Chapter 24
Noah saw the way Grace’s eyes widened and then flared and he knew she was dreading this conversation almost as much as he was, if not more.
The last thing he wanted was some emotional autopsy of what had gone wrong the other night, but he also knew he needed to do the responsible thing and explain why he hadn’t kissed her senseless the way he’d wanted to.
“Please,” he said quietly.
“Jacob…?”
“He’s playing a game with Isaiah. They’re well matched.”
Grace hesitated, and then gave a brief nod, her expression veiled as she glanced away from him. “All right, then.”
Not wanting to waste time, Noah went to the closest private space—a drawing room off the entrance hall that he hadn’t been in since he arrived.
As he opened the wood-paneled doors, he saw that the furniture was swathed in dust sheets, the elaborately carved stone fireplace lost in gloom at the far end of the room.
“Sorry… this room doesn’t get much use,” he called over his shoulder to Grace as he went to one of the tall, sashed windows and pulled open the heavy velvet drapes.
Dust motes danced in the air, catching the sunlight and making them both cough.
“Really doesn’t,” he managed, wiping his mouth. “Sorry.”
“It seems like a lot of the rooms in this house don’t get much use,” Grace remarked quietly.
Noah had the sense they were talking about more than the house, but he didn’t want to think too deeply about it.
“Well, I only use a few,” he allowed. “Grace…” He turned to face her, and saw her arms were wrapped around her waist, almost as if she was holding herself together.
A few more wisps had come undone from her bun and framed her heart-shaped face.
She was so slender and strong, her lithe body swathed in a fleece and jeans, her blonde hair like a golden flame in the gloominess of the room.
For a breathtaking moment, all Noah wanted to do was cross the room and kiss her.
But that, he knew, would be a very bad idea.
“I’m sorry about what happened, a week ago,” he told her instead.
“You mean me kissing you and you not kissing me back?” she clarified with a small smile, humor lightening her eyes in a way that surprised him, because he’d really not expected her to joke about the matter.
“Don’t worry about it, Noah. Like I said, it was the wine.
And,” she added, a tremor to her voice that told him she wasn’t quite as insouciant as she might want to seem, “it was the moment, too. Telling you all that stuff and realizing how alone I’ve felt, for so long.
” She forced a smile to lips that trembled.
“I was feeling vulnerable, and impulsively I acted on it. I’m sorry. ”
“Grace…” Noah raked a hand through his hair. He felt like the conversation had already gotten away from him, and he didn’t know how to bring it back. The last thing he wanted was her feeling like she was at fault, when he knew only he was. “You don’t need to apologize to me.”
“Well, I did, so…” She shrugged, the smile slipping from her lips. “Do you think Jacob is finished now?”
“I doubt it, but in any case, there’s more I want to say.
” He stared at her in frustration, wishing the words would come more easily.
It was so hard to explain his reasoning in a way she’d be able to understand without revealing stuff he really didn’t want her to know.
“I didn’t not kiss you back because I didn’t want to,” he blurted.
Her eyebrows rose, a small smile of what seemed like genuine amusement playing about her mouth. “Isn’t that a double negative? Or actually a triple?” She shook her head slowly. “Too many for me to figure out. What are you trying to say?”
“I wanted to kiss you,” he explained stiltedly.
He felt his cheeks heat and wondered where all his easygoing charm—the careless flirting, the smooth confidence—from his Manhattan days had gone.
Vanished, utterly. Maybe it was a good thing, but he could have used a little of it now.
“I still do,” he told her. “Want to kiss you, that is.” Wow. So smooth.
Grace blushed, and she looked away, a tendril of hair falling against her pinkened cheek. “Then why didn’t you?” she asked in a low voice.
“Because you were, like you said, in a vulnerable place, and I didn’t want to take advantage of that.”
“Okay, well, you could have explained some of that at the time, then,” she replied, trying, he suspected, to sound light, but the hurt was audible in her voice, and it made him ache.
He really hadn’t wanted to hurt her, but he had, and the only saving grace was that he wouldn’t hurt her anymore. He’d make sure of it.
“It was more than that,” Noah explained heavily.
“I meant what I said before about it not being about you.” He hesitated and then confessed bluntly, “Grace… I’m not in a good place.
” The words sounded stark, but also simplistic, the kind of pseudo-therapy speak he would normally deride, and yet he meant them.
“I’m not in a place to have a relationship, any kind of relationship, with anyone,” he clarified.
He forced himself to look at her, and saw her gaze was clouded, troubled, as she waited for him to continue.
“I’ve… I’ve hurt people I love. My brother.
My mother. A lot of other people probably, too.
I just…” He blew out a breath. “I don’t want to hurt you.
More than I already did, I mean, and so…
that’s why I didn’t respond. I like you a lot.
I think you’re amazing and beautiful and strong and…
I don’t want to hurt you, and I know I would. ”
He fell silent, waiting for her verdict, but Grace didn’t say anything for a long moment.
She gazed at him, her expression still troubled as well as thoughtful as she sifted through everything he’d said.
He wondered what she thought, whether she believed him, and if she did, if it made her dislike him.
He’d been as honest with her as he could bear to be, but maybe he should have tried harder.
“I think,” she said at last, her voice low and soft, “that what we could both use is a friend. A good friend, who accepts us as we are, no questions, no complaints.” Her eyebrows lifted, a small, tentative smile curving her mouth. “What do you think about that?”
For a second Noah simply stared, trying to make sense of the words.
A friend. A good friend. Once, Jem had been the best friend he’d ever had.
He could certainly use another now, and even if he still didn’t trust himself, he already knew he wasn’t going to say no.
Not this time. For Grace’s sake, as well as his own.
“Yes,” he finally answered, his voice a little shaky.
“Yes, I think I could definitely use that.”
“Okay then, let’s decide to be friends.” She made it sound so simple.
Her smile widened as she stretched out one slender hand.
“Good friends. Friends who can be honest and don’t need to worry about being judged for who they are, or more importantly, who they were.
” Her gray gaze searched his as if looking for an answer.
“Deal?” she asked, and he took her hand, enjoying how small and fragile her fingers felt in his, yet when she shook his hand, her grip was strong.
“Deal,” he answered quietly. He didn’t even know what that kind of friendship would look like with Grace.
And what if he hurt her, simply as a friend?
He still didn’t trust himself, but he knew he didn’t want to sever things with her completely.
He felt as if his world had been entirely dark and in the last few weeks, Grace had shown him a ray of light, breaking through the clouds and giving him hope that things could be different. Maybe even he could.
Still smiling, she slipped her hand from his. “Thank you, Noah,” she said, “for being honest. I know it’s not easy.”
“No,” he agreed, wanting to say more although he wasn’t even sure what.
He raked a hand through his hair, searching for something to say, to bridge the moment they’d just had into whatever came next, as friends.
“What have you been up to this past week?” he finally asked, an awkward non sequitur for sure.
“Working,” she answered with a laugh. “The nature reserve office is finally in decent shape, and Jacob and I have been walking the reserve, checking on things. He’s started a nature journal.
It’s been good.” She paused. “I want to check out the other side of the island, actually. Hard to believe I haven’t explored it all yet, but the nature reserve end keeps me busy, I guess.
” Again with that small, shy smile, her eyebrows lifting.
“Maybe you could give me a tour?” she suggested.
“Becca mentioned something about the old guesthouses, and I’d love to see them.
” She gave an uncertain little laugh. “Sorry, I think I might be babbling. Weirdly, I’m a little nervous. ”
“You’re not babbling.” Noah scratched his cheek, hesitating as he considered her suggestion. Besides going to Grace’s for dinner, he hadn’t been off the estate in months. He hadn’t seen the old guesthouses since he’d been here twenty years ago.
“Sorry, I don’t know if there are difficult memories there because of that girl who died,” Grace began hesitantly. “I should have thought…”
“No, it’s okay.” He hadn’t even been thinking of that girl, from so long ago.
“I didn’t really know her,” he told Grace.
“It was terribly tragic, but… I don’t have any bad memories of the guesthouses themselves.
I have mainly good ones, actually. Jem and I had a lot of fun here, once upon a time.
We got as brown as berries, racing around the island, playing tennis and swimming and sailing…
” He couldn’t help but grimace. “And ignoring the island kids, yes, I know.”
“I wasn’t going to say that,” Grace protested. “I shouldn’t have been annoyed about that in the first place.”
“Well, you may have had a point.” He glanced around the dusty, darkened room, remembering when it had been full of light and laughter, the tinkling of piano music and crystal as his parents had had one of their cocktail parties for their visiting friends.
When he and Jem had been little, they’d peeked down on everyone from between the bars of the banister, on the landing.
When they’d turned sixteen, they’d been allowed to join the parties, and have a single glass of champagne each; he’d savored every sip.
Once, Noah recalled, he had snuck a bottle of limoncello from off the bar and he and Jem had drunk it together, down on the beach.
He’d had most of it, and then he’d been violently sick, and he hadn’t been able to stand the stuff since.
Of all the bottles of alcohol to sneak out, he thought ruefully, but then, he hadn’t known any better, and neither had Jem.
A sigh escaped him and he felt a sorrowful smile curving his lips.
He didn’t often let himself dwell on those kinds of memories, the old, happier ones, because they felt too painful, forcing him to recognize all he had lost, but he realized, right now, with Grace here, he didn’t mind thinking about it.
About Jem. Remembering the good days was hard, but maybe it helped, too.
He turned back to her, blinking the memories away. “That would be fun,” he told her. “I’ll do my best to give a good tour.”
“I’ll pack a picnic,” Grace replied, and as he gazed down at her flushed face, her sparkling eyes and ready smile, Noah had to remind himself that this was a friends-only adventure, and definitely not a date.
Even if in his heart, he wanted it to be one.