Take a Chance(36)

My grandmama would tell me to ignore the sweet talk and walk away. But then my grandmama had never laid eyes on Grant Carter. He was too appealing for words. I missed him. This. Being with him. I missed it. He had shown me how to enjoy life, if only for two weeks. I had felt like I was finally living when I was with him.

“I don’t think I can trust my good sense with you,” I told him honestly.

“You’ll find out you can trust me. I’m not a bad guy. Deep down you know that. I just made a very bad decision.”

Taking chances had never been my thing. I wasn’t a risk taker. I was careful. I didn’t get hurt. I protected myself. I had walls. Grant had made it past my walls once. Letting him in again was asking a lot.

He moved over to me and put his head on my shoulder. “I’m not above begging,” he said.

I shivered from the tingle of his breath against my skin. This was a bad idea. Grant was good at sweet-talking. With his looks and his mouth he could talk a girl into anything. If I let myself care about him any more it would only end in heartache.

“Don’t beg. Just give me some space. I need to think,” I replied, pressing myself further away from him. The fact that I wanted to crawl into his lap and wrap myself around him was not good. I used to be stronger than this. He talked about me making him weak; if he only knew how weak he made me.

Grant gave me this sad look that only made his face more appealing. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “Don’t. You’ve been sleeping with Nan. I heard you. Do you have any idea what that feels like? To know that the loud screams that kept you up at night were actually images of someone-—” I stopped myself. I was going to say too much.

“It keeps me awake at night. I hate knowing you heard that. I don’t even remember much about that night. But knowing you heard us . . . it kills me.”

I looked out the window so I could open my eyes. I didn’t trust myself with those eyes of his locked on me. “Put yourself in my shoes. What if you had heard me having sex with another man . . . one you hated. How would it make you feel?”

Grant didn’t reply. I thought maybe I had shut him up and he was going to leave me alone. I was relieved and disappointed at the same time.

Grant moved closer to me again and his hand reached up and brushed the hair on my neck away. “The idea of some other man touching you makes me so fucking insane, I want to destroy shit. I can’t imagine it, and just thinking about it makes me shake with fury.”

I could feel the stiffness to his body as it brushed against my side.

“Your date with Adam haunts me. I can’t stand the idea of him touching you,” Grant’s finger trailed down my bare arm. “I don’t do possessive and crazy. Never have. But you . . . I want to wrap you up and run off with you so no one can touch you again. Just me. Always me.”

Grant’s head dipped down and the tip of his nose grazed the skin on my neck. “You smell like heaven and hell all wrapped up into one,” he whispered.

My heart slammed against my chest and my legs felt weak. Did he mean all that? I turned my head to look into his eyes, and the determination and desperation told me that he meant every word. Grant Carter wanted me that much. As hard as it was to believe, he had called me and I hadn’t known it. I couldn’t convince myself he was lying. He was so determined for me to believe him. I wanted to believe him.

The memory of how good Grant could make my body feel was replaying vividly in my head. I didn’t want to remember, but he was making it very hard.

“If you don’t trust me, I understand. Just let me near you,” he said as his hand slipped under my shirt and rested on my stomach. “I’ll prove it to you. Just let me. Give me a chance to prove it to you.”

His hand played with the skin on my stomach and I forgot to breathe.

“I don’t want to be another Nan to you,” I told him honestly. I had witnessed firsthand how easily he had slept with Nan then ignored her and her feelings the very next moment.

“You’re nothing like Nan. What she and I had was shallow and based on her selfishness and neediness. She has no feelings for me and she made sure to kill all feelings I had for her.”

I let his hand to continue to touch my skin and send tingles through my body. This might come back to haunt me, but I was good at reading people—and I believed Grant Carter.

“So fucking soft,” he murmured in my ear, and I let my head fall back to give him more access to my neck because I was incredibly weak when it came to wanting what this man could give me. This wasn’t smart. I was making a huge mistake but I couldn’t seem to stop myself. I loved how he made me feel. My body wanted more. Even if my head was screaming at me to stop this.