Page 143 of All I Have Left

EVIE

The house is eerily quiet as we walk through it, Grayson having said nothing to me since we left the wedding. I fight through tears and my wanting to scream at him, but I’m not sure anything else needs to be said between us.

He sits down on the couch when we get back to his house. No words are said between us as I move from the living room, down the hall to his room. The moment he’s out of sight, that’s when the tears roll down my cheeks.

I stare at his bed and think of the night we first slept in it together. Eight years old. And now here we are, fourteen years later and so much in between that time.

I gather some clothes into a bag and head for the door, unsure if I will ever return to this room. It’s not that I want to leave. I don’t. But I can’t keep living this way, and it seems the more time we spend together, the more the past can’t be let go of. We’re holding onto it for reasons I don’t know.

With a shaking hand, I reach for the doorknob, pain radiating through me.

Outside the room, I make my way down the hall to see him on the couch still, his head bent back against the edge, staring at the ceiling. He doesn’t look at me as I walk by. I get to the doorbefore I say, “I’m staying at my mom’s tonight. I’ll get the rest of my stuff later.”

I touch the handle, but I don’t get it open before I hear him move from the couch. He makes his way across the room to me and covers my hand with his on the knob. His chest meets my back and my body shudders.

“Don’t go,” he whispers, licks of his breath tickling my ear as he presses against me, my back curves molding to him. “I’m sorry.For everything.”

Dropping my bag at my feet, I sigh into him, leaning my head back against his shoulder. I don’t say anything as he turns me around. Tilting my head up, I hear him suck in a breath. He searches my eyes, but the depth of emotion in his tells me everything that was said between us was real but didn’t replace this. There’s love here, and just because we said some truths neither of us wanted to hear didn’t mean it was over.

“Do you hear me?” He pauses, searching my eyes. “I’m fucking sorry. You didn’t deserve that bullshit. I’m an asshole.”

I nod. “I’m sorry too.”

Suddenly his hands are on the sides of my cheeks, cupping them, and he captures my mouth with his. Driving his tongue past my lips, he holds me against the door in the most erotic kiss I’ve ever had. It teases, provokes, promises of what’s to come.

Maybe all along, this is what we had been missing to finally come together again as a couple and heal. The ability to be intimate and not hold back. Whatever the reason, I cling to him, his shoulders, his arms. I practically crawl up his body to weld mine to his. It only provokes him, his movements hasty and rushed, all-consuming.

A strangled sigh escapes him as he moves backward, refusing to let go of me or his mouth on mine. Reaching down, he slides his hands over the backs of my thighs and then lifts me up with a grunt.

“Grayson, you can’t lift anything,” I protest, but he refuses, shaking his head.

“It’s fine,” he mumbles, his mouth desperate against mine. “I can’t take this any longer. I have to be with you.”

He carries me to his room and my thoughts turn to what he has planned when he lays me on the bed and begins ripping off his shirt, shoes, and then pants.

Okay, uh. Shit. I scoot back on the bed to the middle. “Grayson,” I sigh. “We shouldn’t.”

He shakes his head, walking toward me. Suddenly, he’s on top of me, bunching my dress up until his hands are on my thighs. The look in his eyes, dark with need, makes me feel desired and sexy, wanted by him. “I need you, like this,” he rasps, gripping my hips and yanking me toward him. “And you need me too, don’t you?”

“But… you’re not cleared,” I murmur, taking in his sculpted shoulders and stomach as he draws in quick breaths.

“I don’t care. I just, weneedthis. We’ll be careful.” He looks so lost and broken when he speaks that I cave. “If it’s too much, I’ll stop.”

I reach out and cup his neck carefully and bring his lips to mine. “I want you too,” I whisper.

He breaks the kiss, staring at me beneath heavy eyelids. His lips part, his breathing erratic as he works my dress off me. I can’t tell you how the next few minutes play out, but it’s rushed. I do remember him not wearing a condom, because I’m on birth control, and the exact moment he enters me.

I cry out, overcome by the feeling of fullness and he stills, a strangled cry of pleasure slipping past his lips. “Christ,” he gasps, his face buried in my neck. He pants as he rocks his hips into mine.

I start crying, for reasons I don’t even know. Happiness maybe? It’s not from anger or resentment, or even bad memories.

“Honey,” he sighs when he notices the tears. “Fuck, am I hurting you? Should I stop?”

I cling to his shoulders with a newfound desperation. “Pleasedon’t stop,” I cry, my body shaking. “I’m not hurt. I… didn’t know how bad I needed to feel you like this, until now.”

Him filling me, it’s like everything has finally been connected in a way that neither one of us knew we needed. “Me too,” he growls, his pace quickening. His hips jerk erratically, but he stops for a moment, his cock pulsing inside me, but I don’t think he’s come yet. “God, I fucking missed you.” His words break, his hold tightening around me.

It doesn’t last long, which, to be fair, we both knew. But amazingly, and I have no idea how, but we fall apart at the same time, our lungs panting in quick, short breaths. My thighs clutch his hips as he rocks into me, his body shuddering with his release, a guttural moan from deep within his throat captured in the pillow beside my head.

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