Free Stepbrother Wants (His Twisted Game, Book Eight) by Chloe Hawk Page A

gone, and Cole was standing there in his office, holding up his
phone.
    His blue eyes were icy hot, his jaw set
in a firm line.  
    He was looking at me expectantly, like he
was waiting for me to say something.
    But there was a roar in my ears and I
couldn’t focus on what he was saying.
    “Avery!” he barked, and the forcefulness
of his voice overwhelmed the whooshing sound in my ears, causing it to retreat
into the background.
    “Yes?” I said.
    “What the hell is this?”
    My first instinct was to lie, to deny it
was me .   But there was no way I could do that.   I was there, on video, for everyone to see.
    “It’s a video,” I said quietly.
    His chest was heaving, like he’d been out
running instead of just standing here in his office.
    “A video of what, Avery?” he said.
    I closed my eyes.   “A video of me and Jeffrey.”
    The admission seemed to confuse him.   He looked back up at me, and shook his
head slowly.   “No, this is… you
were never with Jeffrey.”
    “It was just… it was a mistake,” I said.
    “He must have somehow faked this,” he
said, dazed.   “It’s photoshop.”
    I swallowed, wishing I could tell him it
was, wishing I could tell him the video wasn’t real, that it was just some girl
who looked like me, or some kind of weird CGI thing Jeffrey had been able to
come up with to make it seem like there was a sex tape of us.
    But none of those things would be true.
    And even though Cole might have been in a
haze of denial right now, eventually he was going to come out of it.
    He stood there, the silence between us
pressing down on my shoulders like a weight, suffocating me.
    “God damn it, Avery,” he raged, and then
he threw his phone at the wall.   The screen shattered and the phone dropped to the floor.  
    He crossed the room to me, grabbed my
arms.   “Why didn’t you tell me?” he
demanded.
    “I don’t… I don’t know,” I said.  
    “Why.   Didn’t.   You.   Tell.   Me.”
    “I was embarrassed,” I said, and I could
feel the tears starting, could feel the numb feeling retreating and being
replaced with shame and grief.
    “You were embarrassed?” Cole asked.   He turned and bent over his desk, laying his palms flat on
top of it.   His hands curled into
fists.   “That motherfucker,” he
said, shaking his head.   He stood
back up.   “Stay here.   Do not leave this office.”
    He started heading for the door, but I
stepped in front of him.   “Where
are you going?”
    “Avery,” he said, his voice calm.   A vein throbbed in his neck.   “Get out of my way.”
    “No.”   I shook my head and stood in front of the door, spreading my
arms out over it.   “Cole, you
cannot go see Jeffrey.”
    “This doesn’t concern you.”
    “Stop saying things don’t concern me!” I
said.   “You keep saying that.   And this does concern me, Cole.   It has everything to do with me, and
you know it.”
    “Avery,” he said again, and his blue eyes
blazed, cold as steel.   “Get out of
my way.”
    “No!   What are you going to do?   Go kick his ass? Really smart, Cole.   He’ll just use it as an excuse to come
after me more.”
    “Avery – ”
    “Stop saying my name!” I said, my hands
balling into fists at my sides.   “If you do this, it’s just going to make it worse for me, don’t you
see?   This is what he wants.   He wants you to go over there and lose
your shit.   He’ll call the police,
and won’t that be great for their narrative?   Cole Buchanan arrested for assault twice in two days.”
    “I don’t give a fuck about that,” he
said.   “Stop protecting him.”
    “I’m not protecting him!”
    “Then why don’t you want me to go over
there?”
    “Because it’s going to make it worse,” I
said.   “Aren’t you listening?   Jeffrey only sent that video to you,
Cole.   If you go after him, who
knows what else he’s going to do with it.”
    Cole shook his head and took a few steps
toward me, pushing