Page 107 of Off Limits

“Why not?”

“Because he’s my stepbrother.”

“You’re not blood relatives. What’s wrong with having feelings for him?”

“We share siblings. What if we start something and break up? It’s not like we can just ignore each other. And what if this isn’t love, and I just imprinted on him because he’s the only guy I’ve been with, and I’m mistaking friendship and chemistry for more?” I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter, because he doesn’t love me.”

“How do you know that?” Dev asked. “How can you be sure if he hasn’t said anything either way?”

“Because he doesn’t. He can’t.”

“Because you’re stepbrothers?”

“And because I’m me.”

“Asa—”

“I’m not saying that to be mean to myself. You know me, I’m fine with who I am. Ilikewho I am. I’m just saying that we’re toodifferent for there to be anything more than just sex between us. We’re opposites in literally every way.”

“You’ve never heard of opposites attracting? You remember how Nate and Sarah were together. They were happy for over twenty years before she passed.”

I nodded slowly. Nate and his wife were pretty much as opposite as you could get, but they’d been one of those couples everyone envied. They loved each other fiercely and still acted like newlyweds after two decades and three kids together.

“And that’s just one example,” he continued. “Luka and Zander are another. I’m not trying to tell you how you feel, but being different from your partner isn’t always a bad thing.”

“What if he doesn’t love me back?” I said, my voice barely louder than a whisper.

“That’s always a possibility when you tell someone how you feel,” Dev said. “But what if he does?”

“I don’t think I can do it, not unless he says it first. I like the place we’re in now. I like having him as my friend, and I like living with him. I can’t risk losing all that.”

“Do you mean you can’t risk losing that, or you can’t risk losing him?”

“Losing him,” I managed to scrape out.

“Would things be easier if you weren’t stepbrothers? Do you think you’d be able to tell him then?”

I shook my head.

“So maybe that’s not the problem and you’ve been using it as an excuse to shield yourself from being rejected?”

I let my head fall back and stared up at the ceiling. He was right. Being stepbrothers made things more complicated, but it wasn’t the massive roadblock I’d made it out to be.

Even if we did break up, it wasn’t like we had family things every weekend. Other than birthdays and major holidays, we didn’t really do things as a family. We’d spent three years livingin the same house and survived. Seeing each other for a few hours five or six times a year wasn’t the end of the world.

And it wasn’t like I gave a shit what my parents or his dad thought of me. They’d probably have issues with us being together, but I was too valuable as a babysitter, and Dex was their success story they could show off. The odds of them cutting either of us off were slim.

My dad would probably never speak to me again, but whatever. I was done with him after he abandoned me when I needed help. I wasn’t going to shed any tears if I never spoke to him again.

The real reason I convinced myself that there could never be anything real between us was because I was scared.

Dex was the first—and only—person I’d ever felt anything for. He made me happy, and he took care of me. He was exactly what I’d always needed, and everything I never knew I wanted.

I loved him, but I was so used to never feeling loved that I couldn’t even wrap my brain around the possibility of him loving me back.

“Asa?” Dev asked gently, rousing me from my spiral and bringing me back to reality. “Are you okay? I didn’t mean to make things worse.”

“You didn’t.” I tried to smile, but it probably looked more like I pursed my lips at him. “I’m okay, just have a lot to think about.”

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