Taboo Series - Falling for my step brother

Chapter four

"Starting with your language, stop swearing so much." Lucas said, a sick smirk on his face.

"No, no one is punishing me, I am an adult not a naughty child." I argued.

"Then stop acting like one." Lucas quipped.

"I want to know what you mean by punished." I demanded.

"Nothing too unorthodox, of course I need to discuss the boundaries with your mother." Marcus shrugged as he took a sip of his wine.

"Mum?" I almost shriek, red alarm bells were going off in my brain.

"What do you mean by punishment?" my mother asked, finally seeming to remember she was my parent in all this.

"Well, when Lucas was younger, if he disobeyed me there were a number of punishments that I would use and they seemed to work nicely."

"Like?" I pushed, hating that he was dancing around the topics.

"Grounding, taking away electronic devices, giving house work to do." I felt myself relax a little as he listed the first three. "Spanking." I went stiff as a bored.

My eyes wide I looked at my mum. "No way am I letting your new boyfriend, husband, fiancée, whatever the f**k he is spank me mum. Nuh huh. No way. I would rather swim back to England."

"Of course it would not be me, that would be inappropriate." Marcus waved his hand.

"I don't feel comfortable hitting my daughter." my mum said looking at me. "She has done too much for me and that is a line I have never crossed." I nodded encouragingly happy to see there was someone else with sense sat in the room. "Lucas, could you do it?"

"Mum!" I yelled, standing up so abruptly that my chair fell to the floor. "What the hell?"

"Well, if Marcus thinks it is best and he can't and I won't that only leaves him." Anna tried to reason.

"Or, now this may be me being stupid here, how about no one spanks me!" I cross my arms in defiance, no way was I budging on this one.

"Saint Marc's will need a contact of someone who has permission to administer punishments or they won't allow you in." Marcus tried to explain.

"Then I won't go, I'll get a job." I shrugged.

"As I said, this is my house and you will follow my rules."

"Then I will not be staying in 'Your house'." I flap my arms as I step around my fallen chair and head back to the living area. "Jacob!" I yell, my voice echoing off the walls.

"Lilith please." My mum says as she runs to my side and grabs hold of my arm. "Don't do this."

"Mum, I love you, you know that. But your husband wants me to give his son permission to f*****g spank me when I don't act the way they want to. Maybe you named me appropriately, maybe I am a demon, because I am not going to bow down to the will of a man I have known for thirty minutes and you just over twenty four hour. I will find a way to get back to England on my own." I say as drag my arm from hers.

"Please don't leave me." Anna yelled again going to her knees and wrapping herself around my leg. "Don't leave me the way William did." Oh god, I was having flashbacks of when he came home and said he was leaving, she did this to him and he just f*****g blanked her. I looked down to see the same broken expression I had been looking at for the past year, except this time, I was the monster who put it there.

"Mum." I sighs trying to pry her off me. "We can call, and text and write and Skype, even facetime now you know what that is."

"But I want you here, I need you here." She begged as she grabbed hold of me tighter.

"Mum, I am eighteen, like you said I am legally an adult. I'm not going to be here forever."

"No but just for now, I need you, please do this last thing for me." She pleaded.

"But mum, this last thing is to do whatever your new boyfriend says and let his son punish me when I don't comply. That is not asking me to make you a cup of tea or give you my last Rollo, this is a big f*****g deal." I tried to explain, to make her see reason.

She stood up and dashed her tears away. "You always were an ungrateful child." she hissed.

"Anna." I sighed.

"Don't you Anna me, I am your mother. Maybe if I would have been firmer with you as a child I would still have my husband." I looked behind her to see Marcus and Lucas stood in the doorway.

"Mum..." I tried to warn.

"No! You always used to get in fights because the kids picked on you and called you names. I always took pity on you because you were bullied but the schools always noted you were left without a scratch but I believed your lies and stood up for you. I bet you used to start those fights didn't you?"

"No, I didn't and you know it." I sighed as Jacob came down a few steps and looked at me. "Can you get my suitcase please Jacob?" he nodded and disappeared back up the steps.

"You would always take up all of Williams time, getting him to take you places and do things with you at a weekend."

"He was my dad." I argued.

"He was my husband." My mum yelled pointing to her chest. "You ever think that is why he left? Because he couldn't stand to be around such a clingy and needy child. I mean hell, you didn't even have any friends really, just the kids who's parents were friends with me and your dad would hang out with you because they had to." I closed my eyes and tried to block out her hateful words. "If you leave now, that is it, I am done with you!" she hissed.

"You cannot be done with me, I am your daughter. You think I didn't want to be done with you for the last year? You think I enjoyed cleaning the sick from your hair and hearing you b***h about my cooking? You think I loved how everyone looked at me like crap because I didn't know how to use the washing machine for the first two months."

"Because I always took care of you. No one else would, it was all me, you couldn't even get yourself a boyfriend you were that weird."

"Yeah mum, I'm weird and your an alcoholic who resents her own daughter, why should I be staying here again." I pulled a mock thinking face. Anna went a strange shade of red as she stormed into the dining room and came back out with her hand bag. She rooted around in it for a few minutes before pulling out our passports. She flicked through them and shoved one back in her bag before walking back out of the room. I rushed to her bag and opened the one she had left to see it was hers. "Mum? What are you doing?" I shouted as I ran past Marcus and Lucas in the direction my mum had gone. "Mum?" I shouted again when I saw she was not in the dining room.

I ran a little further down the corridor and found her in the kitchen, holding a pair of scissors. "You will not ruin this for me Lilith, you will do as Marcus tells you too and you will not be leaving me." she hissed as she started to hack at the pages of my passport.

"Mum!" I yelled, running around the island in the kitchen that she stood behind and grabbed the scissors from her, but it was too late. My passport image was sliced in two and I could see the thin stripes of metal that ran through the page. "Mum." I sighed as I fell to the floor. This is what she was like usually when she was on the booze, irrational and out of control.

I felt my eyes fill with tears and looked down, running my fingers across the broken image of my face. Suddenly I heard her gasp. "Lilith, I am so sorry... I don't know what came over me." she reached out to grab my shoulder. But I flinched away and got to my feet, storming back through to the living room. "Lilith please I'm so sorry." she begged.

"Just leave it mum. It's done, you lost your s**t again and it is me that has to pay for it." I hiss at her as whirl and get right in her face.

She looks ready to cry herself as her eyes become misty. "I just wanted you to stay."

"But it should have been my choice."

"I know." Anna said as the first tear trickles down her face. "Please don't leave me."

I feel so much anger and pain and resentment towards this one woman, the one woman who is meant to always be there for me, but I was always there for her instead. I yelled at the top of my lungs, feeling the burn in my throat as I throw the destroyed passport across the room and let a few of my own tears fall. Breathing heavily, I quickly pulled myself back together. "Fine." I sigh. "I'll stay."

I felt my mum wrap her arms around me from behind as I leaned slightly into the most loving touch I had had in a long time and let her guide me back to the dining room, where Marcus and Lucas were already sat. I retook my seat and my mum took hers. "I am sorry you two had to see me like that, I guess I have a long way to go to truly beat my demons." she said as she bowed her head.

"We all do." Marcus said, reaching out and taking her hand. I feel my mum relax beside me that she has not just f****d up everything. "You know that rules now that you are staying Lilith. You will do as I say or you will be punished by Lucas." I just nod, feeling exhausted and defeated. "I prefer verbal communication in this house."

I give him a withering glare for pushing me right now. "Yes Marcus, I understand." I said in a childish voice.

"Now you will refer to your mother as mum, mummy or mother and never by Anna again."

"Yes Marcus." I grit out, feeling like I am still in the edge of actually loosing my s**t.

"And I will be father, dad or daddy." he continued.

"But your not my dad." I said, grinding my teeth.

"I will be soon enough."

"What does Lucas call you?" I asked, nodding towards where Lucas sat watching everything like a f*****g sitcom.

"Dad, father, sir." Lucas shrugged.

"Can't I call you sir then?" I asked.

"Was that on the list?" Marcus asked firmly.

"But..."

"Was it on the list? Yes or no?"

I clenched my hand under the table, letting the sting on my nails pushing into my palm help me keep control. "No... Dad." I gritted out.

"Good, now, there will be no swearing, no parties, and no boyfriends without my approval." I rolled my eyes. "I mean it Lilith."

"Do you preapprove all your sons girlfriends too?" I quipped.

"Yes, which is why he lives in this house. I worked hard to set up my company and I will not let it fall in to ruin because of a scandal." I smirk at that, making Lucas finally stare daggers back at me instead of looking like Lord muck. "And he is your brother so you should be nice to him."

"He is not my brother." I laugh. "Calling mum 'mum', fair enough, calling you 'dad' I can just about not throw up in my mouth, but I will not be calling Lucas my brother." Lucas smiled and stood up, walked around the tables and held out his hand to me. "What?"