Page 53 of Burn Bright

She’s gripping my shoulder, uncertain of what’s about to happen. I’ll make her see stars.

“Don’t mind me!” Eliot’s muffled voice startles me out of the hot visual, and I instantly drop my hand off my dick.

What. The. Fu—the bathroom door bursts open.

I rub a fist to the fogged glass just to confirm, yes, my older brother has barged in here.

Eliot shields his eyes with a hand in a mock display of modesty while he ventures to the vanity. “Goddamn, brother, you take long showers. I thought you were in conservation mode?”

“Is it a mode if it’s his default?” Tom’s voice precedes his appearance in the bathroom.

Unlike Eliot who’s only in navy-blue boxer-briefs, Tom is fully dressed, wearing a black muscle shirt and ripped acid-wash jeans. He immediately bends down to the cupboard below the sink. I don’t know whether to be annoyed, pissed off, or dumbfounded.

“Good point,” Eliot replies to Tom.

“What the fuck?” I speak to both of them. “Hello? I’m showering.”

“Well, if that’s all you’re doing, I’m not rushing out,” Tom proclaims. “My hair is all fucked up, dude. I have a photoshoot in a couple hours. These aredirecircumstances.”

A groan of frustration rumbles in my chest. I pinch the water out of my eyes. “I locked the door,” I tell them. What—do they have a key or something?

“We forgot to mention the lock doesn’t work anymore.” Eliot speaks to himself in the mirror. “Broke during a party last month.”

“Four months ago,” Tom corrects him.

Eliot whistles. “Time is a bastard.”

I wonder if Beckett told them about finding me crying in here last night, but they’re not hovering like I’m about to self-combust. Then again, Eliotisa professional stage actor, so he could probably hide his concern if he wanted.

Tom, maybe not. But he doesn’t seem ready to chuck a fire blanket and first-aid kit at me. It eases my apprehension.

Hard-on officially soft, I shut off the water and the LED lights fade out. “Can you at least toss me a towel?” My brothers clearly have zero boundaries with each other, and I don’t know whether to be envious or aggravated. Eliot and Tom were practically raised as twins since Eliot had to retake kindergarten, which landed him in Tom’s grade for the rest of school.

Whereas the actual twins, Charlie and Beckett, didn’t go to school together really. Charlie skipped third and fourth grade, so he ended up in the same year as our older sister Jane, while Beckett chose to be homeschooled after ballet took over his life.

Eliot throws the plush black bath towel into the shower, and I catch it before it lands on the wet tile. Swiftly, I wrap and knot it at my waist. When I step out of the shower, the steam follows me. Tom’s busy digging in the cupboard for something, while Eliot squirts a glob of toothpaste on a toothbrush.

Eliot eyes me, a wicked grin playing at his lips. “Did we interrupt something?”

Tom, head-half-hidden below the sink, says, “He was definitely jacking off.”

I groan. “This cannot be real life.”

“We can pretend this is all a dream if you want,” Eliot says, mumbling through his toothbrush. He waves a hand like he’s putting a spell on me. “We were never here.”

Tom chuckles.

Yeah, they’re both amusing, but I’m not in the mood to laugh. Pressure compounds on my chest that I can’t throw off. I’m fine, really. And they need to believe it too.

Beads roll down my temples. Using the heel of my palm, I wipe water off my jaw, but my damp hair tracks more droplets down my neck, so I take the towel off my waist to dry my head. Not caring about being naked in front of them. I’m not shy. Undressing in locker rooms pretty much cured me of that.

I just care that I wasjerking offwhen they came in here.

“Can you just not do it again?” I ask.

“Only if you tell us who you were rubbing one out to.” Eliot spits into the sink, and I’d think he were joking if I didn’t know him. But I know him—too well.Quid pro quomight as well be tattooed on his ass. Right alongsidelex talionis.An eye for an eye.

I evade, “I didn’t say I was?—”