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She set her beer down beside the sink. “He’s here for the fundraiser of course. Tucker was supposed to accompany him, but something came up and Tuck asked me to come instead.”
“That your job? Professional babysitter?”
“I’m just doing my brother a favor.”
“The kid’s a tool. He’s been in and out of trouble with the cops since he was fifteen and he doesn’t know when to keep his mouth shut. He’ll screw up. His kind always does.”
She pushed off from the counter, a small frown on her face. “Why would you say that? You don’t even know him.”
“I don’t need to know him, to know what I know. It’s like looking in a mirror.”
“Why do you do that?” she asked, voice sharp. “Why do you want me to think that you’re this awful person? A guy who doesn’t care? A guy who…” Her cheeks deepened even more as she stumbled over her words. “A guy who would screw a woman like no tomorrow even though she came into the bar with another man.” She paused. “Isn’t that what you said?”
“Sounds about right.” He scowled. Never should have brought her out here.
“You’re so full of it.”
“I’m just keeping it real, Grace. You need to know what I am.”
She bit that damn bottom lip of hers—probably did it on purpose because she had to know it would drive any man crazy—and then took a step forward. She was breathing in short, staccato bursts, and that mouth of hers was parted as if she was baiting him to taste her.
“I call bullshit.”
“Call it whatever you want.”
Grace made a strangled sound and it took everything in Matt to keep his hands off of her. “You want to know what I think?”
“Does it matter if I say no?”
A small smile lifted the corners of her mouth. “I think that you’re hiding behind a mask of ugly. One that you’ve taken years to cultivate.” She angled her head and those eyes of hers never left him. “If I had to guess, I’d say probably since you were a young man. Maybe even a young boy.”
She inched forward and placed her hands on his chest. He should have moved back but something kept him rooted to the spot. Every muscle in Matt’s body tightened, and he ached from the raw need that rose up in him.
It had been a while, he thought. That’s all. He just needed to get laid.
Startled, he suddenly realized that the last woman he’d been with was standing right in front of him. He didn’t get a chance to think on it, because she thumped him in the chest with her forefinger.
“You want people to think you don’t care about anyone or anything. That’s why you have sex with women and then toss them aside like yesterday’s garbage. Not because you’re a bad man—that would be the easy explanation. A bad man doesn’t rescue an animal from the side of the road and bring that animal into his house to give birth. A bad man doesn’t walk his best friend down the aisle and then toast her with words that left tears in my eyes. A bad man doesn’t kiss the way you do because a bad man has no feelings.”
She swallowed and exhaled, her hands still planted on his chest. “I feel you, Matt. I know there’s something more inside and I want to know what that something is. I want to know everything.”
Matt stared down into her eyes for so long that his vision blurred. Until that familiar feeling of disgust and self-loathing seeped into him. He welcomed it like an old friend because that’s what he knew.
He stepped away from Grace before tossing his empty beer into the bin beneath the sink.
“You’ll have to spend the night. The roads aren’t safe. I’m going to sleep down here with Rosie. You can take my room. It’s the first door on your right at the top of the stairs.”
He moved past her without another word, and after checking on Rosie and her pups, turned to the sofa on the other side of the fireplace. He heard the squeak on the bottom step that led upstairs.
He tugged off his shirt and tossed it before flopping onto the sofa, grateful for the silence. She was gone. Silence was good. Silence was what he was used to.
So why did it feel so wrong?
7
Grace woke up to AC/DC and “Hells Bells.”
