Free Stepping Over the Line: A Stepbrother Novel (Shamed) by Laura Marie Altom

staple in my life who hadn’t shown up was Savannah—not that I’d expected her to. But I’d be lying if I said that when I’d finally added her name to my visitor list I hadn’t hoped. In the same respect, I hadn’t wanted her anywhere near that shithole. I hadn’t even wanted her breathing in the foul-ass perpetual stench of cigarette smoke and BO.
    But look at us now, drenched in warm fall sun, drinking in gallons of crisp, loamy-scented air, no bars between us other than the ones we’d erected in our heads, and yet our friendship had perhaps irrevocably decayed. We were no longer the happy, colorful leaves at the top of my pile that everyone wants to take pics of and jump into. We were the scum-covered brown and black variety at the bottom. We weren’t going in scrapbooks or being carefully preserved between two squares of wax paper. Whatever had been special between us was now lost. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust—
gone.
    When she tossed the cookie she hadn’t eaten to the birds, and then stared at me a bit longer before finally leaving, I wasn’t sad about her exit, but relieved.
    Lying on my prison bunk, I’d imagined our reunion hundreds—maybe thousands—of times. But then the effort—the inevitable pain—of wanting and never having it grew too hard. I’d carefully wrapped memories of our happy times in tissue to be placed in a box, then shoved so far back into my mental closet that I never saw it again. What was the point?
    The only memory I refused to give up was the photo her mother had taken of Savannah and me on the day we’d met at the Kentucky Derby.
    “Put your arm around her,” Delilah said. “She won’t bite.”
    “Go ahead,” my dad prodded. “It’s okay.”
    “Yes, ma’am.” I did as I was told, praying I didn’t get a boner. God, Savannah was hot. The guys at school would be jealous when I showed them the gift I’d gotten for my father’s wedding.
    “Smile, Savannah!” Delilah snapped us from all angles. “I want a happy memory of the day you met your big brother.” Crowds pressed in around us. I remembered everything—the smell of horses and freshly turned dirt. Perfume and gin. Most of all, I remembered Savannah’s smile. Her sweet scent. The way the breeze caught her long hair, feathering it against my face. The way for the first time since I’d been sexually active, I didn’t just want to fuck her, but know her, savor her, protect her.
    Most especially, I didn’t want to be her brother, but her boyfriend.
    Once our parents married, I’d crammed all of those forbidden wants deep inside, pretending they didn’t matter, and that they weren’t real. But to this day, they were. And I didn’t know how to make them go away.

Chapter 12
Savannah
    Monday, it was too rainy for me to eat in the park.
    But Tuesday, the sun came out to play.
    I sat on my usual bench, watching for any sign of Garrett.
    My mouth was too dry to eat, so I sipped my bottled water, wishing I knew why I kept torturing myself this way. I claimed to not want to see Garrett. Because of Cook, I, in fact, had a very real reason to keep a safe distance from Garrett. Honor dictated that I avoid the man who’d killed his father. Yet, here I was, sitting on a potential powder keg primed to blow. I could pretend all I wanted that my feelings for Garrett had changed, but if they actually had, then why did my runaway pulse make such a huge deal out of the mere possibility of our reunion?
    Wednesday, rain again forced me inside.
    But Thursday, everything changed.
    I approached my favorite bench, but couldn’t sit down, because Garrett lounged in my usual spot. He’d stretched out in the sun, hiding his eyes behind mirrored Ray-Bans. His usual wifebeater was off, and his chest was a bona fide Michelangelo. He’d clasped his hands behind his head, showcasing ridiculously toned arms my fingertips itched to touch. His skin would be hot from the sun, and maybe a little sweaty. If I ran my tongue along his