Free My Billionaire Stepbrother (Lexi's Sexy Billionaire Romance #1) by Lexi Maxxwell Page B

when I left our old house.  
    I thought of myself when I stopped returning Dad’s calls — and Angela’s, because a call from her was a call from Dad by proxy.  
    I thought of myself when Duncan and I partnered to create WinFinity because I’d had another sorta-partner at the time named Chuck, and Chuck wasn’t smart enough to pull off what Duncan could.
    I thought of myself when we ditched acts that needed us early in WinFinity’s career. Callous, perhaps, and a breach of loyalty since they stuck with us back before we were anything at all. But the press saw those decisions as smart business, and though they were, I’ve always felt guilty.
    I thought of myself so much that I’ve started to overcompensate. More charity. Being overly friendly. Listening to Samantha’s yammering about my image and trying to seem better in the public’s eyes.
    I steamrolled over Angela as an asshole kid. By the time I was established and wiser, it felt too late to go back. What was I supposed to do — drive up to the house and speak to Angela alone, explain that it was unfair to paint her with the same brush as I’d painted my dad and her mom? To tell her that even though she’d never been friend or family or a date, she was still someone worth knowing … and maybe worth saving from all she’d been forced to endure?  
    I’d waffled on that for years. There was no solution. Angela came with baggage: two deadbeats I wanted out of my life. I’d jettisoned Bill and Maria, but she never would. It was a no-win situation without a way out. I solved the problem by stuffing it down, sweeping it under the rug, and forgetting all about it.  
    But that card.  
    Seeing her name.  
    Imagining her face.  
    I haven’t seen her in years. I still think of Angela as that obnoxious, pretentious drama girl: full of life, the insistent center of attention, sure she was so special. The girl who looked younger than her years on the surface but older than her years once inspected. The girl who, it turned out, had blossomed just as I’d known she would.
    I watch her across from me as she sits three-quarters on the plush black leather, the bar with its crystal decanters a foot ahead. She stares at the passing streets, taking us from the wrong side of the tracks to the right. From the hard streets to the sparkling uptown. From the place I once lived to the place I live now.  
    She’s quiet. Her skin is smooth and looks soft. She’s a shade or two darker than me, with an Italian complexion mixed with something I can’t place and never cared to ask about — Slavic blood, maybe. Her eyes are slightly narrow in profile. Her eyebrows are long, thin, and striking. Her hair is long, and she’s gathered it into a neat but no-nonsense ponytail, still slightly oily with sweat. She’s changed from her running clothes into a simple short-sleeved yellow top and jeans, yet still manages to be striking.  
    She probably thinks she looks like a pig. But Angela’s different from someone like Samantha. It takes a lot of exercise for Sam to keep her body flawless, but she’s anything but glamorous with her makeup off and workout clothes on. Samantha is meant to primp. Properly fixed up, she’s one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever seen. Angela, by contrast, is meant to be real. It doesn’t matter whether Angela tries to dress up or if she tosses on jeans and pulls her hair into a ponytail. As long as she’s authentically herself, she’s breathtaking.
    Not that I should be thinking any of this. Angela is my stepsister and has been for thirteen years. When I saw the birthday card, I was thinking nostalgically about helping a good girl who deserved my assistance by virtue of taking care of a shitheel dad I wanted nothing to do with. When I was having sex with two women earlier, I got distracted by Angie’s (not Angela’s) name and nothing else. I’d never think of Angela that way. Not now that I’m a responsible adult, free of the confused,