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“Fiiine,” she grumbles, pushing to her feet. “But you’ll have to wait here while I pack.”
“You want me to help?”
“No.” Her face flushes bright pink as she twists past me in the narrow space between the sofa and the coffee table without another word.
That damnably Ophelia Sanderson scent flares my nostrils again as the warmth of her body touches mine and leaves me burning. She throws a look over her shoulder as she heads to the stairs with a little toss of her shimmering honey-gold hair.
“Stay here. No boys allowed,” she says.
Then she’s gone, flitting upstairs, as warm and bright as if she hasn’t just been assaulted.
Goddamn.
How does she do it?
No matter what happens, Ophelia Sanderson picks herself up and forges on, shining on like the summer sun.
Then again, she wouldn’t be the woman who thieved away a piece of my heart ages ago if she didn’t.
Whatever happens next, that’s one jagged piece I’m sure I’ll never get back.
8
ONE BIG SLIP (OPHELIA)
There are times when I feel like Grant Faircross can sear me open with a single glance and see all my hidden secrets.
Which is why I can’t believe how densehe is sometimes.
And how completely oblivious he can be to the way he just delivered an earthquake, left me reeling by rushing to my side the second he thought I was in danger.
That closed-off, rude, blunt boy has grown into a man with an iron heart.
But there’s something different about him, too.
There are times when the walls crack for the briefest second and his emotions show freely.
It almost makes me think he cares.
That there’s something more than just the unwavering obligation to protect me because I’m his best friend’s little sister.
God.
Doesn’t he realize how many feelings he’s kicking up?
Like the fact that I’ve always hated how it felt like Grant just saw me as extended family, like his own little sister, a complete nonentity, not really a girl—or now, a woman.
But the way those dark-mocha eyes ran over me as he looked at my bruises, the way hetouchedme...
That was not the caring, distant caress of a big brother.
In that moment, Grant freaking Faircross made me feel every inch a woman and then some.
Also, it only took half an hour to pack my things, considering I’d just unpacked them and I hadn’t brought much with me to Redhaven.
Grant waited patiently downstairs, though I heard him thumping around a bit in the bathroom to put the first aid kit away. The déjà vu hit like a freight train.
It’s justweird.
