Yet another. They were looking at each other. His face was clean-shaven, but the look in his eyes as he gazed down at her was familiar. It was the same way he looked at me.
“What are you doing?”
The picture fell from my fingers as I turned in surprise, my heart leaping into my throat. The frame exploded, glass going everywhere.
“I’m… I’m so sorry.”
Squatting down, I tried to save the photograph from the glass. There was a long scratch down the center, cutting them in two. A heartbreaking metaphor if I’d ever seen one.
“Leave it alone.”
His voice was harsh, tight. My fingers trembled as he snatched the picture from my hand, his jaw tightening as he saw the scratch I’d already witnessed. The look on his face as he gazed down at his dead wife broke my heart.
“I’m sorry.”
His face tightened again as he placed the photograph back in the box. “Get out, Zoe.”
I swallowed hard and took a step back, crying out when a piece of the glass sliced into my toe.
He cursed and reached for me, scooping me up and over the glass. He was breathing hard, not from exertion but from pure anger as he deposited me on the kitchen counter.
I’d been here before, not so long ago, my wounds being treated by him. But this time, he wasn’t looking at me with compassion and worry. Now, the anger was growing and growing, the way he was ripping open the bandages evidence of how truly furious he was.
I caught his wrist, stopping his movement when he went to lift my foot. “I can do this.”
He growled low in his chest and yanked his wrist away. “I think you’ve done quite enough.”
The verbal barb was razor sharp, and I took a deep breath. He had a right to be angry, I reminded myself. I had snooped without permission. I had broken something that was precious to him.
Pain sliced through my toe as he pulled the glass out, turning me without warning until my foot hovered over the sink. The water was icy when he first turned it on, and I tried to jerk away. He growled again, tightening his hand around my ankle, holding me still.
“Let. Me. Go.”
He grunted some response I didn’t understand but loosened his grip as he waited until the water was warmer. Then he washed away the blood and used paper towels to dry me off.
“Is that why you were attracted to me? Because I look like her?”
His eyes flashed up to mine, an expression I’d never seen living there. It was a combination of every emotion a human being could feel. But he said nothing.
“Is it?”
Something deep and vital to my well-being was cracking in my chest as he fumbled with a Band-Aid, the adhesive sticking to his finger then collapsing on itself when he tugged it loose.
“Fuck!” he screamed, throwing the small brown bandage at the cabinet. But it didn’t go. It clung to his hand, pissing him off even more. “Dammit!” He wagged his hand up and down, trying to shake it off, and I couldn’t help it… I laughed.
Seeing such a big man having a hissy fit was funny.
He whirled on me, the bandage still hanging from his hand. “You think this is funny?”
Not anymore.
The way he glared at me was a reminder that I was isolated with a stranger I knew intimately, but didn’t really know.
My heart began to pound. “I’m sorry.”
“Stop fucking saying that!” he roared. “God, stop it. Just stop.” His voice cracked. “Just stop.” His voice was a whisper by the end.
Taking a fresh bandage from the box, I wrapped my toe and slid down from the counter. “Gray. I—”
He backed away, his hands in his hair again, the Band-Aid now stuck to his beard. My heart squeezed. All the fear I’d just felt, all the pain and uncertainty melted away. Not completely, but compassion took the place of it all.
I held out my hand. His face grew tight and he looked up at the ceiling, his hands still in his hair.
I waited. I didn’t force myself on him. Just held the space for him to come closer.
Come Closer.
The book I’d begun writing as a girl. The book I’d finish writing as a woman.
Because of him.
There was a part of me that wanted to punish him for yelling at me, for scaring me, for looking at me with such hateful eyes. That was the ego part of me that wanted to make him wrong while putting myself on the pedestal of rightness.
There was also a part of me that wanted to doubt him, that made me want to put my wall back up, push him away. That was the scared little girl inside me, the one who’d seen the dark side of the world and had trouble believing that anyone could live in the light.
The biggest part of me didn’t want to lose Gray. I didn’t want to lose what was growing between us. I wanted to fight for him. For us. For me. And I refused to let my ego or my fear get in the way.
His fingers linked with mine, and I exhaled as he lifted my hand to his lips. “You do look like her,” he said, voice raw. “At first, it was a punch in the gut. The similarities may have been what drew me to you, but it’s you, Zoe… dammit, it’s you, the unique you, that made me unable to stay away.”
“You saved me when you couldn’t save her.”
His entire face twitched as his jaw tightened. “Yes. And I thank God every day that I made it to you in time.”
I squeezed his fingers, tears burning in my eyes. “Let me save you back.”
He smiled. “You are. You do. Back in the room, I went a little crazy. I’m sorry for that. It’s just that I hadn’t been in that room for so long, and seeing you there… seeing the pictures, her stuff. I don’t often go off a deep end, but I took a flying leap from it then.”
I nodded. “Yes, you did, but even in your anger you didn’t hurt me.” I smiled and stepped closer to pull the Band-Aid from his beard. “You pretty much demolished this, but you didn’t hurt me at all.”
He touched my cheek, the big hand so gentle. “I would never hurt you.”
“Even with a feather?”
He scratched at his beard, at the place where I’d yanked off the bandage. “Um… feather? Am I missing something here?”
I laughed, relief flooding through me that after the very tense few minutes we’d experienced, we were able to come back to this good place. We would need to talk about things later. But that was later. This was now.
“On my first night here, I asked if you tortured people and you said that—”
“Oh, yeah. That’s right. I said I only tortured with feathers.” He slid his hand down his face. “God, I can’t believe I’m that corny.”
I stepped closer, until my breasts were resting against his chest. “I don’t think it’s corny. I think it’s sexy.”
His eyebrows shot up. “You do?”
I ran my hands under his t-shirt, feeling his warm skin. “Will you torture me?”
Gray’s nostrils flared, his pupils dilating as desire spiked through him as hard as it was spiking through me. “I thought we were taking a day off from sex.”