Break Me (The Summer Series)
Read Break Me (The Summer Series) Online
Authors: Harper James
This is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons,
living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely
coincidental.
All rights reserved. This e-book is
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for respecting the hard work of this author.
Edited by
Theresa
Wegand
Cover Design and Photography by Emily
Cutrer with
Emily
and Daniel
.
For my daddy,
Because there has never
been
a day I doubted your love for me or your pride in the person and
author I have become.
Gemma
Gemma hurried around her room,
throwing the last few things she could think of to pack into her suitcase. If only
she could find her only beach bag, which also happened to be the one her mother
loved to borrow, she may actually make it out the door on time. She knew that,
just as she had for the past few years, the majority of her time would be spent
either in her room or on the beach, book in hand. She definitely wasn’t
interested in getting a ride to one of the local shops in order to get a new beach
bag once she arrived if she couldn’t find hers. That meant additional time with
one of the four people she would be avoiding like the plague for the next eight
weeks. There was no way she would choose this year to start socializing with
her father’s family. Just sharing a room with Kate, her far-too-peppy half-sister,
was more than she could tolerate.
“Mother,” she called out in an annoyed tone,
knowing her mother hated being called by that particular name.” Where is my
striped beach bag? I’m going to be late,” she yelled as she crawled under her
bed. She couldn’t help but roll her eyes as she pushed the latest box full of
books her father had sent out of the way. So what if he was trying. So what if
she was desperate to read at least three of the ten books inside. So what if
she needed to save every penny and these would help alleviate the amount taken
up by her limited Kindle money. There was no way in hell she was giving him the
satisfaction. As she heard her mother approaching, she scrambled out from under
the bed and hid the envelope from the University of North Carolina in her
bedside table. Now was not the time to get into that discussion.
“Gem, I told you I was taking it last month
when I went to that training.” Maggie came into the room and tossed the bag on
the bed, the bangles she wore on her wrist clanking as she let her hand fall to
her side. Her long flowing black skirt waved from side-to-side. Gemma took her
in and admired her timeless, effortless beauty. Gemma wasn’t one who could pull
off the natural hair and makeup or the loose, flowing, hippie-inspired clothing
her mother opted for daily. Instead, Gemma wore unassuming outfits, designed to
avoid attention, not because she was shy but because there was nothing worth
showing off. She had dark hair, which fell at an average length; she was
average height and average weight.
What is there to showcase when you have what
most other girls have and only wish you could look like the few who were
blessed with more?
“Mom, that was a month ago. I told you if you
borrow my stuff to give it back.” Gemma grabbed the final item she needed,
stuffed it in her suitcase, and zipped the top closed.
“Gem, please pay attention.” Her mother shook
her head but smiled. “Are you focusing?” Gemma crossed her arms and stared at
her mother, attempting to hide her scowl. “That beach bag I just gave you? It is
yours
.” The sarcasm was so thick at that point Gemma nearly had to bat
it out of her way. “That was me giving it back.” Gemma gave in and rolled her
eyes as she pulled her suitcase onto the floor and started to head out of her
room.
“Uh-uh, missy, we need to talk.” Maggie sat on
the end of Gemma’s bed and pulled her legs up under herself, wrapping her skirt
around her feet to warm them.
“Mom, I know: be safe, carry mace, and don’t
turn into a blond bimbo. We good?” Gemma huffed as she looked at the clock and
calculated how much time she had left.
“Yep.” Maggie stood. “Oh, and try to see if you
can find anything to treat that bug you’ve come down with. I don’t want that sour-puss
attitude to rub off on me.”
“Too late,” Gemma said, walking up to her
mother to give her a hug goodbye. “I’ll see you in eight weeks. I love you.”
“Yeah, yeah, just don’t get pregnant.” Gemma
knew her mother was joking, but there was a part of her that wondered just how
much. There was a part that wondered if her mother ever wished she could go
back and take her own advice.
~~~
Two hours later Gemma sat in her seat
and fastened her seatbelt. Her flight was crowded, so she was reluctantly
thankful to her father for booking her the window seat right behind the exit
row, which allowed for a little bit of space. After lifting the shade, she was
able to see the men loading the suitcases onto the belt and into the underbelly
of the plane. Watching her oversized suitcase ascend the long system, she
leaned her forehead against the cool surface and closed her eyes, fighting back
tears. This was it, her last summer to have to endure this trip and these
people. One more summer and then she would go to school and finally cut the
ties her father had severed before she was even born.
Her flight was a long one, or, at least, long
for the person stuck in a seat wanting nothing more than to bail and disappear
for the coming weeks. Gemma knew that she had a lot of decisions to make about
her future, but for now, all she could think about was what she had to endure
as soon as she exited the aircraft. Her father’s family was nothing like her
and her mother. Where Maggie would drop the f-bomb or shrug her shoulders over
a broken curfew, Karen never swore or looked anything less than country-club
perfect. And there was no question about how her father and Karen would react
to a missed curfew, because Gemma’s perfect half brother and sister wouldn’t
dare break it in the first place.
Gemma lived in a suburb of Dallas, Texas, while
her father and his family lived in Durham, North Carolina. The only things
their hometowns had in common were the D’s that started their names. Gemma’s
mother taught various art classes at a local community college. Though she
could support the two of them along with the monthly checks she received from
Gemma’s father, they in no way lived a glamorous life. Their simple two-bedroom
apartment and shared car got them from one day to the next. Gemma was also expected
to follow in her mother’s footsteps and pursue a life both creating and
teaching art to show the world just a little more beauty.
Gemma’s father, Michael, didn’t have an
artistic bone in his body. He did have the ability to create, however, and that
is what made him one of the most respected and well-known authors in the
country. Every university had fought for him as soon as he made it known he
wanted to get in a classroom. UNC had won out based on its reputable writing
program and the fact that it was so close to his muse, their summer home. Every
summer since she could remember, her father and his family would rent the same
beach house for eight weeks so he could write as much as possible in the place
his creativity never seemed to stop. He would hole up in the loft that made up
the fourth floor of the home and only come down when he was starving. Clearly,
it was working since his last three books written there were instant best
sellers and the three before that only took a couple of weeks to climb the
charts.
Since Gemma landed at Raleigh-Durham
International Airport, they always waited on her there, loaded her things into
the already full car, and headed straight to the beach. As usual, this arrival
was no less awkward than those in the past. Gemma walked through the terminal,
dread and nerves filling her inside. She had been taught since she could absorb
information that these people were wrong and her mother was right. They were
the ones who had ruined any chance she ever had for happily ever after. When
the glass carousel door deposited her on the sidewalk, her father’s family sat
almost directly in front of her, waiting. He hurried out of his car and around
the front as Karen, his wife, climbed out with a smile too big for any grown
woman.
“Gemma.” Michael Andrews smiled down at her; it
was sincere if not insecure. “Did you have a good flight?”
“Sure,” she said as she handed her bag off to
him awkwardly. Karen came forward as if to hug Gemma, so she lowered her head
and hurried toward the van, pretending not to have seen the gesture as well as
the hurt in her stepmother’s eyes. Michael cleared his throat uncomfortably as Gemma
slid the door open and Karen started toward her own door to get back in the
vehicle.
Gemma peered inside the van and saw that Gray,
her brother and the youngest of the crew, had already designated the very back
of the van for himself. He was looking at his phone with his headphones already
in place. Kate sat on the far side of the vehicle, waiting on Gemma to climb
in. Gemma could already tell it was going to be a long ride. She hadn’t even
turned to shut the door behind her when Kate started talking.
Yes, a very
long ride, indeed.
Their summer home was in a small city called
Emerald Isle, which was the definition of a beach town. Gemma watched out her
window as they entered the city by way of a bridge. Dozens of people stood on
their paddleboards below, making their way slowly into the distance. There were
gift and souvenir shops, bike and equipment rentals, walking and riding trails,
and quaint diners everywhere. Her favorite place to frequent, Dockside Coffee,
was open, and she could almost taste her medium iced coffee. What made it so
great was the ice. The cubes were frozen coffee. Her mouth watered, and her
caffeine-deprived head pounded at the thought.
A left and then, about a mile later, a right
and she was in the beachside community that would be her home for the last two
months she would ever have to spend with these people. Kate sat next to her in
the middle row of the mini-van, reading what looked like a book Gemma had been
dying to get her hands on for weeks. She would have to figure out a way to get a
hold of it one night while Kate was off with her mother or asleep. This
wouldn’t be the first summer she “borrowed” books from her sister. She had
quite the knack for grabbing the book right from Kate’s hands as she slept.
Kate and Gemma were complete opposites. Kate
was small in both build and height. Her straight sandy blond hair always seemed
to be perfectly in place, and her bright eyes glowed against her tan skin. She
always wore perfect makeup and the latest trends in fashion. She was the
cheerleader, the class president, and one of the most talented singers Gemma
had ever heard in person, and that was only in the shower. Gemma was average in
every way and had wavy dark hair. Her eyes were pretty enough, a dark brown
that almost shined, and that worked to dress her face up enough that she rarely
wore more than mascara and lip gloss. She had hidden in the shadows all through
high school and had never gotten involved in anything beyond her school’s newspaper.
She had dated a guy she worked with on some stories for a few months, lost her
virginity to him, found that sex sucked, and bailed on that relationship. To
Gemma, all the glamour had gone to her father’s second child, and that pretty
much summed up the karma of her life.
Gray was asleep across the rear bench, his legs
over the back of his seat. Gemma couldn’t believe how much her fifteen-year-old
half-brother had grown. Gemma wondered how he was already so old. It was crazy
how fast time went everywhere else but seemed to stall for her. She would
finally be eighteen a few weeks before summer ended. Having her birthday every
summer while she was away from her mother and with a family she could barely
tolerate just further proved her lot in life. Kate, who had just turned seventeen
in March, had spent the first thirty minutes of the car ride, telling Gemma
about the party her parents had let her throw. Gemma wasn’t sure what tortured
her more: the fact that Kate believed Gemma would in any way be interested in
this or the fact that Kate now had a brand new Jeep to drive around her high-class
neighborhood while Gemma and her mother shared a Mazda3.
As they pulled up into the circular driveway,
Gemma jumped out of the car as fast as she could. She wanted nothing more than
to get in the house, throw on some shorts, and get the hell out of there. If
Karen asked her if there was anything special she wanted picked up from the
store one more time, she was going to cut her. As she was pulling her bags out
of the trunk, a loud laugh had her turning around to see where the noise was
coming from. A beautiful blond girl held onto a beach chair and bag as another dark-haired
girl carried an umbrella and her own bag. A tall, dark, and oh-so-handsome boy
gripped the free hand of the dark-haired girl and smiled down at her. Definitely
taken. Blondie glanced over her shoulder at Gemma and smirked. Something about
that smile told Gemma distance was best. No problem there. She turned back to
her bags and headed for the back door.
“Gemma,” her father called and poked his head
around the side of the van. “Don’t go anywhere. We’re going to eat in a few,
and then I was thinking we could hang out and play a game or something
tonight.” Gemma fought to keep from rolling her eyes as she turned back.
“Yeah, sorry”—she shrugged—“I’m not really
hungry, and I’m pretty tired from all of the travel.” I’ll just be in my room.”
Michael frowned but nodded, knowing that starting a fight now was useless.