Gorgeous Bastard Read online

  Gorgeous Bastard

  ***

  Stella Blaze

  Copyright 2015, 2016

  Previously published as Shattered

  Smashwords Edition

  Edited by Stephanie T. Lott (aka Bibliophile)

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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  Chapter 1

  Cali

  Our first kiss ruined everything.

  My stepbrother—Joshua, the tool—in an uncharacteristically cool moment, had deigned to help me with my three point shot. And since he was all state in high school, and now had a full ride to go to Duke in the fall, I put aside my disdain for him so I could soak up some of his tutelage.

  I rolled my eyes when he made me jog three miles with him as a warm up. I practically bit my tongue off when he made me do sit-ups, jumping jacks, and pushups. Then he made me play him for over an hour in our driveway, a little hidden cul-de-sac wedged between the side of our house and the seven foot wooden privacy fence that separated us from our nosey neighbors.

  The hoop was affixed to the garage at NCAA standards. Joshua’s dad, Paul, had even painted a three point arc, complete with the classic free throw line and everything.

  We take basketball seriously in this family, if you hadn’t noticed.

  The freaking sun was getting ready to set by the time we finally started working on my three point shot. I really wanted to slam the ball into my stepbrother’s pretty face, but my three point shot really did suck, and that alone was holding me back from being a starter for my team. As a sophomore, at the same school as my illustrious stepbrother—shivering in the shadow of his greatness—I was desperate to prove myself.

  Joshua had me attempt a few throws before he began to impart wisdom and critique.

  Only one throw even touched the rim.

  He’d stripped off his t-shirt, flexing his powerful upper body: those pecs, those arms and shoulders…

  I’d thought Joshua was a hottie when our parents tied the knot two years ago. But then he’d opened his mouth and ruined that. He was arrogant, opinionated, sexist, and a freaking jerk. Asshole was a good word for him too, but I didn’t like to curse… and my mom would have smacked me in the back of the head if I’d ever used that kind of language around her, “child abuse” or not.

  I involuntarily rolled my eyes at his display of chiseled manliness.

  And then I saw it, right where his sweats slid down that perfect V shape some guys get around their hips. The six-pack V.

  A tattoo.

  My mouth dropped open and I just pointed.

  “Do mom and dad know about that?”

  Joshua got this wicked grin on his face, and then made a show of pulling the waistband of his sweats down to show me the leering Blue Devil inked into the flesh right above his hipbone.

  I had to smile.

  “What if you flame out and get kicked off the team? That little guy will be kind of embarrassing, won’t it?”

  Joshua looked into my eyes and for a moment I felt this pull… and I kinda forgot where I was.

  “I’m not gonna get kicked off the team.” He snatched the basketball out of my hand effortlessly. “And even if I do, I can always get it removed or covered up with another tat.”

  “You never answered my question, Joshy,” I knew he hated when I called him that. He endured my mom nicknaming him, but I was not so privileged. “Do mom and dad know about your little tattoo?”

  “Dad took me himself,” Joshua said, beaming. Then he slid his hand down his washboard stomach and said, “The girl that did it said it was sexy.” There was that arrogant, self-satisfied look again.

  I HAD to wipe it off his face.

  “You were paying her,” I said. “She was just telling you what she thought you wanted to hear.”

  The look on his face was still smug, but I’d seen the slight bulge of his eyes. I’d pressed the right button.

  But not hard enough…

  Even though I wanted—needed—to perfect my three point shot, that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to try and shoot my full-of-himself stepbrother down.

  I took hold of the bottom of my t-shirt and hoisted it up, pulling it over my head and then tossing it to the side.

  Joshua’s eyes bugged out and his mouth fell open.

  I smiled.

  I was wearing a sports bra—a pink one with a touch of lace framing my décolletage—but I was showing a hell of a lot more skin than my Train Like a Girl t-shirt had afforded.

  Joshua’s eyes darkened, and even though I’d wanted to wipe the smug off his face, having him look at me like that was…

  Confusing…

  I felt my face flush.

  I looked away. I was tempted to put my t-shirt back on.

  But I’d be damned if he was going to get the best of me.

  I stood up straighter.

  I looked him straight in the eye… well, the face. His eyes were honed in on my cleavage.

  I snapped my fingers and his eyes reluctantly rose to lock on mine.

  I moved slowly toward him, a playful—hopefully sexy—smile on my lips. I licked them to make them shiny.

  And when I was within arm’s length of him, I reached out and stole the ball back.

  I giggled as Joshua blinked the boob-dust from his eyes and realized I had played him.

  “Do you want to work on your three point shot or not?” He sounded pissy.

  I didn’t want him pissy. I wanted him to help me. So I nodded, reached down and grabbed my t-shirt from the asphalt and pulled it back on. I joined him by the three-point line.

  I noticed he’d left his shirt off.

  Boys were lucky that way. They could walk around half-naked and though it was sexy as all hell, no one batted an eye. Let me walk around downtown with just my sports bra on and the town would catch on fire. There would be cat calls, damning stares, “slut” and “whore” would be bandied about, and my parents would be called by our minister, my principal, and probably the police chief.

  It wasn’t fair.

  Joshua stood beside me and nodded sagely.

  “Watch me.”

  I have been…

  I looked down his smooth, bulging pectorals, how his tanned skin glistened in the waning sunlight.

  He practically glowed.

  Okay, that wasn’t what I had wanted to be thinking…

  I took a step back and watched as Joshua threw a three point shot, and the damned thing swooshed through the net.

  Perfect.

  He jogged over to retrieve the ball, his well-muscled body jiggling in all the right places.

  Joshua talked me through his next throw.

  It was my turn to blink the hottie out of my eyes this time.

  I watched and listened as he told me what he did before every three point shot. He threw it again, and it just dropped right through the net.

  He went after the ball, but this time I ripped my gaze from him and studied the moon flowers growing up the trellis to my parents’ room. Having drool dripping off my chin would seriously cramp my style.

  A memory flashed through my mind of what Joshua had looked like jogging after that first ball…

  Mmmmmm…

  I closed my eyes hard and shook my head

  What was I supposed
to be looking at?

  Oh, yeah—the moon flowers. When the sun finally set, they’d bloom, glowing a brilliant white in the twilight.

  “Cali!” Joshua hollered. “Pay attention.”

  I gritted my teeth. I wanted to punch him in his too-pretty-to-even-have-a-zit face. I also wanted to run my fingers over his chest, to touch his sun warmed flesh…

  “Now,” he continued as I came nearer, “When you shoot the ball I see you locking your knees together,”—Really?— “And then your back starts getting tight.”

  Well, yeah. I always feel myself stiffen when I’m attempting a throw.

  “And then, just as you throw, you drop your left shoulder. That alone would make your aim off, but combined with your back and knees I’m surprised you don’t need a chiropractor.”

  Smartass…

  Well, no. He was being serious—and a smartass. But he was right. I did all those things.

  I took the ball out of his hands and planted my feet solidly on the three point arc, pushing all lusty thoughts out of my head. I needed to learn this, and if my ass-hat of a brother could tell me all that by just watching me shoot a few times, then he knew his stuff.

  That was way more help than my coach had been when I’d asked him for help. He’d just spouted the platitude, “practice makes perfect.”

  I gazed up at the hoop.

  I can do this.

  I took some deep breaths. I let my body relax. Thoughts of floating in a still, clean pool of water permeated my thoughts.

  Don’t think about it.

  I know what to do now.

  I opened my eyes as it hit me… the solution to the problem.

  Pretend it was someone else throwing a three point shot.

  So simple.

  I threw the ball.

  It soared through the air in a graceful arc.

  And then it whooshed through the net.

  Perfect.

  The excitement welled up inside me, bursting from my chest and shooting to my arms and legs like liquid fire. I jumped up in the air, a high pitched scream ripping from my throat, and then I turned and launched myself at Joshua. I wrapped my arms around his neck, laughing and screaming with pure, unrestrained joy.

  I had never made that shot before.

  I’d dreamed of making that shot.

  “Thank you!” I cried out, hugging his neck with all I had.

  A moment later I felt him hug me back.

  “You know you still have to practice it… like a million more times, right?”

  I kissed his cheek and stepped back, looking up into his face.

  “I know, I just…” I stopped. I couldn’t say anything more. I couldn’t think or move.

  Just one look up into Joshua’s beautiful faded green eyes and I was mesmerized…lost…

  A grin played on his lips…

  Those thick, biteable looking lips…

  I lunged at him, wrapping my arms around his neck again, my lips colliding with his.

  He tasted like raspberries and something foreign and strange—Joshua.

  His lips were so soft.

  I felt him tense as I kissed him. I was sure he was going to push me away. He had to, right? I was his stupid little stepsister.

  It was wrong.

  This was wrong.

  But as his strong, bare arms encircled me, and his lips parted, his tongue licking into my mouth… It felt so right.

  Our bodies melded together, fitting so perfectly it was as if we were made for each other.

  I gasped as that thought tore through my mind, and the warmth of his body made my flesh tingle. Something inside of me was pulling me closer and closer to him. I arched my back so that more of me was in contact with more of Joshua.

  My breathing quickened and I felt my pulse race at that thought.

  More of Joshua…

  I felt something hard bulging against my stomach.

  Oh god… that hardness was him!

  I pulled away and looked down, seeing the hugeness sticking out from his sweats.

  Then I heard a familiar sound: the twin carbs and dual exhausts of Joshua’s dad’s Silverado truck.

  Oh no…

  The look of blind panic and horror on Joshua’s face must have mirrored my own.

  We separated, pushing away from each other.

  I heard the slight squeal of the Silverado’s brakes as Joshua dashed over and grabbed the basketball from the ground, turning around with it, strategically obscuring his crotch. A guilt stricken look overwhelmed his face.

  The Silverado turned into the driveway, going too fast, and then suddenly stopped with even more squeals from the brakes.

  I stood there dumbly, feeling so caught. Mom and dad would know, wouldn’t they?

  They would just know, from the looks on our faces.

  What if that thing between Joshua’s legs didn’t go down? What if they saw it?

  Oh god, oh god, oh god…

  Joshua looked at me as if he were having the exact same thought.

  The passenger side door swung open and my mom hopped out, her face flushed and her expression angry.

  She knew!

  I gulped and hugged myself. My life was over—over before it really got started. Mom was going to kill me!

  She turned to the open truck door and glared at my stepfather.

  “I told you I never met your friend before! Why do you keep bringing it up?”

  My stepfather, Paul, opened his door and climbed out of the cab. He was taller than Joshua, and more filled out in the shoulders.

  When he looked down on you, you were intimidated, totally.

  “Richie said he’d met you before, Susan,” he said, closing his door with a controlled gentleness. “I would just like to know from where… and how.”

  Mom slammed her door, her eyes blazing. “What in the hell does that mean? How? If I’d met him, I met him. That would be the how. But I never met him.”

  Paul gritted his teeth, the muscles in his jaws showing. “Susan… I know Richie, and that man is a pussy hound, pure and simple.”

  Why was Paul calling her Susan? He always called mom Suzy.

  Mom’s face fell as she connected the dots.

  “So you think I…”

  Paul’s eyes were rimmed in red, burning with anger. “If he knew you, then I’d bet dollars to donuts he knew you that way.”

  I had stepped back while my parents argued, what had just happened between Joshua and I a distant memory. I watched, my back pressed up against the side of the house, no thoughts of anything but what was going on between my mom and dad.

  Everything was going wrong.

  Mom’s mouth screwed up as if she had taken a bite of something rancid.

  “So now not only am I lying about knowing your stupid asshole of a friend—who you haven’t seen in years—but now I’ve been fucking him. Is that right?”

  I blinked as tears blurred my eyes.

  Mom and dad were fighting, which they never did… and mom said the F-word.

  I could almost feel my world crumbling around me. I wouldn’t have been surprised if the ground beneath my feet cracked open and I fell in.

  Paul stared down at my mother, not saying a word, but clearly thinking them.

  Mom spun on her heel and marched toward the side door of the house. “I guess if your friend said he knew me, then of course it’s true! And of course that means I’ve been screwing him too!”

  Paul followed mom into the house like an anger fueled locomotive.

  The door slammed behind them and I stared at it for a few moments, not believing what had just happened.

  My parents never fought. They were the happiest couple anyone had ever seen.

  This was crazy…

  This couldn’t be happening…

  I turned and looked at Joshua. He was looking at the side door too, a lost look on his face, and then he turned and looked at me.

  He opened his mouth as if to say something, but I turned and ran tow
ard the front of the house, and then to the street, and then down the street. I needed to get away from him. I needed to get away from the house, my parents, everything.

  I ran and ran, not caring where I was going, just wanting to get… to get anywhere.

  Our kiss… Joshua and I kissing had caused this. It had to have.

  It had been so wrong.

  And now we were going to be punished for it.

  Chapter 2

  My parents fought for three days straight. It was as if the two loving people they’d been were now possessed by two hate filled demons. And when they weren’t fighting the house was filled with a hard, gloomy silence.

  I tried to talk to mom about it, but she wouldn’t hear of it. She just said they had “things to work through.” That it would just take time.

  Time…

  I knew different. They were fighting because I’d kissed Joshua. Because I’d done wrong and had enjoyed it. And now my world was unraveling, deconstructing.

  I couldn’t even look at Joshua, though he kept trying to get me alone. I didn’t care what he wanted to say to me. Whether it was to tell me what a slut I was, or that mom and dad fighting was all my fault.

  These things I already knew.

  I stayed after school a lot that week. I volunteered to help my English teacher clean out her storeroom. And I practiced my three point shot.

  Though it had improved by leaps and bounds, I was no longer happy about it. If it hadn’t been for needing Joshua’s help improving it, then none of this would have happened.

  Not the kiss.

  Not royally pissing off the fates.

  And mom and dad would still be happy.

  ***

  A week and a half after the kiss my mom told me we were moving in with my grandmother in Fayetteville. She and Paul were separating.

  I started crying, sobbing like a baby. If I hadn’t kissed Joshua, none of this would be happening.

  Mom pulled me to her and held me, stroking my hair comfortingly.

  “It’s all my fault!” I sobbed.

  Mom made a gentle hushing sound.

  “None of this is your fault, sweetie.”

  Yes, yes it is.

  If she knew what I’d done she would be so disgusted. She would never speak to me again.

  “Paul and I just… we’re not getting along anymore. That’s our fault, not yours.”