“He hits her. He’s a fucking psychopath.”
“His father’s company will be quite the addition, and we both know Abigail isn’t the most…attractive investment.”
I looked back down the hall, thinking I should leave, when the click-clack of heels stopped my heart. I turned, finding Tansy Crowne. We both froze as I stared her straight in her red-brown eyes—eyes so similar to her least attractive investment’s. Then sanity returned and I quickly looked at the floor.
Her approaching footsteps were the only sound; then she stopped exactly parallel to me. I stared hard at her polished, nude heels, my heartbeat thunder. The minute dragged on like nails against a chalkboard.
“How much?” she asked, voice low.
“What?”
“How much?” she repeated. “I’ve paid off every girl who thought she loved my son. You all have a price. Name it.”
The shock of that statement had me looking up and into Tansy Crowne’s eyes.
“You’ve paid off every girl interested in Grayson? Does he know?”
Her red-brown eyes slimmed. “Do I tell him about the girls who wanted his money?”
“I don’t want his money,” I said, though I had to look away. Because what was I even doing here? I’d signed my name on a dotted line for cash. All this was only for money.
Tansy kept walking, and I let out a breath.
When I got to Grayson’s room, he was on the edge of a couch, legs spread and head in his hands, already in a tux for the party. He looked every bit the lonely, broken prince I knew him to be, crushed beneath the weight of expectations. I struggled with the decision to leave him alone or go to him.
I wanted to take the weight off his shoulders as no one had done for me when I was a kid, but I knew that was impossible, because no one could take that weight away. Sometimes problems are just unfixable.
So I said the one thing I wished someone had said to me.
“It’s not fair.”
He lifted his head at my voice. It was the infamous Playboy Gray with his tangled, messy hair—all to hide the deep-blue eyes beneath. The iconic messy image of Grayson Crowne, the boy who doesn’t care, but in reality, it’s because he cares too much.
“Whatever this weight is on your shoulders, you shouldn’t have it…” I looked down, unable to stare into his burning eyes, fiddling with my thumbs. “Your shoulders will get stronger, though.”
Silence stretched until his choked voice called to me. “Come here.”
My heart was already close to shattering, but I couldn’t say no to him. Not because he didn’t give me a choice, but because my heart was wrapped around a wire, and he held the leash. When I was within distance, he grasped my wrist, tugging me into his lap.
He stroked the back of my neck, looking beyond, like he wasn’t aware I was even there.
“I had one fucking thing,” he said, still staring ahead, like he wasn’t talking to me. “When my father died, I filled the shoes as the patriarch, became the beam of support for my mother. I became a son for my grandfather…all I asked for was one fucking thing.”
He stopped talking, brow furrowed in thought, and cautiously I pushed the hair off his forehead.
“My mother, my grandfather, my sisters, this fucking house,” he continued. “Everyone needs a piece of Grayson Crowne. Fine, whatever, I just wanted one goddamn thing. Don’t marry my sisters off to assholes. Don’t let them marry someone like me. Which, admittedly, is like fishing for minnows in a sea of sharks.” He dragged his free hand down his face.
“Marrying someone like you wouldn’t be so bad,” I said.
His heavy eyes found mine, a look in them that strangled my soul.
“Yeah, Snitch, you’d marry someone like me?” He had a sardonic, self-deprecating tone, but I saw beneath that. To the hurt. The hope. And I knew I should lie, change the subject, to put some kind of frail armor around my already cracking heart.
“I would,” I whispered.
Pain splintered his blue eyes.
I’ve missed you, I almost said, missed these small moments where you trusted me enough to pull away your thorns…