Chapter 17 #2
He chuckled. “Yeah, something like that.” He turned to the stove and lit a burner. “I wish I could, though. Be happy in a home with a lawn, kids’ toys in the driveway, a boring, mundane job.”
I scoffed. “Don’t lie. Since when?” I couldn’t even picture him like that.
He turned to me, his face sombre. “Since you.”
A lump formed in my throat. The thoughts of our impending separation, I had been doing my best to ignore, surfaced. Grayson was letting me go, but could I let go of him? It would break my heart. It was already breaking. Crumbling slowly with every tick of the clock.
“I wish I could fit into such a life, for you.” His head was low.
“I wouldn’t want you to change for me, Grayson.” I wrapped my arms around his torso and pressed myself against him. I wished I never had to let go.
His hand was in my hair, and he lifted my chin, tracing the curve of it, his eyes on my lips.
He was battling with himself. I tried to tip the scales by inching upwards, standing on my toes.
I wanted nothing more in this moment, in this life, than for Grayson to kiss me.
To make me his. If only for a fleeting moment.
We both knew we were not compatible. That we, our lives, were just too different.
Neither one of us could fit into the others.
But I wanted him. Gods, I wanted Grayson against me, inside me, so close that I could pretend he was mine.
Pretend that I could take away his hurt, with my body, with my hands, with my love.
It would only make the heartbreak so much worse once I had to let go, but I didn’t care.
In this moment, I would sell my soul to Hades to feel Grayson’s lips on mine, on my body.
He lowered his head, brushing his nose against mine.
I strained on my toes, pulled to him. Magnetised.
That tether between us pulling tight and glowing brightly.
If our lips touched, his strangled defences would crumble, and he would unleash himself on me.
I felt it in the air around us, his want like static electricity.
I felt it pressed against my lower abdomen.
I felt it in the slight tremor of his hand on my jaw.
“Ava,” he breathed, his lips brushed against mine, so lightly I would have thought I imagined it if it wasn’t for the shudder that rippled through his body. His hands fell to my arms, which he gripped painfully, pulling me even closer to him. My body trembled in pleasure and anticipation.
“Don’t do this. For once, I’m trying to do the right thing here,” he whispered against my ear.
I inched backwards, to look at him, to understand what he was saying through the haze that clouded my mind. He took that as an opportunity to pull me down so my heels hit the ground again, to separate us a little more. But he still held on tightly to me, pulling me against him.
“I’ve done enough damage to you, Princess.” The hurt on his face that he tried to mask with a smile made my heart ache. “Just let me get you home before I make it worse.”
“You’re that bad a kisser?” I joked softly, trying to lift his mood.
My whole body was still trembling. I had to stop myself from climbing him like a tree and have my way with him.
To hell with his sudden urge to do the right thing.
I wanted him to ruin me, to break me, like he had once warned.
I was already ruined and breaking. I wanted him to burn the sight of him fucking me into my mind, like every other thing about him already was.
I wanted him to ruin me for any other man that might come after him, because I already knew in the deepest crevices of my soul, they would never compare.
He loosened his grip on me, making me feel heavy. “Let me finish your pancakes.”
He was asking me to let go. I dropped my hands and took a step back. I struggled not to feel rejected. He just wanted to do the right thing by me, I kept telling myself while I watched him flip the first pancake over.
A few seconds later, he placed it on a plate and speared a piece on a fork. He blew on it, tested to see if it wasn’t too hot against his own lips and then brought it to mine.
No, I couldn’t see how this man could have been a killer at eighteen.
I took the bite and let my head fall back. It was the best pancakes I had ever tasted. “Gods, Grayson! It’s amazing,” I swooned with my mouth full.
He chuckled and placed a kiss on my cheek, before turning to make the rest.
We sat, cross-legged, on the kitchen island, the stack of pancakes between us.
We didn’t bother with a fork or syrup. I was telling him about Rachel, and all the trouble she got us into while in her rebellious phase.
He laughed from his belly as I explained how we ended up in the back of a cop car when we were sixteen.
Of me being so scared I almost peed myself.
Halfway through our stack, Grayson suddenly pulled me to the ground, startling me. Then I heard the front door rattle, as someone tried to open the rusty lock. Grayson pushed me towards the backdoor, but I protested.
“Don’t you dare leave the pancakes,” I whispered as the front door creaked loudly.
He laughed softly and grabbed the plate off the counter. I struggled to get my heartrate down and my laughter contained as we ran down the alley. It was a sight to behold, Grayson running with the plate of pancakes held high in the air to keep them from falling off.
“That was fun,” I said excitedly around a mouthful of pancake as we walked along a pond.
The ducks were long gone, only a few feathers here and there hinting at their previous occupancy.
Grayson had offered me the last pancake and had left the plate on a picnic table.
He was strolling alongside me,with his hands in his jean pockets, looking more like an angel than a devil.
I swear his smile was crafted by the gods to melt women’s hearts.
Grayson pulled his hand from his pocket and peered down at a wooden something he had clasped in his fingers.
He handed it to me. “For you.” I recognised the shape of it, though I hadn’t seen it up close before.
It was the carving Grayson had done on the porch the day I escaped him.
The little animal, but now I could see what it was. The details on it were impeccable.
“A honey badger?” I looked up at him questioningly.
“You know what a honey badger is,” he teased. “Then you’ll know that it’s deemed the bravest animal in the world.” He pushed me with his shoulder. “Like you.”
My cheeks heated for the millionth time since I met him. I wanted to tell him that I hadn’t been brave a day in my life. That I hid from the world. From my dreams. And played it safe my whole life. Always worrying about consequences.
Grayson must have seen the doubt on my face.
He pulled me into him, making my whole body tingle.
“You are brave. You love and give so freely. You forgive people who hurt you and you let them in like they were worthy of you all along. In a world like this, with people like me, it’s the bravest fucking thing I’ve witnessed in a while.
Look at you,” he said with a grin, as he swept a thumb over my lips.
“You’re in the jaws of a fucking viper, and the only thing in your eyes is acceptance and curiosity.
” He chuckled into my hair. “And you’re a fierce fighter, little badger. I have the scars to prove it.”
My eyes followed the lines of his scars. Gods, how things have changed. “If I could take it back, I would.” The scars and all the time I wasted hating him, fighting him, fearing him.
He shook his head. “Every time I look in the mirror I’m reminded of you.” He smiled warmly to himself. “The marks of a worthy opponent. A sorceress who disarmed me in ways I never expected.”
“Stop.” I giggled at his cringey choice of words and half-heartedly tried to twist out of his hold.
“The only person to ever make me bleed and live to tell the story,” he continued with a grin, holding me tighter so I couldn’t escape.
I giggled harder, remembering his frustrated words in the tent, as I tried to push away from him and his cringy words. He might have said the last part as a joke, but I had a feeling it was anything but.
His eyes twinkled devilishly. “A clever, beautiful witch, who started out as my captive, but somehow ended up the master of my black heart.”
I stilled in his arms, meeting his eyes, the grin slipping from my face.
The master of his heart?
I swallowed against the emotions in my throat. Gently, I brushed the same fingers that made them, across the still pink scars over his eye.
“I like it. It suits me,” Grayson said softly at my touch, smiling down at me.
“It does, doesn’t it?” I mused, as my heart thundered beneath my ribs. It was a piece of me, that he accepted and… cherished. Grayson was willing to carry it with him for the rest of his life.
Or maybe I was projecting too much. Maybe he only meant that I made him look every bit as scary as he was. Because it did.
“Don’t you dare forget me, Grayson,” I whispered thickly.
“Never.”