Now, he’s standing in my bedroom, half naked, and looking at me like I’m something he wants to kill. Or eat.

My thighs clench at the thought of Levi putting his mouth on me. The last time—no. I shut the thought down before it has a chance to go too far. It’s inappropriate. This whole situation right now is inappropriate.

“Get out!” I shout again, because he just continues to stand there, completely stoic. Unreadable. “Are you high?” Along with the rest of the world, I’ve witnessed the kind of life he leads: late nights, partying, an endless supply of women. The possibility that he’s actually high right now isn’t that far-fetched.

Why does he have to look so damn good, though?

Levi’s shirtless chest moves in a silent huff and a humorless smirk makes his lips twitch. And that damn beard. It’s distracting. I’ve only ever seen him clean shaven, but this look is even better. He looks rough. Dirty. Mountable.

Lifting his arm to his head, he rakes his fingers through his hair, making it messier than it already was. The action makes his bicep flex, showing off a massive bump, and creates a long visual line that draws my gaze down over his sculpted chest and abs to the pair of sweat pants that hang so low, I can see damn near everything.

As my eyes land between his legs, it begins to grow. My throat turns into a desert and I swallow, tearing my eyes away as I cast the inappropriate thoughts the vision inspires away. Or at least I try to. They keep sling shooting back, taunting me. Just look at it. One little peek. No!

It should be illegal to walk around like that. In fact, he should be thrown in jail for assault. I’ll never get the vision of him like this out of my head.

I hear Levi’s soft chuckle and jerk to attention.

“You should see your face right now,” he says, his voice mocking. “You behave like you’ve never seen my dick before, which we both know isn’t true. Or,” he says, his voice pitching low as he pushes off the jamb and stands tall, putting that hard bulge on full display, “maybe you just want another taste.”

Yes, please. The heat in my face deepens. I do want it. I won’t deny that, but I refuse to let him drag me any deeper into the rabbit hole or humiliate me over something we both know we want but can’t have.

“I’m not the one standing in his sister’s room with an erection,” I toss back, throwing my legs over the opposite side of the bed in a desperate need to put distance between us. “Besides, I’ve moved on to bigger and better things.”

Levi’s humor vanishes, his eyes narrowing to slits as the insult hangs like a guillotine between us. I’d be proud of myself, if I wasn’t lying through my teeth.

“That’s good, sis,” Levi says, his voice and expression flattening out. “It’s nice to know you’ve moved on. I always worried you’d turn into a spinster in my absence.”

That s.o.b. “That was never a danger,” I say through clenched teeth. “But it’s good to see that you’ve been living up to everyone’s expectations. You’ve certainly defined what it means to be the son of a billionaire: a sleazy, spoiled, lazy, entitled man whore. Stop me if I missed anything.”

The fire that lights Levi’s eyes burns so strong I feel a niggling of worry—that I’ve gone too far—bleed into my muscles. An imperceptible tremor vibrates through my body as he stabs the crutches into the floor, crossing the room in a matter of seconds to stand over me.  Being injured certainly hasn’t taken away his ability to be scary. He’s seething, his nostrils flaring as the breaths saw in and out of his lungs, resembling a raging bull.

“Fuck you, Vista,” he seethes. “What do you know about me? Nothing,” he fills in automatically. “And how could you, when you ran off in the middle of our parents’ wedding and are only just now coming back?”

Incensed, I glare openly now, resentful of him bringing up the past. He knows why I left. What was I supposed to do? He’d rejected me, and I was on my way to college anyway. I’d just sped up the process, saving us all a lot of headache.

“You’re right, maybe I don’t know anything about you, but you know what? I don’t want to. So if you’re worried I’ll want to stick around and find out, don’t be. As soon as this month is over, I’m gone,” I shoot back, getting in his face. I have plans—big ones—and none of them involve hanging around here any longer than I absolutely have to.  Levi Black is a means to an end, that’s all.

Bringing his nose to mine, Levi looks into my eyes. “I. Can’t. Wait.”

The anger with which he says this twists something inside my chest. I don’t want to acknowledge what it might be, so instead, I scrunch my nose up at the fetid smell of stale alcohol on his breath. “You need to brush your teeth.”

Like a total pig, he opens his mouth wider and huffs in my face, making me want to vomit. “My breath might not be minty fresh, but at least it doesn’t smell like dirty ass.”

“Oh, do you speak from experience? Do you make a habit of going around smelling people’s asses?” I toss back.

“Only when I’m chin deep in pussy and they’re sucking my cock, princess.”

I feel my eyes widen and my jaw drop. A cruel chuckle rumbles deep in Levi’s chest and he breaks out in a triumphant grin as he backs toward the door. I hate him. So damn much I could spit nails.

“While sparring with you has been fun,” he says jovially as he shifts toward the door, “you’re not the only one who has work to do. So I suggest you grab a shower and meet me downstairs in an hour so we’re not late.”

Crossing my arms over my chest, I lift an eyebrow to hide my surprise. “What constitutes ‘work,’ exactly?”

“Ah, now that, dear sister, is a surprise. But rest assured. I’ll make sure you put those fingers to good work.”

***

“Change. Your. Fucking. Clothes, Vista. Now.”

I can’t believe she thought she could get away with it. After leaving her room to get ready for the day ahead, I jumped in the shower, wrapping the lower half of my leg in plastic to keep the cast dry, and then struggled some more to get dressed, and still made it back downstairs with time to spare. Massive time to spare.

Women and their beauty regimens. I’ve never understood how any one person could take so damn long on their appearance and come out looking totally natural.

That’s Vista. She’s natural from the top of her walnut brown head to the tips of her unpolished toes. But somehow, she manages to not only look stunningly beautiful, but take for-freaking-ever to do it.

It’s the clothes. She’s made a perfectly ordinary pair of black skinny jeans and a transparent black and purple striped cap-sleeved top look like lingerie. It’s entirely inappropriate for where we’re headed, and I have an insatiable urge to march up to her and tear every thread off of her.

“What’s wrong with the way I’m dressed?” she asks, looking down at herself.

“Nothing, if you’re going for the biker whore look,” I snark back. I don’t know why I do it. Pressing her buttons is a knee-jerk reaction that I can’t seem to get a handle on. But it doesn’t matter anyway. Vista is cold as ice. Case in point, the way she’s looking at me now. It could freeze a man’s nuts off.

“I do not look like that,” she bites back. “And I’m not changing.” The way she says this while lifting that stubborn chin says the conversation is closed. I don’t like it, and I consider fighting her on it, but I remind myself that I’m not her boyfriend or her daddy. I know when to back down and when to start a fight, and we just don’t have time for a fight today.

Crossing the floor in long strides that make her hips sway and my jeans tight, Vista shoves past me and rips open the refrigerator door. “Where are we going?”

Pivoting around, I lean back against the counter to relieve the pressure the crutches put on my underarms and continue drinking my glass of milk as I watch her. She has her head in the fridge, her arm slung over the top of the open door, and the position shoves her perky ass up and out. Goddamn.