Page 33 of Auctioned to her Stepbrothers

“Don’t even think about that,” Lyle says, his voice threatening. “We’ve already taken enough from her today.”

“She’s ours for the week.”

Lyle charges, and once again, I’m between them. This is twice in one day, but in actuality, it feels like I’ve spent most of my lifein this position. “She’s not even there, Ky,” I say in a placating tone.

“Then we’ll go to her place.”

“No.” I grab his arm. “Not like this. She’s not who you’re angry at.”

“But she’s who I want to fuck.”

“Not going to happen.” Lyle appears on Kylian’s other side, but I shake my head at him. It’s better for me to handle this. “There are rules for this week.”

“There weren’t supposed to be,” Ky says sullenly. “Wasn’t that the deal? We only get her for one week instead of four, and in return, there aren’t supposed to be any fucking rules. That’s the part that gets her the hottest, isn’t it?”

“Either way, I’m not letting you take your anger out on her,” I say firmly. “Why the hell did you tell Dick-Ass it was Honor?”

Lyle stiffens as we wait for Kylian’s answer. Finally, he says, “I wanted to wipe that condescending smirk off his face.”

“It didn’t work. He doesn’t care about her.” I sigh, my breath disappearing into the warm night air.

“He’ll just use it as another thing to hold over our heads,” Lyle mutters.

“Who the fuck cares?” Ky says.

“We do,” I say, and then hold up my hand to keep my older brother from interrupting. “We don’t have to care what he thinks, but we have to put up with him. We work with him. Live with him.”

“That needs to change,” Lyle says resolutely.

It’s far more complicated than that, and Lyle knows that. Still, it’s not like he’s wrong. “Agreed, but until it does, we need to be a united front against him.”

“Why?” Kylian demands. “I told you two I’d deal with him. If you’d left it alone, then I’d be fighting him, not you guys.”

“We’re not little kids anymore. You don’t have to protect us.” Even as I say it, I wonder if Ky will ever believe that. Maybe, to him, we’ll always be the younger brothers he has to shield.

Lyle sits down on a little stone wall, his voice cutting through the dark. “Maybe it won’t matter. After all, Dick-Ass never gave a crap about Honor anyway.”

I nod. “But we did. And we still do.”

Kylian curses. “Are you two living in some kind of alternate universe?” He presses a button on his watch. “It’s two o’clock on Wednesday morning, for fuck’s sake. That means that after tomorrow, our week’s up, and we’re not going to see her again.”

“You don’t know that,” Lyle insists.

“After the way we’ve treated her?” Kylian growls. “What woman would stick around after that?”

“She might—if we change how we treat her,” I say softly.

“Yeah? What are you two going to do? Show up on her doorstep with roses? That’s not what this week is about. And think of how many times we’ve gotten her off. She gets off on this kink, too.” Kylian suddenly looks tired. “She’s as fucked up as we are. How could any of us not be with the kind of upbringing we had?”

No one disputes that. Then Lyle speaks. “Maybe we can change. Honor has.”

Kylian scoffs. “Yeah, she changed from a sweet kid to a woman who sells her body to the highest bidder.”

For a moment, I think that Lyle is going to jump up and take another swing at Ky, but to his credit, he stays where he is. “She’s strong now. She speaks up for herself. If she can do that with three men who bought her, she can do that with anyone. She’s changed.”

“I guess she has,” I concur.

“It doesn’t matter. If you two think this week ends with the four of us riding off into the sunset together, you’re fooling yourselves. But it makes no difference to me,” Kylian says, striding toward the house. “Either way, I have two more days to play with that ripe little body, and I intend to make the most of it.”

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