Chapter 23: The Fake Zone: Chapter 23

“That was…” Hannah doesn’t finish her sentence.

“Yeah…” Hadley says.

“What was with Abe?” Hannah asks. “He needs an attitude adjustment, stat.”

“He was a dick,” Hadley confirms.

“He wasn’t that bad,” I say.

“Not that bad? He was shooting you devil eyes,” Hannah says.

I noticed. “He’s me.”

Hadley whips her head to look at me from the passenger’s seat. “He’s ?”

“In our friend group, I’m the suspicious one who doesn’t open up easily, resists change, and is the most guarded. I’m more refined, but I’m Abe.”

“No, that role’s filled by Katie,” Hannah says.

Hadley giggles, and I can’t stop my own laugh from leaking out, though I shake my head. Katie has a tougher exterior, but she warms up. My suspicions never rest.

“You’re nothing like him,” Hannah tells me.

But I am.

“Okay, girl talk. I hereby invoke an NDA that whatever is said tonight in the car doesn’t leave.” Hannah leans forward, gripping the headrest of my seat. “Do you like Grey? Because I can usually spot these things, but you two have me thoroughly confused.”

I shake my head. “No.”

Hadley stares at me. I can feel the doubt emitting from her. “He wasn’t at all interested in that Blair chick. As soon as Sonny introduced her, he was looking at you.”

“He wanted you to be jealous,” Hannah says.

“I don’t date football players.”

“You and me both,” Hannah chimes.

“Why not?” Hadley asks me.

Telling her my real reason would be cruel, so I give a plausible excuse instead. “It would make things weird with Hudson being my best friend.”

“That makes sense,” Hannah says.

“Or…” Hadley says. “Maybe it would be seamless.”

“Valid point,” Hannah says.

“Grey doesn’t date, so it’s a moot point.”

“He’s dated anyone?” Hannah asks. “Like ?”

I shake my head, realizing once more that there’s a lot about Grey I don’t know, including this detail. “Not since I’ve known him.”

“Since neither of you wants to date, you could always do a friends-with-benefits situation,” Hadley says.

I side-eye her. “Like you and Nolan?”

Hannah howls with laughter.

Hadley raises her hands. “What’s the worst that could happen? You guys catch feelings for each other?”

Her words fester in my thoughts after I drop them off and lie in bed. My bedding is too hot, too cool, too heavy, and not heavy enough. I’m restless, and more than once, my thoughts stray to Grey, wondering if he and Blair hit things off once we left. Is he kissing her the way he’d kissed me? What else might they be doing?

The thought of Grey naked makes that pressure between my legs grow as I trace my finger along my bottom lip, allowing the memory of that damned kiss to resurface. I recall the bite of his teeth, the graze of his tongue, and imagine him doing that along my breasts, my neck, and between my legs. The heat and roughness of his hands against my thighs, my ribs—everywhere.

These past couple of weeks are wreaking havoc only because we’re spending so much time alone due to our friends being busy from the holidays along with this stupid and crazy deal we struck. Maybe it’s also the fact I haven’t had sex for over a year, and Grey is undisputedly one of the most attractive guys to walk the earth.

I roll over and stare at the pages of my book, but I can’t focus on the words. I close my eyes, but the image of Grey kissing Blair, running his tongue across her, and driving inside her makes my stomach uneasy.

I growl with frustration, hating that we went to Highgrove to watch the fight, and that Evelyn planted this seed of me being with Grey in my thoughts, which Hadley watered tonight with the suggestion that Grey could be mine in all the physical ways.

The sound of my phone vibrating stirs me awake.

Five people call me. Two are on the second level of the house, two are in another state, and Griff is across town. All of them should be asleep, which has me scrambling for my phone.

Grey’s name on the screen is the last thing I’m expecting.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“I didn’t know if your parents were asleep.”

“Of course, they’re asleep. It’s five.”

“Five thirty.”

I pull back the covers. “Are you here?”

“You’re supposed to be warming up.”

My brows furrow as I ascend the basement stairs and open the door that leads out near the front door. I pull the curtain back, exposing the window beside the door, and peer out at Grey, standing on the front porch.

I hang up, disarm the alarm, and pull open the door.

“What are you doing?”

Grey’s eyes flash to my Disney’s Stitch pajamas that I received as a birthday present last year. They’re so thin you can practically see the outline of my breasts, certainly my nipples. I cross my arms over my chest.

I swear, his scowl deepens. “Why aren’t you dressed.”

I return his scowl and search for signs of a night of unadulterated bliss: a hickey, scratches on his neck, swollen lips. I want to be angry with him, the impulse so intense I have to hold my breath and remind myself he hasn’t done anything to warrant my anger before I can respond. “For what? Unless there’s an alien invasion, I’m going back to bed.”

“It’s five thirty.”

“Exactly.”

“You’re supposed to be warming up,” he says again.

A gust of cold wind rifles my hair and has goosebumps coating my skin. “And you’re not supposed to be here. You said you were spending the week in Highgrove.”

“Are you quitting?”

“Hello, judgment. It’s so nice to see you again. Won’t you please come in?”

Grey’s eyes flash with silent objections, but he passes me and steps into the house. I’d like to have this conversation here, next to the front door, so he can leave, but Jon is a notoriously light sleeper. I cross to the basement door, swing it open wide, and point for Grey to go downstairs.

He hesitates.

“It’s this or you leave,” I tell him.

His jaw clenches. I don’t think he’s used to being told what to do. He moves forward, though, silent on the stairs that lead down to my personal space.

I close the door and follow him.

Grey’s peering around as I reach the bottom step. “Why do you rent an apartment?” he asks.

“Why are you here?” I counter.

“So you can trust me to answer your question, but not if I’m capable of training you?”

I’m undercaffeinated, exhausted, recovering from multiple near panic attacks, and struggling with more insecurities and jealousy than I’ve experienced in the past several years—maybe ever. The combination is making me incapable of sparring with Grey, even with words. “Are you that upset that we came out last night?” My eyes pinch. “Are we embarrassing? Or is this because we ruined your blind date?”

“It wasn’t a date.”

“A hookup then.”

“We didn’t hook up. Nothing happened. I left an hour after you did.

.”

I hate the relief that slides through me, potent as caffeine, easing my muscles.

“If you wanted to see a fight, why didn’t you just ask?”

It takes me a second to recall we’re still arguing and why. “Would you have let me come?”

Grey stares at me, a resounding no clear in his clenched jaw. “It wasn’t safe.”

“Sonny was there. So were other women.”

“It wasn’t safe for .”

I shake my head, emotions snarling in my stomach—anger and offense with sharp thorns of regret that leave me wishing I hadn’t told him about my past. “I’ve been taking care of myself for a long time.”

Grey takes a step closer to me, anger dancing in his eyes like flames in a fire. “It kills you to ask for help. Doesn’t it?” He takes another step and then another.

I stare at him, pride thrumming in my chest like a shield, one Briggs has warned me against hiding behind. “I didn’t need help.” I can’t tell him the real reason we went last night because selling out Hannah would make me a jerk. “We were just there to see the fight. After two weeks of working out and not even teaching me how to shove someone, I wanted to see what it was all about. See if your friend was as good as you claimed.”

Grey swallows the rest of the space between us, so close I can feel his erratic breaths and the warmth radiating from his body. “Or maybe you just wanted to see me.”

His arrogance gives me whiplash that has my anger spiking. “I—”

Grey’s hand encircles the back of my neck, hauling me toward him so fast and hard I have to raise my hands to brace myself as I collide with his chest. Before the shock can settle, he’s kissing me. His mouth is hard and urgent, a declaration of war as his lips rove across mine without the same introduction I’d felt with our first kiss. Instead, he kisses me as though he knows me, like he’s punishing me as he tips my neck back and runs his teeth over my bottom lip. He doesn’t allow me to meet his rhythm as he takes complete control of the kiss, greedy and purposeful as though he’s memorizing me—marking me.

He pulls away just as suddenly as our kiss began, his chest rising and falling with heavy breaths, his eyes as bright and piercing as the stars I’d stared at last night—the stars I think too much about, like him. The coldness sweeps over me with the loss of him pressed against me as my heart bleats in my chest.

I should be asking him what in the hell he’s thinking and why he’s here. I should tell him this is likely a terrible idea that we’ll both regret, but instead, I’m gripping his shirt and sealing my mouth over his again.

Grey envelops me, sliding one hand into my hair. His fingers span around the back of my skull, angling my head with the slightest of pressures before his tongue invades. He sweeps into my mouth as his other hand wraps around my lower back, ensuring he’s in complete control.

I run my tongue along his, matching the savage and unforgiving tempo he established, losing myself in the heat of his mouth, the pull of his fingers, and the demands we both work to develop and then establish.

Grey’s hand dips under the thin barrier of my shirt, and I match him, sliding my hands under his sweatshirt and discovering hot, sculpted flesh that I rake my fingertips over. He groans, and I take the point, kissing him harder.

His hold on me tightens as his fingers fist my hair and compress against my back, pressing me so close I feel his heart against my chest and his desire pressing into my stomach. A sound between a gasp and a moan catches in my throat, and I know Grey feels it, maybe hears it, because his lips pull into a smile against mine for half a second before he plunders my mouth with his tongue, taking this point.

Fury has me kissing him harder. I want his pleasure more than my own. It’s a game—a dangerous, reckless match that leaves me feeling wanton.

I slide my hands down his chest, each muscle contracting as I pass over it until I’m gripping the band of his sweatpants and underwear and slipping my hand inside.

Grey’s moan mixes with mine as I wrap my hand around his length. My body aches, an empty feeling that has my heart racing and desperation making me clumsy as I tug at his pants, forgetting the rules and the points as the need to feel him inside of me becomes my only thought.

“Mila,” Grey says, encircling my wrist before I can move further.

I’m breathless, my heart pounding painfully in my chest, reverberating in my core with one focus—him.

“This isn’t why I came.”

I shake my head. “I know. And I know you don’t date, which is perfect. I don’t want to date, either. Relationships freak me out, and I suck at them.” The words pour out of me with conviction. I’ve always been terrible at relationships. I don’t trust people, which makes me cagey to let people in, so I always date guys who are like Green-eyes from the football game or guys too burned to care or ask.

Grey’s eyes bore into mine, and I see his lust slipping away, sense reminding him who I am—who we are. His restraint is impressive, hinting at how strong his morals are. There are a million things I don’t know about Grey, details I would fail if quizzed about his preferences, but time has sewn knowledge about his honor, character, and loyalty.

Grey’s sapphire eyes track mine as I take a step back toward my bedroom, and I don’t think either of us knows if I’m inviting him to follow or trying to escape. The rules of our game are too new, too unknown.

He steps forward, reaching for me fast as a strike. He wrapps his hand around my hip, the roughness of his skin is so much better than I’d imagined, promising the friction I’ve imagined so many times. His lips land on mine like he feels the same desperate need and holds the same hope that this will quench whatever desire burns between us.

I pull away before things go too far, wordlessly leading him to my room, where I close the door and try not to allow the intimacy it offers to fester as I turn to face him, hating how fast the brazenness that had me kissing him eddies.

Grey steps beside me and reaches for the hem of my shirt. With a gentle tug, he pulls me closer and kisses me. His hands make purchase on my waist, giving me the illusion of feeling small while he continues kissing me, trailing his fingers up my torso, across my ribs, so light, it’s nearly ticklish, and then over the swell of my breasts.

Heat swallows me a second before he pulls away and reaches down, grasping my shirt in his hands again and stripping it off with one tug. My nerves and desire soar as he watches his thumbs brush across my nipples.

His eyes snap to mine as I sigh, studying my reaction as he rolls my nipple between his fingers. He slides his other hand over my chest, neck, and jaw, and then skates his thumb against my bottom lip. He slips his thumb between my parted lips, pressing it against my tongue. I close my mouth around the callused skin as he rolls my nipple again, harder this time, resurrecting the rules.

I run my tongue over his thumb and suck. Grey groans, a long and intoxicating sound that has desire pooling between my legs. I rake my teeth against his skin, and Grey bends closer. Anticipation that he’s going to run his tongue over my nipple as I’d imagined last night has my breath stuttering, but then his mouth comes down on my neck, kissing up to my jaw where he nips me at the same time he pinches my nipple again. His tongue soothes the spot, and then he’s kissing down the column of my neck, across my collarbone. Goose bumps chase every kiss, lick, and taste while he teases my nipple into a stiff peak.

I run my hand over his pants, and Grey’s hips shift forward, his breath catching, encouraging me to do it again. This time, I press firmer as the ache in my core increases.

He sinks lower, grazing his tongue over my untouched nipple. My back arches, and the need to feel him inside of me is so damn consuming I’m shaking with want.

“I need…” I start to say.

Grey gives my nipple a final flick of his tongue and then straightens, the bulge in his pants proof that he knows exactly what I need.

He moves us to my bed with a hand on my waist and pulls the rumpled bedding lower. I reach for his pants, but Grey catches my wrist. “I need to taste you first.”

I shake my head. “It’s just sex.”

The ghost of a frown mars his brow, but before I can study it, he bends down and places a hand behind both of my knees, knocking me on my back without an ounce of grace. He doesn’t give me a second to recover, discarding my pants and underwear with one clean swipe.

“God, you’re beautiful.” His hands go to my thighs, and I hate that my thoughts wander to that man in Orlando telling Grey he hoped he had a bag.

Grey spreads my legs, each palm pressing down on my thighs, and though embarrassment lingers in the back of my thoughts, the reverent way he stares down at my exposed sex quiets those nerves. Grey pulls me to the edge of the bed, then drops to his knees, and before my next breath, he runs his tongue across me. My back arches again, and my plea sounds too much like his name as I slide a hand into his hair, trying to remind myself that blonds aren’t my type.

Grey runs his tongue over me again, lazily, exploratory, reminding me of our first kiss. Every time I arch or gasp, his grip constricts, and he hums in response, an appreciative sound that I get drunk on. I’m lost to the sensations of sharpness from his unshaven face and the way his tongue goes from teasing to demanding, marching me straight for a release and then stopping, leaving me on what feels like a cliff.

“Grey.” My voice is no longer a plea but a warning as I tug at his hair, trying to direct his mouth back to where I need it so I can tumble into the abyss.

He chuckles a dark and mirthless sound. “You’re so damn wet. So responsive,” he says, flicking his tongue across me again.

I shiver as my eyes slam shut and my heart beats a needy and separate tune. That throb between my legs builds as he leans back again, determining his next move. With his mouth still inches away from where I want him—need him—he brushes his fingers over my sex, rubbing that bundle of nerves and then drawing his finger down to my entrance, and slowly—so damn excruciatingly slowly—he presses inside of me.

I groan, barely managing to keep my eyes open because observing Grey watch me has become my new favorite hobby. His eyes flash to mine as he withdraws his finger and presses it back inside of me. He adds a second finger, and my hips surge off the bed. Grey shifts forward ans seals his mouth back over me, working me with his tongue and his fingers like a musician plays his favorite instrument until I feel the tremble start in my spine and spread to my thighs and down my legs. My entire body trembles with need as Grey’s pace becomes a torturous demand, and then I’m coming apart, panting and whispering his name as stars flash behind my eyelids.

He runs his tongue over me a final time and then stands, his chin wet with my arousal. I expect to see a smirk, proof that I lost this first round that he dominated and wrung me out with, but instead, he’s staring at me like I was the one on my knees.

I fist his sweatshirt and pull him toward me, but he remains still, forcing me to sit up to meet his mouth. I kiss him, tasting myself on his tongue, a heady and wicked taste that makes my head spin.

Lust and panic vie in my chest as I realize I nearly slept with the guy I’ve been convinced only tolerated me.

Briggs would say this was a terrible way of proving my self-worth.

“Get dressed. It’s time to go running.” He stands, and heads back out to the main area of the basement, leaving me in a cloud of bliss and confusion.