Chapter 24
I curl furtherinto the warm body beneath my face, tightening the arm I have thrown across it, holding on tight. A growl sounds in my ear, and I frown, half-lucid in the dark. Parting my lips, I swipe along them with my tongue, picking up the feeling of thin hairs on the tip of it.
I rub the skin beneath my palm and feel something that has to be a hip bone slightly lower than where I have my cheek. I roll my face until my mouth brushes a thicker patch of hair, leading lower, and lower?—
“Get back up here,” Garrison grunts in the silence, still bossy even in a half-asleep state.
He reaches blindly for my hair and wraps the length of the ponytail around his fist, gently pulling on it before releasing it, holding me again. I push myself back up his body and return my head to where it was when we fell asleep. The steady thump beneath my ear is calming, quiet.
“Your body is unnaturally long,” I say on a sleepy exhale.
“You’re not short either.”
“I’m medium height.”
“I like it.”
I smile, uncaring if he can feel it against his skin. My scalp aches from having my hair up for so long, the pain impossible to ignore now that his tug reminded me of it. The thought of uncoiling myself from around Garrison to pull it free, however . . . I’d rather not.
“Can you pull my hair tie out? My head fucking hurts.”
He doesn’t reply, simply focusing on doing as I’ve asked instead. The arm curved around my back and over the thick swell of my hip shifts, his fingers grabbing the tie and pulling it free. I moan at the instant relief, the pleasure stronger than the pain.
My hair now flows over his arm and chest, and he dives his fingers deep, pressing the tips firmly against my scalp.
My eyes roll back as he works, not rushing or digging too hard. He massages my head for what feels like hours, not saying a word or expecting a damn thing in return. The dark, silent room, with only the steady thump of his heart beneath my ear, has me asleep again in no time.
A heavy weightkeeps me pinned to the bed. Lying on my side, I stretch my arm beneath the pillow tucked beneath my cheek and swallow. A sliver of pinky-orange light stretches from beneath the hem of the curtains across the carpet, so it must be early morning.
A soft snore tickles my ear, hot breath rustling my hair. A timid smile tugs at my mouth. Shy has never been a personality trait of mine, but apparently, all it took was an arrogant and beyond-handsome billionaire to yank it from its hiding spot. Fancy that.
Said billionaire shifts behind me and tightens the weight—an arm—over my side and yanks me further into his chest. His leg cages mine as he buries his face in my hair and groans.
“I never took you for a spooner,” I whisper, enjoying my loose muscles.
He makes a disgruntled sound in the back of his throat and presses his fingers deeper into my lower belly, getting a better grip on me.
I lick my dry lips. My arm is weak from being stretched at a weird angle as I check the time on my phone and then set it back on the nightstand. It’s too damn early.
“How are you feeling?” I ask him, already making a mental note of all the meds he’ll need to have and what I’m going to make him for breakfast.
“Sick,” he mutters.
“Thanks, tips. Do you need more painkillers? Cough medicine?”
He’s hot against my back but definitely not sweltering like he was before we fell asleep. I’ll have to check his temp again to be sure, but hopefully, his fever broke overnight.
“Painkillers. And something for my fucking nose. I can’t breathe.”
“Got it.”
I wiggle free of his grip and dig my toes into the carpet, stretching my back. Garrison rustles the blankets, the bed creaking. Glancing over my shoulder, I find him flopping onto his back with an arm tossed over his face.
“What’s wrong? Is it your stomach?”
“Put some pants on before I park your ass on my face, honey. I’m at too far of a disadvantage with my stuffed nose. I wouldn’t be my best.”
A loud laugh tears up my throat and explodes through the room. He lowers his arm enough to meet my eyes. They’re filled with heat and a light twinkle of humour, the combination making my belly flutter.
“You’d take suffocating between my legs to a whole new meaning,” I blurt out, the words cracking with laughter.
A smile teases his lips. “There are worse ways to go.”
I shake my head, forcing myself to stop laughing. “I’ll be right back.”
His reply is a blunt “okay” as I step out of the room, still pantless and feeling too evil to do as he asked. It takes a few minutes to get breakfast ready and on a table tray, but once I’m finished, I know he at least won’t be going all day without anything in his stomach. If he throws it up, then I’ll try something else.
With all of his meds already in the bedroom, I bring the food right to him, avoiding the light switch. The light from the hall is enough to have me avoiding tripping on anything. I’m sure anything brighter would only hurt his head.
“Can you sit up?” I ask softly.
Garrison pushes himself up on his elbows and then sits on his butt, slowly yanking a pillow behind his back for support against the headboard. He blinks slowly, each one heavy. I know he’s tired, but I’m pretty sure it was a stomach growl I heard beneath my ear last night, and I should have fed him long before now.
I carry the tray of food to his side of the bed, and he lifts a brow, staring at the assortment of cheap, easy food. White toast with butter, a mug of peppermint tea, and a bowl with instant oatmeal that I found in the cupboard from who knows how long ago. I’m oddly nervous as I wait for him to say something. It’s just food, but it feels like more than that.
“The only person who’s ever brought me breakfast in bed is my mother” is what he chooses to say.
A million questions fill my thoughts, but I voice only one as I put the pain meds on his tray. “Are you close to her?”
He grips one edge of the tray, and I help get it situated on his lap before standing awkwardly at the side of the bed. Tapping my fingers on my bare thighs, I cross one leg in front of the other and watch him stare down at the food. When he looks up again, his eyes are full of appreciation, and it helps ease a lot of my awkwardness.
“I’m very close with my mother,” he answers before taking a sip of the tea and swallowing the pills.
“Does she live in Toronto too?”
“Yes. My parents have lived in the same house for a while now. Since I was a teenager.” He sets the mug down and tilts his chin toward the empty space beside him. “If you want to learn more about my personal life, you can at least sit beside me while you do.”
“I’m being weird,” I admit, puffing out a big breath.
“This is an odd situation. But I’m enjoying myself regardless. I haven’t been murdered yet, so you have my company’s appreciation,” he teases, a slight lift at the corner of his mouth.
I shouldn’t be acting like this right now. I’m the one who brought him here, and it’s not like we’re strangers. Not really. He’s told me more about himself in the past couple of weeks than I’d bet he has anyone else in Cherry Peak. Johnny included, and that guy is as close to a BFF that he has on the ranch.
I’m a confident woman, yet Garrison brings out a side to me that I haven’t seen since I was too young to know how to kick ass and take names without a care in the world as to how I was perceived. It’s alarming but also refreshing. Like I’m becoming more myself with every day we spend together. A snake shedding its skin only to reveal one with more vibrant colours hidden beneath.
If the girls could read my thoughts right now, they’d lose their shit. Bryce would probably tie me up and toss me in her car to take me to see a psychologist.
I slide onto the bed beside him, over the blankets to limit the temptation to crawl on top of him. It hardly works. With the comforter pooled at his hips, his entire chest is exposed, and fuck me, it’s a nice one, as I’ve established a million times by now. It wouldn’t take much effort to just reach out and explore the patch of hair leading beneath his underwear?—
Crossing my legs, I force my hands to remain in my lap and mentally curse my horny urges. “Tell me about your mom. I’m curious now.”
“What do you want to know?”
“We can start with the easy stuff. Her name, for example.”
He rasps a laugh. “It’s Cynthia.”
“That’s pretty. Do you look like her at all?”
“Our eyes are a similar shade of green. When they want to be green and not brown. I’ve been told that we share the same nose. That’s about as far as the similarities run.”
“So, you look more like your father?” I ask, treading carefully over the dangerous topic.
Garrison takes a large bite of his toast, his nostrils flaring. I inwardly wince at the reminder that his relationship with his father is so terrible that even the briefest mention of him has him on edge.
Once he’s swallowed the bite of toast, he answers, “No. I wouldn’t say that. I look more like a mix of the two of them than either one separately.”
“When you left town the other week, did you go home to see your mom?” I steer the conversation back to safer territory.
He tips his chin. “I’m used to seeing her far more often than I’ve been able to recently. A few times a week, at least. It’s been a hard transition. For me more so than her, I’m sure.”
“I’m sure she misses you just as much as you miss her.”
“Maybe. I’m told I can be a bit overbearing when it comes to her. She’s probably enjoying the break.”
He takes another bite of toast, his pearly white teeth tearing into the bread with a vengeance. I watch his jaw work as he chews, the strong, sharp line of it a downright crime.
“Protectiveness is a blessing until it becomes suffocating. There’s a fine line there, I think. But I’ve always been sickeningly independent, so my opinion may be shrewd.”
“Have you always been that way? Independent, I mean.”
“Yep. Darren is only a year older than me, and with only one school in town, we were close enough in grade that he thought I’d appreciate him designating himself as my personal security detail. Shocker, but I didn’t. Having him scaring both boys and girls away from me and trying to dictate where and when I could go places only made me try harder to go behind his back to make friends. I learned very early that I didn’t like anyone having power over me, and it wasn’t long after that that everyone knew it,” I explain, the memory of a young Poppy and Darren having it out on the front lawn of our childhood home vivid in my mind.
Garrison’s thigh presses to my knee, an offer of silent comfort. It’s not necessary, but I’m not about to tell him that. Pressing my cheek to his shoulder, I slide my hand over the arm closest to me and hug his bicep.
“We’re similar in our independence. It can be intimidating for some. When we don’t need other people, it can make them feel powerless,” he says.
I nuzzle into his shoulder, nodding. “It’s not as though I need no one, because I still do. Anna and Bryce, my brother and parents. But they all know that I need my space to make my own choices while also wanting them around to offer advice and their company. Anyone worth our time will recognize that and respect it.”
His swallow is so thick I can hear it and see the heavy bob of his throat when I glance upward. “My father has never understood that about me. Maybe if he had, he wouldn’t have placed so much of his attention on what I didn’t need him to do for me and focused on my mother instead.”
I tense up, the tidbit of information rattling through my head. Nipping at the inside of my cheek, I hug his arm a little tighter.
“What do you mean?”
He sets the tray of food on the mattress beside his leg. I frown at the oatmeal he hasn’t touched before thinking that it’s probably safer he doesn’t eat it. It looks a bit stale. Okay, a lot stale. At least he drank all the tea.
His eyelids fall shut when he settles back against the headboard and opens and closes his mouth three times before speaking.
“My mom has osteoporosis.”
“I’m not familiar with it.”
He swallows again. “It’s a disease that makes your bones incredibly brittle. When you have it, you grow more prone to breaks and sprains. Most of the time, you don’t even know you have it until you wind up in the ER with a broken bone when you’ve only had a minor accident.”
“That’s terrible, Garrison. I’m sorry.”
“I wasn’t in town when my mother hurt herself the first time. At the time, Swift Edge Records was still small. It only had two offices. One in Toronto, and another in LA. The US office was new, hardly open two weeks before I flew down to look at how everything was coming. The team there was experienced in the industry, but it wasn’t enough to see their success on a resume. I wanted to see it with my own eyes.”
“I’d have wanted to do the same thing. Trusting others with something we love as much as our own companies can be incredibly hard. It doesn’t happen overnight,” I tell him, understanding burning bright in my chest.
He lays his palm over my knee and squeezes. His fingers trace the curve of it, making me shiver. “In my parents’ house, my father has a home studio that rivals the one we use for our artists. It takes up a majority of the basement, with soundproof glass and every piece of audio equipment you could ever think of. He always spent more time there than he had anywhere else. Alone or with his choice of artist, it never mattered. Making music is in his blood.”
I turn my face into his shoulder, dragging my lips over the warm skin as I wait for him to continue. My stomach cramps, the hurt in his voice obvious even through the scratchiness.
“You don’t have to tell me all of this right now, Garrison,” I say softly.
“You’re the only one I’ve wanted to tell in a long fucking time.”
My heart swells. “I’m listening, then.”
He inhales a long breath. “My mother called me from the hospital the morning of my second day in LA. She told me she was bringing food down to my father when she lost her footing on the second-last step and fell. Her knees took most of the impact, but it was her wrist that snapped when she caught herself before her face smacked the carpet. Yet, even with this bomb dropped on me that she was hurt, all she cared about was the food splattered all over the walls and staining the white carpet. Then she told me that Dad wasn’t there with her.”
I inhale sharply, and he tightens his grip on my leg, as if he’s using it for stability. For strength.
“She fell and broke her wrist, but he didn’t hear her cries because he was too busy in his studio. That stupid fucking soundproof glass kept him from hearing her when she needed help. And she didn’t want to bother him while he was working, so the stubborn woman drove herself to the hospital, half out of her mind in pain and fear, and then called me only when the nurses threatened to do it themselves if she didn’t. I’d always resented my father for spending more time with his work than us, only paying attention when it involved something he cared about. It had been that way for as long as I can remember. But it had never led to something like this before. Not with Mom.”
“You resent him for what happened to her,” I say on a long exhale.
“I do. My mom was in the hospital for five hours before my aunt had shown up to take her home. When she got back, he hadn’t even noticed that she was gone in the first place. I was already on a flight home, and once I got back . . . we fought hard. If it weren’t for my mom begging us to stop, I would have thrown him into his precious soundproof glass. Our relationship was never great, but it wasn’t this bad. After that, there was nothing left of one at all.”
“And your mom? How is she with all of this? You’ve forgiven her for not asking your dad for help?”
This is worse than what I was expecting to learn about Garrison and Reggie. I thought it was some petty fight between two stubborn men that led to their broken relationship. But hearing that there’s a genuine reason behind it? That everyone has assumed this was all Garrison’s fault and that Reggie was in the clear the entire time? Fuck, my stomach is in knots.
There’s no perfect solution here. Everyone is at fault. I’m not too biased to recognize that. But Garrison’s feelings are also valid regardless. They are so fucking valid.
“She had my forgiveness the moment she called me from the hospital. Everything just spiralled after we learned she had osteoporosis. I was terrified because what happened to her could have been so much worse than a broken wrist. And he just didn’t care enough to stop his work anytime that day to even check on her just once?” He spits the question, his anger and hurt and betrayal seeping through every word.
“Does anyone else know? About what happened and how it’s made you feel?”
“Outside of my parents, no. And even then, my father is more prideful than he lets on. He thinks he’s made up for what he did, but he hasn’t. Spending a few nights a week with his wife instead of working or fiddling with his soundboard doesn’t make up for the years he put us both on the back burner. The years he pissed away working that he could have been using to live life with his wife doing everything she can no longer do. I don’t care if he didn’t think he was doing anything wrong. He was.”
“I’m not arguing with you on that, Garrison. I understand where you’re coming from. There’s nothing wrong with feeling hurt by what happened. Anyone who tells you otherwise isn’t worth sharing this with in the first place. If anything like that happened to my mom on my dad’s watch, I’d have kicked his ass to high heaven.”
A hard laugh cuts through the room before trickling off. “Thank you.”
“You don’t have to thank me for listening.”
“I’m thanking you for far more than that.” He lifts the hand from my knee and waves it toward the tray beside him and everything littering the nightstands. “Anyone else would have left me in the stable. You took me home and haven’t left my side since.”
“Careful, you’re going to lose your big bad CEO persona with all these sweet words,” I warn lightly.
A finger settles beneath my chin and curves over the edge of my jaw, tilting my head back. His eyes are pits of glittering emeralds when they meet mine.
“With you, I’m starting to think that’s not such a bad thing.”