Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
GREYSON
Present Day
Rain falls in a wall of water so thick that I can’t see more than a few feet in front of me.
Standing on my front porch with a cup of coffee, watching it come down is fascinating.
The power of it. The raging energy. Yet I’m calmer than I’ve been in months.
Leaning my shoulder against my new porch pillar, admiring the riotous view, I’m almost relaxed, something I thought would never be possible now that I’m back in Happiness.
But it’s a vast improvement over the last few months, where everyone around me thought I’d snap like a twig at the slightest provocation.
Even the mountain of dirt Cian left on the side of the drive that’s quickly turning my private road into a mosh pit and will likely create a few thousand dollars in damage doesn’t deter me from studying meteorological savagery with mild enjoyment.
Witnessing Mother Nature ravage the area as Hurricane Isolde warnings blast through my cell phone is an apt representation of what’s been happening inside my mind since returning to Happiness, Georgia a few days ago.
I don’t belong here.
But I’ll live here for Sage and Braxton.
I fight back a shiver because thinking about my lifelong best friend as my half brother is still messing with my head. He seems to have adjusted to this particular betrayal much better than I have.
We’ve been best friends for twenty-five years. His grandfather, Ace, adopted Sage and I after my father went to jail for the death of my sister.
The worst part is, people knew we were related, but no one bothered to tell us until last year.
Since Ace passed away, our lives have been upended. First, he threw us curveballs with his will. One sent Braxton here, to Happiness, to essentially find and fix the heart and soul of the town, which ended up being Madi Ryan, his new wife.
My mission was slightly…different. And twofold. First, he wanted me to run Omni-Reyes Media on my own. While that’s daunting, fine. I’ll never back down from a challenge. It was his second request that’s still haunting me.
The mistakes of youth and misplaced trust weigh heaviest on innocent souls. When Sin turns to sadness, don’t allow her to break. Be stronger than those before you. Choose love, and light, and laughter. Choose Happiness, Greyson. Choose to let go in order to move on.
I’m certain he wanted me to choose this godforsaken little town too, with all its intrusive residents, fucked-up festivals, and absolutely no privacy, but his words were written in secret codes I can’t decipher.
Sin? Who the hell is that? And why will she be sad?
None of it makes any sense.
But I chose Happiness for him. I’m here. I tried.
And I failed.
Or more accurately, Savvy fucking Monroe failed me.
Fool me once, shame on me, but you won’t get a second chance because you’re instantly dead to me.
And that’s where I stand with my new sister-in-law’s best friend. She’s dead to me.
It’s my own fault. I never should have gotten close to her. I never should have confided in a stranger I met online, and I sure as hell never should have announced to half the town that I was getting a baby of my own.
Not because I’m embarrassed by that, but because they’ve put up roadblocks at every turn. They want me to be happy, but they don’t want me to be happy on my terms.
Braxton and Sage have moved on with their lives, and I’m happy for them. Truly.
After my sister died, Braxton and I took on the burden and the privilege of raising Sage. Ace was there for moral support, but every decision we made from the time we were twelve on was done with Sage in mind.
Braxton’s married now. Sage is attending the local college here and is treated like a superstar on the football team.
They moved on without me, but the one thing I’ve done right in my life is Sage. I want that again. I want to be responsible for someone. I want to give a child everything I never had growing up.
I want a little girl, though another boy would be fine too. The only logical way to make this happen is through surrogacy.
The last thing I expected was to form a connection with a woman via the surrogacy app, only to find out that the woman I spilled my secrets to was none other than Savvy Monroe.
That’s the real reason I fled home to California as soon as I could. Savvy made me question who I am at my core. I felt as though I were cheating on her when I would talk to Firefly and vice versa.
It makes no logical sense, and I’m always logical. Savvy and I weren’t dating, we were never exclusive, and she made sure I knew that every chance she got. We weren’t even friends with benefits. We were…benefits.
Liar.
Fuck me and my conscience.
I didn’t want to feel anything for Savvy.
Slightly more truthful.
But she always, always showed up when I was at my weakest point. And now I know why. She got me to open up to her as Firefly, then used that information to—to what exactly?
I still don’t know. She didn’t take advantage of me with the information. She just…showed up.
It’s so damn confusing. All I know for sure is that when I saw that message on her phone, betrayal like nothing I’d ever felt before cut me to my very soul.
After six months, I’m no closer to finding answers, but I also couldn’t stay away from Braxton and Sage any longer.
I’d already cut out on Sage’s football team, where I’d agreed to help coach, like a class A asshole.
Sure, I flew back to work with the quarterbacks once a week, but I never stayed more than a day.
I never gave anyone a straight answer either, and I know they’re fed up with my bullshit, especially now that Braxton is going to be a dad.
The worst part is, I’ve never in my life backed down from a challenge or a fight.
But Savvy broke something I don’t know how to fix, and it’s slowly killing whatever kindness I have left.
Something moves in the distance, a flash of yellow through the sheets of rain. What the hell is out there?
There’s no way though. Someone would have to walk up my mile-long driveway in this weather, and it’s—
For fuck’s sake.
I set my mug of coffee on the porch railing, then stand straight with my arms crossed over my chest.
If that’s who I think it is, I might actually kill her.
Why is she on my property when she knows I’ve blocked her number and have actively avoided being in the same space as her since Braxton’s wedding?
In the middle of a severe weather advisory.
Another flash of yellow, and I squint my eyes, attempting to follow her. The shock of color comes and goes, but if it’s because she keeps falling or because of the rain patterns, I can’t be sure.
Then the wind blows from the opposite direction, clearing a path to her in time to see her go down face-first into the muck. My muscles clench as I wait for her to lift herself up. She’s the only woman stubborn enough to believe she can outrun a goddamn hurricane.
Savvy pulls herself up, only to fall again a few steps later, and a gnawing guilt outweighs my anger when she’s close enough to see she’s missing a boot. It was probably swallowed by my mud sea, so I stomp down into the rain with every intention of sending her away.
I’d just finished a workout when I came outside, so steam rises from my bare chest and arms when I hit the chilly rain, even though it’s humid as hell out here.
No one on this planet can piss me off as much as this woman does simply by existing.
I sink into the mud up to my shins, the mountain of dirt looking more like an anthill now.
Savvy stands, and I’m not sure what happens, but her eyes flash brightly, the entirety of her face caked in mud except the whites of her eyes.
She steps forward and right out of her pants that get swallowed into the earth.
It trips her up, and she wobbles through an ungraceful spin before falling backward onto her ass, and it’s then that I see the first signs of defeat in her shoulders as her entire chest cavity appears to sink into itself.
Lost to her own mind, and honestly, probably exhausted from her hike up my driveway, she hasn’t noticed me yet as she lies back and…and cries. It’s raining so hard I could have missed it if it weren’t for the quiver to her chin and the complete and utter despair on her face.
A porcupine releases all its quills in my throat. In the time that I’ve known this woman, she’s been strong, stubborn, independent—painfully so. She doesn’t break down, and she doesn’t give up.
Seeing it happen now, just yards from my house, causes my heart to pound violently against my chest.
Get up, Savannah. Get. The. Fuck. Up.
She doesn’t move.
I should have known that she wouldn’t let me cut her out of my life forever. I suppose I should be thankful for the six-month reprieve I’ve had because apparently, our standoff is over.
For now.
Shaking my head, I trudge through the mud that gets precariously deeper the closer I get to her. With her eyes closed, she can’t see me coming. Her tears and the rain wash her face clean of mud, but nothing can erase the sadness, the complete sense of defeat in her expression.
It’s something she would never willingly show, and I almost feel guilty for intruding on this moment, except I won’t because she’s the one trespassing.
Right. She’s the one who doesn’t belong here. It helps me hang on to my anger with a little more force as I bend, then lift her over my shoulder.
I almost toss her too far and have to readjust my grip. She’s lighter than I remember, and I hate that.
My hands land on her bare, muddy thighs, and I hate that I remember how good her skin feels beneath mine.
That’s another thing she stole when she betrayed me—the best fucking sex of my life.
She wasn’t looking for anything serious, and I’ll never be a forever kind of guy, so it was perfect. The way we hate each other ninety-nine percent of the time only made the sex that much hotter.
“Gr—Greyson. W—what are you doing?”
I slide her off my shoulder and into a wedding hold, then nearly drop her when I realize her lips are blue.
“How long have you been out here? Are you trying to get yourself killed?” I take quick but careful steps toward my house.
“C—Car…s-stuck. E-e-eleven.” The chattering of her teeth is a knife to the gut with each stuttered syllable.
I pause as her words register, then I pick up my pace and come close to jogging the rest of the way to my front porch. “You’ve been trying to get up my driveway for two hours, Savannah? Two fucking hours with a hurricane warning in effect?”
Granted, it’s not hypothermia-type weather, but she grew up in Vegas, and she’s cold when its seventy. Wet and muddy? No wonder her entire body shivers now.
“T—two hours?” she asks as I walk us around the porch to the outdoor shower, but I’m too angry to respond.
Savvy is a smart woman—her podcast listeners call her brilliant—yet she does the stupidest goddamn shit sometimes. It’s as though she never learned to properly care for herself.
“This is going to suck,” I say through clenched teeth. The outdoor shower doesn’t currently have any hot water. It’s on Cian’s list to fix, but my priority was finishing the small apartment and putting in an elevator in the workshop of the detached garage for Moose first.
It’s the least I could do for the old guy who sold me his dream home that he had no intention of ever selling.
I walk us into the shower, turn on the spray, and do my best to get most of the mud off us as she gasps and shivers in my arms.
Instead of bothering with towels once she’s mostly clean, I march us straight into my house, up the stairs, and into my room and the attached bathroom.
She doesn’t protest or even make a sound except for her chattering teeth. Her condition is much more precarious than I first thought because Savvy Monroe will fight me to her death just for the fun of it if given the chance—it’s probably why I liked her so much.
But she ruined that, and I can’t do second chances.
Setting her on the bench in the large walk-in shower, I blast the hot water while hosing off my legs and torso, then adjust it so it doesn’t burn her. With my luck, the hot water would send her into shock or something.
I’m pulling down the showerhead, and her eyes widen when she realizes my plan.
And my entire being feels lighter as I turn the spray on her and hose her down from head to toe until she’s warmed enough to stand on her own and fight me for the showerhead.
“Stop,” she gasps as warm water splashes her face.
“Sorry, you’ve got a little mud…” I spray her in the face again. “Right there.”
Savvy stalks forward, the usual fire returning to her blazing green eyes, and rips the shower nozzle from my hands.
I simply smirk and walk away, not giving a shit that I’m soaking my floor.
“Hurry up. You’ve got a long walk home,” I call over my shoulder, then slam the bathroom door.
In my closet, I strip naked, tossing my wet shorts into the laundry basket and slipping on some lounge pants. A suit would feel like necessary armor right now, but I know putting one on will only lead to questions, and I just want her out of my home as quickly as possible.
And, because I’m not a complete asshole, I also grab Savvy one of my T-shirts and another pair of loungers.
I’ll never get them back, but it’s fine. The sooner she gets out of here, the sooner I can go back to reminding myself why I hate her in the first place.
She’s not going anywhere in this storm, you dingledick.
Opening the bathroom door without knocking, I ignore how she sits on the floor of the shower under the hot water—even though my stomach turns at the sight—and drop the clean clothes on the vanity for her.
“Don’t use all the hot water. I’ve got shit to do today.”
“Grey…”
Whatever she’s about to say won’t undo the fact that for months, she talked to me as Firefly12, that she broke my trust, or that she might have even broken my cold, dead heart.
This time, when I exit the bathroom, I slam the door so hard the walls around it shake, then I retreat to my office, where I can hopefully get lost in work while she figures out how the hell to get home.
My world no longer includes Firefly12 or Savannah Monroe, and I need to keep myself busy so I don’t forget that.