Broken Read online

  Did he just call me Buttercup?

  “Good boy, Max. I forgive ya for bein’ a snitch.” I gave him a quick pat on the head, then raced into the bedroom to get out of my sloppy, comfy clothes and put something decent on.

  Fifteen minutes later, I was standing in front of the full-length mirror, which hung on the back of the bedroom door, examining what I’d chosen to wear. Angie had taken me clothes shopping for my birthday a few weeks ago, and my wardrobe had been given a complete makeover. I knew to most people jeans and a cleavage-enhancing top were nothing special, but they were hopefully more appealing than a sloppy yellow sweater and sweatpants, and they were more fitting for the person I wanted to be. I pulled the hair tie from my hair and gave my locks a good brush, letting them fall naturally over my shoulders. I didn’t want to look as if I’d gone to any trouble—he was only coming back to collect his dog, after all—so I decided to just swipe some mascara on to emphasize my gray eyes and swipe a pale pink gloss across my lips.

  I fetched my laptop from the back porch and set up on the end of the dining table in the open-plan living space.

  So what had I learned? A guy can be sexy as hell without even trying. A beard on the right face was hot—who knew? I’d never been a big fan of facial hair, but Adam wore it well. And swimming in cold water could make a man’s ding-dong almost nonexistent, so any sex scenes in an ocean, lake, or other body of cold water were definitely out.

  I decided to work on my character descriptions. With Adam and his toned, lean body still fresh in my mind, I thought the obvious thing to do was give in to what my character wanted to be, and base my male lead around what I had just witnessed, both on the beach and in the house. I was just figuring it out when there was a soft rapping on the door, before it opened and Adam stepped inside.

  Immediately I learned another valuable lesson—a gorgeous man dressed in jeans and a pale gray cable-knit sweater with a slouchy beanie on his head was just as sexy as a naked one. The beanie looked very much like something Mimi used to crochet and call a tea cozy, but on him it looked amazing.

  “Hello again, Buttercup. Are you busy?” he asked, noticing my laptop and frown.

  I hesitated at the Buttercup term of endearment again, but decided to let it go. “Hey, Sugar. I’m just workin’ on a new book. I’m a writer.” The words sounded peculiar to my ears, and I felt foolish for verbally spewing it out without him asking.

  His brow shot up. “Oh, wow. That’s impressive. Have you written anything I would have read?”

  Casting my gaze at the mound of short stories that were still strewn across the coffee table, calling myself a writer felt even more ludicrous.

  I shook my head. “Not unless you went to MSU ’bout seven years ago.”

  He grinned. “No, I grew up in England. I’m an Oxford man.”

  Of course he was. Apart from the jaw-dropping accent, if he’d been at MSU, I would have noticed him, without a doubt.

  While making himself comfortable on the sofa, he noticed the pile of short stories on the coffee table. “Is this some of your work?” He frowned. “Eden Rose? Is that a pen name?”

  I nodded, cursing myself for not being more tidy or using the pages as fire starters.

  “May I?” He picked up the top story from the pile, then sat back into the cushions of the sofa, his eyes scanning the pages, one after another, smiling, until he eventually threw his head back, laughter filling the room.

  That wasn’t a good sign. It may be a little old-fashioned in its wording, but it was supposed to be erotica, not a comedy.

  “Oh my God, that’s fucking brilliant. You’re really hilarious.” He swept up another story, chuckling away to himself as he read. “Bah! Throbbing dagger into her tunnel of love. Classic.” He wiped the tears of laughter from his eyes while I sat there mortified, trying not to shed a tear of my own.

  When he’d read another three stories, he stopped and seemed to remember I was sitting there watching. “These are magic. I haven’t laughed so hard in a long time.” His smile faltered as he observed my expression. “Don’t you think they’re funny?”

  Swallowing down the lump in my throat, I tried to smile. “They’re not meant to be funny. In their day, they were pretty well received…as erotica.” My hands fidgeted in my lap. “I guess now they just seem stupid.” My eyes welled, not because he was laughing, but because they were worse than I had imagined. I had been worried that I wasn’t capable of doing this anymore. That it had been too long, that I’d been too isolated and lost my mojo. Watching Adam try to compose himself so as not to offend me any further, I realized that I’d never had any mojo to begin with.

  “Look, I’m sorry,” he said, standing and approaching cautiously. “You write really well, and your structure and grammar are great. It was just some of the expressions and names for things seemed pretty fucking funny.”

  I shrugged. “So you don’t like dagger or sword. How ’bout pee-pee?”

  His hands flew to his head. “Oh God, I haven’t called it a pee-pee since I was six. At the very least you have to call it a willy, but really, it’s a cock, so call it a cock.” He strutted around like a cock of the feathered kind. “You can’t take that away from us. Do you know why men walk around with their chests puffed out?”

  I shook my head, totally mesmerized by the performance.

  “Because we have a cock, and do you know why we’re so proud of it?”

  I shook my head slowly again.

  “Because it’s something that women don’t have. So don’t take that away from us, because if not for our cocks, the only thing you would need us for is opening jars.”

  “Okay, so it’s a…it’s a cock, then?”

  He beamed at me. “Yes!” Dragging the chair out beside me, he sat, leaning forward with his elbows resting on the table. “What do you call your lady parts? Would you use pussy?”

  “Gosh no, I’m more subtle than that. I think tunnel of love is romantic. You read the stories.”

  He attempted to hide the smirk behind his hand. “Driving his throbbing sword into her tunnel of love sounds painful. You have to at least use pussy, if not cu—”

  I slapped my hand over his mouth. “I couldn’t use that word. It’s just too crude.”

  “So pussy, then,” he mumbled through my hand, his breath heating my cool palm.

  I couldn’t believe I was sitting here, openly talking about cocks and pussies with a guy I’d only met a few hours ago. Charles would never in a million years even consider verbalizing the words without praying for forgiveness. Yet it seemed so natural, and it gave me a brilliant idea. If Adam could help bring my thinking into the twenty-first century, maybe I could combine his take on sex and various body parts with my talent for weaving a story.

  “So, would you consider answerin’ a few questions for me?”

  He sat back in the chair. “Sure. Ask away.”

  Opening a new blank page on the computer, I thought about what I wanted to know. This may be the only chance I got to pick the brain of a gorgeous, sexy man who I’m sure would have a lot of experiences he could share.

  “Okay, so tell me what type of girls you like.”

  “Hmm.” He rubbed his beard as he pondered the question. “All sorts. I’ve known athletic girls and voluptuous girls. It’s not a type as far as looks go. It’s more an attitude. I’ve known some stunning girls who have been really conceited and ugly on the inside. Then I’ve met some regular girls who have become more and more beautiful as I’ve gotten to know them better.”

  Well that was no help to me at all. Let’s try this in a different way.

  “Yes, but, if you went to a bar and met a group of girls, would one draw your eye more than the others?”

  He smiled. “Probably. I might begin by chatting up one woman, but by the end of the night after talking to them, I may leave with a different one than who I’d originally thought.”

  Fine. I’ll just make up a girl to write about.

  The next q
uestion was an embarrassing one, but I wanted to know as much for my story as for my own personal knowledge. “There’s been a growin’ increase in…in waxin’.”

  His brows shot up as he grinned mischievously. “Yeeess…”

  Leaning toward him, I lowered my voice and asked, “You know what I mean, right?”

  He frowned and shook his head. “I’m not sure I do. Please, elaborate.” His eyes were dancing as he watched me squirm.

  “Girls waxin’ their…their hoo-ha.” I indicated my groin area.

  “You mean pussy?” He couldn’t hide the laugh in his voice.

  Heat rose in my cheeks. “Yes, I mean…pussy. Is that essential these days, to be bald down there?”

  Adam chuckled and leaned forward again, patting my arm. “See, that wasn’t so hard to say, was it, Buttercup?”

  Again with the Buttercup. What’s with that?

  He sat back once more, smoothing down the whiskers on his chin with one hand. “It’s not essential for me. I don’t mind a little bit of hair.” He gave me a shameless wink. “You don’t want to have to go slashing through the forest with a machete to find the good bits, or end up with a hair ball in your throat. But neat and trim, or completely gone is fine.”

  Unable to meet his eyes after his description of needing a machete, and thoughts of my own out-of-control bush, I busied myself taking notes…Neat and trim or completely bald is preferable. Must head into town to buy a razor or some wax strips.

  We continued talking and I frantically jotted down as much information as I could garner. Nothing seemed to be off-limits with Adam, including favorite sexual positions, most of which I’d never heard of but that he happily explained. We talked about leaning, bending, standing, lying, sitting, and any other conceivable position where two people could become joined. It seemed Adam enjoyed them all equally whether hard and fast or slow and deep, his smooth accent making everything sound seductive.

  Then we moved on to the importance of oral sex and how he believed the theory of a man being in control when he performed oral sex on a woman was a total myth.

  “How can you say a man is in control of the woman? That’s absolute bollocks.” He looked at me for some sort of reaction. All he got was stunned silence. So he continued. “I mean, sure, she’s at your mercy when you’re licking her out, but she’s still in control.”

  My cheeks grew hot, especially from the term licking out, and any note-taking had been forgotten.

  “Tell me any other time when a guy is focused, hell-bent in fact, on doing whatever it takes to make a woman completely happy. We’ll twist around and stand on our heads for a better angle while she lies back giving instructions.” He threw his hands to the side. “If that’s not being in control of the guy, I don’t know what is.”

  He seemed to be waiting for me to respond, but my head was still back at the licking out part and images of Adam contorting himself to get the best angle. I pictured how Adam’s head would look between my thighs, my fingers tangled in his long hair, and I wondered if he moaned with a British accent. He had a dirty mouth and by God, it was a turn-on.

  “You don’t agree?” His brow was cocked, watching my rosy cheeks as I tried to discreetly fan myself.

  “Hmm, sorry…what?” I tried to snap out of my haze and recall what I was supposed to be agreeing to.

  He chuckled. “Do you agree that when a guy goes down on you, you’re the one in control?”

  “Oh, umm…to be honest, I have absolutely no idea,” I said, diverting my eyes to the computer, totally embarrassed by my admission. “My experience with sex is to get it over with as quickly as possible.” My cheeks flared red hot, the confession out of my mouth before I could stop myself.

  Deafening silence filled the room as the walls closed in. I didn’t know where to look.

  “How long were you married?” he finally asked quietly.

  “Seven years.”

  “Was the guy a fucking monk? What…he never…” He ran his hand through his hair in disbelief.

  My brow furrowed with embarrassment. “Close. He was a preacher. Comes from a long line of preachers who believe sex is for procreation and not pleasure.”

  “Fuck me, what a tosser,” he declared, then raised his hand apologetically. “Sorry, you don’t mind me swearing, do you?”

  Giggling, I replied, “No, I don’t mind. I ain’t the preacher.”

  Max finally stirred and headed toward the door, needing to go outside. Adam jumped up to let him out, then gazed out the back window at the lighthouse in the distance.

  “Would you mind if I brought my easel over to paint from your back porch? It really is a magnificent view.”

  “Sure. I don’t think the owners would mind, as long as you don’t get paint everywhere.”

  He paused, processing what I’d just said. “So this isn’t your house? I don’t know why, I thought you lived here.”

  I shook my head. “No, my agent leased the place for the winter. I have eight weeks to write a masterpiece.” I rolled my eyes at the impossible task.

  Leaning up against the doorjamb, he nodded as I spoke. “I’m in the Hamptons for eight weeks, too, then back to Philadelphia. It was on my bucket list to come here to paint.” He dropped his eyes. “It was now or never, so I thought what the hell.”

  His eyes rose to meet mine and I saw a sadness behind them, the sadness from the night before perhaps, creeping in. It was gone in a split second and his expression was back to the easy smile he seemed to wear so comfortably, but I swear there was something more lurking beneath the rugged good looks that he was struggling to hide.

  “By all means, bring your stuff over. I’d love the company.”

  The beaming smile returned, making me forget he was anything other than a confident, sexy man…who wanted to spend time with me. Well, wanted to spend time on my back porch, at least.

  He checked his watch, then scratched his beard, hesitating for a moment. “Are you hungry? Do you fancy some lunch yet?”

  Looking at the time on my laptop, I couldn’t believe it was after one in the afternoon. We’d been talking for hours and it had only seemed like minutes. “Thanks, Sugar. That’d be great.”

  Mischief crossed his face, his eyes dancing. “I’ll go grab something to eat, and my easel. Your homework while I’m gone is to write a list of ten words you can use in your book for a penis.” He grinned at me, chuckling as my face dropped at the thought. “No swords or daggers or any other lethal objects. I want good, strong masculine words that a guy would use every day of the week.”

  Pushing the door open, he took a step through and turned. “I’ll give you the first word to get you started. It’s cock.”

  I sat dumbfounded for what felt like ten minutes, my mind totally blank. The only thing that I could think of was cock and the way the word had rolled from his lips like a sensual promise.

  Trying too hard never worked for me. Thoughts and ideas needed to flow naturally in their own time, so I decided to put on some music as a distraction. I’d brought my iPod with me, so I plugged it into the sound system and cranked up the volume. A bit of Taylor Swift was in order, and my favorite song at the moment was “Shake It Off.” As I danced around the living room, I let the music take hold, shaking my booty and singing along at the top of my lungs.

  It was working. Words were coming to me as I wiggled around the sofa, and to help them stick in my mind, I called them out in time with the music to the empty room.

  Shake it off, shake it off…dick! Shake it off, shake it off…pecker!

  By the time the song was finished, I was energized and had a list of eight words I was confident Adam would approve of, including junk, member, shaft, prick, manhood, and of course, cock. Did I really need ten? I went back to the laptop and jotted down the eight words, then wrote a list of lady parts to coincide.

  After coming up with my lists, I felt inspired to commence writing the actual book. Now a few pages in, the clicking of Max’s claws on the wooden dec
k alerted me to their return. Adam followed behind, carrying a drop cloth under his arm, his easel in one hand, and a plate of bagels in the other.

  He dropped the cloth to the deck, then carefully placed the easel against the railing outside and brought the plate in, leaving it on the coffee table. “Lunch is served, ma’am,” he announced.

  I was starving and couldn’t wait to eat, having realized in all the excitement of seeing Adam naked that I’d skipped breakfast.

  “How did you go?” he asked, taking a big bite of his BLT.

  I showed him both lists, then sat back, wringing my hands as he read them, commenting approvingly as he went.

  “I know I gave you a hard time earlier about your writing. That was wrong of me. I’m sorry.”

  My gaze dropped as I nibbled on my lunch. I wasn’t used to having someone admit they were wrong and apologizing. Everything that Charles ever said that was hurtful he would blame God for. It was God’s will that he should be an ass and talk down to me, because in his mind it was a teaching that he needed to administer. It was God’s doing that he would blame me for not being able to bear his children, even though he refused to let me have tests or explore IVF.

  Now here sat a man who hardly knew me, but who was showing more compassion than someone who was supposed to have loved me.

  I shook my head. “It’s fine, really. I know the stories were pretty lame.” I shrugged. “It’s no big deal.”

  “But it is a big deal.” He reclined farther into the sofa. “Truth is, I think what you do is pretty amazing. You’re leaving a legacy for people to read and remember you by long after you’re gone.” His brow furrowed. “I don’t have or do anything that people will remember me for.”

  I hadn’t thought of it in that way. I’d always thought of my stories as being around in the present, not really considering that once they were published, they could be read in years to come.

  “You said when we met that you were changing your name.”

  I nodded as I took another bite.

  “So using my limited male intuition, I worked out that you’re getting divorced, right?”