Broken (Brody Brothers Book 4) Read online

  His large, work-rough hands that had pushed her back against the car door gentled. One of them slid to her nape to pull her up more intimately into the kiss, while the other slid down to her waist to explore the curve of hip he found there. Then his lips opened hers, his tongue nudging in to taste her, and a whole new world of madness exploded in her.

  Whoa!

  The slide of his tongue invading her mouth was a moment she would never forget, she was absolutely sure of it. It was sensual and sublime, a lush sensation she wanted to last forever because it was so new and exciting. Exhilaration raced through her veins, and she went up on her toes to chase after that feeling, dancing her tongue with his to wallow in that intimate, beautiful magic. A rough sound rumbled from deep in his chest, as much felt by her as heard, and it thrilled her more than anything she’d ever experienced before.

  He liked how she kissed.

  A lot.

  If that wasn’t a miracle, she didn’t know what was.

  When he finally raised his head, she realized in a dim sort of way that he had to work at it, as her hands were in his wavy black hair and holding him to her like her life depended on it. Hastily she let go, snapping back to a reality where he struggled to escape her, while she tried climbing him like a damn tree.

  How embarrassing.

  “That was not cool.” She had to say it before he did, if only to make him understand she wasn’t about to throw herself at him like so many other townies did whenever a Brody man walked by. “That… that won’t happen again, I promise. You have my word.”

  “What the hell are you talking about, woman?” His voice sounded odd—deeper, with a lionlike purr running through it. It did something weird to her insides, turning her into a melty puddle that was an echo of what was going on in her wet panties. “You enjoyed the fuck out of kissing me. Don’t deny it.”

  Oh Lord, was he trying to shame her weakness? “I’m not.”

  “Then why the hell are you saying it won’t happen again? You like something that much, you should damn well do it as often as possible. I won’t complain.”

  At last she managed to meet his gaze, only to blink in surprise when she discovered he was looking at her like she was his favorite flavor of ice cream and he couldn’t wait to lick her everywhere. “I’m just not… I’m not good at this sort of thing. I’m not sure what the rules are.”

  “For one thing, you’re a kickass kisser, so don’t try telling me you’re not good at it. And for another, I have no fucking clue what you’re talking about when it comes to rules, so if you’d care to enlighten me, I’m all ears.”

  “The rules between men and women,” she expanded, while an uncomfortable heat crawled up her neck to make her whole head sizzle. Maybe he’d take pity on her and assume her undoubtedly neon-red face was from the scorching heat of the day. “I’m kind of… sheltered.”

  “Sheltered, huh?” A corner of his mouth curled, and he regarded her for a long moment before nodding once. “I guess that’s a Quaker thing, or something?”

  The heat in her face got worse. “Or something.”

  “Well, lucky for you, I know all about the rules between men and women. I can help you out every step of the way, no worries. Do you want to know what the first rule is?”

  “I can’t tell if you’re serious, or if you’re making fun of me.”

  “I’m perfectly serious, especially about the first rule.”

  “Okay, I’ll bite,” she said, still suspicious he was laughing at her. “What’s the first rule?”

  “The first rule is that there are no rules, except for the ones we make for ourselves as we go. Everything we do from here on in has no right or wrong to it, Winsome, you understand me? It’s just us being us.”

  “But…” She shook her head in bewilderment while her heart did odd little twirls at his unexpected statement. “There is no us, Des. Didn’t you hear me? I told you, Granny inherited Smiley homestead, not me.”

  “What the fuck.” The change in his expression was shocking to watch, like all things bright and happy were suddenly sucked out of existence. “What does us being us have to do with the homestead? Tell me. I want to hear you say it out loud.”

  Ohhh, boy. “Look, I don’t want to make you angry, okay? It’s just that I’m not stupid. I can put two and two together.”

  “Uh-huh,” he muttered, his upper lip curling. “And just what the hell kind of answer to that equation did you come up with?”

  Damn it, how was she being made to feel like the bad guy here? “We both know you never once spoke to me before my father died. None of the Brodys did. It’s like I wasn’t even there—total invisible girl to your eyes.”

  “I’ve explained that.”

  “Then,” she went on, “the moment Able Smiley’s grave is dug, you’ve got all kinds of interest in me. So clearly that interest wasn’t actually in me,” she added with a grimace. “Though that’s not surprising. I know I’m homespun and unworldly and literally the definition of the girl next door, so obviously Granny was right. I was always too beneath you to catch your eye all on my own. I know that.”

  “Fuck that,” he muttered, and if anything he looked even more dangerous than ever. “You don’t know shit, woman.”

  “I know you’re a sophisticated world traveler with better cashflow than God, and you grew up with a silver service in your mouth. I’ll be honest here,” she added, trying not to flinch under that blistering scowl. “I’d love it if your interest were solely about me, but the odds aren’t in my favor. That’s why I needed to rush over here as soon as my father’s will was read. Telling you that I’m not the heiress you thought I was is my version of ripping off a Band-Aid. I had to do it nice and quick, so the pain of it wouldn’t be drawn out. Now that it’s done, I’ll… I’ll just be going now,” she finished lamely and started to turn her back on him to open the car door. Without warning he caught her elbow. The world spun as he wheeled her around to face him so that they were nose-to-nose, and he was so close she could see the wild glimmer of rage blazing in his eyes.

  “If you thought all that shit about me, that I was just playing you for a country rube to get what I could out of you, why the hell did you even go out with me?” he demanded, the words pushing out through the barrier of his bared teeth. “What game were you trying to play with me? Trying to see if you could make me fall for you?”

  Her jaw dropped, staggered at the mere possibility. “What? No—”

  “Then why did you go out with me?”

  “Des—”

  “Why, Winsome?”

  “Because I couldn’t help myself,” she shot back, breaking under the pressure of his barely leashed fury. There were few things in this world that made her curl up into a protective little ball faster than male aggression, and at that moment that was exactly what he was the embodiment of. “Once, just once, I wanted to be noticed by you, okay? I didn’t want to be the perpetual invisible girl who was beneath your notice, even though I knew it was only the property you were seeing, and not me.”

  “Jesus.” His cold gaze cut her to shreds. “You have got to be—”

  “Pathetic? Yeah, I know. But before you call me out on just how pathetic I am,” she added while an ember of self-directed anger sparked to life, “you should know that I hate hearing these words coming out of my mouth, I really do. But I’m not about to apologize for them. And I’m not going to apologize for throwing caution to the wind and going out to lunch with you today. Even though I know it wasn’t a real date, and neither was that kiss, I’m pretty damn proud of myself for finding the backbone to grab for what I wanted. And what I wanted was to spend time with you. I wanted to go on a date with you, even though everyone knows that a lunch date isn’t an actual, I’m-totally-serious-about-you kind of date. You want me to apologize because I grabbed for what I want? Go ahead and hold your breath. It’ll be fun to watch you turn blue.”

  For a small eternity he did nothing more than glare at her, and it took all her st
rength not to crumble under the weight of it. Then a faint scoff escaped him, and he shook his head. “I guess I can see how you might question my motives, now that you’ve laid it all out for me. There’s just one thing you’ve clearly overlooked, Winsome.”

  Would he ever stop calling her that? “What?”

  “I kissed you after you told me you didn’t inherit the homestead, because when it comes to you, I don’t give a fuck about that lake. Kind of blows your so-called equation all to hell, now doesn’t it?”

  Yeah, it kind of did. “Uh…”

  “What you need to do now is find a way to apologize to me for accusing me of being mercenary,” he went on before she could get her brain to come up with some kind of reply. Abruptly he straightened away from her, his aggressive stance suddenly gone. She sagged back against her car in unadulterated relief, only vaguely noticing how his eyes narrowed when the breath she’d been holding whooshed out of her. “And you need to make it good, woman. No lunch date’s going to do it, because you’re right—I love lunch, but it’s not a real date. I like romance when it comes to my dates, so think of something good. I’ll be waiting for your call.” With that, he turned on his heel and headed back toward the barn.

  Chapter Six

  “I can’t decide if I want to sympathize with you or give you a congratulatory pat on the back.” Fanning herself with the latest edition of Vogue, Cleo Goddard stared wide-eyed at Winnie. “Do you have any idea how many women in this town would sell their souls to have any Brody notice them, much less the only Brody brother who’s still on the market? Des Brody might be the most sought-after bachelor in the history of Bitterthorn, and you’re the one he’s got his bedroom eyes on. I think I want your autograph.”

  “He’s got his eyes on the Smiley property, Cleo, not me.” Winnie blew a corkscrew curl out of her eyes, then tried tucking it back into the topknot bun from which it had escaped. When the curl refused to be tamed, she gave up and went back to sweating over her sewing machine. She’d known this design was going to be tricky, but she was determined to finish the deceptively simple drape of a light-as-air cropped camisole in a loose-fitting, periwinkle cotton gauze. The embroidered inset at the plunging neckline made things tricky, but since the embroidery inset was identical to the banded waistline of the matching maxi skirt with a slit all the way up to midthigh, she wasn’t about to give up on it. “Or at least I thought that’s what he had his eyes on. Now I don’t know what to think, which is why I need your help on figuring Des out. Unlike me, you and your mom know everything there is to know about the weird ways of the male species.”

  “Oh honey, no one knows what men are thinking, except for the fact that they’re obsessed with getting laid. And fed,” Cleo added thoughtfully, still fanning herself and setting her flyaway peroxide blonde hair dancing around her perfectly made-up face. “Those seem to be the two appetites that drive most men, so now that I think about it I’m changing my mind. Most men are a total snap to figure out.”

  “Then tell me what’s in Des’s mind. I told you everything from start to finish, so what’s he thinking? Does he actually expect me to apologize and do it while setting up a romantic date with him? It’s been four days, and I haven’t heard a peep out of him. Maybe he’s already forgotten about me.”

  “From what you told me, he put the ball in your court. My guess is he’s probably waiting to hear from you, not the other way around.”

  Ugh. “So what am I supposed to do? How do I apologize to him when what I said was true? He never spoke to me until my father was dead and gone.”

  “That is kind of weird, I’ll admit.” Clearly mulling it over, her friend chewed on the straw of her iced coffee. “There are some guys who get off on making their women beg, if you know what I mean. Maybe that’s what he wants from you?”

  “That’s not Des.” It was out before she gave it a thought, but she knew she was right. If how he described his stepmother forcing him to play a game where he had to beg for things, she had a feeling he’d never degrade her in that way. “I get that I insulted him, so I should apologize for that. I mean, if the shoe were on the other foot and he’d accused me of, say, going after him because he was rich, I would’ve slapped his lips right off his face.”

  “I’ll bet that’s happened to him a billion times in his life—being hunted for his money,” Cleo expanded when Winnie gave her a questioning look. “I mean, just look at him. He’s the total package—movie-star looks, sculpted gladiator body, and the Brody name and all the insane wealth that goes with it. Greedy little gold diggers have probably been gunning for his finely shaped ass since his preschool days.”

  “Probably. Though Des has never acted like a billionaire,” she added fairly. “Not with me, anyway. Bossy and arrogant, but not like a billionaire.”

  “How’s a billionaire supposed to act?”

  “I don’t know. We rode the rural-route school bus together when I was in middle school and he and Fin were in high school, so there’s that.”

  Cleo’s immaculate brows arched. “They rode the bus like normal people? This is what I get for living within walking distance to all of Bitterthorn’s schools. I missed out on everything that was interesting.”

  “What’s interesting about riding the school bus?”

  “I just always assumed the Brodys got chauffeured around in a limo, or something swank like that.”

  “Des used to sit beside me every day on the bus—no matter where I sat, he’d sit close by. He never spoke to me, though.” Carefully she checked her stitching, then pulled the cami top from the machine, cut the threads and shook it out. “Then again, I never spoke to him. I had my reasons—reasons you know all too well—but Des had his reasons, too. Maybe it isn’t all that suspicious that he finally decided to talk to me after my father died.”

  “I can’t believe it took so long for that disgusting old goat to finally kick off,” Cleo muttered, grimacing as though her coffee had suddenly turned sour. “I guess it’s true what they say—only the good die young.”

  “My point is that I’ve been assuming Des finally acknowledged my existence for the sole purpose of getting Smiley Lake.” Rising from her chair, Winnie took the top and skirt in hand and headed for the triple-paneled, black lacquered screen she had set up in the back of the Goddard family’s dress shop, Cleone’s Closet. “But the truth is, I didn’t go out of my way to talk to him either. I wanted to, but I didn’t. At the very least, I can see how I should apologize for that. I’m trying this on,” she added, waving the two-piece ensemble at her friend before disappearing behind the screen. “If it’s cute, I’ll make more and charge a mint for it, but if not, I’m throwing it out. It’s seriously labor-intensive, and I don’t need the freaking headache.”

  “That means you’re not going to be an impartial judge of it,” Cleo called after her. “We’ll let whoever walks through the door be the judge of whether or not it’s cute. Which, by the way, I can already tell that it is.”

  “That’s the trouble with you, Cleo,” Winnie said, her voice muffled as she pulled off her navy blue T-shirt and slung it on the screen. “You like everything I come up with.”

  “How does that fall into the category of trouble, you weirdo? If you’d been born anywhere other than this little flyspeck town, you’d have already been discovered by some big fashion house, and I’d be mooning over your creations in every fashion magazine from here to Paris.”

  “Paris.” Winnie took a moment to sigh over that particular dream before shucking off her jeans, cowgirl boots and socks to shimmy into the sexy maxi skirt. “I doubt I’ll ever make it to that bright and beautiful city even as a tourist, but it sure is on my bucket list.”

  “You never know what the future holds,” came the airy response. “I’m going to gather whoever’s out front into an impartial judges’ panel. Come out when you’re ready.”

  “My bra looks ridiculous underneath it,” Winnie called back, all her fashionista instincts cringing at the neon orange of h
er bra clashing with the pastel periwinkle of the floaty, cropped cami. Quickly she turned to the pedestal mirror set up behind the screen and winced. Yep. It was as bad as she thought. “Warn everyone that their eyes are going to bleed when they see me.”

  “Take your bra off, Winnie.”

  “Absolutely not,” Winnie called back, horrified. “My girls are fully grown and need all the support they can get. Besides, what would Granny say?”

  “You’re impossible,” came the exasperated reply. “See you out there. And be prepared for Mama to put you up on the dressmaker’s platform, just so everyone can judge you until you want to crawl away and die. Fun times, right?”

  “Fun times,” Winnie muttered as Cleo left, fussing with the spaghetti straps in a futile attempt to cover the neon glow of her bra. At least everything else looked good, from the flirty midriff revealed beneath the gauzy crop top’s deceptively simple cut, to the way the embroidered waistband of the skirt hugged her hips. The skirt’s slit was a bit more daring than she’d intended, but that was an easy fix. With some espadrilles or maybe some high-heeled mules to complete the outfit, it wasn’t half-bad, she decided, giving herself one last look before heading toward the front of the store. Too bad she didn’t have a strapless bra on hand…

  “There she is, the Closet’s very own exclusive fashion designer.” Cleone Goddard, Cleo’s mother and one of Winnie’s favorite people, beamed at her when she ventured out from the short hallway and into the dress shop’s retail space. Though Bitterthorn was a small town, it was only a half-hour drive from San Antonio, a sprawling, cosmopolitan hub of two million people. As such, the stores in Bitterthorn had to compete with San Antonio’s big-city allure, and Cleone’s Closet did so with surprising sophistication.