The Stepfather (MxM) ✓

Chapter 4

When morning came, I felt like I had been asleep for a year. My limbs were stiff and my head pounded - both things that shouldn't happen after a long night's rest.

Was my system ever going to sort itself out again?

I managed to get one eye open, noting that neither Kelly or Alice were in the room. Alice's bed was tidily made and Kelly's was, well, not.

Normally I wasn't someone who needed to abide by the eight-hours-a-night rule, but it felt like every night that I had slept under six hours had come back to bite me in the ass.

Eventually, I made myself stretch and get up. Sleepily ambling to the bathroom, and then on to the kitchen with one objective in mind.

Juice.

From a young age, I had been a bit of a juice addict. For a while, it had been the only way for people to get any kind of water or food into.

Bleary eyed and still half-asleep, I didn't realise that I had collided with the breakfast bar until my hip was whacked straight off of it. But I was far too focused on my mission to react to the dull pain in my hip, rubbing at it absently.

The fridge was in my sight.

The prize was almost mine to claim.

A shiver ran up my spine when the cold blast of the fridge hit me, but I didn't linger and grabbed the carton with a victorious grunt. Uncapping the lid and tilting it toward my mouth –

"I hope that you're getting a glass for that."

I must have jumped a foot in the air.

I just about managed to keep a steady enough hold on the carton, or else I would have been standing in a orange puddle.

"Fucking hell," I breathed, chest rising and falling as I looked at Alex who seemed way too amused with himself.

Alex was sitting there at the breakfast counter, his lips curled into a barely traceable smile as he stirred a silver spoon around in his coffee cup.

I felt a little scrutinized.

"Glasses are to your left," came the helpful suggestion, as he nodded his head in the glass' general area.

I bit down on my lip to stop myself from making remark about where he could shove those glasses (because, really, it wasn't called for at that hour of the...afternoon).

I poured my drink in silence, feeling his eyes on my back until I eventually turned around and caught a glance at those clear eyes again.

"You're not a cheerful person, are you?" he idly observed, taking the silver spoon from his mug and smacking it between his lips.

"Why on earth would I be cheerful?" I snapped, not in the mood for any kind of conversation.

"Well, for one," he started with a contemplative expression, standing up and making his way toward me, "I talked Violet out of your punishment, which wasn't pretty by the way. And secondly, you're here."

"And what's so great about that?" I slumped against the counter for support as Alex rested his elbow on the other side of the breakfast bar, that same self-entitled smile curved over full lips.

"You have people who want to be your family," he informed, tone gentle. I study his features. He's not bad looking, nowhere close. A killer jawline and cheekbones didn't help. He had a light dusting of stubble from neglecting a morning shave. I felt tempted to tell him to keep it.

"I don't do families," I responded, a little more icily than I should have - and I could have groaned at how cliched I sounded.

The look that Alex gave me was an odd one, something that I couldn't read or put my finger on. And considering that I was a pretty good judge of character, I didn't like that I couldn't decipher that.