My Stepbrother's Dirty Little Secret novel Chapter 441

Chapter 441

The look on his face afterward.

The messages.

The apology.

The promise.

Starting tomorrow, I will keep my distance.

My stomach twisted. Maybe… Maybe this wasn’t as easy for him as I thought.

Maybe-

Raphael suddenly let out a harsh breath. Then he dropped his coffee cup onto the table harder than necessary,’ Jesus Christ,” he muttered, dragging a hand down his face. “Can we please talk about literally anything else?!”

I flinched, the reaction was instant before I could stop it. The sound wasn’t even that loud but my body reacted anyway. Raphael’s eyes snapped toward me immediately.

And suddenly that tiny moment I’d had? The one where Alessia’s words had started getting into my head? The one where I almost let myself believe he cared?

It vanished.

Just like that.

Across the table, Raphael’s eyes stayed on me for another second before he looked away.

Then Vincenzo leaned back in his chair. His eyes shifted from Raphael to me, “Hey, kid.”

My head lifted automatically.

Vincenzo was looking directly at me, “You alright?”

The question caught me so off guard I just blinked then I forced a smile, “I’m fine. I just wasn’t expecting the noise.”

His eyes narrowed immediately like he didn’t believe me.

Across the table Raphael pushed his chair back. The legs scraped against the floor, every head turned as he stood. Without looking at anyone, he picked up his phone and keys, “I’ve got work.”

Then he walked toward the door and was gone in a second.

Vincenzo stared at the closed doors, his jaw flexed once then he shook his head, “No.”

Claire sighed immediately, “Vincenzo.”

“No.”

He pointed toward the door Raphael had disappeared through, “That. The hell is that?”

Claire frowned, “Vincenzo.”

“No,” he pointed toward the door again, “That isn’t Raphael. You know what I did when I realized I wasn’t thinking straight?”

Claire immediately closed her eyes, “Oh no.”

His attention stayed on the doorway, “I left. I walked away from my family. I stayed away. I kept my distance. I stayed away from people I cared about. Because if I wasn’t operating at one hundred percent, then everybody around me paid for it. I wasn’t worried about myself. I was worried about the damage I’d cause if I made the wrong decision.”

A strange feeling settled in my stomach. Because suddenly I wasn’t hearing Vincenzo anymore. I was hearing Raphael.

My mind drifted back to last night. To Jules crying, to her screaming, to Raphael standing in my bedroom looking completely lost while she accused him of hurting me.

I remembered the look on his face. The confusion, the way he’d stopped moving the second either of us flinched.

Then I remembered myself. The knot in my stomach tightened.

I had been hurt.

But had I stopped for even one second to think about him?

About what Jules saying those things had done to him? About what it felt like to have a ten-year-old look at him like he was some kind of monster?

I pressed my lips together. The answer came immediately.