My Stepbrother Wants Me-Chapter 177: Unstable

JULIAN

Even after I stormed out of there to my room, I could still hear their voices. I stepped out onto the balcony, the stone railing cold beneath my white-knuckled grip. I couldn’t stop seeing Catherine’s happy face, Dante’s victorious smirk and Richard’s forced, booming laughter. Everything happening in that dining room felt like a serrated blade across my skin.

I pulled a cigarette from the silver case in my pocket, my hands shaking so violently I nearly dropped the lighter. I didn’t care about the house rules. I didn’t care about the "Golden Boy" image. I needed something to dull the image of Dante’s hand on Catherine’s waist—the way he had looked at her like she was the only thing in the room worth breathing for.

I took a long, dragging pull, the acrid smoke burning my lungs. It was a welcome distraction from the hollow ache in my chest. He was a Varo. A prince of a global empire. And I was just a Vaughn; a puppet in a gilded cage, tied to my father’s rules.

The doors creaked open behind me. I didn’t need to turn around to know who it was. The scent of her cloying perfume hit me like a physical blow.

"God, it’s freezing out here," Lucy complained, her voice sharp and grating. She stepped up beside me, leaning against the railing. "Can you believe that guy? The audacity. Sitting at our table, acting like he owns the place just because his family grows grapes for a living."

I didn’t answer. I kept my eyes fixed on the dark horizon, the tip of my cigarette glowing in the darkness.

"Julian, are you even listening?" she huffed, stepping closer. "The dinner is a disaster. Richard is practically drooling over the prospect of a merger, and Gabriel is acting like a jealous toddler. It’s pathetic. We should be down there making sure Catherine doesn’t think she’s actually won something."

I flicked the ash into the wind, still silent. I was a thousand miles away, back in the hallway of my memory, feeling Catherine’s rejection. I’d rather be with a man who can make his own decisions than be with a man who is controlled like a dog.

"You’re so tense," Lucy murmured. Her tone shifted, dropping into that sultry, manipulative purr she used when she wanted to get tactical. She reached out, her fingers trailing up my arm. "You’ve been acting like a martyr all night. It’s boring, Julian. Why do you care so much about what that little charity case does with her low-life boyfriend?"

She moved in front of me, blocking my view of the skies. Her eyes were searching mine, looking for a crack in the armor. When I didn’t respond, she took it as an invitation. She pressed herself against me, her hands moving to the collar of my shirt.

"I can help you offload all that anger," she whispered, her breath smelling of the wine Dante had insulted. "You don’t need to worry about Catherine. You have me. I’m the one who belongs here. I’m the one who is actually going to be your wife."

I stayed perfectly still. I didn’t throw her off. I didn’t move away. I was a statue, frozen in a state of concentrated fury. I watched her hand move to the first button of my shirt, her fingers nimble as she began to undo it.

"Stop," I said. My voice was a low, dead thing. It didn’t sound like me.

Lucy let out a soft, mocking giggle. "Oh, don’t be like that. We’re going to be engaged soon, Julian. It’s about time we started acting like it." She moved to the second button, her eyes fixed on my chest. She was so sure of herself. So sure that her beauty and her status were enough to command my body even if she couldn’t have my heart.

She reached up, her hand cupping the back of my neck as she tried to pull my head down for a kiss. Her lips were inches from mine, a mask of desperation and vanity.

"Let go of me, Lucy," I warned, my voice dropping even lower. It was the sound of ice cracking over a deep, dark lake.

"Make me," she challenged, her eyes flashing with a stubborn, pushy light. She pressed her lips against mine, trying to force a reaction, trying to claim a territory that was already occupied by the ghost of someone else.

The explosion happened in an instant.

I didn’t think or calculate the optics. The weeks of being trapped, the months of watching Catherine drift away, and the sheer, suffocating pressure of Richard’s expectations all funneled into a single movement. I grabbed Lucy by the shoulders and threw her back with a violent, primal force.

She wasn’t prepared for the physical rejection. She let out a sharp cry of shock as she stumbled back, her heels catching on the rug inside the lounge. She hit the floor hard, the sound of her body connecting with the wood echoing through the quiet room.

For a moment, there was complete silence. Lucy sat on the floor, her hair disheveled, her expensive dress hiked up at an awkward angle. There was a look of pure disbelief. She didn’t expect me to be this violent with her. She had no idea how bad I wanted to unalive her. She was the very root of all my problems... only HER!

"You... you hit me?" she gasped, her voice trembling. "You actually threw me?"

"I warned you. I told you to stop," I said, stepping back into the room. I stood over her, my shadow long and jagged in the dim light. "Don’t ever touch me like that again."

Lucy’s shock quickly curdled into a vicious, ugly rage. She scrambled to her feet, her face red with humiliation. She didn’t cry. Instead, she reached for the most lethal weapon she had: the truth.

"You’re pathetic!" she screamed, her voice cracking with spite. "You’re throwing a tantrum because you know you’ve lost! You see the way she looks at him, don’t you? She looks at Dante like he’s a king, and she looks at you like you’re a piece of trash she forgot to throw out."

I flinched, but I didn’t move.

"He’s everything you aren’t!" Lucy continued, stepping closer, emboldened by the pain she saw in my eyes. "He’s stable. He’s powerful. He isn’t afraid of his own shadow or his father’s shadow. Catherine chose him because you’re unstable, Julian! You’re a broken, hollow shell of a man, and she’s finally found someone who can actually hold her without shaking!"

The mention of Catherine choosing him, the idea that she saw me as unstable, snapped the final thread of my control.

I was across the room before she could finish the next insult. My hand shot out, my fingers closing around her throat. I didn’t slam her against the wall; I simply gripped, the pressure firm and terrifying.

Lucy’s eyes widened to the size of saucers. Her hands flew to my wrist, her nails digging into my skin, but I didn’t feel it. I leaned in close, my face inches from hers. My vision was tunneled, focused only on the pulse thrumming frantically beneath my palm.

"Don’t you ever," I hissed, my voice a lethal whisper, "speak her name to me again. Do you understand? You are nothing in this house. You are a transaction. A deal. A piece of paper Richard signed."

Lucy tried to gasp, her face turning a panicked shade of pink. I wasn’t choking her to kill her; I was choking her to silence the voice that was telling me everything I already feared was true.

"Catherine is mine," I whispered, the lie tasting like ash in my mouth. "She will always be mine, regardless of who sits at that dinner table. If you ever mention her choice again, or if you ever try to touch me when I’ve told you to stop, I will make sure Dante never has her."

I held the grip for three more seconds long enough for her to see the genuine darkness in my eyes before I shoved her away.

Lucy collapsed back onto the sofa, gasping for air, her hand clutching her throat. She looked at me with a new kind of terror. The "Golden Boy" was gone. The son Richard wanted was gone. There was only a man who had been pushed past the point of no return.

"Get out," I said, turning back to the balcony. "And fix your hair. We wouldn’t want Richard to see you looking so... unpolished."

I heard her scramble to her feet and bolt out of the room, the sound of her frantic footsteps fading down the hallway. I stood there in the silence, my hand still tingling from the pressure of her neck.

I looked down at the driveway. Dante’s car was still there. He was enjoying the feel of her while I was upstairs, choking on the realization that Lucy was right. I was unstable. I was breaking. And Catherine was downstairs, laughing at the jokes of a man who didn’t have to hide who he was.

I pulled another cigarette from my case, but my hands were no longer shaking. They were cold. Cold as the grave I was digging for myself.