a deeper, sexualized love? Had Paxton ever been to bed with the other woman? I guess it was strange that I was more jealous of one woman in his life, simply because she was still in his life, than the number of women who had been his clients for three years.
    It wasn't my place to feel jealous or anything else, and I knew I was fooling myself if I thought Paxton wanted anything more than a physical relationship while he was in this house. Once his mother died, I'm sure he would be gone soon after, and there would be nothing left between us. Not because of my dad's dictates; just because of Paxton's own history. He had written me off his own mother for more than a decade, so why would it be much different now? Yeah, we were lovers, but I knew