Page 95 of Heartless Stepbrother

Satisfaction. That was the word. The clean, clinical satisfaction of victory. The kind that came when a plan executed itself perfectly. The sight of her trembling hands had been proof enough that I had the upper hand. That she was learning her place in the world of Maddox men.

But as I replayed the moment, her eyes, wide and blazing, something twisted in my chest. A small, unwelcome knot of feeling that had no business being there.

I told myself it was adrenaline. That buzz of dominance and control. But it wasn’t. It was colder, more corrosive. It was the echo of a feeling I had trained myself to kill years ago.

Anger.

Not the childish, reckless kind that made men shout or break things. That kind of anger had died in me long before I was old enough to think. This was the quiet, disciplined fury that burned slow and deep. The kind that sharpened itself into purpose.

And beneath it, buried under the layers of rage and satisfaction, was something worse. Something I didn’t want to name.

She had made me feel.

That flash of panic in her eyes, that defiance trembling in her throat, it should have been fuel. It should have made me feel like a god, towering and untouchable. Instead, it made me feel… alive. Uncomfortably, irritatingly alive.

It woke something that had no place in this carefully constructed life I had built.

For years, I had lived behind walls higher than this house, in a world carved from precision and cruelty. I had learned to mimic the smiles that charmed and the tones that soothed. I had learned that love was leverage and kindness was camouflage. I had learned that people broke when you pressed the right nerves hard enough.

And yet, when she looked at me, really looked, not with submission but with that impossible mix of fear and fire, I felt something recoil inside me. Like the boy I had been before life taught me the cost of softness was still trapped somewhere, clawing to get out.

I hated her for that.

I hated her because she reminded me that I hadn’t buried that weakness as deeply as I thought.

I crossed the room, the soft carpet muting my steps.

I needed a drink.

The whiskey caught the light as it sloshed in the glass, honeyed and false.

The liquid burned its way down, a perfect punishment.

“She’s not special,” I said aloud to the silence. “She’s just another test.”

The words fell flat.

I turned toward the connecting wall. The one that hid her from sight but not from thought. I could almost feel her energy on the other side, tight and restless, probably pacing like a trapped animal. Maybe crying. Maybe plotting.

Good. Let her.

She needed to learn that in this house, survival wasn’t granted, it was earned.

Still, I found myself wondering what she was doing. Whether she was sitting on that bed with her knees pulled up, clutching the blanket like she had the night before when I’d snuck into her hotel room.

The memory sent a current of heat through me, something primal, dark, and dangerous.

Not lust, exactly. It was hunger, yes, but not for touch. For reaction. For control. For proof that I could unmake her if I chose to.

But there was also something else buried in it. An unwilling fascination.

She didn’t crumble the way others did. She fractured, yes, but every time I thought she would shatter, she pulled herself back together just enough to defy me again. There was a kind of beauty in that defiance, a terrible, infuriating beauty that made me want to destroy it just to see if I could.

I told myself this was strategy. That breaking her would break the marriage. That every tear, every act of rebellion I provoked would feed my plan. But I knew the truth was starting to rot through that logic.

This wasn’t strategy anymore. It was something darker.

Obsession had a way of wearing the mask of reason until you forgot the difference.