Always On My Mind (The Sullivans #8)(31)

She acted so tough, put on that sassy act at every turn. But he’d seen the flashes of pain in her when she didn’t think he was looking, simply because he couldn’t look away. It was why he’d let her stay when he thought she’d be next to useless as a farmhand.

Because he’d recognized in her the need to heal that had been in himself three years ago when he’d found the farm.

And yet, even though he’d lived with her for nearly a week, and even though she’d just come apart in his arms and it had been one of the most beautiful things he’d ever experienced in thirty-five years, he still didn’t know a damn thing about why she was on the farm.

Or what she was hiding from.

Grayson knew what he needed to do. He needed to push her away; needed to lash out hard enough that she couldn’t possibly stay; needed to find a way to live with himself for adding more pain to her eyes, more tears on her pillow. He needed a way to forget that he had begun to respect her for turning out to be much stronger than he’d initially given her credit for, filled with a determination that couldn’t help but impress him.

And, most of all, he needed to remember that the last time he’d let himself fall for a woman, he’d ended up losing her.

Grayson couldn’t repeat that. Ever.

Lori’s fingers were moving to his belt buckle when he removed his hands from her and forced himself to take a step back as he said, “This never should have happened.”

Chapter Twelve

Five words were all it took for Lori to feel as if she’d just stepped out into the cold, hard rain, a complete one-eighty from the bliss Grayson had just given her, immediately making everything that had warmed freeze up again.

She knew he was right, that they shouldn’t be doing this, but it didn’t stop his abrupt rejection from hurting. Hurting like crazy, actually, as though his words had run a sharp grater across her already raw insides.

Lori bent down to reach for her clothes, but they were so wet she could barely peel them apart, let alone shove them on so that she could get away from a man she didn’t understand. A man she shouldn’t want to understand when he pulled her into him one second, and shoved her away the next.

She’d been there. She’d done that.

Never again—wasn’t that what she’d vowed?

Oh, how she’d loved being naked in Grayson’s arms, but now that he’d pushed her away, she hated her nakedness. She felt powerless, as if he could see all the way through her when he’d put every single one of his guards back up.

A sob rose as she tried to get her stupid clothes to come unstuck from each other, and she wasn’t quick enough at swallowing it down. It didn’t help when Grayson handed her a blanket from the couch.

“Wrap this around yourself.”

Why did he have to choose that moment to be kind? If he’d been gruff like he usually was, she could have stopped any tears from falling...but now all she could do was take the blanket from him and turn away to move closer to the fire as she wrapped it around herself, hoping he hadn’t seen them. Her years of dance training were what made it possible for her to hold her proud, straight stance even as another tear fell.

“Lori—”

She could hear the regret in the way he said her name and she hated it. Hated that he felt sorry for her for wanting him the way she did.

“Don’t.” The word came out sharply. “We don’t need to talk about what happened. We can just chalk it up to an accident.”

She assumed he was silent because he agreed with her. But she could feel his gaze on her, feel the heat of it burning even hotter than the fire.

Lori Sullivan had always known exactly what she wanted, and she’d trusted herself to follow her heart every day of her life. But now that she’d had to face up to the mistakes she’d made in trusting her ex when she definitely shouldn’t have, she hated that she couldn’t trust what she felt with Grayson, either.

She stared into the fire and watched the flames leap in no pattern whatsoever. But she’d followed the same pattern her entire adult life: She’d fallen for men who promised everything, then after she’d given herself to them, no holds barred, each and every one of them had taken their promises back.

She told herself it shouldn’t matter that Grayson had just hurt her, too.

But it did.

He moved to her side, but instead of looking at the fire, he stared directly at her profile. “It wasn’t an accident.”

She was shocked enough that she turned her tear-streaked face to him without remembering to wipe it clean first.

A surprising tenderness—along with obvious regret—flashed in his eyes at the sight of her tears, and she might have been able to write it off as just another accident on his part if he hadn’t followed it up by brushing one thumb across her cheek to wipe the wetness away.

“No,” she finally agreed, “it wasn’t.” But that didn’t change anything. “So,” she said in an effort to change the subject as she turned her face away to swipe at her damp cheeks with the back of her hand, “do you have any board games in here that we could play while we wait out the storm?”

“Why are you here, Lori?”

What was he doing? Why wasn’t he letting them move into shallow waters again? Didn’t he realize how much easier it would be?

Luckily for him, she was a master at acting like everything was okay when it wasn’t.