Shattered Trust (Shattered #2)

by Magda Alexander

  He waves his hand as if the thought does not bother him one whit. “So be it. I don’t really care.”

  “You will when their money flows my way. This firm is already on shaky ground. When my clients turn to me, you won’t have enough money to run it.”

  Leaning forward, he steeples his hands over the conference table. “So you’re leaving?” He voices the question as if the answer means less than nothing to him.

  “You know damn well I’m not going to turn down representing Mitch.”

  “I thought that would be your decision. Good-bye, Trenton.” He thinks he’s won. Son of a bitch.

  On the way back to my floor, I wrestle my emotions under control. I’ll be damned if I allow my temper to show. I walk into my office to discover my computer has already been disconnected as well as my phone. Someone from support services helps me pack. Even after all these years in the firm, I have few mementos. My law school diploma, a photo of Mitch and me, a Montblanc pen he gave me when I passed the bar. It takes no time at all to stuff everything into a file box. Someone from Human Resources shows up to take my office key card. I walk out of the place where I’ve worked for eight years with my head held high. Not one person meets my gaze. Nobody wants to witness my walk of shame, but I know there are plenty of eyes peering out their glass-enclosed offices while I wait for the elevator that will take me away from this fucking place.

  Once I reach the garage, I drop my pitiful box of belongings in the backseat of my Jag. Driving up to street level, I hand my parking pass to the attendant. I most certainly will never use it again, and he can sell it to someone else for the remainder of the month.

  “You’re not coming back, Mr. Steele?”

  “No. I’m not.”

  “Good luck, then.”

  “Same to you, Harry. Same to you.”

  I pull into the E Street traffic, hang a left on 15th, and head on home to my Crystal City condo. There I’ll plan my next move, but only after I get good and drunk.

  Hours later, a strident buzzing wakes me. “What the hell?” Somebody’s calling from downstairs. Sitting up, I press the button that connects me with the concierge on the first floor.

  “Mr. Steele, there’s a Madrigal Berkeley here to see you, sir.” It’s Tommy. One of the guards at the front desk.

  After drinking two bottles of wine and falling headfirst into bed, I look like shit and stink worse, but I can’t leave her hanging downstairs while I clean up. “Send her up, will you, Tommy?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  I meet her by the elevator. Her eyes look crushed. As soon as the door opens, she walks forward and embraces me. “I’m sorry you’re no longer at Gardiner.”

  Her kindness touches something deep within me. I’ve had so little of it in my life. Dropping my chin on top of her head, I say, “How did you know?”

  “I dialed your cell. When you didn’t answer, I called Joss. She told me what happened.”

  In the state I’d been in I had no wish to talk to anybody. “I turned it off.” A thought occurs to me. “You didn’t come by yourself?”

  “No. One of the Stone Security guards drove me here. I sent him home after he dropped me off.”

  Which means she intends to stay. A slow fire starts in my belly. “You’re spending the night,” I rasp out.

  “Yes. Have you had dinner?”

  “No.”

  “You need to eat. Should we order in?”

  I love how concerned for me she is. “No. I’ll make something. Have to shower first. I reek.” She, on the other hand, smells of lavender and rose.

  “Okay.”

  After emerging from the bathroom a lot fresher than before, I head for the kitchen, where I find her perched on one of the stools. Before I fix dinner, I decant a bottle of wine and allow it to breathe. In less than thirty minutes I have chicken roasting in the oven and pasta bubbling on the stove. I scoop up a portion with a wooden spoon and offer it to her. “You want some?”

  “I already ate.”

  “So that whole order-in suggestion . . . ?” Rather than toss the morsel back in the pan, I gobble it. Predictably, my stomach rumbles with gratitude.

  The corners of her lips turn up. “I wanted you to eat. I know how much you value food.”

  She’s picked up on that, has she? And here I thought I’d hidden my food obsession so well. “Where’s Madison?”

  “At home. There are two guards there—Hunter Stone and another operative. She’s well protected. Right now, you need me more than she does.”

  I do need her. She just doesn’t know the extent of it.

  “So Joss didn’t explain much. She only mentioned you left the firm.” Propping her elbows on the counter, she drops her chin on her hands. “What happened?”

  “Dick Slayton sandbagged me. He called me into a management committee meeting this morning and gave me an ultimatum—either I drop Mitch as a client or my services are no longer needed at Gardiner, Ashburn & Strickland.”

  “And you chose Mitch.”

  “Of course. If it hadn’t been for him, I would probably have been killed in the mean streets of DC, the victim of gang violence.”

  After the chicken browns nicely, I fold it into the drained pasta, pour two glasses from the bottle I’d decanted, and pull up a stool next to her. As I do, she climbs down from hers. Soon she’s washing the pans and cleaning up the kitchen. “You don’t have to do that,” I say.

  “I want to.” She points to my plate. “Eat. You need it.”

  Used to eating fast, it takes me no time at all to devour the meal.

  I toss the dish and the cutlery into the dishwasher, grab her hand and the bottle of wine, and head for the living room. “It’s too warm to get a cozy fire going.”

  “I don’t need a cozy fire,” she says, dropping next to me.

  “What do you need, bella?” The low fire in my belly has become a roaring furnace. I ache for her more than my next breath.

  She rests her hand on my chest. “You.”

  I wrap my hand around her nape and pull her toward me, but soon kissing her is not enough. I lift her off the couch and drop her into my lap, and then I push my cock into her belly so she can feel every inch of me. With open mouths we devour each other, stealing each other’s breath, tasting one another.

  “Take off your shirt,” she commands.

  She doesn’t have to ask me twice. One-handed, I strip off the Henley. As soon as I do, she nibbles her way down my chest to the ring that adorns my right nipple.

  “When did you have this done?”

  “In college.” I lie back on the couch and straddle her legs over my cock. In that position, she can suckle my nipple to her heart’s content and pleasure herself by riding my erection.

  “Why?” When she curls her tongue around the ring and tugs, I hiss in a breath.

  God almighty. “A friend of mine worked at a tattoo parlor. He needed the practice.”

  As she palms my right pec, she shivers. “And you offered yourself as a guinea pig?”

  “Yes.” My gaze follows her every move, wondering what she’ll do next.

  “Did it hurt?” She trails her hand down my flank.

  “A little.” Not wanting her to reach the Promised Land just yet, I clamp my hands on her hips and roll mine beneath her.

  I know I’ve sparked her sweet spot when she gasps. “And the winged tattoo?” With a trembling finger, she traces the symbol branded on my chest.

  The answer tamps down the heat blazing between us. “That’s in memory of my brother.”

  “When did he die?”

  Hoping to avoid the subject, I sit up and kiss her hard. “Do we have to talk about this right now?”

  “No. But I’d like to know.”

  I have no defenses against her honest curiosity. And it’s not a surprise. I knew she’d ask about it one day. “We were taken away from our father when I was eight and he was six. I begged Social Services to keep us together, but they put us in separate foster ho
mes. I tried to keep tabs on him, but it was hard. We kept getting transferred from one home to another. When he was ten, he was arrested for selling drugs. Promising to keep him safe, the authorities talked him into turning state’s evidence against his gang. After he testified, they returned him to juvie. Before they could relocate him, he was killed. They never found out who did it.” The pain of that memory, vivid as it ever was, cuts me to the core.

  “I’m so sorry, Steele.” Fast and furious tears flow down her face.

  “Hey.” I brush the moisture away. “I don’t want you crying over me.”

  “I’m not. I’m crying over your brother.”

  She probably is, but her tender heart’s also bleeding for me. I take her mouth, suckle her lips, taste the sweetness that is Madrigal Berkeley. The combination of the wine and her salty tears stirs something in me. Nobody has ever cried for me. And I certainly don’t deserve her tears, not with my wicked past.

  “Are you going to make love to me?” she asks.

  “I don’t make love, sweet girl, I fu—”

  She lays a finger over my lips. “Don’t.”

  I nibble her fingertip before sucking it into my mouth. My hand skims down her panties to find her wet. “Don’t what?”

  “Don’t say that word. I know the difference between fucking and making love, and what we do is make love.”

  Chapter 10

  Madrigal

  He picks me up by my ass and in one smooth move comes to his feet. I love it when he does that. He’s so big and strong and so very, very male. When we get to his bedroom, he slowly peels off my blouse, stopping to kiss every inch that he reveals. My old boyfriend had always been in so much of a hurry that sometimes he didn’t even stop to take off my clothes. It was like I was a duty to him.

  But Steele? With him, I feel precious, like something to be cherished. As soon as my bra comes off, he suckles the tip of my breast, and I wiggle beneath him.

  “You like that?”

  “You know I do.”

  “You’re going to like this even more.” He shimmies off my skirt and my panties. I’m lying naked while he’s still wearing his silk pajama bottoms.

  He pulls something from his night drawer.

  “What’s that?”

  “A silk scarf.”

  Unsure about his intentions, I ask, “You’re going to tie me up?”

  “Yes. Unless you have an objection.”

  “No.” I trust him not to hurt me, not to take more than I can give.

  “Place your hands above your head.”

  “What if I want to touch you?”

  “You can’t.” There is no softness in his voice. It’s as hard as the rest of him.

  “Doesn’t seem fair that you can touch me, but I can’t reciprocate.” I want to feel the hills and valleys, the virile heat of him.

  “We can stop if you like.”

  “No. Do it.” I raise my hands above my head. In the next second, he secures them to the bedpost.

  Hunting in his drawer again, he retrieves a second item. A mask. I bite down on my lip. I’ll be helpless. Do I really want this? “I won’t be able to see.”

  “Yes, I know. I won’t fasten your legs. We’ll do that another time.”

  “Oh?” After the mask is in place, I will my breath to saw in and out while I wait for him to take the next step. Some rustling occurs. “What are you doing?”

  “Getting ready.”

  “Ready for what?”

  “To fuck you.”

  Too late I realize I shouldn’t have said what I did. He has two ways of fucking. One is what he’s done with me all this time. The other? Whatever he’s getting ready to do, which I imagine is what he does with other women. My heart takes up a wild rhythm. What is he going to do to me?

  He climbs back on the bed, clasps one of my tied hands, and curls it around his thick, hard cock. “Feel me.”

  The musk of him surrounds me. More than anything I want to taste him, to put him in my mouth, but that’s not what he wants. At least not right now. I pump him the way he likes, and he groans.

  “All the way down to the root.”

  When my fingers brush against him, I find something there. A cold, metal object wrapped around him right at the base of his shaft. “What is that?”

  “A cock ring.”

  “What does it do?”

  “Makes me hard so I can keep you coming all night long.”

  My breathing goes staccato as he leans over me to suck my nipple into his mouth. “Don’t stop pumping.”

  When I continue, his cock grows thicker, longer, and he groans.

  I jerk away my hand. “I’m hurting you.”

  “No, you’re not.” He curls my fingers back around him and moves them up and down his shaft. With his hand over mine, we’re both stroking him, something I find strangely erotic. I lick my lips, and he comes closer. “You want to taste me, don’t you?”

  “Yes.” My voice wavers.

  “Here. It’s all yours.” He teases my lips open, and I take him in, at first just the head. I lick him, and he groans.

  Filled by him, I can’t talk. I can only let him know with my tongue, my teeth, how much I’m enjoying him. As he slowly slides and retreats, I rake them over him.

  “Fuck.” For the next few seconds, he gently surges in and out. But then when I lick the rim, his breathing grows harsh, and he pops out. “That’s enough.”

  “I want you to come in my mouth.”

  “No. Not tonight.”

  “Fuck me, then. Please.”

  He slides down my body, kissing my skin every inch of the way until he gets to the very heart of me. I wish I could wrap my hand around him, guide him to me, but it’s not to be.

  When he parts my folds and licks and suckles my pearl, I shudder. “Please, Steele.” One hand climbs up and clamps over my mouth. How much control does he want? I can’t touch, can’t see, and now he wants to silence me. He teases his cock against my folds, and I moan beneath his open palm. When he finally gives me what I want and slips an inch into me, the feel of him is exquisite. I want him deep in me, so deep he’ll touch my heart. I clamp my legs around him, communicating my need with the only avenue left to me. Grunting, he thrusts. He’s so hot, so big, so thick, I can’t help but buck beneath him. Unhinging his hips, he pounds in and out until he hits rock bottom. When he does, I whimper. The girth of his rigid length is almost more than I can stand. I tense from the sweet ache.

  “Relax.”

  “I can’t,” I mumble beneath his hand.

  “Yes, you can. Trust me, Madrigal.”

  Taking a deep breath, I will every cell in my body to ease, to let his body claim mine in the most primeval of ways. Somehow I do. When he thrusts again, my body flushes with pleasure. I’ve gone totally liquid. Everything is heat and ache down below. I lick my lips, thrash my head. I want to touch him, but I can’t. He’s holding my hands captive above. Jerking up my hips, I murmur, “Faster, harder.”

  He grabs my ass, and his pace goes to double time. I arch, but he forces me down so he can do what he wants with me. His hand finds my clit, and I go from urgent to downright desperate. I jolt up toward him, but his strength holds me down.

  “Stop moving. You will lie there and take what I give you, take me.”

  Sliding his hands under my thighs, he opens me wide so he can sink farther and then lets it rip, pumping hard and fast into me until I don’t know where I begin and he ends. I scream with mindless pleasure as he lets loose the punishing strokes of his cock. Sweat, pungent with his lust, drips on me and mixes with my own, creating a unique cocktail of our scents. We’re one in this world he’s created. There is no him and me, just us, two sexual creatures intent on nothing but this dark, mindless paradise.

  Heat streaks through me. Everything about me trembles—my legs, my arms, my breath. “I’m coming!” I scream. No words slip out from beneath his hand.

  He comes with a curse. I’m so out of it, I barely register hi
s collapse on the bed next to me. A minute goes by before he unties my hands, takes off the mask. He’s wrecked, but then so am I. My gaze finds his cock. The ring’s not there; he took it off.

  While I’m still experiencing the aftershocks of what he did to me, of what we did together, he says, “There. We fucked.”

  Why did he do this? To prove a point? It doesn’t take long for me to find an answer. Because I got too close. And because I felt sorry for him after the firm severed their partnership. This is his way of telling me I never should feel pity for him. He doesn’t need or want that emotion from me. And he just made it clear what he does want. Mind-blowing sex. The kind I will never, ever forget and will crave for the rest of my life. But is there another reason for him to behave this way? Is he trying to pull us apart? If he thinks I’m going to run away because he showed me this side of him, he’s got another think coming.

  Still lost in the aftermath of our lovemaking, I trace my hand through his scruff. “Yes, we did, and I loved it.”

  His eyes widen as his right brow hikes.

  Pulling him to me, I nibble his sensual lips. “I hope we do it again soon, except next time I’ll tie you up.”

  He throws back his head and laughs before he flips me over, grabs another condom from the night table, and slips it on. And this time when we join, it’s not another fuck. It’s plain and simple making love.

  Chapter 11

  Trenton

  After rising at my usual time of five thirty, I brew a cup of Italian roast in my Keurig before jumping into the shower. Half an hour later, I’ve shaved and dressed, while Madrigal sleeps. She’s got to be exhausted after last night’s marathon sex session. I’d made good on my promise to keep her coming, if not all night long, then at least until two in the morning. When after a final orgasm she’d fallen asleep, I’d dropped off into a dreamless state myself. This morning I was tempted to wake her in the best way possible, but she has to be sore, so I let her rest.

  I’m knotting my tie in front of the bathroom mirror, tossing the occasional glance toward her glorious body, naked and spread out on my bed, when she slowly awakes. She blinks at me, at the clock on the night table, and back at me. “You’re dressed already? It’s not even six thirty.”