Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 133321 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 667(@200wpm)___ 533(@250wpm)___ 444(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 133321 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 667(@200wpm)___ 533(@250wpm)___ 444(@300wpm)
“No, that’s what I’m telling you. When I was laying there I thought: I trust him. How did this happen? How did we get here? And then it hit me. I trust you completely. I trusted you completely and the idea that I could trust that much, and find that woman pressed against you, I just—that was such a deep wound. Don’t you see?”
“No, Mia, I don’t. Because what happened didn’t feel like trust.”
My lashes lower with his anger and I force aside a moment when I want to shut down, which was exactly where I went wrong with our breakup and exactly why I admit, “I shut down. It was the only way to protect myself. That was the flaw that was really perfection. I trusted you so completely that I didn’t know how to survive the wound.”
“You didn’t fully trust me or you wouldn’t have needed to shut down.”
“I did. I swear to you, Grayson. I did.”
“I don’t know what to do with that, Mia. You want a reason to distrust me?”
“I loved you to the point that your betrayal felt like it would end me. I can’t be with you if you’re going to resent me. I can’t be with you if you don’t think I deserve everything again. You just—I just need you to know that maybe I loved too much.” I try to move away but he catches me, his hand on my hip and the back of my head.
“Maybe you didn’t love me enough,” he says. “Maybe you didn’t love me like I did you because I couldn’t have left you.”
“Loved?”
“You know I still love you.”
“Maybe not enough.” I try to move again and suddenly my stomach is not feeling well but Grayson holds me. “Let go. I feel sick. I need up.”
“Stop, baby. Stop pulling away.” He rests his forehead against mine. “I love you more than I love life itself. I’d say you know that, but obviously, you don’t. Obviously, you didn’t.”
“I did. It was my own insecurity that got us here. I told you that back in the Hamptons.”
“How do we fix that? Did I do something to create it? Because if anyone knows I’m not perfect, it’s you. I let you see everything. You made me be real, remember?”
“Real is good and I don’t want you to stop being real even if that means being angry, but forgive me, okay? Because we can’t do this if you can’t.”
“I’m angry at us both for letting it happen,” he says, “not just you.”
“Well then, yell at me, fuck me, do whatever it takes, but stop being angry.”
“No yelling,” he says, dragging my mouth to his. “Lots of fucking.”
Our mouths collide and our tongues stroke long and deep, a frenzied rush of kissing, touching, and him lifting me to press the soft tip of his thick erection inside me. I gasp as he pulls me down and drives into me. We stay there, connected in the most intimate of ways, breathing together, wanting together, savoring each other until a crackle of electricity seems to snap between us and we’re kissing again, our bodies swaying, grinding, swaying some more.
At some point, we move from that seductive emotional bond to one that borders on pure physicality. I lean back into his thrusts while his gaze rakes over my breasts, a hungry look on his handsome face. His fingers clamp down on my nipples, and with each push and pull of my body, sensations ripple along my nerve endings, tightening my sex, and I just need to be closer to him. I lean in again and our kisses become desperate. His hand squeezes my backside and then he gives me a hard smack that has me gasping and arching into his thrust.
“Oh, God,” I breathe out because the man rocks my entire world in every way.
He reacts by rolling me to my back, and thrusts and pumps, his hand under my backside, lifting me into a deeper, harder, spot that has me shattering with no warning. I am just there, right there, in that perfect place, and my sex clenches around him. Grayson buries his face in my neck and he groans, this deep, sexy, groan and shudders into release.
For just a moment, he all but flattens on top of me, but then he rolls us to our sides, facing each other, fingers tenderly stroking my brow. “Don’t leave again,” he says. “You stay. We fight. We fuck.”
“Yes,” I whisper. “I stay. We fight. We fuck.”
“Good. Then we need to talk, and we might need to fuck again when it’s over.”
“About Ri?”
“Yes, baby, about Ri.”
Chapter thirty-two
Mia
Grayson shifts us and we both sit up on the couch, and then he’s standing, taking me with him. I yelp as he scoops me up again, but I don’t know why I’m surprised. The man is always carrying me around, but then we’ve been apart for a year. What is familiar is being reintroduced and in every way, it still feels perfect. He loves to carry me around and I love when he does. A short walk later, I’m on the counter in our stunning bathroom with white tile trimmed by wood that matches the floors. Grayson walks to the bathroom door, reaches behind it and grabs a pair of pajama bottoms he pulls on, which reminds me of my robe that had once hung in the same spot.