39. Now
THIRTY-NINE
now
In my very best dreams, I see Gray.
I see him the way I try to remember him—happy. Usually wearing nothing more than his boxers, in the bed that used to be ours. With his thick, dark hair flopping over his forehead, some soft electricity glowing in his green eyes.
The man standing on my street at two a.m. may be Grayson Stryker.
But he isn’t Gray.
The furious man glaring at me might as well be a stranger. This person is cold and hard, from the set of his shoulders to the fists clenched at his sides.
My amaretto-soaked brain isn’t quick enough for shock or fear. It can only scramble to keep my lungs functioning in the face of his absolute loathing .
Oddly, my body still wants to be closer to his. I edge nearer, hoping I might be able to help whatever horrible tumult has him frozen on the spot. I start to reach for him.
It’s me.
I’m the reason he’s like this .
My hand falls to my side at the same moment his name falls from my lips. “Gray?”
For a moment, he maintains his gorgeous mask of fury. Even murderous, Grayson is every bit as handsome up close as he was when I saw him at Stryker & Sons. His wide jaw works, grinding. The stubble over his cheeks and chin catches the sheen of the nearby streetlight, along with his eyes.
They aren’t flat and hard at all. Up close, the seas of green shift—turbulent, with swells of desolation.
Gray smiles, but it’s a bleak facsimile of the grin I once adored. A mockery.
“For Gray, for always,” he quotes, his voice oddly even.
I smell the gin on him, along with rich, musky cologne. Combined with his words, the familiar scent leaves me lightheaded.
He came because he saw my book… and the dedication… which means… did he read it?
A pulse of nausea swells under my diaphragm, along with a sickening surge of hope. “You read it?” I breathe.
“Didn’t need to,” he bites back. “Lived through it once already. That was enough.”
Of course he’s right. Why should he relive his pain for my benefit? He already went through all of it because of me. He doesn’t owe me anything. And, besides, the characters in my book find a much happier ending than the one I created in real life .
Even so, my gaze loops over his face again and again, greedy. For years, I’ve only seen paltry copies of his beauty—pictures in tabloids, the odd news story or magazine feature. Pale imitations of the real Grayson Stryker.
I’ve imagined this reunion a thousand times… What would it be like if I ran into him at the dry cleaners that Marjorie sent me to in Midtown? Our favorite bakery in the Bowery? The boats in the park?
I always assumed Grayson would revert to his poised formality. I pictured him making clipped small talk, flicking his eyes at his watch…
Anything to get away from me quickly. And I wouldn’t have blamed him.
But we aren’t trading stilted pleasantries now. This is something different than a chance encounter. Something darker.
A reckoning.
Fear finally fights its way through my cloudy consciousness.
Oh God. What am I going to tell him?
My teeth sink into my lower lip. Grayson’s eyes follow the motion, spark, then blaze. The look reminds me of the way he used to gaze at me when he had one too many drinks.
“You’re drunk,” I tell him, trying to be stern.
As I put my hand on my hip, my ankles wobble, undermining any attempted authority. Gray’s grin widens and heats, turning predatory. “So are you.”
I know that grin. And it still makes me press my thighs together.
I blow out a shaky huff, tamping down my lust and pouring indignation over the embers. “Don’t tell me you came all the way to Brooklyn, after three years, for a booty call .”
He always was adorable when he drank too much. I tried so hard to forget that.
“Okay,” he shrugs, loosening the tense set of his shoulders. His hand reaches over to finger a stray lock of my hair. “I won’t tell you that. ”
Sorrow swirls in his eyes while they run over my face. A bolt of pain tightens the lines of his. I can’t decide what feels worse—his outright hatred or watching him war with himself.
Desperate to maintain my distance, I back away and fold my arms. “How did you find me? Why did you find me?”
The indecision bleeds from his expression, leaving another chilly smirk in its wake. “Oh, that’s right. You thought you managed a successful disappearance, didn’t you, baby?”
How dare he?
I nearly choke. “Ex cuse me? You showed up here after all this time. I think you’re the one who should be justifying themselves.”
Gray looms closer. “ Me ? After you left me ? For no reason ? And then waited three years to dedicate a whole goddamned book to me? I’m not the one who needs to explain.”
The surrealism of it all disorients me. Am I seriously shouting at Grayson Stryker in the middle of my street? At two a.m.?
All the alcohol rushing through my veins definitely doesn’t help. I’m too warm in my vintage coat. My fingers itch to reach for him. Tingles race over my skin when he gets near enough for me to feel the restless energy surging off him.
His beautiful eyes become unfathomable, too full to separate the light from the dark. With a low rumble, he snaps, “Damn it, Ella,” and lifts his hand to brush his thumb over my lip, releasing it from between my teeth.
The air between us changes when he touches me. Our gazes lock—and it’s like falling into a hole ripped right through the universe. A vortex to the past. Back to a time when, no matter what, Gray and I connected on a soul-deep level.
The longer he looks at me, the more serious he seems. His perfect features pull into a tight mask of agony. His fingertip curls under my chin.
“Please,” he rasps, solemn and hoarse. “It’s making me crazy not knowing. You have to tell me why you wrote that.”
I want to tell him that I don’t understand it either.
How can I still love him after all this time? How can I still want him when I don ’t even know him anymore? After everything that happened to me… how can I even think of him without wanting to die?
But if I don’t have any answers after all this time, I know it’s not fair to ask Gray. Especially considering how things ended between us.
“I didn’t mean for you to see it,” I tell him, full of every sort of regret. “It’s just a stupid book I uploaded online. I never guessed you would see it.”
He cups my jaw in his hand and squints down into my face, trying to read me. “Well, I did see it,” he murmurs, intense. “So now we have to deal with it.”
We .
It would be so easy to fall right into him. Beg for forgiveness. Tell him every horrible, selfish detail. Maybe, at the very least, I could release him from the torment of not knowing what drove me away.
But then he’ll have a whole host of new demons. And they’ll ruin him.
He sways, and I see an opportunity to rip myself away before I do any more damage. “You should go home and lie down, Gray.” I swallow a scratchy lump of tears. My eyes implore him. “Try to forget about me.”
He stares right back, all devastation and desire. “You think I haven’t tried that?” he demands harshly. “You think I haven’t fucked every woman I could? Spent more money than anyone should on traveling and shopping and bullshit? Took the job I never wanted just to have something to keep me busy for the rest of my life ?”
He throws his arms out to the sides and steps away. “I’ve done it all, Ella,” he shouts, tilting his head back to bellow at Brooklyn. “I’ve tried everything! And I still couldn’t fucking forget.”
His hands fall to his sides. The fury leeches out of his posture, leaving him hunched and panting in the cold. “So now, I’m here. ”
I don’t know how to explain that he can’t be here. That we can’t be together without ruining his entire life.
Pain echoes through my torso, making it hard to even breathe. “Gray…” I say softly. “I can’t, okay?”
“Jesus, Ella.” Molten misery melts his anger away. “Stop calling me that.”
Tears prick my eyelids. “Right. Sorry.”
He rocks again, nearly losing his balance. I’ve seen him drunk but never so messed up that he can’t maintain his usual air of confident self-control. Concern crowds my lungs.
“Where’s your car?” I ask gently. “Or your phone? I can call the car for you.”
He pats down his pockets and frowns, blowing out an exasperated breath. “Jesus Christ. This fucking week.”
Gray waves off the look on my face and turns to peer down the street. “Fuck the phone. And the car. How far is the subway?” A humorless laugh scrapes out of him. “An Uptown train out of Brooklyn. I’m coming full fucking circle.”
I’m lucid enough to know that’s a horrible idea. A guy wearing his watch should not take a subway in the wee hours of the morning.
“That’s not safe,” I mutter. “Besides, the only trains running at this hour take you to Midtown. You’d have to hail a cab to the West Side.”
Gray’s gaze freezes over. “East Side. I moved.”
Right . Of course he did. That makes sense. He probably wanted to be near his parents.
Still, I feel surprised. He used to talk about how much he dreaded his inevitable future on the Upper East Side. He wanted something different for himself back then. But the man standing in the street with me has clearly given up on a lot of things.
Because of me.
I can’t leave him out here alone. Not like this.
“Come in,” I sigh. “It’s cold out here. ”