They weren’t related.
That’s what Ava kept telling herself.
It had only been a year since their parents married — a beachside wedding, sunset vows, and suddenly Noah was her “stepbrother.” But he didn’t feel like a brother. Not with that lazy smirk, that lean swimmer’s body, those eyes that always lingered just a second too long.
They shared a house now. Two bedrooms, one thin wall. She could hear him at night — his music, his laugh on the phone, sometimes his groans when he thought no one was listening.
Tonight, the AC had gone out. The air was thick, damp with heat. She padded into the kitchen in just a tank top and sleep shorts, hoping for ice water — but found Noah there instead, shirtless, glistening.
His gaze dropped to her thighs. “Couldn’t sleep either?”
She nodded. “Too hot.”
He handed her a glass. Their fingers brushed. Her breath caught.
The silence stretched. Heavy. Buzzing.
“You always walk around like that?” he asked, voice lower than it should’ve been.
“Why? You watching me?”
A beat.
“I do,” he said. “Too much.”
She should’ve walked away. Should’ve gone back upstairs. But she stepped closer.
“You know this is messed up, right?”
“Yeah,” he said, staring at her lips. “Still want it?”
She kissed him first — a test, a dare. He answered with his hands in her hair, her back against the fridge. Tongues clashing, bodies pressed, his name a whisper on her mouth. He lifted her like she weighed nothing, set her on the counter, pulled her shorts down with a growl.
They moved like they’d waited too long, heat pouring off their skin, her legs locked around his waist as he filled her — slow, deep, wrong in all the ways that made it feel so right. Her nails carved his back as he made her fall apart.
Afterward, they didn’t speak.
Just sat in the dark kitchen, breathing heavy, not looking at each other.
Not yet.