Just One Regret(5)

The couch dips from the weight as Grayson sits down at the far end. He props his feet on the tiled table in front of us and tosses one arm over the back of the mint green colored couch.

It looks too feminine for him, too small, and I feel my lips twitch, fighting a smile at seeing him sprawled out.

“You broke the rules.” The intensity in his statement isn’t diminished by the quiet way he speaks.

I used to love that about him, that he never felt the need to speak unless necessary. He chose words carefully, using as few as possible, whereas I’ve always tended to ramble, especially when nervous.

I flinch and look away from him so I can’t see him out of the corner of my eye.

“You were my best friend, Kennedy. The one person I could always count on. But that was never supposed to happen between us.”

Tears sting my eyes. He’s so forward and so blunt. Each word he speaks is a dagger to my heart. “You didn’t protest.”

“You were never someone I wanted to use in that way. It changed everything. Ruined it.”

My chin quivers and a burn sears my chest from the inside out. I leap to my feet, keeping my back to him so he doesn’t see the tears in my eyes.

He can’t understand the full impact of what he’s saying and how he’s affecting me. Only Sarah knows.

“God you’re an asshole.”

I don’t know what hurts more—that he admitted to using me, or that he’s blaming me when he’s the one who walked away. If he had stayed, everything could have been different. I wouldn’t be so broken, so terrified of allowing another man in my life.

Of starting a family.

“I always was, you knew that.”

“Yeah.” I shake my head. “I never should have been so stupid to think you’d want me for anything more, huh? Or ever find me as attractive as the sluts you took home.”

“Jesus. You think that’s why? That I didn’t ever want you?”

I shrug. My back is to him, but I can tell he’s coming closer. The tense heat rolling off him as he walks up behind me is palpable. The air thickens with every slow step he takes.

“Kennedy, you were my best friend—the only person who ever truly knew me, and I knew you. We never would have worked. I was never going to be good enough for you.”

His hand lands on my shoulder, cupping it and turning me to face him. I fight him for a second before giving in.

It’s Grayson. I always give in.

“That doesn’t mean I never wanted to know what you felt like.” His voice softens as our eyes meet. “You’re right, and I lied. I wanted you that night. I wanted you for years before then, too, but you never acted like you wanted me that way.”

My eyes widen in surprise but he keeps going.

“You never showed any interest until everyone else did, too. Then I thought you were just using me.”

I laugh, but it’s brittle and harsh. “I fell in love with a boy who handed me the pocket of his T-shirt.”

His eyes close. His chest expands as he inhales. I watch every moment of that breath like it might be the last time I see him. It has to be. Nothing good will come from rehashing this.

“I never knew.”

“I always thought it would make me lose you.” I shake my head. “I guess I was right.”

“I walked away because I wasn’t good for you. You know that. You were off to college, doing your thing, and I was stuck—just another washed-up loser townie with a high school degree and no future. I wanted you to have more.”

I lift my hands and let them fall back down against my hips. “Then thanks, I guess. I got everything I wanted. I just lost the only person who ever knew me, too, in the process.”

I lose the hold on my tears, and as they drip down my cheeks, I taste the salt on my lips. I take a step back, wiping them away, when I see the pained expression on Grayson's face.

“I wanted to call you,” he says softly. “I wanted to return all your calls and make things right, but I didn’t know how.”

“You didn’t even listen to them,” I accuse, my voice sharp. Had he listened to them, he would have called me back. He wouldn’t seem so clueless now.

I watch the guilt flash in his eyes as I score a point. He doesn’t even bother admitting it. He doesn’t need to.

“Everything changed so quickly after that.”

“Yeah, you became famous. I noticed.”

“I’m trying to explain here, Kennedy.”

“Then explain,” I snap. “And explain what you meant about what you said in the locker room earlier.”

I catch a glint in his eye and the edges of his lips twist up. “I could blame that on fighting adrenaline, if you’d like.”

My hands snap to my hips. “How about the truth?”

He takes a step forward, I move backward. It’s the same thing he did to me in the locker room earlier. I hate that my lower stomach warms and flips in all the right places as he takes another step toward me.

“I knew you were there as soon as I stepped into the ring. Don’t know how I knew it, but I found you almost instantly. And when I saw you, the first thing I thought was that I was the biggest fuckup in the world for walking away from you. The second was how much I want to fuck you again.” His gaze dips to my throat.

I absorb every single one of his words and my body shivers in response. They’re everything I wanted to hear for nine months after the door slammed behind him.

His lips twitch again and widen into a sensual smile, one full of promise and pleasure. I love it and hate it in equal measure.

“I don’t know what you want me to say to that.”

“Say yes.”

A quiet click and slide of the door opening catches my attention. When I turn to look at who is interrupting us, one of the twins is in the doorway. He holds a green bottle of something in one hand, two bottles of water in another. “You need to hydrate.”

He tosses the bottles into the air, one at a time, and Grayson grabs each of them as they fly toward his chest.

He hands me one of the waters and I take it, twisting off the cap just for something to do. The interruption has done nothing to quell the strange and not entirely unwelcome emotions running through my veins.

Grayson is all I’ve ever wanted. And now he’s offering to give it to me.

At least for a night.

I blink at the thought—the reality of what will happen if I give him one more night of me.

He’ll walk away, move to whatever town he’s fighting in next, and I’ll return to my day job as an interior designer, giving away my heart to a man who can’t return it all over again.

There’s no way it can happen.

“No.”

His throat, working on drinking a thick green sludge, stops its movement. His eyebrows arch and he pulls the bottle away from his mouth.

“No?”

“No, Grayson. I can’t even apologize for it. It was good to see you and everything, I guess, but I can’t give you that. It’d hurt too much when you walk away again.”

“What if I don’t walk away this time?”

The plastic bottle in my hand cracks and creaks from my tight grip. My other hand trembles at my side. I don’t know if I can spend more time with him and not confess the secret I’ve carried for so long.

Yet there’s another part of me that wants to spend hours with him. I want to hear how he really got started in MMA. How he got noticed. I want to hear about his life now and every single thing I’ve missed for the last six years.

But that too will hurt too much when he packs up and heads out of town.

The small amount of time I’ve spent with him tonight will hurt enough.

“I really need to go,” I say and start heading for the door.

“I don’t want you to.”

I look at him over my shoulder. “I’m not sure it’s a good idea for me to stay.”

I have to distance myself from him, from the secret I hold that will forever make him despise me.

“Please,” he says. The word stops me in my tracks. “I just want to talk to you, Kennedy, get caught up. I can’t apologize for doing what I thought was best for you all those years ago, but I did miss you. Every day. You have no idea how many times I’ve needed to hear your voice, get your opinion or advice. Just talk to me. Spend your birthday with me.”

I want to ask him why he didn’t then. Why didn’t he call? Why didn’t he ever return one of the messages I left for him? It’s not like I’ve been hiding. I spent two more years at South Central University, where he knew I was, and for the last four years I’ve been in Cambridge, twenty minutes from where we grew up.

I turn around and face him. My head screams at me to leave, to go home and go to sleep and forget this night ever happened.

My heart, the traitor, whispers at me to stay. Because like he just said, I want to know everything about him, too. I always have.

“What do you want to know?” I ask, taking a tentative step back toward the couch.

His shoulders fall. A breath of air puffs from his lips.

Then he smiles.

“Everything.”





Four





Grayson





When I was four years old, I actually thought Santa Claus was real because I got one present that year—a fucking red bike. It wasn’t wrapped. It didn’t have a tag on it. It didn’t even matter that when I woke up on Christmas morning, my dad was passed out on the living room couch reeking of beer and whiskey.