Paid to Leave: Escaping My Stepbrother

My stepbrother hated me. But I always clung to him. He paid me twenty thousand dollars to stop walking home with him. He paid me two hundred thousand to transfer out of his class.

Except every single time, I found my way back to him. After high school graduation, he wired a massive sum into my account. His voice was ice. "Five million. Go study abroad.

Never show your face in my house again." My eyes turned red. I lowered my head. "Okay." Jackpot. He finally fell for it.

Chapter 1 I walked in on Cole almost kissing Melody, the scholarship student. Inside the dimly lit VIP booth. He leaned back against the corner sofa with his eyes closed.

The girl in the white dress stood over him. She planted her hands on either side of his hips, hesitating before leaning down to close the distance. I pushed the door open.

She jumped, spinning around to face me in sheer panic. Her eyes were wide and glossy.

A deer in headlights. "Kendall, I—" I walked right past her and straight toward Cole. "The driver is here.

Your dad told me to take you home with me on the way." He snatched his jacket from the cushion, slung it over his shoulder, and followed me out.

The club hallway was empty this late at night. He pulled the door shut but did not walk away.

He leaned against the heavy wood, practically boneless. "She was about to kiss me." I said nothing. Irritation bled into his tone. "She is timid.

It took a lot of courage for her to even try." I unlocked my phone and showed him the time and his dad's texts, explaining softly. "Your dad really did tell me to get you." He barely glanced at it. "Oh.

I am legally an adult.

High school is over." "He cannot control me anymore, so running to him will not work." The neon strobe lights swept over his face, catching the heavy flush high on his cheekbones.

He was wasted. I gripped the edge of my sleeve, shrinking my voice to a whisper. "But—" He cut me off. "Go home by yourself.

And one more thing." His thumbs flew across his phone screen. "Here is five million. Go study abroad." "Never show your face in my house again. I never want to see you again.

I really hate you, Kendall." He never wanted to see me again. Tears instantly pricked my eyes.

I dropped my chin to my chest, biting back a sob. "Okay." Cole shoved his way back into the booth and slammed the door shut behind him.

I pulled up my banking app and counted the zeros. I dropped into a crouch, slapped a hand over my mouth, and let out a muffled shriek of pure joy. Jackpot. He finally fell for it.

Cole had despised me for years. He thought my mother and I were just gold diggers after his family money. Well, he was a smart guy.

When I was fourteen, he dumped two live lizards in my bed to scare me out of the house. The sight terrified me into tears.

His dad felt so bad he transferred a massive allowance into my account. The second I saw the money, my tears dried up.

When I was sixteen, his dad enrolled us in the same prep school. He refused to share a classroom with me. He also wanted to avoid his dad grounding him and paying me off again.

So he skipped the middleman. "Two hundred grand. Transfer out of this class." Freshman year, I transferred out. Sophomore year, I transferred right back in.

He never specified a time limit. The day I walked back into homeroom with my backpack, Cole looked like he wanted to murder someone.

The guy sitting in front of him just smirked. "Your sister is pretty damn persistent, Coley." Chapter 2 Cole's voice was ice. "She is not my sister." A chorus of knowing, suggestive laughs echoed through the room.

Cole shot me a dark look, his brows snapping together. "What exactly will it take for you to disappear from my sight?" I let my eyes well up with fake tears. "Do you really hate me that much?" He flashed a number with his fingers.

I bit my lip, playing the part perfectly. "My mistake. Walked into the wrong homeroom today." I had just discovered a brilliant business model. Cole was stupidly rich.

His absentee mother overseas had already paved his entire future with gold. He played golf. I acted as his personal cheerleader, holding his water bottle and jacket by the green.

He marched over, demanding to know why I was there. I tilted my head up, putting stars in my eyes. "I just admire my big brother.

Is that a crime?" His thumbs flew across his phone screen, wiring me cash. "Go shopping if you are that bored. Stop annoying me." Don't mind if I do.

I clung to Cole like a parasite for over a year. Everyone knew about his annoying stepsister. They even cracked jokes, asking when we were going to end up in a taboo romance novel.

Eventually, Cole could not even be bothered to explain. He just threw money at me to get lost. But I was never walking away from my personal ATM.

The night of his eighteenth birthday bash, he got wrecked.

When he stumbled home from the hotel, I had my arm wrapped around his waist, balancing a glass of water and Advil in my free hand.

I was praying his blurred vision would make him accidentally add an extra zero to my next payout.

He squinted, looking down at me through halflidded eyes, and said suddenly, "Kendall. You are truly manipulative. So calculating." The sarcasm dripped from every syllable.

My foot stalled on the edge of the stair. Verbal abuse costs extra, buddy. Without warning, his hand snapped out, gripping my hip with bruising force.

He slapped the hall light switch off. He shoved me back against the wroughtiron banister of the spiral staircase and crashed his mouth down on mine.

The world plunged into pitch black. Shock paralyzed me for a split second before I shoved him hard in the chest.

The glass shattered against the hardwood, the ice cubes clattering down the dark steps. "Kenny, what happened down there?" His dad's voice drifted down from the secondfloor landing.

I swallowed the violent tremor in my throat. I slipped right back into my usual helpless victim routine. "Coley is drunk and throwing a tantrum.

He knocked the glass right out of my hand." Cole hung his head, leaning heavily against the banister. He let the darkness swallow him, not saying a single word.

A heavy sigh echoed from above. "He gets crazy when he drinks. Ignore him, honey." "Go back to your room.

I will carry him up." I bolted up the stairs and locked myself in my bedroom. Three in the morning. My phone vibrated with a text from Cole. [I am sorry.] [It was too dark.

I thought you were someone else.] His very first apology to me. It felt like a slap to the face. A massive cash transfer notification popped up right beneath the texts.

My chest tightened, a sour taste coating the back of my tongue. I did not accept the money. I did not text back. It took me a while to figure out who that "someone else" was.

One of his many desperate admirers. Melody, the straightA scholarship student. She was cripplingly insecure and timid, only ever daring to stare at him from a safe distance.

Of course, Cole noticed her. I once overheard him talking about her. "She always looks so damn pathetic. Just like Kendall.

Who exactly is she trying to manipulate with that act?" He despised my victim routine. Yet, he was completely captivated by Melody's.

After school, I sat in the back of the town car, waiting for him. He finally walked out of the double doors, a girl in a faded prep school uniform trailing closely behind him.

The heavy car door swung open. He did not get in. He just stood there, casually gripping the strap of her backpack.

He arched an arrogant brow at me. "Get out." I froze, blinking at him. Melody nervously reached out, her fingers lightly tugging at his sleeve.

Her voice was painfully soft. "It is okay, Coley. I can take the bus." Cole did not budge.

His tone dropped, turning dangerously cold. "I am driving her home." "I just wired you the cash. Call an Uber." I stared at the fresh transfer notification on my screen.

Could you not have wired a little more so I could just buy my own car to drive home? Chapter 3 Whatever. Quit while I am ahead.

I gave a humiliated little nod, biting my lower lip as my fingers tightened around my backpack straps. I obediently slipped out of the car. The twilight crowds had thinned out.

I stood alone on the curb, staring down at the tips of my shoes. Tears spilled over my lashes, dropping one by one. I waited until the taillights vanished in the opposite direction.

Then I wiped my face completely dry and opened the text from Cole. Twenty thousand? Thank god I did not check my phone in front of him.

I never would have been able to squeeze out those tears. Cole's five million came a little too late. I had not prepped for the international entrance exams at all.

I had to cancel all my summer trips and parties, locking myself in my room to grind through vocabulary flashcards.

Cole was throwing a massive rager downstairs with his fratboy friends. The bass rattled my floorboards.

I yanked off my noisecanceling headphones and marched downstairs. "Could you turn it down a little?" One of Cole's friends patted the empty spot on the sofa next to him, flashing a grin. "Kenny, you are home.

Why don't you come hang out?" I gave a shy, embarrassed little smile. "I am upstairs memorizing vocabulary." "Memorizing vocabulary?" Someone finally killed the music, turning to actually listen to me. "I thought tryhards like that only existed on TikTok." "Melody is here hanging out.

You should join us." Cole did not even bother to look up. Melody sat right beside him, offering me a sickeningly sweet, gentle smile.

Then she hesitated, putting on a perfect show of concern. "Kenny, you are not planning to take a gap year to retake your exams, are you?" I barely knew the girl.

Using my nickname with that level of fake intimacy meant she and Cole were definitely a done deal. She kept going. "It is okay if you tanked your scores. Your stepdad is so rich.

I am sure you have plenty of backdoors into a good school." The room went dead silent as the tension spiked. My voice was perfectly smooth. "You are right. My family is loaded.

It really does not matter what I score." "Are you worried about tanking yours, Mel?" The color drained entirely from her face.

Cole finally lifted his head, his hand dropping to pat her knuckles in silent comfort. "Kendall. Do not cross the line." I nodded. "Okay. I am going back up to study.

Keep the volume down." I slid my headphones back over my ears and headed up the stairs. The weight of their stares burned into my spine.

Melody was at the house again on the day the exam scores were released. This time, her excuse was that her dinosaur of a laptop had crashed.

Even though we both knew the board emailed the results straight to our phones, Cole indulged her anyway, bringing her over.

Around three in the afternoon, muffled sobs drifted out of Cole's study. I could not tell if it was total devastation or tears of joy.

The email broke down the sections but did not give the total. Cole was punching the numbers into a calculator for her, one by one.

I walked past his study on my way out to a tutoring session. The door was cracked open.

He leaned against the bookshelf, reading the final number aloud. "Six seventytwo." Just loud enough for me to hear. He knew I was walking by.

He did not look up. "And you?" Melody looked confused. "What?" I was downstairs sliding into my shoes.

I tossed the answer casually over my shoulder. "Six eighty." I had completely outperformed myself. I had been waiting all day for him to ask.

Something abruptly hit the floorboards with a sharp clatter. "My dad wants you to apply to Yale." That night, Cole stood right outside my bedroom door.

His dad was a traditional guy. He cared about prestige and believed sending his kids to Ivy League schools was the ultimate flex.

I kept my hand on the doorknob, ready to shut him out. "But you told me to go study abroad." "…" Cole went totally silent for a moment, and then he let out a low laugh.

Chapter 4 "So obedient all of a sudden?" I already secured the bag. How could I not be? Though, to be fair, in the past I only ever halflistened.

He would tell me to get lost, I would get lost for an hour, and then I would wander right back. But this time, I actually felt a little guilty. Five million dollars.

I swore on my life to take the money and vanish. My mom and I could even sit at a separate table for family Thanksgiving.

He said, "So you are just going to ignore my dad?" I was a master at playing the good girl at home.

I ducked my head, biting my lip and nervously pinching the hem of my skirt like a total saint. He demanded, "Give me your Common App password.

I will fill out the applications for you." I murmured weakly, "Please do not exile me to a community college in the middle of nowhere." Cole let out a low, breathy laugh. "You know I wouldn't." I did not know that.

And I did not care. I was taking an offer abroad. Just to be safe. Cole applied early decision to Yale for Agricultural Sciences. He put Melody down for Mechanical Engineering.

His absentee mom had endless money and connections; he just needed the Ivy League title, he did not care about the major.

As for my application portal, he filled out eighty different choices, all for schools within a tenmile radius of Yale. I had to log in and withdraw them, one by one.

He and Melody both got accepted. He clearly did not give a single damn about how Melody was going to survive an engineering workload. His dad was thrilled.

He booked a luxury country club to throw Cole a massive graduation dinner. At the dinner table, he popped open a bottle of vintage wine and clinked glasses with my mom.

Cole strolled down the stairs, dropping the question with practiced nonchalance. "Is Kendall sharing the party with me?" We had shared a joint graduation party back in middle school.

His dad chuckled. "Kenny is holding off on her party for now.

She is heading abroad." "She already withdrew all her domestic applications so she wouldn't mess up the admissions curve for anyone else.

We will throw hers next year." The faint, arrogant smirk playing on Cole's lips instantly vanished