Phoebe: Book One of Broken Girls Series

by J. A. Hornbuckle

  She wanted him.

  And there was no denying he damn-well needed her.

  So Ryker shifted until the head of his steel-like member met her moist cavern and sank in inside with the clink of metal on metal as one of his knees swept banged against the little latch of the plug. Sinking in, he couldn’t help his groan of completion.

  This was where he was supposed to be.

  Was exactly where he was meant to be.

  So he stroked himself, clenching and then releasing his hips as his body took up the rhythm older than time, sinking in and out of her. Soon, Ryker found her body propped on his thighs, the water still hitting his back as his hands gripped her hips, thrusting her pussy down, hard and fast onto his length, taking her in a primordial way.

  And as his cock registered her tightening pulses, white hot spirals hit his lower back and balls, he knew their joining was perfect.

  Perfection for both him and her.

  So he arched his neck down, careful to maintain his balance as he continued to slew in and out of her on harsh breaths, his mouth seeking the sweet taste of her skin as she began to squeeze in her bliss, and his cocked throbbed as he spewed into her hot, wet depths.

  When he was finally able to raise himself from her chest, his eyes dropped to the water level that waved around their hips.

  Lazily dragging his eyes to her face, he found her grinning. “So do we call this shower sex or a sexy tub thing?”

  Leave it to his girl, wanting to give their doings a name.

  Especially when he’d already labelled it as, ‘comforting my girl in the shower’.

  As they dried off, Phoebe’s eyes zeroed to his. “Good thing I had Dr. Brust give me a Norplant after he’d checked to see if I’d been raped.”

  He’d fucking forgotten. Motherfucking forgotten to glove-up since his original thoughts had been on nothing but to comfort her.

  “Better than the pill because it’s faster to prevent stuff we don’t want happening.” Her voice continued even though she was head-down, watching as she dried her lower half.

  Yet Ryker, scuffing at himself with his own towel, without volition added, “Until we want it to happen, mi amor. Until, not don’t want.”

  From the corner of his eye, he saw his Phoebe stop all movement. “You want kids?” her breathy whisper questioned.

  “With you, yes. Most definitely.”

  And he glanced up after he knew his thoughts were received only to find a small, sweet smile on his girl’s face.

  One that his own mouth echoed as he bent to dry the remaining wet bits of himself.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Although I’d been invited to attend Ryker’s family dinner that Sunday, I begged off. After my first full week back at work, and spending all day Saturday with him (as well as a yummy, lazy yet energetic Sunday morning), I was in need of touching base with my ‘family’.

  Or more specifically, with Diana.

  But I will admit to not wanting to be around Cruz or Max if pressed. Their family dynamics were a lot different than what I was used to and while I loved Maggie to flipping bits and beyond, two of her three sons were not on my favorites list.

  That evening I found myself at Di’s house, seated at her table with her new group of foster-boys along with Abe, sharing a meal of spaghetti and meatballs, with garlic toast and salad. The food was great and the dinner conversation lively as it always was when shared with five adolescent males ranging in age from ten through fourteen. We laughed and talked, trading banter and tall-tales before Abe announced he’d be leaving in fifteen to drive them all to the movies, but whoever had dish-duty that night needed to, “Hop to it”.

  Diana and I shared a soft smile in memory of the times I’d heard Abe bellow almost the same thing to my group of girls. Although I think for us, he said something like, “Get on it”.

  Soon the house was quiet again and Diana put on water for tea.

  “God, were we ever that loud?” My ears were still ringing from all the noise the boys made as they raced up and down the stairs, yelling at one another as they searched for coats, hats and shoes.

  Diana laughed, taking down two mugs and plopping a tea bag in each. “Are you kidding? Add a few girlie screams and accusations of ‘you’re wearing my whatever and I want to wear it’ to the mix. Then, yeah.”

  I giggled as memories bubbled up, including the noise level with my foster-sisters at the last get-together in Tonya’s house. And I knew Diana was right.

  “Want to take these into the living room?” At my nod, Diana passed me a steaming cup as we went to find a comfortable seat among her collection of couches and chairs. I settled in with a sigh, folding my legs up onto the seat of the couch, my knees pressed to the side.

  Diana took a sip and I caught her eyes over the rim of the cup giving me the once over. “You look like you’re feeling a lot better.”

  “I am,” I admitted with a head nod before bending my face to my own tea. “My shoulder especially. I didn’t have to ice after the Thursday shift at all.”

  “That’s good. What about the nightmares?”

  “They seem better too. I had one last night but I didn’t wake Ryker up screaming. Just came awake in a panic.” It was true or at least I hoped it was. About the nightmares getting better. Either that or I was learning to keep those first few moments of blinding terror to myself, unwilling to disturb Ryker’s sleep any more than necessary. And to bring to a halt his never-ending request I seek professional help in dealing with them.

  “So Ryker’s spending the night now?”

  I blinked hard and deep. I hadn’t meant to give her so much info about my relationship with my answer. “Ah, yeah. He has been since before I was attacked.”

  Diana’s eyebrows rose sharply as she tried to hide her smile behind her cup. “A couple of the girls told me you think you might be falling in love with him.”

  Shit! I had said that both at dinner and again when they’d come to visit me, although at least in the hospital I had the excuse of being doped up to the gills. I should’ve known one or another of them would’ve told Diana too. Not that it was a bad thing, it’s just I wanted to be the one to tell her, in my own way and in my own time. Because I had a few questions about what was going on with me and my man.

  Things I didn’t have answers for and needed help in understanding.

  Well, no time like the present, my brain announced as I parted my lips. “Here’s the thing though. How do you know you love someone? That what you’re feeling is really love and not just lust or infatuation instead?”

  She giggled softly and put her cup on the table next to her chair. “I asked the same question of my grandmother once, although I think I said ‘physical attraction’ instead of lust.”

  “And what’d she say?” I wanted an answer not to play semantics! Because we both knew they were one and the same thing, for god’s sake.

  “A lot actually,” Diana replied softly. “But the core of it was, do you put his happiness before your own?”

  I thought for a moment and realized that most times, not always, but most of the time I did. And I knew Ryker did the same with me. Plus, I found his happiness contagious, proud I could give it to him.

  “Have you told him yet?” Ignoring Diana’s question for a moment, I tried to formulate the next item that had been going around and around my head for a while.

  “But it seems like when two people become a couple, the woman’s career and former ambitions somehow get derailed while the man’s continue. You know what my goals mean to me and I’m afraid of getting so caught up in Ryker, I’ll wake up one day and realize I lost myself, my dreams because I fell in love with him.” I took a deep breath to steady myself since just the thought of it happening scared me to freaking death. “So how do you avoid it?”

  At that, Diana threw back her head and laughed outright, which kinda pissed me off. “Don’t you ever wonder if you have a tendency to over-think things a bit, pretty girl?”


  “I don’t consider it over-thinking,” I huffed, turning and tucking my legs to the other side. “I’m just pre-planning for what may happen down the line.”

  “Have you talked about this with Ryker?”

  I shook my head and looked down at the cup in my hands.

  “My Henry and I used to talk a lot about our future together,” she said softly, her voice taking on a warmer note as it always did when speaking about her husband who’d died too young and much, much too soon for Diana. “And it wasn’t because either one of us wanted to derail the other’s plans, dreams and goals. But for us, it gave us an opportunity to discuss what each of us wanted so we could negotiate to get what we both needed.”

  “You make it sound so easy,” I blurted without thinking.

  Diana’s canted her head with a tiny frown. “Don’t you and Ryker talk?”

  I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out.

  “Because it doesn’t sound like you do, at least not about important things,” she continued. “Have you told him about what happened to you as a young girl?”

  “Well, I told him about my parents…,” I hedged, looking everywhere but at her.

  She sighed and I heard her disappointment in it. “That’s not what I meant, Phoebe.”

  “I know.” I hated it when she talked to me like that. Or more to the point, I hated it when she was right and I knew I was wrong on important things.

  “And I also heard you found about what happened to your Ryker as a teenager.”

  Damn, damn and double damn. God! Who was it? Maizie? Beta? Because neither one of those girls could ever keep shit to themselves, always telling other people personal stuff which should have remained private!

  “What about secrets then?” I challenged, my voice a little bit louder than I’d intended. “Can’t a person have secrets when they’re a part of a couple? Or are you just supposed to let it all hang out because you’re ‘in love’?” I even provided a modified air quote with my cup and fingers as I dragged the word ‘love’ out for a good five syllables.

  She shook her head with a smile as she reached for her mug. “Sure you can have secrets. Everyone needs to keep a few but what I think you’re really asking has more to do with trust than it does anything else. And revealing your vulnerabilities to someone else, a special someone you value and tell of the experiences you’ve weathered, that made you the person you are today, helps build emotional trust between you.”

  “Emotional trust?”

  She bent her lips to the cup and I could almost see the wheels of her mind working behind her unfocused gaze. “If he’s spending the night with you, Phoebe, it means you’ve created a measure of sexual trust between you. So much so, you’re willing to sleep next to him which when you think about it, makes a person very vulnerable to someone they don’t know, right?”

  “I guess,” I agreed, thinking more about what she meant than what she was saying.

  “Then, my beautiful girl, what is preventing you from sharing the wreckage of your early years with him? Especially with a man as good for you as your Ryker seems to be?”

  “What if he thinks I’m weird, too weird to be around?” My whisper sounded scared even to my own ears. “What if he doesn’t want to see me anymore after I tell him what happened?”

  She cocked her head and frowned again. “How did you react when you learned he’d been convicted and sent to jail so young? Did that change how you felt about him? Did you want to break up with him and send him away?”

  “No!” I returned quickly, vehemently. “I mean, I thought about it for about a half-second but then figured I just needed more info or forget I’d ever heard it. But, it didn’t make me want to stop seeing him!”

  Her face got soft and her movements very still before she spoke again. “So why do you think he’d react any differently when you tell him what you went through?”

  I didn’t have an answer for that. So I took the coward’s route and took a sip of my now cold tea.

  *.*.*.*.*

  Ryker helped his ma clear the table and brought back another beer for him and his brothers before Maggie poured a second glass of wine. This was how it used to be back in the old days.

  How after dinner, the family remained at the table to talk about what was going on in their lives, to ask for advice or a different take on something. Even when Max was in the military, they’d always share a telephone call so the four of them could talk together on a Sunday night after one of his mom’s amazing dinners.

  It was one of the things Ryker’d missed most when he’d been sent away.

  “So Ma says you’re spending more nights at your girl’s place than here,” Cruz started and Ryker took in his brother’s casual pose as the man slumped in his seat, one elbow snagged behind the chair back and the other hand toyed with his beer bottle. “How do you see this thing playing out, bro’?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Are you two gonna shack-up for a while before you make her an Adams or have you already reserved the church?” Cruz’s smug, half-assed smile almost prevented him from taking a long slug of his beer. “Inquiring minds wanna know.”

  “We aren’t that far along,” Ryker mumbled with a frown. “Although we could be moving that direction, you know, like, eventually. But I’m kind of old-fashioned and want to make sure I’ve got a good job making enough money before I make that kind of commitment.”

  “Old-fashioned? You?” Max’s snort more than revealed his feelings about what Ryker’d said.

  “Yeah, you know like how the man is the provider and the protector his wife and their family.”

  “Christ! Now he’s talking about making a family with the gringa,” Cruz announced to the table at large as he shook his head in disbelief.

  “And you don’t think your place at Black Ice is a ‘good job’ or that you don’t make enough money?” Max’s growl signaled his offense at Ryker’s inadvertent slam.

  “No, it’s not that,” he snapped back, tapping his fingers on the table. “It’s just I want to have a house and a healthy bank account before I promise forever-and-ever to my bride.”

  “Forever-and-ever?” Cruz laughed outright at the thought. “Jesús, bro’ that’s not how that shit works nowadays. Which is why anyone with half a brain in their head does a background check on their intended and gets the pre-nup signed well in advance of the ‘I do’s’. Because nothing lasts forever, jackass. Better get that through your skull right now.”

  “I disagree,” Maggie chimed in, slapping a palm on the table to gain all of her sons attention. “Si, the divorce rate is high but I thinks it’s because we’ve raised a generation who expects instant gratification. That if a marriage doesn’t work, just throw it out with the rest of the garbage and start over. Bah! There are still plenty of couples who promise to stay together for the rest of their lives and do it! Learning to work through the bad times and celebrate the good, knowing to do it will make their connection, their marriage stronger.”

  “Exactly, mamacita,” Ryker murmured, taking her hand and bringing it to his lips. “Gracias.”

  “You and dad didn’t get a forever-and-ever,” Max corrected.

  Dragging her smiling eyes from her youngest, she glared at her oldest. “I didn’t? So where’s this otra marido? Mi segunda esposa? Ha! You cannot find him because I didn’t take another husband after your father died!”

  “Why didn’t you, Ma?” Cruz asked, his confused eyes on the bottle he was now rotating in both hands. “You were young and pretty enough to snag another hombre anytime you wanted.”

  Leaning forward in emphasis, Maggie’s eyes blazed as she looked to her middle son. “Because I gave my vows in a Iglesias before the padre Santo and Dios. And I promised to love, honor and cherish him until death parted us. Which to me meant I was going to be su papa’s novia until I died.”

  “I don’t think that’s what it means—” Max started, but Maggie cut him off.

  “What? You became a hom
bre santo when I wasn’t looking? Can interpret santos votos now?”

  Max shook his head and glanced at his brothers. “No, Ma. I didn’t become a holy man who can interpret holy vows.”

  “I’d quit while you’re ahead, dude,” Cruz advised in a whisper loud enough for them all to hear. When nothing else was said, he picked another thread to talk about. “So Ry, have you done a background check on her yet?”

  “No.” The fact of it was, Ryker never even considered it. “It’s not like I have a lot for her to get her hands on if she was a gold-digger or something. Which she isn’t.”

  “But it might tell you about all the lights in her house, mi hijo,” his madre advised. “The reason behind them.”

  Ryker hadn’t thought of that. But would it be wrong for him to ferret out her secrets when he wasn’t yet able to tell her of his?

  As if reading his mind, Max gave voice to what Ryker was considering. “What’d she have to say about your trial and time in the penal system?”

  “I haven’t had a chance to tell her.”

  Cruz laughed and waggled his eyebrows. “Haven’t had a chance, lil’ bro’? Since you two are practically living together, what seems to be taking up so much of your time?”

  Maggie reached and gripped Ryker’s forearm. “You must tell her. Otherwise it’ll become a huge secret between you, a wall. And amor verdadero cannot grow in the spaces between secrets.”

  “Just do the goddamn background check,” Cruz added. “I always get one after the first date.”

  “Which is why you no get second ones!” Maggie exclaimed on a shout, pointing to her middle boy and the table erupted in laughter, releasing a lot of the tension that filled the room.

  She turned to Ryker again. “I think you should tell her, but my best advice is to follow su corazón, your heart. I’ve grown to know your Phoebe, and she is a good woman even if she isn’t a Latina. Una mujer que puede dar a su hombre tanto amor y respeto.”