“What?” His manly brows furrowed.
“Rough and dirty,” she added, and he frowned. She smiled, “And HOT.”
“Are you trying to piss me off?” he asked lightly, his hand still caressing her cheek. She shook her head.
“Best sex ever,” she whispered, her nose tingling slightly at the admission. She watched how his serious expression dissolved and turned soft. It might have been rough and a little dirty, but it had been more than sex, and somehow she knew they both felt that.
“Fuck, baby.” He closed his eyes and kissed her tenderly before sliding out of her. The loss of him made her miss him immediately.
He brought her in close to him, making her wrap her bare thigh over his legs.
“Did I hurt you?” he asked, and she shook her head. His arms wrapped tightly around her, making her press her face into the nook of his throat. “That was…”
“Great?”
“Unbelievable,” he said, his voice slightly off, and she wondered what that was about. He kissed the top of her head as their breathing went back to normal. Her body felt boneless and tired, but refreshed and energized at the same time. She looked at the clock over the mantle and sighed.
“I should go.”
“Go?”
“It’s late,” she stated, and his body froze momentarily before he stood, pulling his boxers up.
Feeling physically and emotionally exposed, and with no throw blanket in sight, she stood and grabbed her clothes off the floor. She could feel his eyes on her as he watched her silently.
For all the sexual adventures she’d had in her life, she didn't share her bed. She might be in love with him, and he might want to try things out with her, but there was nothing stable between them. Spending the night was too much and definitely not an option, she thought as she walked to his guest bathroom.
Chapter Thirteen
Grant
When she closed the door behind her, he went to grab two glasses of water for them from the kitchen. She quickly came back out, dressed in her tank top and shorts, barefoot, and he leaned against the counter wearing nothing but his boxers. He wasn't sure why she was dressed, or why she needed to leave.
With one hand in her shorts, she walked to him, grabbed the glass of water with her free one, and drank. His kitchen was completely silent. She had a look on her face he couldn't read, so he was just going to wait and see what she was going to say.
Her hand left her pocket and went flat to his stomach. He kissed her forehead, loving the way she tucked her petite body into his.
“I should probably go.”
“Why? Worried about the traffic?” he finally asked, fighting the smile on his lips, but she didn’t smile back at his corny joke.
“I...” She was looking away from him, and he didn't like that. He didn’t like that note of hesitation from her.
“We're not done.” Her head snapped up to him, all wide-eyed in surprise. He couldn’t help but smile. “You seriously think once on the couch is enough? I expected more from you.” Her lips twitched, and he watched her take another drink, her mind thinking furiously.
“What are we doing?” she surprised him by asking and taking a step away from him.
“Come here.”
“No,” she snapped, and he raised an eyebrow. “I need to know. I don’t want what we have to get messed up and…” She swallowed hard and looked him in the eyes. “What we’ve done so far can completely mess it all up.”
“Honey…” he was going to explain to her how he felt, but she kept talking.
“I can do casual if that’s what you want,” she offered, and he wondered if that was what she wanted. A sick feeling kicked into his gut.
“Casual? What the fuck?” he whispered, not breaking eye contact with her.
“I…”
“Did that feel casual to you?” He was pissed. He knew that both of them losing their shit wouldn’t help. If anything, that would make everything go to shit, but he couldn’t help it.
“I…” she started to talk, but he asked her again, his voice even deeper now.
“Did that feel casual to you?”
“Look, I just want…” She wasn’t answering, and that made him lose his shit.
“I get you’re all for women’s lib, Shell. I’ve seen you with the men you date and fuck.”
“What?” She flinched as if he had struck her, but he was too pissed to stop. How could she think what they had could ever be casual?
“I’ve seen you.” The accusation was clear in his voice. “Shit, you get these guys and drag them around by their balls, just so that they can get a whiff of that sweet pussy of yours, but I am telling you right now, I’m not like them.”
“You are completely right about that!” she yelled, and he saw the pain in her eyes. Pain he’d somehow caused. It made him cool off instantly. Calm down, Grant, Olivia’s voice whispered in his mind. “I don’t know what the hell I was thinking.” She shook her head, placing the glass in the sink and walking to grab her wool shawl. “This was a mistake,” she hissed, those four words snapping him completely out of the shitty attitude he’d flown into.
“Shell…” He started to walk toward her, but she turned, silent tears running down her face, a look of hurt and pain so raw he couldn’t move.
“Don’t,” she whispered loudly, putting her hand out. “Don’t touch me.”
“Honey…”
“Don’t call me that either. You know what the difference between me and the younger women you fuck is?” She didn’t even wait for him to say a thing. His heart beat painfully in his chest. “I know what I want. That also means I know what I don’t want. You’re a grown man, Alexander, act like it. I’m far from your first, so don’t be fucking bothered by who might have warmed my sheets before, because guess what? You sure as hell won’t be there anytime soon.” With that, she slammed his French doors, and he heard her run off into the darkness.
He rubbed his face, wondering how the fuck this had been the best and worst night all at the same time. He grabbed his shorts from the floor and put them on as well as tugged on a sweater that hung off a hook by the back door.
He walked out into the darkness of his yard and looked next door. The light was off in her studio, but the light in the kitchen of the main house was on. With his hands on his head, he breathed in deeply and knew he couldn’t let time cool her off. That wasn’t how he had to handle her. He’d fucked up and needed to make shit right.
He went out his gate and to hers, and when he opened her back door, he saw her standing by her dining table, her amber colored eyes looking at him.
“I don’t want to talk to…” she started to tell him as she stood and stepped closer to him, but he cut her off.
“I’m sorry.” And he was.
He was a dick.
He’d been married for a long time. He knew it was better to apologize than hold on to his stupid pride. The scowl on her face couldn’t hide her surprise, and he knew she was trying to stay angry.
“You and I are not casual. I sure as shit don’t want casual. We’ve known one another way too long and know one another way too well to play games and pretend otherwise. If we do this, which, honey, we kind of already jumped in, we need to be honest. We can’t play games.” To say she looked surprised would have been putting it mildly. He took advantage of that and moved in closer to her and wrapped his arms around her waist. “I really am sorry, honey.” He kissed her nose, and she looked down.
The silence around them grew, but he didn’t let go. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t.
“Shell…”
“What I feel for you scares me,” she admitted so damn softly he almost couldn’t believe he heard her.
“Why?” His voice gentled. He was worried about her shutting down on him.
“I’m…”
“You’re what?” His hand cupped her jaw, and she looked at him as if she’d somehow been defeated.
“I’m me.”
“What?”
/>
“I’m me and you’re you.”
“Shell…”
“Polar opposites.” She sighed, and he moved his hand to the back of her head, tipping it back so that she would look at him.
“Do you feel something for me?”
“You know I do! Other than Jess, you’re my best—”
“More than friends?” he pressed and watched her bite her lips as her eyes widened. A second before she closed her eyes, he saw the fear behind them, and he was curious about that.
“Yes,” she admitted, and he leaned in, stopping only when his lips were a hairbreadth away from hers.
“I do too,” he spoke there.
“Grant, I’ve…”
“Come home with me.”
“Babe…”
“Let’s go to bed.” She opened her eyes at his words. They were on his lips, and even in the darkness of the night, he could see the slight blush on her cheeks.
She opened her lips, and he leaned in to kiss her quiet. He wasn’t sure why he didn’t want to let her come up with excuses about why they shouldn’t do this. All he knew was that he needed it. He needed to kiss away the pain he’d caused, and the fear that was behind her gaze. He needed it more than his own breath.
“Okay.” Her breathy acceptance made him feel as if he’d somehow conquered a new world.
He led them back to his place, closing and locking the doors the moment she walked in.
“Grant?”
“Hmm?” he asked, mindlessly grabbing the shell he’d picked up during their walk, and threw it into the glass jar.
“What is that?” she asked, her head tilted as she watched him. Now it was his turn to blush.
“Just a bowl.”
“With shells?”
“Yeah,” he snipped. “I live on the beach, and this place needed beach décor.”
“Beach décor?” Her lips twitched as she stepped closer. “Rocks and shells are your idea of beach décor?”
“Yeah.”
“I always wondered about that.”
“About what?”
“What you did with them. Though I never noticed you picked up rocks. On our walks, that is. Do you get shells and rocks on your runs too?”
“No”
“Then?” He shrugged, and she smiled.
“I got the rocks on the walks I went without you.”
“And the shells?”
“Every walk we have taken at night,” he admitted, realizing what he’d done and what it meant. He studied her. She looked as if she could have been toppled over by a light breeze.
“I’ve never done this.” That worry he’d seen outside was obvious now.
“Done what?”
“Any of this.” With a slight shake of her head, she looked down at the dark, wooden floors, and he didn’t like her eyes not on his. “I’m far from a virgin, Grant, but a relationship…” She took a deep breath, “More than casual, I’ve never…” He thought he understood what she was saying, and it surprised him.
“How is that possible?” His voice was low, and she shrugged, still not looking at him.
“I’ve never met anyone who would have wanted to take it there…”
“Bullshit,” he stated, and her surprised eyes jerked up to his. “I’ve seen the men in your life, honey. They all wanted more.”
“I didn’t care to give it to them.”
“Are you giving it to me?” he asked, his heart charging in his chest.
“I…” Her eyes darted nervously from the floor back to him.
“Will you?” he asked again. Something bigger he’d ever expected at this stage in his life was happening right now, in his fucking living room, and they were three feet away.
“Grant,” she whispered nervously, and he couldn’t take it anymore. He closed the space and pulled her body into his. Holding her close, he put his lips at her ear.
“I’ll take care of it,” he promised. “I won’t take it for granted, I swear…”
“I’m scared.”
“Don’t be. I won’t let anything happen. Have I ever let anything happen to you?” he asked, and she moved, looking into his eyes
“Cards on the table?” Her voice trembled.
“Yes.”
“I have never been in love.” He swallowed hard, wondering how the fuck that was possible. She dripped love into everything she did and gave it to everyone she came into contact with. “Until now.” Two little words said out loud with a tremble in her voice, but she’d laid it out for him.
“You love me love me?” She nodded, and he smiled, running his nose over hers. “I love you too, Shell,” he whispered against her lips.
“Aren’t you scared?” she asked, her voice full of wonder.
“No.”
“Really?”
“I’m fucking terrified,” he said, and her body shivered. “But I know what I feel. Now that I know we’re on the same page, we move from there.”
“But… “
“What?” He looked at her.
“Olivia was one of my closest friends.” He hugged her tightly, her arms wrapping around his waist. She was worried about Olivia. God, he fucking loved her. That alone proved to him again the amazing woman she was.
“Somehow, I think Olivia would have been happy about this.” She looked at him as if trying to figure out what he meant. “She went peacefully, honey. She was worried about me and made me promise to try to fall in love again.”
“She made me promise to help you feel alive,” she shared, and now it was his turn to be surprised. Thinking about it, she had done that, hadn’t she?
“You did,” he admitted, and her eyes shone brightly. “You would piss me off on purpose. It drove me crazy.” She gifted him with a mischievous smile that turned sweet. “When did you know?” he asked.
“I don’t know…”
“Don’t do that. Cards on the table, remember?” he reminded her, and a second later, her face moved up and her gaze met him head-on.
“While I was sketching you. It hit me like freight train. I couldn’t fight it.” Her voice softened at the end. He moved away, holding her hand, and led them up to his bedroom.
She walked into a space of his home she had never once been in, and he liked the way she looked there. He’d never brought a woman home, much less to his personal retreat.
Her back was facing him as she stood in front of one of her paintings he’d purchased years ago. He heard a soft giggle escape from her, one of her hands going to her lips.
“I always wondered who bought this one.”
“Yeah?”
“Why did you buy it?” she asked, not turning to look at him, and he figured he should keep laying his own cards on the table.
“It felt different.”
“It was.” Her head tilted to the side.
“It felt like a piece of you was in that painting,” he admitted, and she turned to look at him as he kept talking. “I didn’t want it to go to some stranger who wouldn’t understand that.”
They stared at one another, and before he knew it, he watched in silence, his mouth running dry at the sight of her hands moving to the hem of her top and pulling it up and over her head, letting it fall where it would. He would have gone over and picked it up, being the neat freak kind of man he was, but her hands went to the back of her black lace bra to unhook it. It fell to the ground. Where? He wasn’t sure, and he couldn’t get himself to care since he was looking at her topless, as she was working on taking off her shorts.
Standing nude in his room, she walked to him. Her hands on the bottom of the sweater, she tugged it until he pulled it over his head. He helped her when her hands moved on his pants, again not caring that the floor was littered with their clothes. The warmth of her skin pressed against his.
“Let’s go to bed,” she whispered before kissing him, and that was exactly what they did. Only there was hardly any sleeping done.
Chapter Fourteen
Shelly
She shi
fted against him as he kissed the top of her head. She wasn’t sure how they’d ended up here, but she couldn’t get herself to care. He’d brought her over the edge twice. Once with his hands and another with his mouth, and she had gone on her knees and returned the favor.
His fingers stroked the tips of her long hair. She closed her eyes and listened to him breathe in deep as if memorizing the way she felt tucked up next to him in bed.
“You still awake?” he asked, his free hand around her and in her hair.
“Yeah.”
“You okay?” She smiled and nodded. She was more than okay. She was satisfied in a way that felt complete. Slow and sweet that built up to hard and beautiful. He was glorious in bed.
“Mhhmm,” she murmured. “Grant,” she whispered into the darkness.
“Hmm?”
“There was no one,” she whispered, biting her lower lip.
“What?”
“You know how you thought I was seeing someone?” His body stilled.
“I don’t need to know about him. As long as it’s done, I don’t want to know, honey.”
“I made it up.” Her voice was soft, but she shook her head at herself. She needed him to understand. “The night of the charity event when you came over to apologize, I lied. I didn’t have a date the next day,” she told him, and he shifted their bodies so that they were side by side, facing one another.
“Why?”
“I thought you…”
“I what?”
“You couldn’t see me that way. We’re so different, and the women you date are so much younger. It felt hopeless to feel like I did.”
“So you lied to me?”
“Yes and no. At first it was just to get out of going to lunch with you. Then I felt pathetic or didn’t want to come home, so I stayed at the Beverly Hills Hotel a couple of nights a month. I never said I was seeing anyone. You came up with that on your own.” He frowned, his eyes narrowing.
“What about the dresses, and your hair, and that damn red lipstick?”
“Red lipstick?” She smiled, but his face didn’t soften, so she answered him, “I wanted you to see I could be like the women you dated, even if I am older.”
Wishing For You (Never Too Late Book 2) Page 7
