CHAPTER FOUR #3
His mind, sharp and analytical by nature, raced to piece together the fractured memories. He remembered drinking the scotch. He remembered the sudden, unnatural heat. The loss of control. He had been drugged. He knew with terrifying certainty that he had been poisoned.
But who?
Grayson’s eyes locked onto Kennedy, and a cold, calculating fury began to replace the horror.
He knew Kennedy had feelings for him. Everyone knew it. It had been the quiet, unspoken joke of their social circle for a decade. She had always wanted him. And tonight, he had humiliated her. He had defended Olivia, told Kennedy to step down, put her in her place.
From Grayson’s perspective, the math was simple and damning.
She had been angry. She had been jealous.
She had drugged him, followed him into the study, and taken exactly what she wanted, sabotaging his relationship with Olivia in the process.
He didn't consider, even for a second, that she might have been a victim too.
He didn't see the terror in her eyes; he only saw the architect of his destruction.
Grayson stood up, his towering frame casting a terrifying shadow over her.
"What did you do?"
His voice was a lethal, freezing whisper. It cut through the silence of the study like a serrated blade.
Kennedy flinched. She looked up at him, her hazel eyes swimming with unshed tears. The drug had thinned out, leaving behind a crushing, suffocating mountain of guilt. "Grayson… I…"
"What did you do?!" Grayson roared, the sound echoing violently off the wood-paneled walls. He crossed the room in two strides, looming over her, his hands balled into fists at his sides. "You drugged me. You actually slipped something into my drink."
Kennedy shook her head frantically, clutching the blanket tighter to her chest, her voice breaking. "No! No, Grayson, I swear to God I didn't! I drank champagne, and I felt sick, and I came in here—"
"Stop lying!" Grayson snarled, his face twisted in disgust. "I felt the drug, Kennedy!
I know what happened to my body! I came in here to get away, and you followed me!
You followed me, and you…" He choked on the words, unable to say them out loud.
"You fell this low? Because you couldn't stand the fact that I chose Olivia? Because I told you to back off?"
"Grayson, please, you have to believe me!" Kennedy cried out, a ragged sob tearing from her throat. She tried to stand up, but her legs betrayed her, leaving her huddled against the sofa. "I didn't drug you! I would never do that to you! I walked in, and you were here, and we were both—"
"Both what?" Grayson interrupted, his voice dropping back into a register of dripping, venomous cruelty. "Drugged? Is that your excuse? Then why didn't you walk away, Kennedy? If you were so confused, why didn't you leave? Why didn't you call for help?"
The questions hit her like a firing squad.
Kennedy’s mouth opened, but no sound came out. The air vanished from her lungs.
Why didn't you walk away?
Because she hadn't wanted to. Because when she had the chance to leave, when she had the chance to save them both, she had looked at him and chosen her own desperate, unrequited love over his salvation. She had kissed him first. She had initiated the fall.
Grayson watched the horrifying realization dawn on her face, watching her silence confirm his worst assumptions. His eyes narrowed, filled with an irreparable hatred.
"You kissed me," Grayson stated, the memory surfacing through the haze. His voice was laced with pure revulsion. "I was fighting it, and you touched me. You engineered this whole sick, twisted scenario just to ruin my life, because if you can't have me, no one can."
"That's not true," Kennedy whispered, the tears finally spilling over, tracking through the smeared makeup on her cheeks. "Grayson, I love you, I have always—"
"Don't you dare use that word," he hissed, taking a step back from her as if her very proximity was infectious.
"You don't know what love is. You’re a spoiled, entitled child who threw a tantrum because you didn't get the toy you wanted.
We grew up together, Kennedy. I trusted you.
My family trusted you. And you used that trust to take advantage of me. "
The word struck Kennedy with a physical force. She physically recoiled, curling inward, dropping her head to her knees as a wail of shattered agony ripped from her throat. Her spirit didn't just break; it fractured into a million unrecoverable pieces.
She had no defense. She knew she hadn't drugged him, but she also knew she was to blame for what happened. She had let the monster out of the cage. She had destroyed the only man she had ever loved.
Grayson stood over her for a moment longer, looking at the broken, sobbing woman on the floor. He felt no pity. He felt nothing but a cold, dead emptiness.
Without another word, Grayson turned, picked up his discarded jacket from the floor, and walked out of the study, leaving the door standing wide open to the hallway. He left Kennedy Lockhart sitting in the ruins of her own life, drowning in a silence she would never, ever be able to explain.