Beautiful Broken (University of Branton) Read online

  "Real winner you got there, Dad," I say, dryly.

  "Cut the shit, Dane," Tripp snaps. "What’s it going to take to get you to come to Aspen?"

  "Nothing. There is absolutely nothing in Aspen that I’m interested in."

  He flushes. "You’d rather be around that little slut and Atticus? You’re better than that—better than them."

  "Mom never thought so," I say evenly. It’s a struggle to hold onto my temper, but I manage—because I’m winning as long as I’m calm. And because the scent of Scout is clinging to my fingers, folded under my chin.

  "Your mother was an idiot."

  My vision goes red, and I’m not actually aware of moving, just know I’m standing suddenly, reaching for him, but she’s there. Her little hands are on my chest, pushing me back, her green eyes warm with concern. "Let’s go," she says, softly. I blink, staring down at her. At the understanding and acceptance and lack of judgment. This is home—her arms and her gaze. Screw my father and his twisted version of familial obligation.

  "Don't you dare leave," Tripp says, his voice tight and furious.

  I smile at him, wrapping an arm around Scout's waist and hugging her tight to me. Looks like I win this round. "You know what, Tripp? I put up with a lot. I let you insult me, my life, and my practice. I let you insult my best friend and my girlfriend. But I won't let you insult Mom." I turn away, leading Scout to the door.

  "Dane, get back here," Dad hisses, furious.

  "Fuck you, Dad," I yell back, and Scout giggles, burying her head in my shoulder as we leave the shocked guests and my father behind.

  Scout

  He doesn't talk much on the way home, but he's here. Present in a way that keeps me grounded and not worried about where the hell his head is. Dinner plays on a loop in my head, the insults and veiled threats, the looks from Tripp—and Dane's fingers in me, teasing and coaxing me to orgasm. It was crazy and intense, and I want to do it again. I blush, and shift. Dane glances at me, a wicked smirk on his lips.

  "What did Heidi want?"

  I blink, trying to focus on the bathroom, when Heidi had accompanied me, despite my need to be alone. "Um. She wanted to let me know the invitation to Aspen included us both. If that's what it'd take to get you to agree, anyway."

  His eyebrows furrow a little, and his grip on the wheel tightens. No matter what he might have said, how he might have left, Dane has to be hurting—leaving his father like that can't be easy. Tripp, for all that he's a disgusting, ambitious old perv, is all Dane has left.

  "Dane," I say softly, "you can go. Spending time with him is a good idea."

  He shoots me a disbelieving look, and I shrug. "He's your dad, D. You don't need to stay because of me."

  Dane snorts and turns away. Turns up the music so it's throbbing through the Viper like a living thing. Clearly, we're done discussing it. I lean back in my seat and stare out the window, at the cars passing us on the highway.

  When we reach Branton, he stops for subs since neither of us actually ate our dinner, then takes us home. I'm gathering my purse and shoes when he opens my door. I glance at him curiously—in the darkness, he's barely visible, just the planes of his face lit by the moonlight. It's somehow ominous. I shiver, but give him my hand and let him draw me out of the car. He closes the door, then pushes me against it, pinning me between the Viper and his large, hard body. I inhale sharply as I feel his erection pressing against me. He dips down, kissing me gently, soft, almost chaste kisses along the line of my neck. "Scout, I need you to understand something."

  I nod, helplessly.

  "I'm not staying here with you because I need to. I'm staying because there is literally no place I would rather be than with you."

  I shudder at the brutal honesty in his voice, and he catches me to him in a spine-bending hug. It's too much too soon. Last night—our first time—seems ages ago, but it was less than twenty-four hours.

  "He's your father," I whisper as he kisses a line up my jaw, licking at my pulse point.

  "Doesn't matter," Dane murmurs. "You’re my family."

  I shiver in the fall air, the cool scent wrapped around me smelling faintly of firewood, and Dane, all around me, anchoring me to the moment, to him, claiming me with slow, sweet kisses, his touch still branded on the inside of my thigh. His erection pressing against my belly. I want him, again. Now. I always want him. Tears sting my eyes, because for some crazy, fucked-up reason, he wants me back.

  "Shh, Ittybitty," he murmurs. The name he gave me when we were kids—when I was a little girl tagging along behind him and Atti, and he was a barely tolerant older brother. It's all our history, and all of our present, and a hint of our future, all wrapped up in one affectionate name. "I'm here. I'm not going anywhere."

  And for now—for this moment—it is enough, because it's true.

  I crawl into bed in his long t-shirt, and he shifts, lowering his legal pad to stare at me. "Don't," I warn, crossing my legs and propping my laptop up on the bed. "I have to work."

  Dane peers over my shoulder, at the half designed living room. "That’s what you call work?"

  "Can you coordinate the furniture to match the wall colors and texture?" I ask archly. He laughs and tugs me against him. I settle into the curve of his arms, letting him toy with my hair while I play with the design, changing the paint by a few tones and the angle of the chair before working on accent pieces. It’s fun, panning through the options. Dane makes a few suggestions, all of them so ridiculously wrong I end up trying them just for laughs. He's good at that.

  Making me laugh. Making me relax. I work for an hour, until he's restless and pecking at my neck, adding a little pressure when he pulls his fingers through my hair. I shudder, but I'm not ready to have sex.

  I close the computer and stare at him. "Dane?"

  "Hmm?"

  "Why does Tripp think you should go into partnership with him?"

  He goes still, pulling away and sitting up. "What?"

  "Your dad—" I start

  "I know who you’re talking about," he interrupts, annoyed. "Why are we even talking?"

  I twist, arch an eyebrow. "Excuse me?"

  He has the grace to look a little embarrassed—but not nearly enough. "I just—I don't want to talk, Scout. I want to make everything go away."

  "You fingered me in the restaurant. We had sex on the bathroom sink this afternoon, had a morning quickie, and let’s not even get started on last night. How often are you thinking we should have sex?"

  He smirks. "As often as I can get you to?"

  "Be serious," I say, laughing. "Please."

  He sighs, flopping back on the bed. "I started my practice with seed money I got from Mom's life insurance. I was her sole beneficiary, and we had some money that Grandpa had put aside for Jeanette that reverted to Mom when she died. So when Mom died, I got both their inheritances."

  I shiver. No wonder he doesn't want to talk about it. I don't blame him—talking about the money you have only because your mother died isn't pleasant. "I still don't get why Tripp thinks you owe him something," I say.

  "Because he didn't get anything. From either estate. I used most of the money to buy the practice, so he's been trying to guilt me into letting him in the doors almost since I opened them."

  "Why didn't you give him some, to make him go away?"

  He shrugs, making the bed shake. "Because he didn't care. Not when Jeanette was sick, and not when Mom was in the accident. He couldn't be bothered to even attend Mom's funeral—how does a man who was married to her for twenty years completely forget about her, refuse to attend her funeral? Even when he knew I was there."

  I don't have an answer—but then I've never liked Tripp. I roll over, into him, curling against his chest. His arm comes up around me.

  "She had you. That's what mattered to her," I whisper against his ear.

  "I shouldn't have let her leave me here," he murmurs. "Senior year wasn't so damn important. I should have gone with her to the Keys."

&nbs
p; I don't really know what happened there—I know he was given the choice. Stay with us and graduate with his class, the class he'd been a part of for four years, or go to Key West with Grace to set up the memorial for Jeanette. By then, the Foundation had been established. Tripp was living in Miami.

  "What was special about the Keys?" I ask, softly.

  He laughs. "Jeanette loved it there. We used to go every summer—remember I'd leave with my parents for a week every year? That's where we’d go. She loved everything about the Keys—the atmosphere, the little villa we stayed in. The beaches. Every year, she’d go down and have a fling with one of the locals. It was a game she liked to play, and they all knew it wasn’t going anywhere. I think that year, staying in our villa, really helped Mom. She felt close to Jeanette there, and it gave her time to figure out how she wanted to structure the Foundation."

  There’s sadness in his tone, and I roll over, hugging him. "I should have been there. I should have known she was depressed—I mean, I knew, but I should have been taking care of her. She’d lost her husband and her daughter—and I made sure she lost her son, too."

  "That’s not true, Dane," I whisper, sitting up. "She wanted you to stay."

  He looks at me, and I see the tears standing in his eyes. They shock me—this isn’t Dane. Dane doesn’t break—he’s too strong for that. I don’t know what to do to make it better; I don’t know how to be strong for him, like he has been for me for so long. So I tug him down and hold him while he grieves the family he lost.

  Chapter 14

  Dane

  Our mornings are beginning to take on a pattern, a routine I find myself looking forward to. She sleeps late, leaving me time to get up and workout in the spare room I converted into a home gym, maybe shower before I wake her up and we have breakfast together. I click over to watch SportsCenter while I jog on the treadmill, but I'm not really focused on the chatter about baseball playoffs. I pay some attention when the announcers talk about the games yesterday—the SEC is dominating college football once again. I smirk. Atticus would eat that shit up.

  I won't admit this to anyone—definitely not Atti—but the past few months without him have been harder. I'm used to his presence keeping me grounded, his quiet studying and shit talking at the bar. I get why he left. I do, and I'm not upset. But I miss my friend, and I'm anxious for him to come home.

  Or I was. That was before Scout showed up at my house and neatly turned everything on its head. It's been a week. Just one short week since I picked her up from the treatment center—how did we get here this quickly? I shake my head and turn up the treadmill.

  There's no way I can keep doing this when he comes home. Atticus has always trusted me with Scout, partly because I've never given him reason to not trust me. What I'm doing now—it's not right. He left her with me because he thought it was safe. He'll be furious—and hurt—if he finds out what we’re doing.

  I stop the treadmill and move to the weight bench, settling in and trying to push Atti’s face away.

  It's not like Scout is one of the barflies I usually do, though. She's different. I care about her.

  I never really explained to Mel what happened. She knew that Jeanette died of cancer. She knew Mom died unexpectedly elven months later.

  She didn't know that Dad didn't care. Or that Mom was on her way to me when the semi hit her. She doesn't know that they—and Scout's attack—are what pushed me to using pills to numb everything, and later, to using women.

  I'm messed up. Looking at myself, objectively, I know that. I'm not good for Scout—she needs a guy who's steady and put together, not grappling with his own issues. And Atticus wouldn't be off base to point that out. I don't expect him to understand that what makes Scout so very special is that she knows how screwed up I am and why, without me having to explain it all. There's no secret, because she's been part of my life too long to have secrets. I let the weights drop with a loud clang and grab a towel, wiping the sweat from my brow.

  Scout's standing in the doorway, her eyes warm as she watches me workout, and something tightens, low in my gut. Lower, in my dick.

  God, this girl is a walking wet dream. And looking like that, sleep tousled, with a hungry look in her gorgeous eyes, I don't care about my best friend and how much he'll disapprove. I don't care about anything but getting her naked and under me.

  I swallow hard. "I didn't mean to wake you."

  "I was cold," she says with a shrug, walking into the room. She leans into me, and my hands find her hips, naturally. Close over them as she licks at my lips and kisses me. She tastes of mint and orange juice, and herself—that strange, sweet taste that is uniquely hers.

  I lean my head back and let her kiss me, controlling my movements and the thrust of her tongue with a grip on my hair and the slightest pressure on my shoulder. Her nails dig, softly, gently, and I want more—I want her raking those nails along my back, into my ass, as I push into her.

  She eases a leg over the bench, pushing me down as she settles over me. Her panties brush against my thigh as she drags herself up my body, and I shudder—she's so hot.

  She sits up, pulling the shirt off with a quick tug. I smooth her tousled hair down, and she rocks against me. With my legs braced on either side of the bench, I've got very little to push against her with, leaving me strangely helpless. She leans down, her breasts brushing teasingly against my chest, and I shiver, reaching up to cup them, tweaking her nipples between my thumb and forefinger. She shudders, and I smirk. Then draw her nipple deep in my mouth. Her moan is like music.

  "Clothes," she says breathily, against my ear. "Get rid of them."

  I laugh, and she stands up long enough for me push my gym shorts and boxers down. She kicks her panties off and comes back, straddling me. My cock nestles against her pussy, but she doesn't take me inside her. Instead she leans back down, kissing me, her fingers dancing over my chest, tugging lightly at my nipple ring before slipping around to find the tattoos. Her tattoos.

  "Do you have a condom?" I ask. She shakes her head.

  "I'm safe. I want you without one."

  I pull away and stare at her. She smirks at me, sliding down my body.

  I know what she's doing, but it's still mind-blowing when she takes me in her mouth. Her lips close over me, and I groan, the noise echoing around us and the empty room. My head drops down as she cups my balls and tightens her lips, bobbing slowly on me. I expect her to stop before she takes all of me, but she doesn't, and my eyes roll back. "Shit, baby," I hiss, and she smirks, a slight twitch of her lips. I grip her hair, but let her set the tempo as she sucks my dick. I'm close—so close I can almost taste it when she stops, pulling away slowly with a last caress of my balls. I'm panting, "Don't stop, baby."

  Scout giggles. "Are you begging?"

  I pull her up my body, growl against her lips, "For you? Hell yes."

  Something flickers in her eyes, but I can't think about it. Not right now. Right now she's sliding down on me, her body wet and silky and clenching around me. She gasps as I fill her, falling against me. I catch her and hold her up. She grabs the bar above me, steadying herself as she shifts her hips a little back and forth, adjusting. I'm deeper than I have been, filling her—I can feel her heat and wetness against my balls, and it's driving me fucking crazy.

  "Move, Scout." I groan, my fingers digging into her hips. "Come on, baby. Ride me."

  Her eyes flutter shut and she does—she plants her feet and lifts, achingly slow, before taking me back in her, just as deep as before.

  She's gorgeous—so beautiful and breathtaking, I can't do anything but watch her, my hands hard on her hips as she rides me, her pace increasing. I see her shaking, the tiny tremble in her arms as she gets close to orgasm, the way her face shutters, almost closing. I thrust against her as she loses rhythm. I'm so hard, so close to coming, but I push it back, think of nothing but her, and the tiny hints that tell me she's close. "Let go, baby," I whisper, and her eyes open, lazily staring at me as she whimpers.
I catch her nipple, tugging gently. She moans, a long, low noise that is still recognizable as my name. It's broken and sexy and with her pussy tightening around me, I groan, pulling her down on me as I thrust into her twice more, then I'm gone, orgasm slamming into me like a freight train. "Shit. Scout," I groan, and she stirs, rubbing against me, rubbing out my orgasm.

  Afterward, I can't move. She's sprawled across my chest, her hair tickling my nose. I don't want to move. I want to stay like this, my dick inside her, her sated and sleepy against me, forever.

  "I can't move," she says, lazily.

  "So don't," I murmur, playing with her hair. "Stay."

  She looks up, a smile on her lips. "For how long?"

  I kiss her, pushing away the sadness that swamps me. Because I can't keep this up. I owe Atticus too much.

  Scout pulls away, frowning slightly at me. "What's wrong?"

  I'm still inside her. I can't say this when I'm still inside her, my come filling her up.

  "Nothing. I'm hungry—want some special eggs?"

  Her eyes light up, and she nods, kisses me once more. "I'm gonna get dressed."

  She slips off me, leaving a slightly empty, hollow feeling behind. It hurts. She sways away from me, and I watch until she's gone.

  Then I pry myself off the bench and clean up with her forgotten shirt. Pull on my boxers. I glance at the weight bench and grin. I don't think I'll ever be able to lift weights again without thinking about Scout on that bench.

  Scout

  I enter the kitchen, the smell of fried onions and jalapenos mixing with eggs and salsa, steak and cheese. I pick a piece of ham from the plate as Dane scrambles the eggs, then pop a couple slices of bread into the toaster. Dane is quiet. Aside from a lecherous grin when I walked in, he hasn't even looked at me—it's not normal.

  "Wanna tell me what you’re thinking?" I ask, leaning against the counter.