Harlow
When I opened my eyes Grant’s arm was wrapped around me and I was nice and warm, tucked against his chest. I glanced at my closed door. The clock beside the bed said it was after eleven in the morning. Nan would be awake by now. Was I ready to face this?
“Stop thinking so hard,” Grant mumbled sleepily.
He wasn’t at all worried about Nan. I didn’t understand their relationship at all. If I was smart I wouldn’t be snuggled up in bed with someone who had any kind of relationship with Nan. But having the willpower to ignore Grant’s sexy smile and smooth-talking ways was almost impossible.
“I won’t let her do anything to hurt you,” Grant said into my hair.
That wasn’t what I was worried about. I could take on Nan if I had to. I was more concerned with making a choice that would eventually break my heart. Could I love Grant? Was I falling in love with him? Was it fair for me to love him?
Yes. I was positive I could love him. But I wasn’t in love with him right now. This was simply attraction, and possibly a crush. He flashed his smile and I did dumb things. That would be considered a crush, right? And if he wasn’t in love with me then would it hurt for me to love him? Even if he didn’t know my secret yet?
“Turn around and look at me,” Grant said, letting his tight hold on me go so I could actually move.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because I don’t like where your head is. I need to fix it,” he replied.
He had no idea where my head was. And he really needed to get over wanting to fix everything for me.
“I’m not worried about Nan,” I told him. Okay, maybe I was a little. I didn’t like confrontations, and the one I had waiting on me when we left this room was going to be dramatic.
“Then why are you so quiet?”
“I’m trying to figure out what we’re doing. If I’m headed for possible heartache in the future,” I replied honestly. There was no reason to lie to him. I wasn’t one for pretenses.
“Turn around,” Grant growled, pulling my arms around him this time.
This was a bad idea. His face looked even better all sleepy. His eyes weren’t fully awake, which only made his long lashes more obvious. And his hair was all messy. Made a girl want to run her hands through it.
“I don’t do relationships. Closest I got was with Nan, and that was because she was so damn needy. I liked being needed. No one ever needed me. She did. But then she was also crazy as f*ck and heartless, and that ended things for me. So what you and I are doing right here is a first for me. I’ve never wanted to wake up and cuddle with a female in my life. I’ve never missed her when she wasn’t around. You’re all I can think about, Harlow. Where I’m headed is new to me, but I damn well want to go there as long as that’s where you’ll be. You’re worried about getting hurt, but I don’t think you understand yet that you’re holding all the damn cards, sweet girl. All the damn cards.”
I stared up at him and let his words sink in. Why me? What was it about me that made this man want to do something he had never done before? Was I needy? Did he think I needed him? Because I was pretty damn self-sufficient.
“I’m not needy,” I told him.
He grinned. “I already figured that out. But I am—at least where you’re concerned.”
And there went my resolve to strengthen one of the walls I had built around myself. Instead, it crumbled a little. This man knew exactly how to make me weak.
I started to say more when a loud banging noise sounded at the door, followed by “Grant Carter, get your f*cking worthless ass out here NOW!”
And there was Nan.
I jumped out of bed, thankful to be wearing my pajamas and not naked, like Grant had wanted. “She figured it out,” I whispered.
Grant sighed and lay on his back as if he didn’t care. “Go away,” he called back.
She started banging on the door again. “I will not go away, you motherf*cker! Get out of there now! I won’t let her do this. She has it all, why the hell does she have to take you, too? Stupid slut!”
My eyes went wide. I’d never been called that, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about it.
Grant sprang out of bed and stalked to the door. The murderous look on his face had me backing up against the wall. Maybe I wasn’t as brave as I thought I was. Grant was an even-tempered guy, so I’d never seen him look so . . . pissed.
He jerked the door open. Then he reached for her. I watched as he grabbed her shirt and pulled her close to his face. “Don’t ever call her that again. Do you f*cking understand me? Ever.” He let her go and she stumbled backward, and then he slammed the door in her face. The sound of the lock turning echoed in the silence around us. I think he had shocked her into silence, too.
His shoulders were rising and falling hard as he laid one hand on the door and stared down at the floor.
I didn’t move and I didn’t speak.
Finally, he turned to me, and the anger I had seen earlier was gone. He looked like Grant again. Fun-loving, easygoing Grant. “I’m sorry,” he said simply.
I didn’t know what to say to that. “Okay” didn’t seem like the right word to use here. I just nodded.
“She just wants to hurt you. I’ve tried to talk to her and help her see that nothing is your fault, but she won’t listen. If I could muzzle her I would.”
A mental picture of Nan muzzled made me smile. Grant smiled back at me in return and then walked over to me. “She should’ve never called you that. You’re so far from that, and she knows it.”
He was talking about the slut comment. Was that what set him off?
“I think you scared her. She’s not saying anything.” I wasn’t even sure she was still there.
A frustrated frown touched his forehead. “She isn’t done. She’s just too mad to react right now. I’ve never been that tough on her. I typically just walk away and let her talk. But that,” he shook his head, “that shit was going to be dealt with.”
“Are you trying to fix things again?” I asked, wondering why he thought he had to fix all my problems.
He grinned and bent down to press a kiss to the corner of my mouth. “No, sweet girl, I’m just correcting a wrong. No one can fix Nan.”
I was afraid he was right.
Grant
All I wanted to do was get Harlow naked and back in that bed. But I was behind on work and we both needed to leave the room and get this Nan shit over with.
I let Harlow get dressed while I cleaned up in the bathroom. I couldn’t watch her dress because we’d end up back in bed. Screw work. Once we were both dressed, I opened her bedroom door slowly, just in case Nan was standing out there, waiting to pounce.
Harlow waited behind me and I was pretty sure I heard a sigh of relief when we saw the hallway was empty. I reached back and took her hand as we walked out of the room and to the stairs. I didn’t think Nan was going to jump out of a damn corner and attack, but I still felt safer with Harlow as close to me as possible.
I wasn’t going to let Harlow stay here alone until I was sure Nan was over this. I didn’t know what she’d say to Harlow, and I wasn’t going to let her lash out at her without me there to protect her and shut that shit down.
“Hungry?” I asked her as we reached the bottom step with no Nan sightings.
Harlow jumped when something made a loud noise in the kitchen. Guess we wouldn’t be eating here. “I, uh . . . probably not a good idea,” she said, staring at the kitchen.
“Want to just leave?” I asked.
Harlow shook her head. “No. I live here, too. I want coffee before I leave. I won’t hide; this is my home, too.”
The way her shoulders straightened reminded me that behind the sweet face was a spine of steel. She’d been through a lot. I just nodded and let her lead the way.
If she was getting coffee then so was I.
Nan was standing in front of the microwave and turned to glare at us when we entered the kitchen. Her eyes dropped to our joined hands, and her glare turned to pure hatred.
“You have got to be f*cking kidding me. Really, Grant? Holding hands? My God, you have lost your mind.” She snarled and jerked the microwave open and pulled out a small bowl.
Harlow let go of my hand and walked over to the coffeepot. I had to make myself stand still and not run after her to guard her. She wanted to do this and I was going to let her.
“He gets bored easy with your type. I don’t know what he’s telling you but he likes excitement, which you could never give him. Don’t let that little heart of yours get involved, because you’re not Grant Carter’s type,” Nan said in a haughty tone as Harlow went about making coffee and avoiding her. When she set her mug down, she turned and gave Nan her full attention.
“He may get bored with me, but that isn’t your business. It’s mine,” Harlow replied.
I had already realized I would never get bored with her. She was so damn fascinating, no one could get bored with her.
“Grant likes to f*ck. He isn’t into hand-holding and talking about your feelings. He likes it rough. Right here across this counter, he’s thrown me down and ripped my panties off and f*cked me. He loves it, and he’ll be back for more.”
Yeah. That was enough. I started walking toward Harlow to get her the hell out of there before Nan gave her any more details I didn’t want her to hear. She didn’t do well being reminded of my past sex life.
“Then I guess that makes you the slut, Nan. Not me. Because I’d never give you details. That’s just trashy.” Harlow picked up her mug, then turned to me. “Ready?” she asked, as if Nan hadn’t just given her a play-by-play of something I didn’t want her to know.
“Uh, yeah,” I replied, and glanced back at Nan, who was seething. That only made me smile. Damn, my sweet girl could cut deep with no drama. She just did it with ease.
I slipped my hand around her waist and led her to the door, where she grabbed her purse and keys. When we stepped outside, she moved away from my touch and looked back at me.
“That’s done now. I told you I could handle her. I missed tennis so I need to talk to Adam and apologize. Thanks for going with me yesterday. It meant a lot,” she said, then pressed a kiss to my cheek and started to walk toward her car.
What. The. F*ck?
I went after her and grabbed her arm to stop her. “Hey, wait. What was that?” Because it sure as hell felt like a brush-off. And that wasn’t f*cking happening.
She smiled at me sadly and shrugged. “My way of putting distance between us. I need it.”
Distance? “What the hell? I thought after yesterday that we had moved past distance.”
She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I don’t do this. I’ve never done this. That’s probably why I’ll have the image of you jerking Nan’s panties off and screwing her on the counter forever etched in my brain. Before, it bothered me; now, I have visuals. So I need distance.”
I wanted to hurt someone. Particularly a certain redhead in that damn house. “Harlow, don’t do this to me. That was before. I didn’t know. I was f*cked up. It was after we found Jace’s body, and I lost it there for a while.”
“I’m sorry, Grant. But I can’t. I’ve been protecting my heart for years. I can’t stop now. You’re dangerous. That sexy smile and those sweet words are hard to resist, but I can’t let something that could possibly destroy me into my life.”
No. F*ck no. She was not going to do this. “I’m not going to go away. I want you, Harlow. Just you.”
She reached up and brushed her thumb over my bottom lip. “I believe you right now. What scares me is who you’ll want in a couple of weeks.”
Then she turned and opened her car door and got in. Had I not just told her this morning that I had never felt this way about anyone? Were Nan’s f*cking words that powerful? My chest ached and I put my fist on it to ease the pain. I wouldn’t let Harlow do this. I just needed to find some way to prove to her that I was serious. Completely serious.
Harlow
Iwatched Adam finish his session with a lady I didn’t recognize. I tried to focus on apologizing to him and not on what had happened this morning. The fact that I had just reacted like a jealous girlfriend was eating me up. I wasn’t that girl. I didn’t let something like Grant’s past sex life make me punish him. I could lie to myself and say I had meant what I said, but the truth was I did it to get back at him. For what? Screwing around with Nan? When had I gotten so shallow? Was I acting like Nan? Oh, God. I felt nauseated.
Adam glanced over at me and I smiled. I would think about Grant later. I would work this out in my head. He didn’t deserve what I had done this morning. We were seeing where things could go with us. I knew about him and Nan. It wasn’t a secret. I’d heard them my first night back here. I had just gotten all territorial and been a bitch about it.
I was horrified with myself.
Adam ended his session and he waited until the lady he was working with walked out of the gate before following her out. He came over to me.
“You’re late,” he said with a smile I didn’t deserve.
“I slept in late. I’m sorry. Long day yesterday. I had to see my dad about family stuff.”
“It’s okay. Life happens. I hope everything is okay.”
I nodded. It wasn’t, but telling him the truth wasn’t going to happen. “Everything is fine. I just wanted to make sure you knew why I wasn’t here. I didn’t want you to think I was just blowing this off and had no thought to your time.”
He grinned. “How do you expect anyone to get frustrated with you? Has anyone ever? I’d find it hard to believe.”
I thought of Nan. He had no idea.
“It happens,” I assured him.
“Send them my way and I’ll correct that.”
Adam really was nice, and so less complicated than Grant. But the excitement and bone-melting passion weren’t there.
“I was about to grab some lunch. Want to eat with me? Make it up to me that you stood me up?” he said.
I was hungry, and company during lunch sounded nice.
“Yes. I’d love to,” I replied.
“Good. The restaurant here okay with you?”
I had never actually dined in the restaurant here. “Sure,” I told him. I just needed food. I wasn’t picky.
He held out his arm for me to take it. So nice. I slipped my hand over his arm and he led me up the stairs and toward the doors to the club.
The hostess obviously liked Adam. She couldn’t keep from smiling at him. I was worried she was going to trip walking us to a table.
“Your server will be with you in a moment,” she told Adam. As far as she was concerned, I didn’t exist.
When she walked away, I picked up the menu and tried to hide my grin.
“You find that amusing, don’t you?” Adam said, smiling over at me.
I pressed my lips together to keep from laughing and nodded.
“She’s cute and we went out once, but she isn’t really my type.”
No wonder she’d ignored me. I just nodded again and went back to looking at my menu.
“The boss is on his throne,” Adam whispered, and I glanced up. What was he talking about? He tilted his head slightly to the left. “You see the dark-headed guy up there in that round booth talking to Rush Finlay?”
I didn’t want to look. Especially if Rush was up there. He would see me staring. I gave it a few moments, then quickly glanced over my shoulder. Rush wasn’t paying attention to us. He was talking with the dark-headed man. I had seen him before. “Yes,” I replied.
“That’s the boss, Woods Kerrington. He owns the whole damn place. Nice guy if you don’t piss him off.”
He was young. I wanted to look back again just to make sure I had seen him correctly, but I didn’t. “Is he young? He looks really young.”
Adam took a drink of his water and nodded. “Yeah. Like twenty-five or something. His dad owned the place and died of a heart attack a while back. Now the place belongs to Woods. Finlay is a good friend of his and is on the board of directors. Rumor is so is Dean Finlay. When that got out it was really good for business. Everyone wants a glimpse of the famous drummer.”
I didn’t know all that. Interesting.
“Good afternoon. My name is Jimmy and I will be your server today. Can I get you mineral water or sparkling?”
I looked up at the tall, attractive blond who was smiling at me. “I would love mineral, please,” I replied.
“I’m good with this,” Adam replied. “What is the special today, Jimmy?”
“A cold crab bisque with raspberry salad and seaweed-wrapped grouper, fresh off the boat.”
Adam frowned and I decided I was sticking with a sandwich.
“I’ll let the two of you look over things and I’ll be back with your mineral water,” he said, then quietly walked away.
“You into seaweed?” he asked me with an amused smirk.
I laughed and shook my head. He must have been thinking the same thing. I had eaten some strange things while living in L.A., but seaweed was not one of them.
“I think I’m going with the chicken pecan salad on a croissant,” I told him.
“I may have moved to pecan country but I still don’t eat them,” he replied.
I closed my menu and glanced up just as Grant walked into the dining room. His eyes were focused on someone else and it gave me a moment to prepare myself. Would he say anything to me? Or had I made him mad? Did he decide my drama wasn’t worth it? I watched him as he walked over and sat down beside Rush at Woods Kerrington’s booth. Woods said something to Grant and he forced a smile that didn’t meet his eyes.
I had started to look away when his head turned and his eyes met mine. We both froze. I wasn’t doing anything wrong, but why did it feel as if I was? His eyes flickered to Adam, then back to me, and a hard edge transformed his face. He wasn’t happy. Well, crap.
I quickly looked back at my menu and counted to ten. My heart was beating fast, which was ridiculous. I shouldn’t be nervous. We hadn’t left things in a good place this morning, thanks to me. So me sitting here, having lunch with Adam, was no big deal. Right?
The chair beside me pulled out and I swung my gaze up to see Grant sitting down.
Okay . . . wrong. This was apparently a big deal.
He didn’t look happy but the tight smile on his face was trying to say otherwise.
“Hello, Adam,” Grant said before turning his intense blue gaze to me. “You could have asked me to lunch,” he said simply.
Technically, I hadn’t asked Adam. He’d asked me.
“You’re here with friends,” I told him, hating how my voice gave away how nervous I was.
Grant leaned closer to me. “I would drop anyone and anything the moment you called.”
There were those words again. The ones that managed to slide through you and turn you into a bowl of jelly.
“I, uh, Adam asked me to lunch. I was hungry,” I said, unable to look at Adam. I had no idea what he was thinking and I didn’t want to know right now.
“Looks like we have three guests now,” Jimmy said as he set the water in front of me.
“Mr. Carter, would you like me to get you something to drink?” Jimmy asked.
Grant didn’t take his eyes off me. “A sweet tea, please, Jimmy,” he replied.
“Yes, sir,” Jimmy said, and left without taking our orders.
“I guess I need to make sure I ask before Adam next time,” Grant said, then leaned back in his seat and put his arm around the back of mine in a possessive move. “So, Adam, how’s tennis going? Like the new job?” he asked in a polite tone.
Adam looked nervous. He glanced back at Woods’s table then back at Grant. I wondered if they were watching us. “Yes, sir. I’m enjoying it. The town is great.”
Grant touched my bare shoulder and he began to trace circles around it in a gentle caress. Adam noticed. This was becoming more and more awkward.
Grant
Icould feel Woods and Rush staring at me. They had tried to stop me. Not that I listened. It wasn’t like they wouldn’t have done the same thing. Sitting here eating and letting Adam the tennis pro hit on my girl. Hell, no. That was not happening.
Harlow was stiff as a board. I hated that she was so uncomfortable, but she shouldn’t have come to lunch with Adam, the f*cking tennis dude. This morning had f*cked up my day. If Harlow thought we were going to bed tonight with this shit unsettled, she was wrong.
I listened as Harlow ordered a sandwich and ignored Jimmy’s amused grin. He knew what was going on. He probably talked to Rush and Woods about it when he was filling their drinks.
“I want to show you something when lunch is over. Do you already have plans?” I wanted to add that she needed to take a break, but I didn’t want to sound like an ass.
Harlow glanced at me. “No, I don’t have anything to do.”
“Good,” I said, leaning in to wrap one of her strands of hair around a finger so I could feel its silkiness. “I’m sorry.” I said the words without thinking about them. But I was sorry. I was sorry about this morning. I was sorry about how uncomfortable she was right now. But I wasn’t sorry that I was making sure Adam knew Harlow was not available.
“Adam,” Woods’s voice caught my attention and I looked up to see that he’d walked over to the table. “Nelton is double booked. It was an accident. He needs help with Mrs. Venice before she causes a scene. If you could please help, I will have your lunch brought to you. It’s on the house today.”
He’d just made that bullshit up. I had to cough to cover my laugh. Guess he did have my back after all.
“Yes, sir,” Adam replied, standing up and looking over at Harlow. “I gotta go. Next time,” he said, then turned to leave.
Woods didn’t say anything else before he went back to his table. Rush was staring down at his drink, grinning. He was in on this, too. I coughed again to cover my laughter.
“That was a setup, wasn’t it?” Harlow said, looking at me with her eyebrows drawn together.
“I assure you, when Adam gets out there he will have someone to teach,” I told her. Woods would’ve made a phone call to be sure of it.
“But Woods made that happen,” she said. Harlow wasn’t stupid.
“Yeah, he did. I didn’t ask him to, though. That was all him, and probably Rush, from the look on his face.”
Harlow glanced over at them and they both quickly looked away from us.
“Guess it’s nice to have friends in high places,” she said, turning back to me.
I had been ready to thank Woods but if she was pissed, I wasn’t gonna be thanking him. “I had nothing to do with that,” I repeated.
She sighed and relaxed. “I think I believe you. And honestly, I don’t know how Adam was going to eat with you rubbing on me and glaring at him anyway.”
“I didn’t glare,” I replied with a relieved grin.
She rolled her eyes and picked up her glass. “Yes, Grant, you did.”
Maybe I had, but I didn’t like the guy. He wanted what I wanted. “I want to talk about this morning and I want to show you my place. You’ve never been there and I want you there.”
She took a sip of her water, then set it back down before looking at me. “I acted like a jealous girlfriend and I hate that. I’ve never acted like that before. I’m sorry. We aren’t exclusive. You have a past that isn’t my business, and when Nan threw the bait out there I took it. I shouldn’t have.”
Not what I’d been expecting her to say. Again, Harlow wasn’t like the other girls I knew. Also, we needed to discuss that “exclusive” comment. Because lunch with Adam was one thing, but I’d be damned if she intended to go out with that prick again. “What Nan said was mean and bitter. You didn’t like it and that’s normal. As for exclusive, I am very, very exclusive. Since yesterday on that plane, I knew I wasn’t touching anybody else.”
Harlow tilted her head to the side and studied me silently. Had she thought I was going to go screw other people now? Really? Was my reputation that bad?
“Okay” was all she said. If there one was thing about Harlow that drove me nuts, it was her one-word answers, like “okay,” when I wanted a few lengthy sentences. Dammit. Girls liked to hear themselves talk. Why didn’t she?
“Could you elaborate on that?” I asked, reaching over to take her hand in her lap because I just needed to touch her.
The corner of her mouth turned up. “What else do you want me to say? You aren’t going to sleep with anyone else while we’re doing . . . this thing we’re doing. And I won’t have lunch with anyone else,” she replied.
I needed more than that. “Lunch? That’s it?”
She shrugged. “It isn’t like you have to worry about me sleeping with anyone else. I don’t do that.”
No, she didn’t. And damned if that didn’t make me want to pull her into my lap and growl at anyone who looked her way like a damn dog with a bone. “Dates?” I asked. She’d been on a date with Adam.
She frowned. “I said no lunch. That meant dates, too.”
“Just wanted to clarify,” I told her, and leaned over to press a kiss to her lips. I had sat here and stared at them long enough. My eyes lifted and I saw Woods and Rush watching me. They were enjoying this a little too much.