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I blink up at him, my brows pulling together.
That’s two for two on shit I never thought would happen. Gray Eastwood asking me what I need and Gray Eastwood caring if I’m okay.
I am okay, but I also don’t know how to handle the fact that he’s asking, so I nod quickly, trying to dislodge his hand with the movement.
It works. Or at least, he moves his hand, although maybe it wasn’t because of me.
Both palms come to rest on the mattress beside my head, and he stares down at me, his gaze penetrating.
“None of us touched your paintings, Sparrow. I swear it.”
21
Gray’s blue-green eyes are hooded and dark, and sincerity burns in the depths of his irises.
I refused to believe his words when I was sinking below the heavy waves of a panic attack, but now, with the tension finally draining from my body and my mind regaining a little clarity, it’s hard not to.
I hate that he might be telling the truth.
My life would be easier in some fucked up way if the Sinners had been the ones to destroy my art. It would finally force me to make a clean break from them. It would hammer the final nail into the coffin of whatever strange, chaotic feelings exist between the four of us.
Because I could never forgive them for that.
“I’m serious, Sparrow,” he says softly, trailing a finger over the lines of one of my tattoos as he speaks. “None of us would do that. I’ve seen your pieces, and I know—we know—how much they mean to you. That’s the kind of shit we don’t fuck with.”
I clench my jaw, wanting to draw away from his touch, from the feel of Elias’s large, warm body on one side of me and Declan’s on the other. But I can’t quite force myself to move yet. Whatever my heart may have to say about this bullshit, my body clearly has an addiction, and like any good addict, it binges on them every chance it gets.
But I can’t stay here. This bubble the four of us are in right now isn’t real life, and I can’t let myself forget that.
“Yeah, alright,” I say.
It’s not quite an acceptance and it’s not quite a denial, but it’s the best I can offer. I slide out from under him and slip off the bed before any of them can stop me, gathering my clothes quickly and tugging them on.
I step toward the door, then turn back, trying not to notice how fucking gorgeous they all look. When we first ended up on the bed, I was still deep in the throes of my attack, and I didn’t really get a chance to appreciate all that sculpted, firm muscle. All that man.
Too bad I never will again.
Pinning my focus on Gray’s eyes to stop my gaze from wandering, I lift my chin. “You still have the ID card you stole from me?”
He nods.
“And you swear you didn’t use it to wreck my pieces?” My throat tightens as I force the last words out.
“Yes.”
I swallow, then hold my hand out. “Give it back.”
He climbs off the bed and opens a drawer in his desk, pulling out the little plastic card he took from my back pocket the day they dragged me into the storage closet. Then he crosses the room and places it into my outstretched palm, his hand lingering on mine for a moment.
“Do you want help?” he asks. “Cleaning up?”
The simple question almost breaks me all over again. I’m honestly not sure I can go back to my room and face the scattered pieces of my soul on my own. But I refuse to lean on them for this. If I do, I’m afraid my addiction will turn into something else. Something far more dangerous.
Real, true need.
“No.” My voice is rough, blunt. “I clean up my own messes.”
Gray’s expression shifts a little, something almost like pain or regret flashing through his features. But he doesn’t say anything else, just nods and steps back, leaving me free to go.
