Her eyes were sad and hardened, a stone in the water. Then she sniffed, and fuck, my entire chest caved. Why is she the one I want to comfort? The one whose tears boil my blood?
I wanted to kiss her.
I wanted to kiss that trembling bottom lip she keeps trying to hide.
Why can’t Lottie see me? Why does it have to be her? She’s the one who hugs me. Who isn’t afraid to ask me questions. Who isn’t afraid to acknowledge my scars. Who looks at me like she understands them.
But she isn’t the one I love.
She isn’t the one I’m marrying.
Why her?
“Why you?” I growled, bruising her chin with my finger. “Why is it you?”
Her bright, pained eyes looked at me through thick lashes, and I dragged her closer. I wanted to taste the lips I knew I shouldn’t. Kiss her until I swallowed all the salty tears on them. Until we both forgot the reasons we shouldn’t.
“Why you?” I said softly, our mouths so close I could taste her breath.
Then the fireworks popped, and we separated.
Twenty-Four
STORY
* * *
Why you?
Grayson said it over and over again with anger, then despair, and nearly kissed me after that sudden shocking hug. I know he did. The possessive, burning look in his stony blue eyes has left claw marks in my gut.
I keep ruminating on what it might mean, and coming up empty.
It was another night and a stiff tension between Grayson and me in the dark. I’d been mentally kicking myself for hours. First, for letting way too much slip. Second, for West. I’d fallen for the unattainable. A boy who only wanted to play a prank on the silly maid.
Was I doing the same thing? Doomed to make the same mistakes.
“I know you’re awake, Snitch.” Grayson’s trademark bored grit wove into the darkness.
I understood why his fans were so obsessed with his apathy. I’d had a taste of the other side of Grayson, of his depths of passion deeper and hotter than the earth’s core. Now that I’d had a taste of it, I found myself wanting to do anything to hear it again.
The growl.
The heat.
The bite.
I knew it meant nothing. It’s just, in a twisted way, I was the only one he can trust. Our truth bulwarked by deals, and more secrets, and contracts. It wasn’t how it’s supposed to go, but in Gray’s life, it’s insurance.
When I didn’t immediately respond, he said, “Your thoughts are almost louder than your constant shifting.”
“What did you mean earlier when you said I’ll be gone soon?” I asked the dark.
He didn’t respond.
I shifted again.
“What did you and Lottie talk about?” I tried instead. I had no right to ask, I never did, but the darkness peeled away our caste.