Adam stopped dead in his tracks about a metre away from them, knowing he was too late. Lucas stepped beside him a moment later.

Raul and Alfred were staring at each other in stunned silence, one from shock at the revelation and the other from shock that he'd made the revelation.

“What are you talking about?” Raul chuckled with almost tangible unease.  “Cut it out with the jokes, Alfred. We're having a serious conversation here.”

“Oh believe me, I know just how serious our discussion is.” Alfredo sneered.

Raul stumbled back as if bludgeoned with an unexpected weight, his eyes glimmering with nothing but shock, shaking his head in flagrant denial.

“No, Alfredo... This has got to be one of your stupid jokes. You're in love with me? It can't be possible. You're not gay. I've seen you with girls. We've had threesomes, fucked girls together. You can't be gay.”

“Bet you've never heard the term 'bisexual' in your life.” Alfred said sarcastically.

Suddenly, as if the avalanche of his confession was crashing down on him, Alfred sunk onto the car they were standing by, looking utterly defeated.

“Why? Why did you fall in love with me?” The poleaxion still characterized Raul's demeanor.

“Has anybody told you you ask the stupidest questions in the whole world?” Alfredo glared at Raul darkly. “Because you're fucking handsome and hot. Because you're just you and I couldn't keep myself from falling hard, damnit!”

Silence reined for minutes, stretching on like an elastic material and showering tension on them. Finally, Raul spoke, running his hand through his thick, bushy hair.

“How long, Alfred? How long has it been since you realized that you. . . were in love with me?” He said the words after the pause with a pained look on his face.

“Don't know. Maybe when we bought the penthouse and began living together alone.” Alfred answered wearily. He had the what more is there to lose look on his face.

“No it can't be. Alfred, that is five years ago.” Raul voiced in horror. “How did I ever not realize it?”

“Maybe because you chose not to?” Alfred scoffed. “Because you weren't in my shoes and you fucking didn't have to suffer any silent feelings for your stepbrother because you were just going to get heartbroken the moment you revealed your feelings and your relationship with him was never going to be the same.”

Raul still looked as stupefied as ever as he sunk down on the car beside Alfred. “I don't even know what to say. I... I never imagined something like this. I swear that...”

“Why are you justifying yourself anyways?” Alfred snapped, seemingly frustrated with himself and the situation. “It is my fucking problem, falling in love with a man who's as straight as they come. You know what? I think I'll just go. Enjoy the rest of your evening.”

With that Alfred got up to his feet. Shooting Adam and Lucas a fleeting miserable look, he was trotting down the street. It took some more silence before Raul finally looked up at Adam and Lucas.

“Guys, I never even ima...” He paused suddenly, his eyes glazing over warily, as if he'd just come to twig something. “The both of you already knew didn't you?” He directed his gaze first from Adam and then to Lucas. “That's why you don't even look shocked.”

He chuckled. “Am I the only one who fucking didn't know about this shit?” He stormed past them in a direction opposite to where Alfred had gone, his expression a mixture of disappointment and bewilderment.

Lucas held Adam's arm when he attempted to hold Raul back. “Let him.” He sighed. “This is messed up.”

“Tell me about it.” Adam echoed.

He had dreaded a moment like this after finding out about Alfred's feelings for Raul a year ago. He just hadn't ever imagined how things would work out from the. But right now, only one thing was for sure.

The relationship between the stepbrothers was never going to be the same.

≿━━━━༺❀༻━━━━≾

Eva groaned for the umpteenth time, glaring at her computer when she came up with no plan concrete enough to at least begin the processes that would lift the company from its crisis.

Now that they didn't have the support of Brandon's family, she'd promised her mum that they would work through this together, and she needed to come up with something soon.

The ringing of her telephone was a welcome distraction. Picking it up, she brought it to her ear and spoke into the mouthpiece. “Yes?”

“Miss Eva... I mean Eva, someone is here to see you. Doesn't have an appointment but claims you wouldn't refuse to see him.” Then she rushed on as if she was dreading what Eva would say. “I called you because you saw the last person who came without an appointment and...”

“It's okay, Suzzy. I'll see him.” She sighed as she placed down her receiver.

Frankly, she was beginning to get frustrated by how Suzzy, the new secretary she'd hired three weeks ago, behaved like she had to walk on eggshells around her. Was she that intimidating? Her efforts to get her to be freer around her had all gone down the drain.

Her attention was drawn to the door when it creaked open. Faint whiffs of a cologne she was all too familiar with reached her nostrils, tingling every nerve ending of her body with awareness even before the man himself stepped inside.

He looked splendid in his neatly tucked-in white shirt on black trousers, hair remaining tousled.

“Adam.” She breathed.

“Eva.” Her name was delivered in a husky tone that sent desire flaring through every pore of her being.

She got to her feet and rounded the table, the ritualized excitement his presence never failed to elicit in the pit of her belly creeping right in. Adam gripped her by the waist, and with a groan of relish that seemed to match how she felt, crashed his lips down on hers.

She accepted entry into her mouth, feeling her tongue meld with his. The kiss seemed to go on forever.

“You taste like you were having a very bad day and I just brightened it a hundred times.” He chuckled against her lips when they finally pulled back.

“A thousand times actually.” She let out a heavy sigh.

Adam peered at her curiosly. “Wanna share?”

She nodded, taking his hand and leading him behind her desk, letting him take her swivel chair. “Nice office.” He said, looking around appraisingly.

“Thanks.” She muttered.

“So what's up?” He drew the chair near when Eva sat on her desk, his hands gripping her thigh.

“The company is going through some kind of crisis, and we need a business plan to help us out of it, something substantial. So far, none of the shareholders or even the employees have been able to come up with anything appreciable. Neither have I. I feel so unproductive.”

“Have you thought that it's because maybe you've been stressing yourself too much?” He asked, placing a soft kiss on the exposed skin just above her knee. A shudder run through Eva.

“Probably. I feel so stultified though.”

“I have no idea what the hell that means. But what if I told you I had a remedy to give you more inspiration?”

“And what remedy of yours is that, Wild One?” She shoved her fingers through his hair, ruffling it lightly, uncaring since it was already tousled anyways.

“Has anyone told you you look gorgeous in suit?” He asked.

She was wearing an ash suit on an equally ash skirt, and his hands began riding the hem of her skirt higher up her thighs, his lips following the ascent.

She chuckled even as her breathing accelerated, trying to take Adam's hands off. “Really? This is the remedy?” Her flippancy at his 'remedy' didn't stop him. “Adam, we're in my office. What are you doing?”

“Hmm.” He hummed noncommittally.

Eva knew she was in trouble. Especially since she couldn't bring herself to pull away from his touch.

When the hem of her skirt was mid-thigh, his right hand swerved to her inner thighs and caressed her intimately, his fingers riding higher and higher, making her breathing shallower and shallower.

“Adam, please...” She clamped her thighs together weakly.

“Open up for me, baby.” He rasped, his other hand climbing to her breasts, fondling her through the white blouse she wore underneath her suit.

The manipulation together with the endearment had all her resistance crumbling to the ground, and her thighs parted open for him.

A gasp tore from her throat when one digit grazed her already weeping core through her panties. His finger and and her panties grazed through her folds while his thumb rubbed her firmly on the clit.

Her body being so receptive to his touch, sensations forked through every one of her nerve endings.

Her panties was swept aside, two of his digits entering her immediately. Eva screamed, having to muffle it with her hand, writhing from the sheer painful pleasure of it. His fingers retraced, then plunged back in, rotated, then scissored along her walls.

Just when Eva thought she couldn't take it anymore, his fingers pulled out completely, making her whimper at the loss. She watched with heavy eyes as he brought the fingers to his mouth, wrapping his tongue around it and sucking greedily on it, savouring the taste.

She almost cummed from the sight, and it was all she could do to stop herself from telling him to continue fingering her.

Adam chuckled. “You look so hot when you're holding yourself back from begging for my dick.”

“Oh shut it. Cocky bastard.” She sneered playfully.

Adam laughed. Grabbing her by the waist, he pulled her from the desk onto his laps, right onto his straining erection. Lord was he hard. He hissed, seemingly at the contact.

“How did you find my office anyways?” She asked, resting her back on his chest while he kissed her neck.

Thank God she had no appointments, just a board meeting in about thirty minutes.

“I googled the name of your company. Took the HQ address.”

“In other words, you were stalking us.”

He snorted. “No, you. I wanted to surprise you.” He sighed.

There was something about that sigh that made Eva lean away from his chest, tilting to look at him. “Want to share what's bothering you?”

He sighed again, much heavily this time. “Something happened between Raul and Alfredo.” She pushed back strands of his hait that had fallen on his face, and he continued. “Alfred finally confessed that he is in love with Raul.”

“No way.” Eva gasped, then said after a while. “Alfred never struck me as gay.”

Adam nodded. “He's bisexual to some extent. He thought he was straight until he and Raul moved into the same penthouse and he suddenly found him attractive. Then feelings morphed into something stronger. Anyways, he rarely gets attracted to other men. Just Raul.”

“Oh my God. How's Raul taking this?”

“He's still freaked out. Alfred hasn't gone home since we parted around eleven last night. To be frank, I'm beginning to get worried.” He bit his lower lip. Eva had to tell herself this was no time to think about how sexy that was. “We're such a tight circle, Eva. I'm afraid this thing is going to wreck a part of it.”

He's baring his heart out.

It suddenly struck Eva. Adam had never really talked about his loved ones with so much delicacy around her. Moved, Eva tilted so she was sitting horizontally across his laps, wrapping her arms around his neck.

He wedged his hands between them, squeezing her breasts all of a sudden. Squealing, she pulled back from him.

He chuckled. “So how's that extreme sports story you're writing going?”

Eva widened her eyes, elated that he'd asked her about it. “Pretty well. Got over my writer's block but I changed the storyline. It's no longer just about a woman learning to concur her fears. It's also about her finding love along the way. Just like us.”

She realized the gravity of what she'd just said when Adam's eyes darkened. “Just like us?”

Eva decided that she was tired of hiding her feelings. “Adam, I've been wanting to tell you how I really feel about you for a while now. I think...”

A knock cut through the moment, and the door opened a second later. “Eva dear, I need you to...”

Eva shot up from Adam's laps, swallowing nervously as she looked at her stunned mother.

“What the hell is going on here, Eva? Who is this man?” Her mother demanded, gaze pinned to Adam.

“Mrs. Rebecca,” Adam got up to his feet, his eyes quickly sliding from her tag. “I am...”

“I was speaking to my daughter, if you'll please.” Her mother cut him off. Eva winced at the rudeness as her mother's demanding gaze returned to her. “Who's he?”

“Uh, mum, he is Adam. Adam Garcia. Great sports extremist and a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious photographer! He's...”

“I wasn't asking for his profile. I meant, who is he to you?” The look in her mother's eyes suggested no room for escape.

“Adam? Oh he's... He's my...”

What was Adam to her? So far none of them had really brought up the subject about their relationship status. They'd both been happy without having to think about labels. Now it was coming back to bite her ass.

Before she could make more mess out of herself, Adam stepped forward from behind her desk. “Eva is my girlfriend, ma'am.”

___________

I probably shouldn't be saying this but you better brace yourself for the following chapters.

LOL
–E