Unbreak Me (3 page)

I hoist myself over the gate and feel greedy anticipation. Surrounded by lush landscaping and featuring a cascade of water that circulates from hot tub to pool, the space is more water feature than swimming hole. I don’t know Rich Dude, but he has excellent taste, and this little oasis is one of my favorite places on Earth.

I could have headed home after the reception, but I knew I wouldn’t sleep tonight. I told my mom I wanted to stay over, and I waited until everyone was in bed before grabbing a robe and trekking across a couple acres of lush grass for a moonlight swim.

I’m no stranger to insomnia, but it’s been worse since I returned home. In the silence of the night, there’s too much room for my thoughts and they expand until they fill every corner of my mind. While I was away, I could be anyone I wanted to be, but in New Hope, everywhere I turn, someone’s labeling me. When I was young, I was just
one of the Thompson girls,
but now the labels aren’t so innocuous.
Black sheep. College dropout.

Slut.

I drop the terry cloth robe from my shoulders and dive into the water completely nude. Most pools would be intolerably cold in Indiana before June, but the water circulating from the hot tub keeps the temperature comfortable from spring to fall. Even if it was cold, I’d still be here. Exercise is the only thing that calms my mind. Tonight, I’ll swim laps to escape the demons.

Until last year, small-town life was the only life I’d ever known, so I should be used to it, but you can be cut open a hundred times, and the slice of the blade still hurts.

I just never expected Will to be the one holding the knife.

Does he love her? Would he marry my sister out of spite?

Did he tell Krystal the truth about our canceled vows?

I turn and pull my limbs through the water, asking myself the question I’ve been avoiding for weeks.
Can I live here and watch Will and Krystal build a life together?

I count out twenty-five laps. The rhythm of my breathing calms me. The water rushing over my skin salves my wounds. Finally, I rest forearms on the edge of the pool and gulp in air, focusing only on my breath and the water dripping from my face.

“Training for the Olympics?”

I snap my head up in surprise. In the soft glow of the moon, I can make out the bad boy from the reception. He stands in swim trunks three yards from me, a towel draped behind his neck. I was right about the tats. He has some sort of starburst on his left pec, another circling his thick biceps.

“Sneak up on many girls?”

“Only the special ones.” He drops the towel on a chair and dives into the water.

When he surfaces, my heart kicks up a beat. He’s close. I could almost touch him if I reached out.

But even as my eyes tour his broad chest and sculpted shoulders, I back away. “What are you doing here?”

His eyebrow quirks. “I live here.”

I snort. “No you don’t.” Then, when his expression remains stoic, “Shit. Really? You’re Rich Dude?”

“Rich who?” He looks puzzled. And annoyed.

Giggles bubble up and slip past my lips. I’ve always pictured the owner of this property to be some white-haired old man with a cane and a monocle. Asher is so far off the mark, I can’t help my laughter. “Shit. I’m sorry. I just…” I laugh more, and it feels damn good. My muscles are spent from my swim, my mind is calm, and laughing feels like a long-denied decadent treat.

“You haven’t come to swim in a long time,” he says softly.

That cuts my laughter short. “You watch me?” I want to feel violated by the idea. But the thought of
this
man watching me swim nude in his pool zips potent arousal through my veins.

Asher shakes his head, studying me. “My groundskeeper told me a young girl used to sneak in about once a week. I assume that was you?”

“Yeah,” I say softly.

“Why’d you stop?”

“I left town for a while.”

“Looking for something?”

I shake my head. “Running away.”

He nods, as if my answer is perfectly reasonable, and I get the sense that he doesn’t just accept it, he
understands
it. His gaze settles on my mouth. When his eyes drop to the water and my bare breasts, his breath catches, and I feel that rush that comes from being desired, that false sense of worth I’m willing to be fooled by tonight. Suddenly, I want him to kiss me. Touch me. More.

I want to bury my loneliness under the weight of a man’s body on mine, to erase unwelcome memories with his mouth.

This man’s body. This man’s mouth.

“Sorry I had to disappear earlier.” His voice is low, husky as he watches me.

“I’d let you make it up to me,” I murmur, closing the distance between us. I hesitate, but his gaze—hot, hungry, all over me—is all the invitation I need.

“You’ve had a long day,” he says. “You want to talk?”

I drape my arms behind his neck. “Why would you think I want to talk to you at all?”

He grunts. “Because you’re looking at me like a starved woman at a prime rib buffet.”

“Yes,” I murmur. “What does that have to do with talking?”

His eyes are so damn sexy. The kind of eyes you see in magazines, where the man staring at you from the pages seems to invite you to strip bare while promising you’d enjoy it.

“Don’t you want us to get to know each other before you indulge?”

I pretend to consider it. “I’m more about the meal than the conversation.”

“You’re a kid.” If it’s supposed to be an objection it rings weak against the pressure of his hand on my hip.

I trace a rivulet of water down his neck. “I’m twenty-one.” I bring up my knees and wrap my legs around his waist, satisfied when he draws in his breath with a sharp hiss.

“Is this about him?” he asks.

I frown. “Who?”

“The groom at your sister’s wedding? He has some kind of hold on you. I saw it in your eyes. In his.”

“This has nothing to do with William Bailey.”

He looks unconvinced but doesn’t call my bluff. Instead, he brushes his lips over mine. Gentle. Careful. Sweet.

The only thing that can break me tonight is sweet, and I won’t be broken. I bite his full bottom lip and dig my nails into his shoulder blades.

A quick study, he gets my message. His hand tangles into my hair while the other digs into my ass and pulls me against him. The hard length of his cock rests between my legs and lights a hot coil of pulsing energy.

He rubs his tongue against mine and moans. Or maybe that’s me, because I’m pulling him closer. I wrap my arm tighter behind his neck, and I’m practically crawling up him in my efforts to get closer and
closer
still.

I break the kiss and make myself back off. I’m not the kind of girl who loses control. I don’t lose my mind over men and expect to be saved. I don’t want Asher to save me.

His fingertips are at my hip, tracing an invisible path down and under, moving ever closer to that coiled ache between my thighs. His lips part and our breath mingles as I savor the heat of his body against mine, the sweet anticipation of his fingers inching closer to where I want them.

I slide a hand down his bare chest and between our bodies and cup him through his swim trunks. I’m rewarded with another hiss and then his lips, his tongue, his teeth, hot and desperate against my neck, nipping, toying, playing. Electrifying the sensitive skin.

He cups my breast, and this time I know the moan I hear is my own.

“So goddamn sexy.” His thumb flicks across my nipple, a strangled sound escaping his throat.

I graze my fingertips under the waistband of his swim trunks. I want to feel him in my palm. I want that power to whip through me as I wrap my hands around his hot flesh and it pulses thicker, harder.

For a moment, that’s where this is headed. His hands are greedy, all over me, his mouth doing delicious things to my neck.

“You have protection, right?” I ask.

He laughs and stops toying with me, his head leaning against my shoulder. Slowly, he slides his hands to my back. “That’s not exactly something I keep tucked in my swim trunks.”

I’m so aroused it hurts. Asher is stunning. Solid. Delicious. I want to bite into that corded muscle of his neck. Want to explore that smattering of chest hair with my fingers while I drag my mouth down his flat stomach.

But he doesn’t have protection, and that’s a deal breaker.

“In your house?” My breathing’s unsteady, my heart pounding.

He cups my face in one big hand. “Why don’t you run home and get dressed? I’ll take you to breakfast.”

My jaw goes slack. Who the hell is this guy? Who has brakes that good? “Are you serious? I mean, you don’t want to…” Rarely am I at a loss for words.

“Sure, I want to do a lot of things. But sweetheart, you don’t know a damn thing about me.”

“You’re really hung up on that.” I unwrap my legs from around him and run a hand over my eyes.

Just my luck that I’d pick a bad boy who’s all Mr. Sensitivity and wants to
get to know me
.

So be it. That’s a better fit for the New Me plan anyway, right?

“Good. Because, you know, I’m not that kind of girl anyway.” I wait a beat, but God doesn’t strike me dead. “I’ll be back in fifteen minutes?”

His lip twitches.

“What?”

“I’ve just never met a woman who can really get ready in fifteen minutes.”

I hoist myself out of the water. “I’ll bet breakfast on it. If I take longer than fifteen minutes, I’ll cook for you.”

Asher runs his eyes over my body, lingering at all my best parts. “Deal.”

I grab my towel, making no effort to minimize the swish of my hips as I exit through his gate for the first time.

I pad through the dewy grass back to my mother’s house and slip in the back door. I take a quick shower to wash off the chlorine. After a towel-down and some lotion, I slip into jeans and a tank, and pull my wet hair into a ponytail.

When I head toward the door again, my mom is blocking it. Her arms are crossed and worry creases her features. “Is there something you want to tell me?”

That old shame slithers up my spine and I immediately imagine she knows what I’ve been up to tonight. The trespassing. The strange man. The lust.

So many deadly sins, so little time.

“I don’t live here anymore. I don’t need your permission to go to breakfast with a friend.”

She looks at her watch skeptically. “It’s 3 a.m.”

“I’m hungry.”

She shakes her head. “I want you to think about how important that wedding was to your sister. And then I want you to think about how you can make it right.”

My jaw drops. “What?”

She tucks a piece of chestnut hair behind her ear and cocks her head. “We’re a family, Maggie, and we’ll forgive you for your mistakes. But we can’t do that until you own up to them.”

My fists clench until I feel the bite of my nails against my palm. It’s a lecture I’ve heard so many times I could recite it in my sleep. It’s a lecture I deserved more times than I can count. “I didn’t have anything to do with the stink bomb.” The words are hard and gritty, pushed through clenched teeth.

“Maggie—”

I push past her, through the door and into the moonlight, anger and hurt a burning fist in my chest.

When I finally steady myself and make it to Asher’s, he’s waiting for me on his patio, sipping out of a steaming mug.

“You
lose
.”

I tense, still wound up from my confrontation with my mom. “What?”

He smiles and points to his watch. “Twenty-five minutes. You lost the bet.” His smile fades. “Are you okay?”

“Oh, right. Yeah.” I wave a hand. “I’m fine.” I let out a long, slow breath and settle into a chair. The moon shines bright and stars sprinkle across that infinite span of darkness. “I’ve missed this.”

“What? Breakfast? First dates?”

“The stars. The light is constant in the city. Inescapable. I missed seeing the stars,” I say, more to myself than him.

Suddenly his words register and I shift my eyes to him. “And this isn’t a date.”

Asher raises an eyebrow but doesn’t question me. “So you left for a while but now you’re back…for good?”

I wrinkle my nose. “You still insist on playing the get-to-know-you game?”

“Absolutely.” He grins at me and leans forward. “I like hiking, seafood, and long walks on the beach at sunset.”

I can’t help but smile. “You’d think we had a country full of avid hikers,” I say. “Every trail at every national park would be packed if everyone who says they like to hike actually did it.”

“Your turn,” he says. “Tell me something about yourself.”

Is this guy for real?

I steal his mug from his hands and take a long sip of hot, rich coffee.

“I’m waiting.”

I let the heat sink to my belly and relax my shoulders. “Well, I
should
tell you one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“I am
that kind of girl
.”

His laugh is rich and deep and sexy. “Sure you are.”

“You don’t believe me? Ask…oh, anyone in this town.”

Something changes in his eyes. If sadness had a color I’d say I could see it circling his pupils. “I don’t put much stock in the things people say. Anyway, I’d rather hear about you from your lips.”

He can’t possibly know what that single statement means to me. The silence stretches between us as I consider how to abbreviate my life into a series of simple sentences. He doesn’t rush me. Doesn’t seem intimidated by silence like so many people are. That alone makes me want to share myself with him.

“I’m just Maggie.” I fight the urge to say too much. Months trapped in a self-constructed prison of silence have left me hungry for a confidant, but sexy Asher isn’t it. “Black sheep. College dropout. Famished. Painfully turned on.”

He groans, a low, guttural sound that speaks to his own arousal. “Well, I can fix the famished part, but the last will have to wait.”

But I don’t want to wait. I need to…escape. Forget. “I pay my bets.” I wrap my fingers around his biceps. “Let me cook for you.”

“You really cook?”

My eyes flick to the large French doors at the back of his house, but I dismiss the idea, ready to be on my own turf. “Follow me to my place and I’ll show you.”