Page 2 of Filthy Rich Ex's Brothers

Alex’s smile is infectious, and I’m smiling too, laughing as he noses against me, hands sliding down to my waist. Then we’re kissing against the wall, breath and touch and his chest against mine.

I register the exact moment his tone shifts from affection to desire, his exhalations coming harder, his hands tightening on my hips. My muscles tense, my body sending up walls and blocking him out before he has a chance to get close.

“Sorry,” I breathe, pushing him back and looking into his eyes. “I have that thing. Senior photos.”

Groaning, he drops his forehead against my shoulder. His hands are still anchored on my hips, squeezing, pulsing steadily like a caged animal. “Skip it,” he mutters, voice low, only half-joking.

I laugh through the twinge of annoyance. Alex is always asking me to abandon sessions, drop weddings when they interfere with his weekend plans. But even with him paying two-thirds of the rent for this place, and even with my newest, high-paying client, I still feel the squeeze at the end of the month.

Remember that it’s you both against the problem, I hear the counselor saying, her gravelly voice low and even.Affection can go a long way toward softening a moment. Remember what you love about each other.

“I wish,” I murmur back, pressing a chaste kiss against his mouth before untangling myself from him. When I’m a few steps away, I turn, catch his disappointed expression, and shoot him a bold smile fueled by guilt. “You’ll be here when I get back, right?”

His eyebrows stay low, but his mouth curls, softening the expression. We hover like that for a lingering moment, caught between rejection and happiness, then his brow lifts. “Depends. What do you have in mind?”

Chapter 2

Serena

“…just take thefreakingUber, Ser.”

“I’d rather save the twenty bucks,” I mutter, even as the first drops of rain hit my arms. I walk down the street in the vibrant, wealthy neighborhood in which Alex and I currently live. It’s like a beautiful screensaver, all pruned rose bushes and cobblestone driveways. The kind of place I would have dreamed about living when I was a kid, getting shuffled around from home to home.

Sometimes they were nice, suburban houses like this. Sometimes they were trailers, farmhouses. Sometimes the nice houses had bad people, and sometimes the other way around.

Usually, I love doing photoshoots in May, especially with the lilacs blooming, but today I spent a lot of time thinking about that townhouse. I was a little distracted as I repositioned the gangly teen, and assured the grad’s mother I could definitely replace the gray lid of a sky with blue and puffy clouds.

“I do not understand you,” Bianca mutters on the other end of the line, pulling me from my thoughts. “It’s not worth twenty bucks to stay dry?”

Just from the shifting in the background, I can picture where she is—sitting on her dusty rose duvet, leaning against the wallplastered with Polaroids and magazine clippings. Her room is small, but mine was the smallest in our house.

Well, notmyhouse anymore. When I met Alex, I was living in a gorgeous old Victorian with what felt like a dozen roommates. Sometimes, like now, I still feel a pang of jealousy for what I left behind. Especially when I can practically smell whatever Lillie is cooking right now through the line.

“It’s twenty bucksplustip. Besides, I’ll make it home just before the rain really starts coming down,” I say, my voice sounding far more confident than it should. The sky above me has darkened from a placid, flat gray to something heavier, darker. Clouds pregnant with the promise of a storm.

“Is that your last grad shoot? Like, of the season?”

“Yes.”

Bianca hesitates, “…well, did you have any ideas for a new project? We could take the train to Coney Island like we did that one time.” When I say nothing, just listen to thethump, thumpof my feet against the sidewalk, Bianca goes on, “I know you hate it when I push but you’realways working,Ser.”

“I have my whole life in front of me,” I say, catching myself thinking about that townhouse again. My whole life is ahead of me, but it won’t take place in Gramercy Park. Instead, it will be in some polished chrome box outside the city with tall, shining gates and a perfectly manicured lawn. “After Alex and I settle on a place, I’ll think about doing another project. But right now, I’m just trying to… pull my weight.”

Bianca is quiet again. We’ve been friends since college, but the whole “rich-girl, poor-girl” thing has always been a quiet, persistent barrier between us. She grew up like Alex—beautiful homes and so many expensive vacations. I didn’t know her back then, but I visited her house once when we were in college.

Thinking back, I could picture it. Could hear the swift zip of a school uniform’s skirt, feel the pad of freshly vacuumed carpetunder her feet, see the glow of her MacBook Pro as she did homework, clicking and typing. The gentle knock on the door from her mom, bringing her a plate of carrot chips and organic vegetable dip.

Needless to say, my childhood was nothing like that.

“But you shouldn’thaveto pull your weight.”

I sigh. This is another conversation Bianca and I have had at length, and another perspective of mine that she just doesn’t understand. “Alex isloaded. The kind of money he has? From his dad? There’s like, no reason why you should have to contribute at all.”

From the moment I mentioned Alex’s last name, Bianca has acted a little like a fangirl.Are you talking abouttheOakleys? Like Stephen Oakley? Seriously, Serena, how do you not recognize that name? Can you set me up with one of his brothers?

“Gee, thanks, Bianca, I should throw away my dreams, just resign myself to the life of a little housewife and?—”

“—no, I didn’t say that.” A pause, then, “He can afford a housekeeper, too. What’s the point in being with someone rich just to keep living like you did before?”