My heart warmed, expanded even more to love him even harder.
I fell asleep in his arms and woke up draped across him like a blanket.
“Morning, sleepy.” He grinned, trailing his fingers down my spine and back up. “I love sleeping next to you. I think it should be a permanent arrangement. No more of this going back and forth between rooms.”
Yes. Wait… “Is this because of what I—”
He pressed his lips to mine. “No. It’s because I want you with me, even when we’re sleeping.”
“Your room or mine?”
His eyes narrowed as he thought. “Mine. It’s bigger.”
“I would make your room a mess.”
He nodded. “Yes. I’m willing to chance tripping over your clothes if that means I know you’re sleeping here.”
“Are you sure?” We already lived in the same house, but moving into the same room felt like…well, moving in together.
“Certain.” He grinned and playfully smacked my butt. “Now go get ready so we can hit the farmer’s market. I’m thinking osso buco for dinner.”
“Ooh, that sounds like a plan!” I gave him a smacking kiss and ran to the shower.
Once I was clean and wrapped in a fluffy towel, I wiped the steam from the bathroom mirror and began my skin routine. How different this was from the first shower I’d taken here, from when I’d been scared to encroach too much on his space. Now every space on my body was deliciously sore from Grayson.
Pretty fitting.
“All yours, flyboy,” I called as I went into my room and got ready. Grayson’s phone rang, and then went to voicemail. The shower started up again as I dressed in a flowy skirt that hit beneath my knees and a cute halter top.
Grayson’s phone rang, and rang again. The shower turned off, and I crossed into his…our…bedroom, and picked it up off the dresser as it rang yet again. Three missed calls from Parker.
Something had to be wrong.
“Grayson.” I knocked on the bathroom door. “Parker’s calling, and it looks important.”
The door opened and steam wafted out as he stepped into the hallway, taking the phone. “Wonder what she’s pissed about now.”
He squeezed my hand and went into his room to call her while I searched for a set of matching shoes in the pile of insanity I called a closet. Two Grecian sandals later, I knocked on his door. “Grayson?”
“Come in.” His voice was tense, curt.
“Everything okay?” I asked as I stepped inside. “What?” He had a bag on the bed and was furiously packing, throwing clothes in haphazardly.
“Thank you, that will work,” he said into the phone, and then hung up.
“Where are you going?” I asked, my voice small.
“Home. I just booked a flight.” He wasn’t looking at me, too busy throwing underwear in the bag.
He zipped the bag and slung it over his shoulder. As he walked toward me, he looked right through me, dazed. “Grayson,” I called out, catching him by the hand as he passed me into the hallway. He turned, then looked down at his hand, surprised that I held it.
“What’s going on?” I stroked the rough skin of his unshaven cheek. “Do you need me? Can I help you?”
He shook his head and stepped back, dropping my hand. “That was Parker.”
“Yes?”
He looked back up, his face contorted in shock, and joy, and something indescribable as he backed away. “I have to go, she’s asking for me.”
A sense of foreboding came over me, depleting the room of oxygen and gravity. “Who? Parker?”
“No, Grace. She’s awake.”
He was gone before I could find air to pull back into my lungs.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Grayson
I parked my rental car in the hospital lot. Parker had offered to pick me up at the airport, but I had this inexplicable need for solitude.
The salt in the air tasted like a memory. Dozens of times I’d stood outside this hospital—the morning Mia was born, the day I broke my arm, when Mom had her gallbladder taken out…the night I lost Grace, but I’d never felt this numb.