Bullied By My Alpha Stepbrother novel Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Jasmine's POV

The entire dinner table was tense and even when Hardin ate with us, things were never as silent or as tense as this and I knew the reason. I was sure everyone on this table including Lisa knew the reason why.

It was because Lisa Morales was here.

I wondered how my mother was feeling, seeing the identical twin of Russo's first love and mother of his child sitting across from her beside Hardin, her smile bright and carefree as if she did not have a bother in the world because I knew that it worried me to look at her.

For all intents and purposes, Lily was the template from which Hardin was cast. He might have inherited his father's dark hair but those blue eyes that turned glassy or looked like the sky when they weren't darkening in rage, had come from Lily, his mother. And Lisa had those exact glassy blue eyes.

And that smirk when they raised the side of their mouths or bit their lips were also the same.

I wondered how Hardin was handling seeing someone that looked like his mother but was not in fact his mother.

I guess he was handling it well, considering that it was because he had called her that she had come all the way to stay with us. For how long? We had no idea.

"Oh come on, why is everyone so quiet? No stories to tell? Or is everyone just like this because I'm here? And I don't mean Russo or Hardin. I'm talking to the two of you." She said, looking at my mother and me.

When my mother merely replied with a smile and a shrug, Lisa laughed, throwing her head back like she was in a melodrama before she gently touched Russo's arm.

The action was quick but I caught the way her nails softly ran over Russo's forearm before she picked her glass of wine and took a sip.

My eyes moved away from her to Hardin and I was surprised to see that he didn't have a smirk on his lips or anything lewd to say.

Instead, there was a frown on his lips and he looked like he wanted to be anywhere but here at the dining table.

Well, that made two of us.

"As I was saying, you don't need to be uncomfortable around me. I'm not a stranger. Or am I?" She looked in Russo's direction and he nodded, taking my mother's hand and squeezing gently in a way that told me that this wasn't the first time he had done that.

I saw my mother's mood lighten instantly and was glad that she didn't look so out of place or upset anymore.

"No, you're not a stranger" Russo answered finally and she grinned.

"I mean, when did we meet? It was freshman year high school, wasn't it? Remember when you were dared by me to kiss someone and you kissed Lily? Or when you were asked the kiss, kill or marry question and you said that you would only ever marry Lily? Do you remember that?" Lisa said excitedly as she touched Russo's hand again and I had to fight the urge to be blunt and tell her that I wished she never came.

Especially when everything she had just said made me and my mother feel like outsiders that were intruding in a family that didn't want or belong to us.

"Stop it, Lisa" Russo growled and Lisa raised her hands in mock surrender, feigning a smile.

"Oh, Camila, Jasmine. I didn't mean to hurt you, did I?" Lisa said dramatically, covering her mouth with both hands in faux shock.

My mother shook her head in response. But somehow, Lisa reached out to take my mother's hand

"Don't mind me, dear Cami. It's just that this man and I used to be in the same school with Hardin's mother and they were high school sweethearts..." She trailed off immediately Russo glared at her in annoyance and cleared her throat with a smile that was exaggerated.

My mother on the other hand looked ashen, like she wanted the ground to open and swallow her even though she did nothing wrong.

Lisa's words had made her feel out of place and like she didn't belong. Like she was an outsider. I guessed that this was what Hardin had wanted. Someone with the guts to do what he had been unable to do after all these weeks.