Broken Read online

  “Let me out of this,” she begged him, but Blake didn’t seem to hear her.

  He went over to his jacket and pulled out what appeared to be a checkbook. He wrote something furiously and went over to the door, not even bothering to put on a shirt or to button up his pants.

  Opening the door, he blocked any view into the room. And Blake had to be a fearsome sight, because the man on the other side of the door took a quick step back. All Jewell could see were his feet through Blake’s firmly planted legs.

  “What in the hell do you think you’re doing?” the man said, but his words weren’t quite as loud as they had been while the door was closed. “This is private property,” he said for the second time.

  “This is my boat now. Get the hell off my property,” Blake growled as he lifted the check he’d just written and slammed it against the stunned man’s chest.

  “I…what?” the man gasped.

  “Call your boss.” Without another word, Blake shut the door with a final click and bolted the lock, then turned and shot Jewell a look with so much heat that she wasn’t sure how she didn’t melt against the still-made bed.

  “We won’t be interrupted again,” he said as he stalked back toward her.

  “What if he doesn’t want to sell his boat?” Jewell questioned.

  “I told you I know the seller. I gave him more than he was asking. The boat is now mine.”

  “You can’t just buy a boat without paperwork,” she pointed out.

  “I can.”

  Jewell was stunned.

  “Where were we?” Blake said, hunger burning in his gaze.

  “I’m not in the mood anymore,” Jewell said; she was still in shock over the events of the past few minutes.

  “Don’t worry. I’ll get you there.”

  With those words he undid the rest of the buttons on his pants, and let them fall to the floor. Apparently the interruption had done nothing to put a damper on his excitement — he sprang free, thick, long and hard, and Jewell felt a rush of liquid heat coat her quivering core.

  She couldn’t tear her gaze away from Blake as he walked back to the bed and stared down at her. Then, when he sat down, his erection so close to her face, she tried not to be affected, but it was impossible.

  “Taste me, Jewell,” he ordered her, and her throat tightened.

  She wanted to taste him, wanted to feel his pleasure on her tongue.

  He shifted his body and pulled her back up so she was on her knees, her mouth only inches from his gleaming shaft. When he brought her to his arousal, she didn’t hesitate; she opened her lips to take him inside the recesses of her mouth.

  “Yes, Jewell, just like that.” He guided her head slowly up and down his pulsing thickness. She sucked his velvet skin and smiled around his manhood when she tasted the tang of his pleasure.

  He supported her head with one hand so she didn’t fall against him, while he reached around her throat with the other hand and let it glide downward until he was fondling her breast. He rubbed his palm against her aching nipple, then pinched it, making her cry out even as she sucked on him, and she took him deeper into her throat.

  “Enough,” he groaned, lifting her head. The sight of him wet with her saliva made her core throb.

  “Please,” she groaned.

  “I thought you wouldn’t beg.”

  She tensed at his words, irritated with herself for doing exactly what she’d said she wouldn’t do. Well, she wouldn’t do it again, no matter how much she wanted him buried deep inside her.

  He looked at the stubbornness in her face and chuckled. “Ah, Jewell, you’ll never win in a game of wills with me,” he said, and she suspected that he was right.

  But she said nothing. She wasn’t willing to give him the satisfaction.

  Then he moved off the bed and left her on her knees, with her ass arched in the air and her hands still trapped behind her back. The lights went out. She waited for his touch, but nothing happened, and she writhed on the bed, her core tight and needy, her breasts aching acutely as they rubbed against the blankets.

  He was going to make her speak. She knew exactly what he was doing, and she held out for as long as she could before a frustrated sigh escaped her tightened throat.

  “Okay, please touch me. Please, Blake.” She knew that she was caving to his demands, but she also knew that it was a loss of dignity she could live with.

  “Mmm, my pleasure,” he murmured, before he pulled her backward, leaving her feet hanging off the bed, his hot breath suddenly on the sensitive flesh of her backside. His tongue flicked out and ran down one butt cheek and up the other before he spread her legs wide open and licked the outer lips of her pulsing core.

  “More,” she practically sobbed. The sensation of his rough tongue and hot breath was almost more than she could bear.

  “Arch your back,” he commanded her as he continued licking her most sensitive areas, and sucked the swollen bud of her womanhood into his mouth, making her cry out over and over again.

  Just as she reached the edge of glory, he stopped.

  “Please, Blake, don’t stop now,” she begged him, but to no avail. A sob ripped through her when she felt the bed shift, felt him draw his mouth away from where she needed it most.

  “It’s not yet time for you to be rewarded,” he told her as he spread her thighs even wider and fit himself between them. The tip of his hardness was pressed to the outside of her core, and she wriggled in his grasp, trying to force him to enter her.

  With a groan, Blake finally pushed forward and did as Jewell had bid him, sinking himself deep inside her with one powerful thrust that took her breath fully away.

  He pulled back slowly and then thrust forward over and over again, not fast enough to allow her to come, but at a pace designed to keep her on the edge of the cliff. She pleaded with him to release the mass of tension that continued to build higher and higher within her, but he kept her hanging for what seemed like hours.

  When she thought she couldn’t stand it for another second, she felt him undo the knot on the belt that bound her hands, and then he was lying her down on her stomach. Still buried deep inside her, he lifted her hands and began massaging her numbed arms. She hadn’t even realized they’d gone numb, she was so focused on the pleasure toward which he was leading her.

  When he was finished massaging her, he withdrew from her body, making her cry out in protest, but then she was being flipped over and he was poised above her. He moved them both to the top of the bed, her head hitting the pillows.

  He reached over and switched on the bedside lamp, then looked down at her, his eyes wild with passion. “I need to see the pleasure on your face when I make you come,” he said, and he plunged back inside her.

  Blake held nothing back any longer. He continued thrusting rapidly in and out, his face a figure of ecstasy, and she lost focus as her body released all the pressure that it had built up over the last couple of hours. In the throes of an orgasm more intense than anything she’d ever felt before, she didn’t even try to hold back her scream.

  She was barely maintaining consciousness when she heard his thundering groan and felt the pulsing of his manhood as he emptied himself into her, coating her slick walls with his passion.

  Silence engulfed them as he pulled her against his chest and held her tightly. When her heart’s erratic beat finally settled down, she nearly didn’t hear his whispered words.

  “It will only get better, Jewell. We’re meant to be together.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  When she emerged from sleep a few hours later, Jewell felt completely disoriented. Where in heaven’s name was she? These sheets and these covers didn’t feel like hers. Her adrenaline spiked, but then she felt Blake’s body next to hers, felt his arm wrapped around her back, and felt his heartbeat beneath her hand.

  Her eyes still closed, she savored the moment, fully letting her guard down as she enjoyed the comfort of being held. If only she could admit to Blake how much she n
eeded this moment.

  The sex had been wonderful — unbelievable, in fact — but this right now, right here was what she needed more than anything else. She needed to feel comforted by another person. By Blake. She shouldn’t feel anything at all toward him, but her heart had made its choice.

  Yes, he was demanding, and yes, he made no promises to her, but how could she not feel emotion toward this man who had changed her world so dramatically? Would it really be so bad to take his name, if that was even what he still wanted?

  It would indeed be bad, because she had no doubt that if she spent too much time in this man’s presence, she was going to fall in love with him, and that was something she couldn’t afford to do. She was already too dependent on him.

  When he disappeared for days — for more than half of the time, in fact, since he reappeared in her life — she’d felt unmotivated, almost listless. What would it be like if she were with him for months, or even years, and then he decided to toss her aside?

  Could she be with him without giving him her whole heart? She doubted it. But what other choice did she have at this point? That was the fundamental question she needed to answer.

  “Are you hungry?”

  Jewell was jolted by the sound of Blake’s voice, but she didn’t know what to say, so she said nothing. Damn. Holding her tongue was becoming such a habit with her.

  “Are you in a sex coma, Jewell?” he asked with a laugh as he turned her so she was now facing him.

  She was afraid to open her eyes. Maybe if she stayed as she was for a little while longer, there wouldn’t be any stress, no worries, nothing to upset the moment. She needed just a few more moments of no worry, to just accept the comfort of being in his arms.

  “Ve haf vays, Fräulein Heston, of makink you talk,” he said in an accent she’d never heard him use before. Was he actually joking around with her?

  “I…uh…I’m awake,” she finally said, letting her eyes slowly drift open.

  “I think I’ll enjoy this boat,” he told her as he rubbed his hands up and down her back.

  “I can’t believe anyone would pay so much just to have sex,” she blurted out, and then felt her cheeks turning red. Not only had he paid millions for his new boat so they could complete what they had started, but he’d also already paid a heck of a lot for her.

  His mood lost its lightness. “Don’t think about it, Jewell. Don’t analyze it.”

  “How can I not? What in the world are we doing? Why would you want to help me? I just don’t understand any of this.” She’d laid out her vulnerability for him to see if only he cared to look.

  “I explained it very well. You need help with your brother, and I need a wife for this business deal, so we’re helping each other.”

  “You’re are always so calm and determined. How can you make marriage a business deal?”

  “Life is a business deal, so marriage can’t be any different,” he said, his voice firm.

  “I don’t feel like I have any other option, and that makes me almost despise you, you know.”

  He paused, his hands stilling on her naked skin, his face losing all expression and retreating behind the mask she was most familiar with.

  “I don’t need your love, Jewell.”

  This he had said before, but it still hurt. Even if she was saying things intending to wound him too, it still hurt.

  “You just want my body, Blake.”

  “Yes.” He didn’t elaborate. Even though she hadn’t asked him a question, he still answered.

  “Don’t forget that my little brother comes along with me, Blake.”

  “I like kids.”

  “Have you ever even been around them?”

  “I was a child once.”

  Jewell had a hard time believing that. It seemed more likely that he’d sprung from the womb full-grown. Okay, that was a bit ridiculous, but she couldn’t imagine Blake smiling with dirt smeared on his cheeks, or running around playing cops and robbers. Yes, he worked on construction sites even now, but that was different than making mud pies or building forts.

  “I don’t think you know how to be carefree and go with the flow,” she told him. “I don’t think you even knew how to play games when you were a child. You’re too hard, too set in your ways. You won’t be good with Justin. You’ll realize this eventually and then I’m the one who will pay the price.”

  He was quiet for so long that she figured her words had finally gotten through to him and he was deciding to break things off with her. Why did that cause such a pang inside her chest?

  “Once I decide on a course of action, I don’t change my mind, Jewell. I’m not letting you go, so don’t waste your time thinking about it.”

  With that, he unwrapped his hands from her and stood up. Though she was exasperated with the man, she couldn’t help but look at the magnificence of his naked behind, and she almost groaned when he pulled up his pants, covering up the prime view.

  “I don’t think we’re ever going to agree on this,” she said when he turned back toward her.

  “It doesn’t matter what you want, Jewell. It’s about what I want.”

  With that, he walked from the room. She gazed at his retreating form and sighed. What was worse than anything else at this moment was that she knew he was right.

  It didn’t matter at all what she wanted.

  Chapter Nineteen

  I’m glad you decided to come, Jewell.”

  Jewell looked at McKenzie Beaumont and attempted a smile. “I honestly don’t know why I did. I guess if you call, I come,” she replied softly. Jewell actually liked McKenzie. She had discovered in the months she’d gotten to know her employer that the woman wasn’t nearly as hardened as Jewell had originally thought.

  “You came because, for some strange reason, the two of us have made a connection. Anyway, I have a surprise for you,” McKenzie said, and Jewell witnessed something she had never witnessed before with this woman — a sparkle in her eyes and an actual smile.

  “Okay, you have me very curious now,” Jewell replied.

  “Come on in first and sit down.” McKenzie ushered Jewell into the living room, done in beiges and reds. Jewell remembered McKenzie telling her once how a persons color choice could tell a lot about them. Was McKenzie looking for both peace in the beige and boldness in the red? Jewell didn’t know. “I was able to arrange a visit with your brother. I told you I wanted to help you, and that’s exactly what I’m trying to do,” McKenzie told her.

  “How?” Jewell exclaimed. Was this a joke?

  “I have connections,” McKenzie answered simply.

  “But I’ve been getting the runaround for ages.”

  “Do you really want to talk about how it happened, or do you want to just be happy it happened?” McKenzie asked her.

  “You’re right. Where is he?” Jewell looked around.

  “He should be here any minute,” McKenzie told her, and Jewell’s stomach knotted in anticipation. She was so afraid that Justin had thought she hadn’t been trying to keep her promise to him.

  “ Thank you, Ms. Beaumont…”

  McKenzie broke in. “That’s the last time I want to hear you say ‘Ms. Beaumont.’ I’m McKenzie, and don’t you forget that!”

  “Then thank you, McKenzie. This means more to me than anything anyone has ever done for me,” Jewell said, with a sheen of tears reflecting off her eyes. “I won’t question you about who you had to bribe.”

  The look on McKenzie’s face told Jewell that the woman might have actually done that, but the least Jewell knew the better.

  “I told you that I have connections. Once I give my word, I keep it. That’s all you need to know.”

  “I can live with that,” Jewell said.

  The two women had been sitting there for less than ten minutes when the doorbell rang and Jewell’s stomach tightened once more.

  “Sissy!” The excited cry rent the air, and Jewell’s eyes instantly filled with tears as her little brother came barreling
toward her.

  “Ah, Bubby, it’s so good to see you! I’m so sorry I haven’t been able to keep my word,” Jewell exclaimed a millisecond before he launched himself into her arms.

  “I’ve missed you,” he said with a sniffle, and he held on tight.

  “And I’ve missed you so much. Oh, Justin, I am so, so sorry,” she said again. How could she explain this all to her beloved little brother?

  “It’s okay. I just want to come home with you, though,” he begged, leaning back and making her tears fall.

  “I’m doing all I can to make that happen.” She paused and decided to change the subject before she found herself making him more promises that she wasn’t sure she could keep. “Oh my goodness, you’ve grown a foot since I’ve seen you last!”

  “I’ve been doing what you said, Jewell, and eating my vegetables and being good. I want to live with you so much.”

  The boy clutched at his sister even more tightly. Nothing had ever felt so good for either of them.

  “I’m working on it, Justin,” she said. When he grunted, she loosened her own grip around him. “I love you so much.”

  “I love you too, Sissy. McKenzie has been visiting with me, and she told me that you are doing everything you can so we can be together.”

  Shocked, Jewell whipped her head around to where McKenzie was standing. The woman looked away, but Jewell had seen her cheeks color. It was as if McKenzie didn’t want anyone to know that she had human kindness within her heart.

  But wait. How had McKenzie been able to visit with Justin when Jewell couldn’t? Jewell didn’t know whether to feel anger over that, or relief because Justin hadn’t been abandoned utterly. What was wrong with the court system!

  “You’ve been going to see my brother?” Jewell asked as Justin released his hold on her and spotted the cookies McKenzie had been setting out.

  “You weren’t able to, and I know what he means to you,” McKenzie said with a sadness in her voice that hinted at an untold story from her past.

  “I appreciate it, McKenzie, more than I can say,” Jewell told her, and she struggled with tears. Her happiness over such kindness to Justin won out over her ridiculous jealousy.