Chapter 36
Chapter Thirty-Six
Feel - Wyatt
Ilift myself from Grace, propping myself up at one side, and stare down at her. I’m about to tell her not only do I love her, but that was the best sex I’ve ever had, when I see tears are streaming down her face.
Pure panic seizes me. “Hey, hey, Grace, what’s wrong?” I ask, quickly putting a hand to her cheek.
She swallows hard but doesn’t say anything. My heart tumbles down into my stomach, and a sick feeling washes over me. Grace regrets this.
Fuck, fuck, fuck! Why don’t I know how to do this boyfriend thing? Of course she wasn’t ready. She had been saving herself, and what do I do? Drag her back to my room without anything special planned and take her V-card. I’m an asshole. Why would she want to stay with me? Why?
FUCK.
She rolls toward me, on her side, and stares at me as the tears continue to fall.
“Let me get rid of this condom and then we’ll talk,” I say, praying to God, I can somehow fix this.
“Okay,” she says, her voice thick.
I reach for a tissue on the nightstand, remove the condom, and toss it into the trash can next to my nightstand. I roll over onto my side, so she’s facing me. The tears are still falling, and I feel as though I might be on the verge of losing the one thing that matters to me.
“Baby, what’s wrong? Please talk to me,” I plead, my voice suddenly growing unsteady. “Do you ... are you sorry we ...”
Her blue eyes go wide in shock. “No, no! I’m not sorry at all!”
I’m not fully relieved by her answer. “Then why are you crying?” I persist.
Her lower lip trembles, and she draws it between her teeth. I continue to brush the tears off her cheek.
“It’s stupid,” she whispers.
“Gracie. Nothing is too stupid for me. Talk to me.”
Her eyes flick up to meet mine. “I didn’t think I’d feel this way.”
The panic creeps back through me. “What way?”
“I feel so loved,” she says quietly. “Everything we did ... all the care you took ... it wasn’t just sex for me. And I didn’t expect that.” Grace pauses again, and fresh tears fill her eyes. “I really feel loved.”
My heart jumps to life. Because I felt it too.
I brush my fingers through her silky blonde locks, which are streaming across my white pillowcase. “Gracie, I love you,” I say, staring down at the beautiful girl next to me. “I’ve never said that to anyone before.”
“I love you, too. And I’m so happy.”
Thank God, thank God, thank God.
I continue to brush away her tears, and she stares deeply at me. “How could you think I could regret that?”
“Maybe because I didn’t make it special. Like I didn’t even have candles.”
Grace begins to laugh. “You think I wanted candles?”
“Well, don’t you? It would have been nicer,” I admit.
She lifts her hand and begins to lightly trace her fingertips over my face, starting with my jaw, then moving to the slope of my nose, and ending on my lips, where I grab her fingertips and brush a kiss on them.
“I don’t need candles. I just needed you.”
I can’t stop the warmth spreading through me, or the smile I feel forming on my mouth. “I promise I’ll have candles next time,” I say.
She chuckles. “What if I want next time to be later tonight?”
I love this girl.
“Then I’ll have candles for the next time after you leave my house and come back. But I don’t plan on you leaving tonight.”
“Wy, I can’t stay here! I don’t even have clean underwear or a toothbrush!”
“I have no regrets about ruining your panties.”
Even in the darkness, I know she’s blushing. “Shut up,” she says, but she’s smiling.
“Gracie girl. I’ll do the laundry, and you can wear a pair of my sweats folded over. “
“Toothbrush?”
“I’ll steal one from Nolan.”
“What?” she cries, looking aghast.
“No, not what you’re thinking, that would be gross. Why would I ever suggest that?”
She draws her lower lip between her teeth. “Fair point.”
“Nolan keeps extras of things. Or his mom does. Whenever she visits, she loads him up on all kinds of crap. I bet he has an extra one in his bathroom. I’ll even take you out for muffins tomorrow morning if you stay,” I say, brushing a kiss on the tip of her nose.
“Okay,” she says, smiling lovingly at me. Then her expression grows serious. “I want to talk about tonight.”
I bite back the urge to groan. I don’t want to. I’ve become an expert at putting away things that cause feelings and locking them up.
Like my dad.
But I’ve dared to open new feelings with Grace. I fell in love with her. And it feels so damn good and right. I’ve never been this happy.
So that means I have to be brave enough to go further. To tell her the truth.
I nod. “Okay,” I say, skimming my hand up and down her arm, from her shoulder to her elbow.
“Why were you at Phi Sigma tonight?” she asks gently.
I swallow. “Because Sebastian told me Asher was putting moves on you.”
She blinks. “But you trust me, don’t you?”
“Gracie, of course I do,” I say urgently. “But there was a part of me that was afraid.”
She waits patiently for me to say more.
“I—I was afraid you’d see you deserve a boyfriend like Asher more than a guy like me,” I finally confess.
Her mouth drops open. “What?”
I close my eyes, embarrassed to look at her.
I finally open them to see she’s studying me with a surprised look on her face.
“I thought maybe you were already figuring that out. You weren’t yourself when we talked earlier today—you almost seemed distant.
I thought ... I thought maybe you were having regrets.
That you didn’t want some guy who had never committed to anyone to be your boyfriend or something, I don’t know.
I started to panic. Then I heard Asher was all over you, and I had to do something.
I had to talk to you. See where your head was at.
When I saw you hugging him, I thought the worst.”
Grace winces. She begins to blink rapidly, as if fighting tears. Her hand moves to my hair, and she begins stroking it over and over. “Wyatt, I’m so sorry,” she says, her voice growing wobbly again. “This is all my fault.”
“No, I was stupid,” I say.
She shakes her head. “You’re right. I was weird on the phone earlier.
But that’s because I just had it out with my mom,” she says quietly.
"Then, later on, Elle told me she heard from her boyfriend that the athletic department is thinking of cutting programs. I didn't want to dump any of that on you, Wy. "
I pause, taking in her words. Pain is splashed across her expression, and I immediately move my hand to the side of her face, caressing her.
"Let's start with your Mom."
“I ... I told her off,” Grace confesses. “I told her I was done living her dreams instead of mine. I ... I think I’m going to change my major to fashion media. No. I know I am. And I told Mom that.”
“Holy shit, baby,” I murmur, knowing how hard that had to be. “I’m so damn proud of you.”
She exhales. “It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do. To actually say the words out loud, you know? To acknowledge that she really wanted me to live her dreams and not mine. But I know you understand that.”
My stomach tightens. I do understand. But I can’t imagine doing what Grace did. I put up with Dad and his endless advice because it’s easier than admitting the truth.
Does my dad want me to live my dreams? Or, like Grace, am I a tool he can use to live his?
It hurts too much to think about that being the truth.
“I ended up hanging up on her,” Grace says. “I ... I just hope she can find a way to understand me. To love me as I am. Because I’m not going to be the next Jane Austen. I’m an artistic swimmer and I want to write about fashion. And ... I’m afraid that version of myself will always disappoint her.”
Her voice cracks on the last part of her sentence, and I feel my heart crack along with it. I hate anything that hurts her. I find myself wanting to fix it, but I know I can’t. Nor would Grace want me to.
She doesn’t need a savior. She needs someone to stand with her through this.
“I am so proud of you,” I repeat. “What you did took courage. More than I have. And I admire you so much for telling her who you are. Because your mom should be really proud of who that is, Grace.”
“Thank you for saying that,” she whispers as one tear falls down her cheek.
“I mean it. You’re amazing, Gracie.”
The sadness disappears from her eyes. “That means everything to me.”
I brush a simple kiss across her lips. "Now about what you heard about the athletic department. Tell me exactly what Elle said."
Gracie tells me, and I think on it for a moment. "It's one source. One piece of gossip. I wouldn't panic yet, baby. I still think this would be louder somehow if it were true."
She exhales in relief. "Thank you for giving me your thoughts on that."
"I always will. I promise."
“I’m sorry about how weird I was on the phone. I didn’t want to talk about it, and I made you worry over nothing. I promise in the future I will tell you when something is bothering me.”
I chuckle. “Listen to us being adults.”
She laughs, her warm breath brushing across my skin and making me smile. “Who are we?” she teases.
I see another way my dad was wrong, telling me I wasn’t ready to handle a relationship due to the demands of hockey. Or implying I wasn’t mature enough for one.
Maybe I wasn’t in the past, but that was before I met Grace.
And while he was trying to advise me on what was best for my hockey career, he was wrong about what was best for me.
So wrong.
“I don’t know, but I’m not mad at the person I am now,” I tell Grace.
“I’m not either. And I love the man who had no reason to think I was going to bounce out or decide to date Asher Ryan.”
I’m such a fucking idiot sometimes. I groan, and she grins wickedly at me. “I’m sorry,” I say, embarrassed.
“Do you know why I was hugging Asher?” she asks.
I set my jaw as that image flashes through my head. I feel her fingertips glide along my jaw line. “I was hugging him,” Grace says, “to wish him luck on finding the right girl for him, because that girl was not me.”
“I’m such an asshole, aren’t I?”
“No, you’re not. But seeing you get all jealous was kind of hot,” she teases.
I grin. “Yeah?”
“Mm-hmm.”
I kiss her, slow and sweet. “Well, I’m not going to get jealous again so keep that one on replay.”
Now she’s laughing, and I laugh, too.
“Come on. I’ll give you some of my clothes to wear and make us something to eat while we do some laundry.”
“Okay.” She smiles at me. “I like the idea of wearing your clothing.”
“Yeah?”
She nods. “Do you have an extra jersey I could wear?”
Oh hell yes.
Because nothing is hotter than seeing Grace with my name on her back. Knowing she loves me and wants to wear it. Knowing she’s mine.
And knowing I get to take that jersey off later tonight, I think with a grin.