Chapter Twenty Grace
Twenty
Grace
Grace could feel his eyes on her.
Not the polite, I’m-pretending-not-to-look eyes. The actual, full-blown, I’m-absolutely-looking-and-I-don’t-care-if-you-know-it eyes. The kind that made her skin feel too tight and her breath come shorter and her traitorous body respond in ways it absolutely should not be doing.
The fabric of Reese’s sweats did nothing to disguise his desire. The peak was impossible to miss. A thick, insistent, bobbing whenever he shifted his weight. He was as turned on as she was.
She pulled the blanket tighter. Not that it helped. She could still feel his gaze like a physical thing.
And here was the problem: She was looking back.
Because somewhere between the whiskey, the storm and the forced honesty of being trapped in a tower together, Grace had to acknowledge something deeply inconvenient: Reese Spencer wasn’t just a rich man.
He wasn’t just the man trying to steal her dream.
Or a pretty face with a perfect chest and arms that could probably bench-press her entire café.
He was deeper than that. Smart in ways that had nothing to do with money.
Funny in a dry, unexpected way that kept catching her off guard.
And lonely—genuinely, honestly lonely—in a way she recognized because she saw it in her own mirror every morning.
Which was worse. So much worse than just attraction.
Reese stood to refill their glasses. As he passed her chair, his hand brushed her arm.
It was barely a touch, just his warm skin against her skin through the thin material of her cardigan.
But to Grace, it felt like an electric shock.
When he settled back in his chair, Grace was hyperaware of everything.
The way Reese’s fingers wrapped around his glass.
The way his throat moved when he swallowed.
The way he looked at her when he thought she wasn’t paying attention.
“I saw you were engaged once, to the film director?” Grace heard herself say. “Or married? The internet wasn’t clear.”
Reese’s expression shuttered. “Married. Megan. It…didn’t work out.”
“What happened?”
He was quiet for a long moment, staring into his drink like it held answers. Then:
“She said I didn’t love her. Said I don’t love anyone because I’m a robot. That I just collect people like I collect everything else.” His voice was flat. Careful. “Then she threw a vase at my head. Still got the scar.” He raised his blond fringe to reveal a small scar.
Grace winced. “Sounds dramatic. So…was she right? That you collect people?”
Reese looked up, meeting her eyes. “The collecting part was wrong. I cared about her. But the love part?” He shook his head. “Maybe she was right. Wasn’t built for that, I guess. Business? That I can do. That fits.”
“You’re doing yourself a disservice,” Grace said quietly. “You’re not a robot, and anyone who made you feel less than human is wrong. You have layers.”
Reese stared at her. “You say that like you believe it.”
“I do believe it, now that I know you a little more,” Grace admitted. She sighed, looking away from him, out at the lake. “Look, I still think you’re an arrogant ass who’s trying to steal my dream. But you’re not…empty. You’re not what I expected.”
“You’re not what I expected either, Grace.”
She turned back to look at him. Thunder rolled overhead, long and deep, and Grace felt it in her chest. The space between their chairs suddenly seemed to have shrunk to nothing as they stared at each other.
“Grace,” Reese said, and her name in his mouth sounded like a question and a statement and a warning all at once.
She should make a joke. Should do literally anything except sit here staring at his mouth and wondering what it would taste like.
“Yeah?”
Reese’s knuckles went white around his glass. He stared at her like she was a problem he was trying to solve and then—
He slammed the glass down on the side table and stood in one fluid motion, all coiled energy. He crossed the space between them and dropped to his knees in front of her chair, pulling it toward him and bringing them eye to eye.
“I can’t do this anymore,” he said, voice rough and low.
Grace’s breath caught. “Do what?”
“Pretend I’m not thinking about kissing you every damn minute.”
Her heart slammed against her ribs. The blanket slipped farther, forgotten. Every nerve in her body was screaming at her to close the distance, to find out if his mouth felt as good as it looked.
No, that would be a terrible idea wrapped in bad judgment and topped with a cherry of future regret. But the storm was raging outside and she was so tired of being careful, being responsible, being the good girl who never took what she wanted.
“Then stop thinking about it,” Grace heard herself whisper, “and maybe do it instead. Shut up and kiss me.”
His laugh was low and dark. “If you say so, Sullivan.”
Then his mouth was on hers and—
Wow.
Grace had been kissed before. Obviously. She knew what kissing felt like.
Except she didn’t. Not like this.
This was lightning and thunder compressed into the space between their lips.
This was the storm made physical, wild and fierce and impossible to control.
His mouth moved against hers with an intensity that stole her breath, demanding and giving at the same time.
One of his huge hands came up to cup the back of her head with a possessiveness that sent heat spiraling through her entire body.
He angled her head exactly where he wanted it and Grace felt that spike of heat inside turn into an inferno.
There was something primal in the way he held her. Not rough but absolutely in control.
She pressed her palm against his bare, muscled chest, felt him hot and fevered; his heart hammering against her skin.
Thunder crashed overhead again and Reese kissed her harder, like he was trying to drown out the storm or compete with it or become it. His free hand found her waist under the blanket, fingers spreading across her ribs, thumb brushing the underside of her breast through that thin nightgown.
Grace made a sound—half moan, half whimper—and felt him smile against her mouth.
“You’ve no idea,” he murmured against her lips, “how long I’ve wanted this.”
“Since I beat you at the cook-off?” Grace managed, breathless.
“No,” he said, “since you dumped a tray of appetizers on me.”
“That long.” She laughed or tried to, but it came out as a gasp because he was kissing down her jaw now, teeth grazing her pulse point and her entire nervous system was staging a revolution.
“That was—” Kiss. “—only a couple of days ago—” Another kiss, lower. “—Jesus Christ, Reese.”
“I know.” His voice was rough velvet against her throat. “Two days, and I’m on my knees.”
Grace’s hands slid up into his blond hair, thick and soft and exactly as messy as she’d imagined.
Reese groaned into her mouth, the sound vibrating through her chest and suddenly the chair wasn’t enough space.
He was pulling her forward or she was falling forward or maybe they were both just collapsing into each other like gravity had shifted and they were the only solid things left in the world.
Grace ended up on his lap on the floor, legs around his waist, the blanket finally giving up and pooling around them. His arms wrapped around her waist and they were kissing like the tower might collapse and this was the last moment they’d ever have.
Maybe it was.
Maybe tomorrow morning everything would go back to normal: competition and contracts and all the reasons this was impossible.
But right now, with his mouth on hers and his hands burning through the thin fabric of her nightgown, Grace didn’t give a single damn about tomorrow.