14. Griffin
Chapter 14
Griffin
I n the three days after Ian’s party, Logan and Gracie both came down with a stomach bug that had apparently taken out nearly the whole of the fifth grade, class by class. Grace was the first to succumb, looking a little green around the gills when she got off the bus. By the time I got dinner on the table, she was running to the bathroom. Logan hit the deck the next day. It lasted about twenty-four hours, and I was home to take care of them, but it was Andi who really stepped up. With both kids sick, it was difficult for me to clean the house and do their laundry while also chasing them around with puke buckets, crackers, and Gatorade. She didn’t need to help since these were technically her days off, but she did. She wiped their foreheads with cool cloths and sat with them when they couldn’t sleep. At one point, I stood in shadows outside Grace’s doorway as Andi stroked my daughter’s head, singing softly to her. It was the most maternalistic care my children had ever received, which both broke my heart and mended it back together.
So it shouldn’t surprise me when I find her lying on the couch after I arrive home from work, but it makes my own stomach turn all the same to see her looking so ill. “Andi, you okay?” I rush over and sink to my haunches, setting my palm on her forehead. Her skin is hot and damp. “How long have you been like this?”
She swats at me, though there’s no energy behind it, her hand missing me completely. “I’m fine. I just need a rest.”
“You’re sick.”
“I am not,” she insists, rolling from her side to her back with a groan.
“Have you eaten today?”
“Um…”
“How about liquids? Did you drink any water?”
“This morning, yeah.” She angles her head back, her eyes heavy with exhaustion, and I already know what she’s going to say. “I couldn’t keep it down.”
“We have to get something into you,” I say, and that earns a soft giggle from her.
“I see what you did there.”
I loop my arm around her, hauling her up to a sitting position, taking nearly all her weight against me. “Did what?”
“Get something into me,” she mutters, resting her head on my shoulder. “You can get into me.”
I cluck my tongue. “I think you’re delirious.”
“A little bit,” she says, and I press my fingers against her pulse point, making sure it’s normal before placing a pillow behind her head.
“I’m going to get you some ginger ale and toast. Don’t move.”
“Yes, sir, Captain Stone, sir.” She salutes me but accidentally smacks herself in the head. She’s a mess. A bewitching little mess.
I barely brown the piece of bread before putting it on a plate, offering it to her along with the warm soda. “Here, sweetheart. Take little sips.”
I hold the can up for her so she can wrap her dry lips around the straw. I encourage her as she drinks and then manages a few nibbles of the dry toast. Even if she chews like it’s the worst thing in the world. “It tastes like sand.”
“You’re cute like this, all loopy and out of it.”
She wrinkles her nose and spits out the mangled piece of bread from her mouth onto the plate.
“What’s wrong? You?—”
That’s when she gags and slaps her hand over her mouth, stumbling to stand. She trips over me as she races to the bathroom in the hall, where I hear her retching before I get there.
I sit down beside her, holding her hair back as her body rids itself of the little food and drink it had. After she’s done, she holds the sides of the toilet and whimpers. “I hate puking.”
“Yeah. It sucks.”
“Everything hurts.”
I reach for the hand towel, hanging from the loop on the wall, and nudge her to sit up so I can wipe her face. Her skin’s pale, and her eyes are bloodshot when they meet mine. She frowns. “Bet you don’t think I’m cute now.”
“I think you’re cute all the time.”
“Liar,” she mumbles, scooting away from me to lean against the wall and close her eyes. We sit for a while, neither of us speaking. I assume she doesn’t feel up to standing yet, so I don’t force her to. Plus, she might not be done.
I’m proven right when she throws herself back at the toilet, her hands slapping on the tile floor, her back bowing as she vomits. I instantly reach for her hair, but I don’t scoop it all up in time, and the poor girl gets some puke on a few strands of hair. I wipe it off as best I can with the towel, but she notices and lets out a pitiful moan. “I’m disgusting.”
“You’re sick.”
“And disgusting. I’m all sweaty,” she says, curling up into a ball on the floor.
“Do you want to shower?”
She waves me off. “Just leave me here to die.”
“Can’t do that, sweetheart.” I scoop her up, and she squeaks out a protest.
“No, don’t. I’m gross. Put me down.”
“You’re not staying on the bathroom floor.” When I cradle her against me, the fight leaves her pretty easily, and she relaxes. I think about that first day she stood in the basement, holding Cat, how jealous I was of him. Now I’ve got this woman in my arms, holding her the same way, her arm even flopped out to the side.
I can’t help the twitch of my lips, and Andi notices. “Are you laughing at me?”
“I would never.”
“Then what are you smiling at?”
“I was remembering something funny. Do you want me to help you get cleaned up?”
“I can do it,” she says, even as she tucks her head against my shoulder. I carry her downstairs and set her on her bed. She immediately falls to her side in the fetal position.
“Are you sure you don’t want my help?”
She stares at me for a long time, her tongue gliding over her cracked and dry lips. “You can’t shower with me.”
I bite back a chuckle. “That sounds like a question.”
She blinks sleepily, her fingers lifting toward me. “You can’t shower with me, but you can turn it on for me.”
I find the toothpaste so she can brush and then turn on the shower, making sure she has a fresh towel and clothes before closing the door to the small bathroom. As soon as it snicks shut, I curse myself for not making it bigger. For not bringing her up to my bedroom and putting her in my more spacious bathroom. We could both fit in the shower, and I would gladly stand under the water fully clothed if she needed me to hold her up.
Behind the door, I hear her moving around, groaning every once in a while. The shower shuts off after a few minutes, and I turn around to wait until she opens the door. When she does, she’s in the shorts and T-shirt I found.
“Feel better?” I ask, and she nods, accepting my hand when I extend it. I usher her to the bed, where I hold the covers up so she can get in, but she doesn’t. Instead, she goes to the small nightstand, where she picks up an elastic band.
“Here. Let me.” I take it from her then snag the brush I spotted in a basket on the dresser and point to the bed for her to sit. When she does, I get to work, combing the long strands of wet hair, the light golds and dark ambers blending together to create my new favorite color. After I have all the tangles out, I separate her hair into three lengths and braid them together, tying it off at the bottom. It’s been a few years since Grace wanted me to braid her hair, so my skills are a little rusty, but it’ll do.
Andi runs her hand over her hair. “You braided it.”
“I know.”
“You know how to braid hair.”
“I do,” I say, even though it wasn’t a question.
“Is there anything you don’t know how to do?”
I lift the covers up again, and after she crawls under them, I tuck them around her before sitting back down, stretching my legs out, my back against the headboard. “I don’t know how to crochet.”
She closes her eyes, snuggling into my side, and I drape my arm around her, skating my fingertips over her forehead and temple. She hums. “That feels nice. Please don’t stop.”
I’d never. Not even if a hurricane swept through here.
“I miss it,” she says quietly.
“Miss what?”
“Being touched.”
I stop for a stunned moment. “What do you mean?”
“Physical touch is my love language. I need cuddles and hugs and holding hands.”
I blow out a breath, my mind having run away with all the possibilities she could have meant. I will give Andi whatever she needs, anything she wants to feel comfortable. But the thought of her missing a sexual touch has my skin on fire. Even now, after a minute, my heart rate still hasn’t settled into its normal rhythm.
“Bet the ice queen would be so mad if she saw us now,” Andi mumbles, and I skim my index finger down her nose.
“The ice queen?”
“Elsa. Your Elsa,” she says, like that explains everything. It does not.
“She’s not my Elsa. You know that.”
Andi slants her head so she can look up at me, and I sweep my fingers across her jaw and down to her throat, where I find her pulse. I lay my fingers over it as she admits, “I was jealous of her talking to you at Ian’s party. She’s beautiful and had all your attention.”
“That’s not true.”
“It felt true. But then you came over to dance with me, and Elsa looked like she wanted to freeze me.”
I huff a laugh, and she offers me a stilted smile. “I like when you laugh. You should do it more.”
“I’m laughing because you assume I actually care about what she thinks. I don’t.” I trail my fingers up to Andi’s temple, trace the shell of her ear, and smooth my palm along her neck before sliding my fingers over the hair at the top of her head. “There’s nothing there anymore. Especially after what you told me. I don’t want anything to do with her.”
“But she wants something to do with you,” she points out, and I shrug.
“I don’t even remember what she and I talked about. All I could think about was the way you looked in that purple sundress and your cowboy boots. How it felt dancing with you. Like nothing else mattered.”
I’m not sure if this conversation is happening because it’s been a long time coming or because confessing my feelings to her in this state is like talking to a drunk person. I’m not sure how much of this she’ll remember.
But she hasn’t even been here a month, and already, I feel like she’s changed my entire world. It’s true what Ian said. She’s turned me inside out and upside down. There is no way I can pretend she hasn’t picked the lockbox I keep my emotions stored in. She blew that motherfucker right open.
And for all of my bluster, my nothing-can-hurt-me, grumpy-as-fuck exterior, I’m not sure I ever want that box closed again. Not if it means I might lose the best thing to ever happen to me.
Because that’s what she is. This woman who took me by storm. Who has earned every crack in my armor with each of her smiles. Busted down all my walls with her joy and patience and love for my children. This woman who is much too beautiful and young to be with a fortysomething son of a bitch like me has wound her fist so tight around my heart, I don’t think it would ever work right again if she left.
So, I guess, there is only one thing to do.
Ring the bell. Bow out. And admit I am no match for Andrea Halton.
She’s won.