MY STEP-BROTHER'S FAVORITE SIN

I stood in the elevator with my mother...Catherine, who preferred to be called by her first name like we were friends instead of family...and watched her reflection in the mirrored walls. She was nervous. I could see it in the way she kept adjusting her diamond ring, the one that was so new it still caught the light like it had something to prove.

Three weeks ago, she didn't know Harrison Ashford existed. Now she was his wife, and I was about to become the step-sibling to a man I'd only ever seen in racing magazines.

"He's probably not home," Mom said, her voice taking on that hopeful lilt it always did when she was trying to convince both of us of something. "He's usually at the track or..."

"He's home," I interrupted, watching the elevator numbers climb. Forty-two. Forty-three. Forty-four. "I can feel him."

It was a stupid thing to say, but it was true. Omegas had instincts for alphas the way dogs had instincts for storms. And right now, my entire nervous system was screaming that there was an alpha in this building. A strong one.

Mom glanced at me, her expression shifting to something more guarded. "Don't start, Eva."

"Start what?" I asked innocently, even though we both knew what she meant. My track record with alphas wasn't exactly stellar. I had a tendency to find the ones with the most interesting edges, the ones with the most to hide, the ones who were absolutely wrong for me in every conceivable way.

"Just be nice," she said. "This is a big adjustment for everyone."

The elevator dinged, and the doors slid open to reveal a sprawling penthouse that looked like it had been designed by someone who'd never experienced joy in their entire life. All chrome and glass and carefully curated emptiness. No photos on the walls. No evidence that anyone actually lived here. It was a museum dedicated to wealth, not a home.

A man was waiting for us...Harrison Ashford himself. I'd only met him a handful of times before the wedding, and each time I'd been struck by how little warmth existed in his smile. He was handsome in an intimidating way, all sharp lines and colder eyes, and I could absolutely see where the son would get his looks.

"Welcome home," Harrison said, kissing Mom's cheek with the kind of affection that made me wonder if this marriage was about love or if it was about filling some void in both of their lives. "Let me show you around. Kai should be in the garage."

The garage. Of course the alpha would be in a space filled with machines and speed and danger.

As we descended into the lower levels of the penthouse, I pulled my omega instincts in tight. I'd learned the hard way that alphas could smell desperation, could sense vulnerability like sharks detected blood in water. Whatever this was about to be, I needed to go in strong. Controlled. Like I had absolutely no interest in whatever was radiating off him in waves.

That strategy lasted approximately five seconds.

The garage was enormous, filled with motorcycles that looked like they cost more than most people's houses. And standing in the center of it all, methodically cleaning one of the bikes with an intensity that suggested he was trying to solve world hunger through sheer force of will, was the alpha.

Kai Ashford.

I'd seen pictures. Magazine covers. Videos of him racing with the kind of reckless abandon that made even my omega brain...the part that was supposedly wired to want safety and stability...sit up and take notice. But none of that prepared me for the reality of him.

He was tall, muscular in the way of someone who didn't just work out but lived in his body. Leather jacket thrown over a dark shirt that did absolutely nothing to hide the lines of his chest. Dark hair that looked like it hadn't seen a comb in days. And when he finally looked up from his bike, those eyes...dark, intense, completely unimpressed with my existence...nearly made me forget how to breathe.

An alpha. An actual, full-blooded alpha in his prime, and he was looking at me like I was an inconvenience.

Perfect. Just what I needed.

"Kai, this is Eva," Harrison said, his voice taking on the careful tone of someone negotiating a hostage situation. "Eva, your brother Kai."

Brother. The word felt like a lie the moment it left his lips.

"Hey," I said, keeping my voice level, keeping my expression neutral. I'd become expert at hiding what I was feeling over the years. It was a survival skill. "Sorry to invade your space."

That's when something shifted in his expression. His pupils dilated, and I watched in real time as he caught my scent. The alpha in him recognized the omega in me, and I could practically see the exact moment his brain short-circuited.

I wasn't going to pretend I didn't notice. Wasn't going to play coy or shy or any of the games that so many omegas played with alphas. If there was one thing I'd learned in my twenty-five years of existing as an omega in a world obsessed with dynamics, it was that honesty was infinitely more dangerous than lies.

"You're in the guest wing," he said, his voice rough in a way that made my skin prickle. "Top floor, east side."

"Thanks," I said, moving down the stairs toward him slowly, deliberately. I could smell him now...leather and gasoline and something distinctly male that made my hindbrain light up like a Christmas tree. I didn't fight it. Didn't try to hide my reaction. Instead, I let a small smile play at my lips. "I'll try not to make a mess of things."

I watched his hands curl into fists, watched the muscles in his jaw clench, and felt a surge of satisfaction run through me. This was going to be interesting.

"That's probably a good idea," he said, turning back to his bike like he couldn't stand to look at me anymore. "I value my privacy."

My mother and Harrison had already moved upstairs, probably giving us space in the way people did when they didn't want to witness the chaos they'd created. It was just the two of us now, in this garage that smelled like him, surrounded by machines that represented everything he cared about.

"Don't worry," I said, moving toward him and the bikes. I was deliberately provocative. Deliberately dangerous. "I'm very good at respecting boundaries."

The lie hung in the air between us, and I knew he heard it. Knew he understood exactly what I was saying beneath the words.

I ran my fingers over the seat of his bike...the one he'd been so carefully cleaning...and felt him tense behind me. The alpha in him wanted to react. Wanted to establish dominance, to mark territory, to do all the things that alphas did when they felt threatened.

"You're the racer," I said, not looking at him yet, savoring the moment before everything changed. "Kai Ashford. I've seen your name on the circuit."

"Have you?" His voice was tight, controlled. Barely.

"Mm-hmm." I finally turned to face him, and the proximity shocked us both. I hadn't realized how close I'd moved. "Apparently, Catherine and your father met at some charity event, and there was some kind of... connection. One thing led to another, and suddenly we're moving into a penthouse with a stranger who races motorcycles for a living."

"Convenient," he said, his eyes dark and predatory in a way that made my pulse quicken. "For you."

"Maybe," I said, stepping closer. "Or maybe this is the worst possible timing for both of us."

"Don't." The word came out like a growl, and every omega instinct I possessed screamed at me to back down. To submit. To recognize the authority in that single syllable.

I ignored them all.

"Don't what?" I asked softly, closing the distance between us further. I could feel the heat radiating off him, could smell the shift in his scent as arousal mixed with frustration. "Act like I don't feel this? Like my body isn't recognizing you as something it wants?"

"Whatever this is," he said, his voice low and dangerous, "don't."

"Too late." I whispered the words, and I was close enough now to see the exact moment he stopped fighting it. "I think it started the second I smelled you."

He was beautiful when he was conflicted. The war between what he wanted and what he knew he shouldn't want played out across his face like a movie. And I was absolutely going to enjoy every second of this chaos we were about to create.

"Welcome to the penthouse," he said finally, his voice rough with suppressed emotion. Desire. Anger. Something that might have been resignation.

I smiled, and I knew it was the smile of someone who'd just found exactly what she was looking for, even if neither of us was ready to admit it yet.

"Thanks, brother," I said, emphasizing the last word like it was a joke. Because we both knew that's the last thing we'd ever be to each other.

My room was exactly as Harrison had described it...spacious, modern, with floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the city like I was sitting on top of the world. The guest wing. The east side. Positioned as far away from Kai as possible while still being in the same building.

Smart man, Harrison Ashford. He understood exactly what he was doing when he put me here.

I unpacked slowly, not because I had much to unpack but because I was stalling. My body was still humming with the aftermath of meeting Kai...the way his scent had clung to me in the elevator, the way my skin still felt tight and oversensitive. Omega instincts were a bitch sometimes.

My phone buzzed. A text from my boss at the marketing firm.

*We need that campaign proposal by Monday. Can you have it done before you settle in?*

Monday. Three days. I could do that in my sleep, which was exactly why I'd gotten the promotion to senior strategist in the first place. I was good at my job...really good. The kind of good that made people nervous because I didn't just come up with ideas, I came up with ideas that worked. Ideas that made companies money.

It was the one thing in my life that made sense. The one thing I could control.

I opened my laptop and started sketching out the framework for the campaign. A luxury hotel chain wanted to rebrand. They wanted to appeal to younger clientele without losing their established clientele. It was a puzzle, and I loved puzzles.

For three hours, I disappeared into work. It was the only way I knew how to quiet the noise in my head...the noise that looked like dark eyes and leather jackets and the way Kai's scent made my hindbrain lose all sense of reason.

By the time I looked up, it was past midnight. The city lights spread out below me like a map of possibility and danger, and I realized I was hungry. Not the kind of hungry that food could fix, but the kind that made an omega's body ache.

I changed into sleep shorts and a tank top, grabbed my water bottle, and ventured into the kitchen. The penthouse was silent except for the hum of the refrigerator. Everyone else was asleep...or Kai was doing whatever he did to avoid thinking about me.

The kitchen was massive, all stainless steel and marble countertops. Professionally designed by someone who'd never actually cooked a meal in their life. I was reaching for a glass when I heard the garage door open downstairs.

Two in the morning. Kai was coming home.

I could leave. Should leave. Walk back to my room and pretend I'd never heard him. But I was twenty-five years old, and I was tired of being sensible. Sensible had gotten me into this situation...playing it safe with alphas who didn't want anything real, pretending that my omega instincts didn't matter.

So instead of leaving, I made tea.

I was on my second cup when he appeared in the kitchen doorway, still in his leather jacket, his dark hair wind-tousled from the bike. His eyes found me immediately...like I was the only thing in the room that mattered.

"Can't sleep?" he asked, his voice rough from the ride.

"Could ask you the same thing," I said, not looking at him directly. Playing cool was easier than admitting that I'd heard him coming and stayed on purpose.

He moved to the refrigerator, grabbed a bottle of water, and drank half of it without breaking eye contact. The move was so deliberately aggressive that I felt heat pool low in my belly.

"Long ride," he said finally. "Needed to think."

"About what?"

He didn't answer immediately. Just set the water bottle down with deliberate slowness and moved closer. "About the fact that my father's new wife just moved an omega into my house, and that omega smells like every bad decision I've ever wanted to make."

The honesty of it knocked the breath out of me. Alphas weren't supposed to admit things like that. They were supposed to pretend that they were in control...that the attraction was a minor inconvenience they could manage with distance and cold showers.

Kai apparently didn't believe in that particular fiction.

"I didn't ask for this either," I said quietly. "My mother got married. I got dragged along. That's all this is."

"That's not all this is." He was closer now...close enough that I could feel the heat radiating off his body. "You know it's not."

I set down my tea carefully, buying time. If I didn't respond, if I just sat here and let the silence stretch between us, maybe he'd leave. Maybe we could both go back to our separate wings and pretend that this chemistry didn't exist.

But I was never good at doing what I was supposed to do.

"What do you want from me?" I asked, finally meeting his eyes.

"I want you to tell me this is temporary," he said. "I want you to tell me that you're going to realize this is a terrible idea and you're going to leave."

"Would that be the truth?"

"No." The word hung between us like a confession.

"Then I'm not going to lie to you."

He reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear...the touch so gentle and so loaded with promise that it made my entire body tense. I could smell the shift in his scent...the spike of arousal that matched my own.

"This is a bad idea," he whispered.

"The worst," I agreed.

"We can't..."

"I know."

But he was leaning closer anyway, and I was tilting my head up to meet him halfway, and the first kiss was inevitable the moment I'd decided to stay in that kitchen. It was soft at first...a test. A question. Are you sure?

And then it wasn't soft anymore.

It was desperate and hungry and everything that two people who wanted each other but couldn't have each other should never do. His hands tangled in my hair, pulling me closer, and I was reaching for him, my fingers digging into the leather of his jacket because if I was going to burn, I might as well burn completely.

He tasted like the night and danger and all the reasons why this was absolutely insane. His scent wrapped around me...overwhelming, addictive, marking me in ways that would make it obvious to everyone what we'd been doing.

I didn't care.

He pulled back suddenly, breathing hard, his forehead resting against mine.

"This was a mistake," he said, but his arms didn't release me.

"Definitely," I agreed, but I didn't move away.

"If anyone found out..."

"They won't."

"Eva..." He said my name like it was a plea. Like he was begging me to be reasonable, to be the sensible one, to pull back from the edge we were standing on.

I didn't do any of those things.

Instead, I reached up and kissed him again, slower this time, deeper. A promise. A warning. A surrender to something that neither of us had the strength to resist.

When he finally let me go, his eyes were dark with conflict and desire in equal measure.

"You should go to bed," he said, his voice rough.

"Probably," I said, standing up on shaky legs. "Goodnight, Kai."

I walked past him, close enough to brush shoulders, and felt him flinch like I'd burned him.

Behind me, I heard him exhale slowly.

"Goodnight, Eva."

I didn't sleep that night. I lay in bed with his scent still on my skin and his kiss still burning on my lips, and I wondered what the hell we were doing. We had one kiss...one absolutely insane, rule-breaking kiss...and already I could feel it changing things between us.

By morning, everything would be different. And I had absolutely no idea if different was going to be better or if it was going to be the thing that destroyed us both.

Avoiding someone in a penthouse was theoretically impossible. Practically speaking, it turned out to be surprisingly manageable if you never left your room and had your meals delivered.

I'd spent the entirety of Sunday locked in my space, working on the campaign proposal for the hotel chain. Forty-eight slides. Three different color schemes. A complete brand narrative that I was actually proud of. The kind of work that would get me noticed, that would fast-track my promotion, that would justify everything I'd worked for.

It was also the perfect excuse to avoid facing Kai.

The kiss kept replaying in my head like a song stuck on repeat. His hands in my hair. The taste of him. The way his body had responded to mine. The way I'd wanted to drag him out of that kitchen and find somewhere private where we could finish what we'd started.

Completely unprofessional. Completely reckless. Completely...necessary, apparently, based on the way my body had been vibrating since the moment his lips touched mine.

By Monday morning, I'd convinced myself that we could move past it. That it was a moment of weakness, hormones and proximity and the shock of sudden proximity. That we could exist in the same space like civilized people who weren't actively losing their minds.

I was wrong.

I was in the kitchen making coffee when he appeared, already dressed for the day in dark jeans and a black shirt that clung to his chest. He looked like he hadn't slept any more than I had. There were dark circles under his eyes, and his jaw was tight with tension.

Our eyes met for exactly two seconds before he looked away.

"Morning," he said, his voice carefully neutral.

"Morning," I replied, trying to match his tone and failing miserably because my voice came out too soft. Too intimate.

He grabbed a coffee mug and poured without looking at me. "Your mother and my father went out. They'll be back around six."

"Okay."

"I'm going to be in the garage most of the day."

"Okay."

"We can't..." He stopped, his jaw working. "Last night was a mistake. We both know that. It can't happen again."

The rational part of my brain agreed with him. The part that cared about my career, my relationship with my mother, the delicate balance of this new family situation. But the omega part of me...the part that had tasted him and wanted more...that part was screaming at how wrong he was.

"You're right," I said, because he was. We couldn't do this. "It was a mistake."

He looked at me then, and I saw the war happening behind his eyes. The part of him that wanted to argue, that wanted to convince me otherwise. Instead, he nodded like that settled it.

"Good. I'm glad we're on the same page."

He left with his coffee, and I stood there in the pristine kitchen, feeling like I'd just made a terrible decision by agreeing with him.

The rest of the day, I threw myself into work. I sent the proposal to my boss at 4 PM. By 4:30, I had a call.

"Eva, this is incredible." Marcus's voice came through my phone, and I could hear the smile in it. "This is exactly what they want. You've got the senior strategist position, effective immediately. Bonus included. Are you ready to present this on Wednesday?"

Wednesday. Two days. This was it...this was the moment that proved I was more than just another omega trying to make it in a male-dominated industry.

"Absolutely," I said. "I'll be ready."

After I hung up, I sat on my bed and felt the weight of what I'd just accomplished. Senior Strategist at Meridian Marketing. The youngest person in that position at the firm. Forty percent more money. The kind of career trajectory that meant I could have my own place, my own life, my own future that didn't involve living in my mother's shadow or her mistakes.

I should have been celebrating.

Instead, I kept thinking about Kai in the garage, methodically cleaning his bikes, probably trying to work me out of his system the same way I was trying to work him out of mine.

By the time Mom and Harrison got home, I'd managed to pull myself together enough to look somewhat normal. Mom wanted to go out to dinner to celebrate the wedding properly...a fancy restaurant with the four of us. The kind of thing that was meant to bond a new family together.

I dressed carefully. Dark jeans, a silk blouse that was professional but suggested there was a body underneath, heels that made me feel powerful. I wasn't dressing for Kai. I was dressing for myself. That's what I told myself anyway.

The restaurant was upscale, all soft lighting and expensive wine. Harrison and Mom sat next to each other, clearly still in that honeymoon phase where they couldn't keep their hands off each other. Kai and I sat across from each other, our eyes carefully not meeting while the tension between us was so thick you could cut it with a knife.

"So, Eva, how's the new job treating you?" Harrison asked, his tone the practiced warmth of someone who was trying very hard to be a good stepfather.

"Actually, I got promoted today," I said, unable to stop the smile. "Senior Strategist."

"That's fantastic!" Mom reached over and squeezed my hand. "I'm so proud of you. That's what you've been working toward for two years."

"Congratulations," Kai said quietly, and when I finally looked at him, he was smiling. It was a real smile, and it gutted me because it was the smile of someone who was proud of me. Someone who cared about my success. "That's a big deal."

"Thank you," I said, holding his gaze for longer than I should have.

"You'll have to tell us more about the presentation," Harrison said. "Wednesday, did you say?"

"Wednesday. I'm presenting to a client at their headquarters across the city."

"Kai drives that direction sometimes," Harrison said, and I watched Kai's entire body stiffen. "You could drive together if you'd like. Seems more efficient than both of you taking separate cars."

The silence that followed was deafening.

"That's okay," I said quickly. "I'm fine taking a car service."

"Nonsense. Kai?" Harrison looked at his son expectantly.

"It's not a problem," Kai said, his voice carefully controlled. "I'll take you."

I wanted to argue. Wanted to find any excuse to not spend an hour in a car with him, confined in a small space where I couldn't escape the pull of his scent. But Harrison was already nodding, satisfied that he'd solved something, and my mother was smiling, and backing out now would raise questions neither of us wanted to answer.

"Great," I said weakly. "Thank you."

The rest of dinner was torture. Watching Kai pretend that last night didn't happen. Watching him be polite and distant while every nerve ending in my body was screaming to touch him. Watching the way his hands gripped his wine glass like he was barely holding himself together.

When we got home, I excused myself early. Said I needed to prep for the presentation. He said he was going back to the garage. We were both lying, and we both knew it.

In my room, I stood at the window and looked out over the city, wondering how something that felt so right could be so catastrophically wrong. Wondering if I was strong enough to keep my hands off him, or if Wednesday in the car was going to be the moment I gave in completely.

Wondering if part of me was already hoping for exactly that.