Epoch (Transcend Duet #2)(87)

His brows draw inward. “She’s not here.”

I jerk my head back, doing a weird eye roll.

Griffin looks over my head and his face relaxes. He leans over and sets his cup on the counter. Grabbing my shoulders, he turns my body so my back is to his chest.

I try to wriggle free before Swayze 2.0 turns around.

“Everybody, meet Samantha. She lives on the second floor. New girl. Be nice. She’s easily spooked.”

Blonde girl turns, and she’s not Ginny.

“Hey, Samantha,” everyone replies in choppy unison.

You could fry an egg on my face. I’m so flushed with embarrassment. I don’t like being the center of attention, and Griffin just said I spook easily, which is not true. Well, not entirely true. He introduced me as Samantha when I was only trying on that name for a day.

However, the most cringe-worthy part of this situation is he has me positioned so I’m hiding his wet shirt, but my shirt is wet and my nipples are hard because whatever he had in his cup was cold.

Griffin releases me and I curl my shoulders inward to hide my nipple issue. “I gotta go.” I start to brush past him.

He grabs my hand and yanks me to the left, straight into his bedroom.

“I need to change my shirt!”

He shuts the door and brings a finger to his lips. I pull the wet material away from my chest.

“You can’t leave until you tell me why you came to my apartment.” He shrugs off his wet shirt.

I stare. And stare. And … stare.

“You’ve seen it all before.” He yanks a clean tee off a hanger.

I shrug. “Never gets old.”

He grins. “Why did you come by? Besides you finally opened the envelope and found my address.”

My goofy smile comes out.

“But I still haven’t seen the check clear the bank.”

“Samantha Samuels. Really?”

“That’s what it said on the back of the receipt.”

“I can’t even cash it.”

“Why did you come by?” He steps in front of me and grabs the hem of my shirt.

I squeeze my arms to my body. “Um … what are you doing?”

“You can slip on a clean shirt of mine.”

I stare at him unblinkingly with a death grip on my shirt.

“I’ve seen it all before. Arms up.”

As I relax my grip, he peels the shirt over my head. His gaze goes to my birthmark, something else he’s seen a hundred times before. I’ve never seen him focus on it like this except for the very first time he saw it.

“Why did you come by?” he whispers, keeping a focused eye on my birthmark, like he’s mesmerized by it. I’ve never felt self-conscious about it … until now.

“I … uh … wanted to talk to you.” I cross my arms over my stomach to hide the birthmark.

He kneels in front of me. “About?”

What is he doing? His eyes never leave my stomach.

“Doug.”

Whisky eyes flick up to meet my gaze for two seconds. He nods and returns his attention to my stomach.

“What are you doing?” I ask as he pulls my arms away.

“Shh …” He presses his lips to the bottom of my birthmark.

Tears burn my eyes. I don’t know why. His touch is so incredibly tender, reverent, and haunting. Ever so slowly, he moves his lips up a tiny fraction, like he’s trying to … I don’t know.

“He killed Daisy,” he whispers over my skin. “But he cut her first … from here…” he presses his lips to the very bottom again and ghosts them to the top, just on the underside of my breast “…to here.”

No …

“Not now …” I beg, fighting this miserable reality—this haunting revelation.

“Now,” he says.





CHAPTER FORTY-THREE




Griffin


“I said I would protect you. I promised to keep you safe. You were my world, even if I wasn’t yours.”

Her body shakes with emotion as I wrap my arms around her waist, resting my cheek on her birthmark.

“I woke up early that morning before the sun. And I watched you sleep. All I wanted was to scoop you up in my arms and take you with me. I wanted to chase darkness where we could hide beneath the shadows of a million sunsets. If you could transcend time, why couldn’t we stop it? Why couldn’t our love be immortal?”

“Griff …” she weeps.

I don’t want to hurt her. I want to love her. But I took another life and mine will never be the same. For us to love, for us to live, this has to be our burden to bear. I take it to my grave. She takes it to hers. And we both leave it behind in this life. We leave no stones unturned between us.

We have to be all or nothing.

“Jett used to be in the Special Forces. He has certain skills and knowledge he shared with me. I didn’t have a single weapon. I didn’t need one. Nothing to hide. Less accountability. I knocked on Doug’s door while blocking the peephole with my other gloved hand. He was fearless, like all idiots are, and he opened the door.”

“What the fu—”

I pushed him inside, shutting and locking the door behind me.

“Get the fuck out of here before I call the police.”