A Stepbrother With Benefits Christmas Carol is a prequel story to the main Stepbrother With Benefits series and happens before Ethan and Ashley's fateful night together after they both come home from college for summer break.

I thought it'd be fun to explore their relationship before they had an entirely different kind of relationship. I hope you enjoy the teaser! The full story won't be ready in time for Christmas, but I'm enjoying writing it and I'll keep you updated. ^_^

*** INTRODUCTION

My stepbrother walks towards me, naked, glistening, shining and wet, one eyebrow raised, tossing me a smoldering, wicked smirk, all of his hard… hardness… his…

His muscles! Ugh. His hard muscles. Not his hard… I can't even think the word. Wait, he's not hard, is he? No, he wouldn't… what, wait, oh my God what's going on, why am I thinking about, why is he…

Oh, by the way, he has a towel wrapped around his waist. Otherwise, he's naked. Does that count as naked? I don't know if there's a more accurate definition or not, but right now I'm counting it. Ethan's naked. And, in case you were wondering, he's not hard. I checked. Just now. I didn't mean to! I mean, I did mean to, but I didn't mean to for that reason.

Seriously, he's my stepbrother. That's just… ugh.

Wrong? Yes.

Do I want it to be right? Who is even asking these questions. Come on now!

Also, I have a boyfriend! Yup. That's it. I don't have to even answer any of this because I'm dating Jake and he's the sweetest. Or not. That's something else entirely. Let me deal with one thing at a time here.

“Hey, Princess, my eyes are up here,” Ethan says, two fingers pointing straight at me, rising to lure my gaze from his towel-covered region to his eyes.

Region? I blush at the idiotic idea that I can't even use a word that better defines what's going on.

Except what is even going on? I sure don't know. And what's a better word?

Crotch? Sounds kind of weird.

Penis? A little too technical, but probably accurate. Wait, no, I wasn't!

Dick? Ugh. Cock? Ethan is a cocky, arrogant jerk, so that seems like what I should go with. I mean, these are just my thoughts. I'm not saying the word out loud. I can't say things like that. I just can't.

I'm responsible, the good girl with perfect grades, and I'm not about to act like some blithering, lust-addled idiot girl like the ones Ethan is used to sleeping with just because his abs look particularly interesting when they reflect the light from my bedside table lamp when he turns to the side a little and flexes them, just so.

Which, to be honest, I'm pretty sure he's doing on purpose right now. What a jerk. Ugh!

“I wasn't looking at anything!” I shout at him, trying to bring back some semblance of normalcy. “What are you doing in my room? Why are you naked? Stop calling me Princess. I don't like it! It's weird. You're weird.”

“I'm weird? First off, hey, I'm not naked. I've got a towel on. See?” He taps at the fluffy towel hanging loosely from his perfectly sculpted hips. Why does he have those lines, that V shape that lures your eyes lower? I hate him. I hate that he has sexy hip lines.

I hate that I can't even use better words to describe his sexy hip lines than to call them sexy hip lines.

“Second,” he continues, “They're renovating my shower. Fuck. I miss my shower, Princess. You know how nice it is to shower and step out without clothes on and just walk around your room naked, balls out, drying in the fresh air like nature intended? Yeah, it's great. I can't do that at college. Doesn't really work in the dorm showers.”

“Are you an idiot?” I ask him, scrunching my eyebrows and glaring hard at him.

“Look, I get it, Little Miss Perfect. You're smart. Good grades. Whatever. But that's a little harsh even for you. Why? What's up? Is this literally a case of having your panties in a bunch? I've heard about it but never seen it happen. It's cool. You can fix it. I won't judge. That's what brothers are for, right?”

“First, ew. Second, step. Stepbrother. So, no. Third, ew. Fourth, also ew. Fifth, sixth, and seventh, ew.”

“Oh, hey, thanks for reminding me. I had a third thing I wanted to add before,” he says, ignoring literally everything I just said.

“What?” I ask against my better judgement.

“Third,” he says, definitively, like this is some important rule we have to remember, “I like calling you Princess. What's weird about that? What do you want me to call you?”

“Um, Ashley?” I offer. “That works. That's my name.”

“Nah, too on the nose,” he says, tapping his nose and furrowing his brow. “How about… Little Miss Perfect? That sounded good just now.”

“Shut up.”

“Good Girl Goodie Two Shoes?”

“Can you please get out of my room now?”

“Little Miss Perfect Goodie Two Shoes?” he offers. “I combined the first and the second, see? More emphasis. It's a little long, but it gets the point across. Fuck, my English teacher would be so proud right now.”

“I think you underestimate how much it might take to make your English teacher proud,” I tell him. “Also, go. Get out. You're naked. In my room. That's… don't do that, Ethan. Seriously! This isn't funny. Stop laughing!”

“Hey, if you want to touch the goods, just let me know. What are brothers for?” he asks, lifting his arm and flexing his bicep like he's offering it for my approval.

“Stepbrother!” I screech. “I don't want to touch anything. What are you even talking about?”

I say this as I am most definitely touching him, but to my credit it's more to push him out of my room than anything. And he's being the biggest jerk ever by using his height and his strength to push back against me so I'm not getting very far.

“Stop being such a… a…” I start to say, stammering on the word that I really want to say.

“What?” he asks, smirking at me. “Tell me how you really feel, Princess. Then I'll leave, I promise.”

“Stop being–” An asshole. That's what I want to say. But I… I can't. Because. Just because. “A butthole,” I say instead.

“Seriously?” he asks with a sigh, shaking his head. “It's not like I'm going to go running to mom and dad if you call me an asshole, you know? You can do it. It's completely cool.”

“It's not,” I say, holding my ground. “It's a mean thing to say.”

“Yeah, but I'm kind of being an asshole,” he adds. “So I think it's warranted.”

“Well, I wish you'd stop.”

“Being a…?” he coaxes me.

“Ethan, come on? I get that your shower is being redone or whatever, and I wish you'd just waited and asked me, but I guess I wasn't here when you got home and maybe you didn't know when I'd be back, so I understand that part, but… can you please stop being such an asshole?”

I say this in the sweetest, most good girl way possible, and I'm pretty sure I took all the vulgarity out of the word right then. I don't know how. I might be on to something, though. Yay, me!

“Aw, that was cute,” he says, grinning at me. “Let's hug it out. I think we're really making some progress.”

“Progress towards what exactly?” I ask.

“Fuck if I know,” he says. “Family bonding? Just seemed like the right thing to say.”

At which point he spins around a little too quickly and wraps his arms around me in a hug. While still naked. Not too wet, though. Not as much as I would have thought. I'm sort of a cuddler, or I like to be except–let's not talk about Jake right now, please–and, um… so I hug Ethan back.

It's not on purpose, I assure you. It's an instinctive reaction. Honestly, though? Yup, he's pretty easy and nice to hug. I like it more than I will ever tell anyone, ever. Taking this secret to the grave.

Oh, and, um…

“Ethan?” I ask, unsure how to broach this hard subject.

“What's up, Princess?”

“You're… naked, um…”

“Princess, I've got a towel on,” he says, except then we both look down and, nope, there is no towel wrapped around his waist.

Sometime between him spinning around, apparently just before he hugged me, his towel came loose and decided it wanted to fall to our feet instead of staying safely wrapped around his hips.

Which is where the hard subject comes in. It's not too hard. I mean, I don't think it is? I'm not looking! Oh my God. I swear I'm not looking. I mean, I might have accidentally taken a peek. Because I looked down and saw the towel. On the floor. Which isn't where his cock is.

Yup, I'm going with cock. That's the word, people. If I can say asshole, I can say cock.

Not that I want Ethan's cock near my asshole. I didn't say that! What's anal sex like, though? Is this really the time to be thinking things like that, Ashley? I need to stop asking myself questions I never plan on answering.

Or do I?

See! That's one of the questions I need to stop asking myself.

Ugh.

“Hey, so, I like you and all, but we're sort of related, so…”

“We're not even related,” I tell him. “Your dad married my mom. You're my stepbrother.”

“Oh, so this is cool?” he asks, confused. “Uh…”

“Um, no, it is decidedly not cool,” I tell him. “Why are you still hugging me?”

“Why am I hugging you?” he asks. “Why are you hugging me!”

“I'm—” Oh, wait, I am. I stop that immediately. Because! “There! I'm not! Can… can you, um… I'm going to turn around and not look at you now.”

“Cool,” he says. “Thanks. You're great.”

“Can you please stop being naked in my room?” I ask.

“Yeah, sure,” he says, and I hear him swoop down to pick up his towel.

I'm sure he wraps it around his waist, but I still don't turn around. My cheeks are far too red right now and I would probably rather just hibernate for the rest of winter, or die, or I don't even know.

Something.

“You excited for Christmas?” he asks, this time from the hallway outside my bedroom door.

“No, not really,” I say, probably a little too depressing and straightforward.

I mean, everyone's excited for Christmas, right? That's how you're supposed to be.

And I'm… not.

“What? Are you–“

He starts to say more, tries to, but I'm a little too this, and far too much of that to, um… I just need some privacy, alright? I spin around fast, avert my eyes from the rock-hard sculpted muscle and sin that is my stepbrother, and slam my door shut. I lock it after for good measure.

I really wish he hadn't brought up Christmas. I really wish everyone would stop bringing up Christmas.

Look, I get it. It's happening. Christmas is in less than a week and everyone's out buying presents, getting excited about the holidays, doing all of the amazing and wonderful Christmas things that everyone always does every single year.

When they can. Unless they can't. And then they don't. And then they…

They see everyone else doing all of the amazing and wonderful Christmas things that they won't ever be able to do…

That's me. That was my entire life growing up, at least until Ethan's dad married my mom. Which was still most of my entire life since they've only been married a couple years now.

I hate Christmas. I don't like it. I'm sorry, but I just don't.

~*~

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