22. Chapter 22
Grace
“Yes, Mom. I’m fine.” At least, as fine as I could be. The reflection in my mirror did not say fine. I poked at the bags under my eyes that had me thankful it was just a phone call and not a video.
“Honey, you are obviously still upset. I can hear it in your voice. Do you want me to come over?” She was probably already holding her keys and her purse, half a step out the front door.
I shook my head and waved my free hand, as if she could see me.
If she could, she’d be even more worried.
“No, no. Really.” I cleared my throat, hoping it would make me sound more convincing.
“It’s fine. I’m probably just going to take a long bath and watch a movie or something. I have to work tomorrow.”
She sighed. Did I hear her put her keys back on the hook? At least I knew I didn’t hear her car running. It was a start. “Fine. If you’re sure.” She paused, and I already knew what she was going to say next. “Just promise me you’ll talk to your brothers and figure this whole thing out?”
“Mom…” I groaned, preparing to tell her they would have to come around to the idea themselves, because Connor wasn’t going anywhere.
Then, there was a knock at my door. It was soft at first, and then it turned into the type of pounding that made the door rattle against the frame.
My heart leapt into my throat, each erratic beat making it harder to breathe.
The knocking stopped before starting again. “Mom, I need to let you go. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“Is everything okay?” The concern in her voice let me know this was all going to be more of an issue than I wanted it to be—more than it already was.
“Perfectly fine. I just…need to get this.” My mom started to protest before I interrupted her. “Tomorrow. I promise. Love you, bye!”
I hung up the phone, leaving it unlocked in my hand just in case when I looked through the peep hole.
On the other side, Connor stood statue still, blood running down the side of his face.
I gasped, choking on the quick intake of air and dropping my phone so I could open the door faster.
It still wasn’t fast enough to get to the bleeding man on the other side.
“Connor! Oh my God,” I said, immediately putting my hands on either side of his face and taking inventory of every bloody smear and split wound. “What happened? Are you okay?”
He closed his hands around my wrists, pulling my hands from him despite my protests. “I’m fine, little pearl.” When he smiled, a sob shook my chest. “I just needed to see you.”
“You’re covered in blood!” I licked my finger to wipe away a dried smudge from his cheekbone. “Come inside. Let me at least get you cleaned up.”
I grabbed his hand with both of mine, tugging him into the house harder than necessary when he didn’t resist. He followed me into the living room, dropping onto my couch.
My brain buzzed. I nearly forgot where I kept my more-stocked-than-necessary-for-a-single-woman first aid kit before I stumbled to the hall closet.
The towels and extra sheets fell from the shelves when I dug through them, and I ignored it, leaving them in a heap while I rushed back to Connor. “What happened?” My whisper failed to mask my panic.
When I went to sit on the couch next to him, Connor grabbed my hips and tugged me onto his lap instead. I squealed and then winced, checking his wounds to make sure I didn’t make them worse. “I got in a fight.” He shrugged like it was a routine thing. It probably was.
“I hope the other guy looks worse.” The awkward giggle from my lips sounded stifled, and when Connor only gave me half a smirk in return, I hushed.
“Something like that.” Connor looked so unfazed. “It’s not that big of a deal.”
I dabbed his face with rubbing alcohol, and he winced. “Who?” Did I want to know?
“It’s not a big deal, Grace.” He closed his eyes when I wiped the blood from his eyebrow before tracing my finger over the small cut. The blood made it all look worse than it was. As each cut was cleaned, the leftover marks and bruises didn’t look so bad.
“You have to talk to me,” I said, putting the cloth down and tracing along the lines of his face with the backs of my fingers.
“I know you can’t tell me everything. I know your life is dangerous, and there are risks to sharing.
My brothers have hammered that into me since I was a little kid.
They don’t share anything either. But you can’t keep it all a secret. Look at you.”
Concerned tears formed, welling up and rolling down my cheeks, and the sympathy on his face was replaced with remorse. “Okay, I’m sorry. Listen,” he curled his finger under my chin, “it was just an argument with one of the guys. I’m okay. He’s okay.”
“You promise?” I sniffled.
“I promise.”
“Then how dare you?” I shrieked, smacking his chest repeatedly. “How dare you show up here, all bloody and practically beating my door down, if you’re okay? I was worried about you!”
He grabbed my hands, forcing me to hold them still against his chest. “I showed up here because when I got in my car, I didn’t care about cleaning up the blood.
I didn’t even look in the mirror. I didn’t realize how bad it looked or how much it would scare you.
All I cared about was getting here.” Connor dropped his forehead against mine. “I needed you.”
“Connor…” I sighed. I felt him watching me closely while I took more gauze than I needed and antiseptic spray from the first aid kit.
He winced when I sprayed it over the cut on his forehead, and when I sprayed more, he hissed.
I watched the dark, dried blood soften and turn a lighter red before I wiped it off with the gauze.
Connor grabbed my hand. “I’m okay.”
“What was the argument about?” I sprayed again, covering the mark on his cheek and catching his unwavering stare.
“You.” When he looked at me again, I was just holding the gauze with my mouth open. What about me? “I didn’t like the way he spoke about you. That he even spoke about you at all. Nobody speaks about you that way.”
I dropped my voice in my chest, lowering it when I spoke again.
“You don’t have to protect me like that,” I said, digging into the first aid kit for a butterfly bandage.
I flexed it between my fingers nervously while I pinched his skin together and applied it.
Before I removed my fingers from his temple, he held my wrist.
“I only want to protect you, little pearl.” My eyes burned when his insisted he was telling the truth. The tears that lined my bottom eyelids waited for their turn to fall.
“But last night…”
His face dropped the same way my heart did, likely remembering the moment before I walked out the door with his cum still dripping from me.
The only one who gets to make you cry is me.
Connor groaned, and, with a firm tug, he pulled me into his lap.
Tears from my cheek dropped onto his shirt when I settled against him. A sob broke from my chest.
“I never should have let you leave.” His voice was thick with regret. When he wrapped his arms around me, I felt heavy.
“I needed you,” I whispered.
Connor’s lips painted apologies on my neck. “I know.”
“You didn’t care that I was hurt.” I choked on my assumptions. “You turned me away.”
“I know.” He sighed, placing another kiss on my jawbone. Then, he kissed the stream of tears, gathering them along his lips. “I know. I’m so sorry.”
I sniffled, and, even while my throat tightened, my body lit up. My breath clung to my lungs. “I felt used. You let me think you didn’t want me.”
“Didn’t want you?” The shock on his face when he pulled his lips away from my cheeks broke the tension in my chest. “I don’t want anything the way I want you. Nothing else in this life matters like you do, and I’ve barely known you a month.”
Connor’s hands were still as mine shook, but both of our gazes were steady.
I wanted to believe that, to believe I could be the most important thing in this seriously-out-of-my-league man’s life.
But when I saw the disappointment in his face last night flash across my mind again, doubt crept in. “Then prove it.”
Before the words left my lips completely, Connor lifted me, dropping me on my back on my sofa.
He hovered over me like the future I dreamt of that was just out of reach—a future with this man.
“You want me to prove it?” he asked, grabbing my hands and pinning them to the couch above my head.
My back arched like my chest instinctively reached for his.
“I’ll prove it now. I’ll prove it tomorrow.
And I’ll prove it to you every single day as long as you’re willing to let me. ”
He kissed me, and when his tongue drew along my bottom lip, I believed him.
And I wanted it. I wanted to know what it would be like to have this man spend every day showing me he wanted me as badly as I wanted him, because in this moment, while he gently held his weight above me, there was nothing I wanted more than Connor Murphy. I hummed against his lips.
Connor sat up, grabbing the hem of my t-shirt and pushing it up along my sides, exposing each curve.
When he lifted it over my chest, revealing the cotton bra I’d never have put on if I knew he was going to show up at my front door, I lifted my shoulders so he could pull it off.
Then, he tossed it to the side, bending back down to kiss me again while I clung to the hem of his blood-splattered shirt.
I tugged at it, clawing at the skin beneath it along the way until he sat up, pulling it over his head and adding it to the pile with mine.
The scent of iron lingered with the dried sweat on his skin, and I breathed deeply to inhale him.