Play It Safe(39)

And when I did that handsome face was grinning at me in a way that was so sexy I nearly had another one.

And it also hit me that he gave me that and he didn’t get his own.

“What about you?” I whispered.

“I’m inside you for the first time, dollface, it’s not gonna be on a bunch of hay.”

The hay was warm and I liked the smell of it but it was also scratchy and although the air in the stables was not as cold as outside, it wasn’t toasty warm either.

Therefore, I saw his point.

So we got out of the hay and he gave me my first horseback riding lesson.

I was pretty good, Gray even said so.

But what he gave me in the hay started something. Something I wasn’t experienced enough to understand fully but intuitively I felt that he liked giving it to me, he liked what he saw when he did and because of that, the floodgates opened.

A week of making out, heavy petting, getting used to him, his taste, his smell, his hands, his body, discovering all of that was fantastic. I loved every second. But I would understand after he gave me what he gave me in the hay that, before, he had it under stringent control.

Because, after, that control was gone.

And, it must be said, it probably helped that him giving me that, knowing what that felt like, how beautiful it was and wanting more of that from Gray, my control was gone too.

All day yesterday after our time in the hay, when his eyes dropped to my lips, he didn’t drop his head to touch his to mine. He dropped his head, his mouth hit mine, his tongue drove into my mouth and then we went at each other like there was no tomorrow. He’d press me against the wall, the counter, take my hand and drag me out of a room his Gran was in and there he’d press me against a wall and lay a hot and heavy one on me. Lots of tongue, lots of hands and it felt like, for the both of us, it took a mammoth effort to pull away.

I loved it. I loved that he liked touching me, tasting me, holding me and letting me know he did. And I loved doing those things to him.

In fact, I loved everything.

I loved Mustang.

I loved my little room even though there wasn’t much to it, not even personality (yet). It still was mine and for a girl who carried everything she owned in a bag, that room was a huge step up.

I loved Janie. I loved my job. I loved our customers. I loved having cash in my purse. No, I loved having cash I earned in my purse and the way I earned it being normal, real not to mention legal.

I loved making coffee in the morning from my coffeemaker, pouring it in my cup (well, ones I’d borrowed from Gray but still, I’d have my own soon) and standing by the window at the front, watching the town of Mustang wake up. I loved pouring my own cereal using my own milk. I loved going to the corner market on the square to get bits and pieces. I loved going to sleep in a bed I knew I’d go to sleep in the next night, and the next, and the next.

And then there was Gray who I loved most of all.

Truly, completely…I fell hard and I didn’t mind the fall, it didn’t hurt a bit so I stayed down.

Since I was going to church with them and I spent all day at Gray’s yesterday, instead of taking me back into town only to go back in and pick me up in the morning, I crashed in his guest bedroom.

And I spent half the night trying to find sleep instead of throwing back the covers, wandering down the hall, finding Gray and convincing him to disrespect his grandmother in their home.

Luckily, I succeeded in this endeavor.

But I had the feeling that it wouldn’t be long before I had Gray, all of him, and I…could not…wait.

I looked at myself in the mirror and even to me, taking in my swollen lips, dreamy eyes; I saw that I looked happy.

And that was something else I’d never seen, I’d never had, never felt, not in my life.

“Dollface.” I heard Gray say and at his strange tone of voice, I whipped around to see he also had a strange look on his face.

I studied him a moment and saw it was concern.

“What’s going on?” I asked softly, moving quickly to him.

“Don’t know. It’s Gran. She’s in her bathroom, tellin’ me to call her friend Shirley. She says I can’t go in. She doesn’t sound right.”

Oh dear.

I held his eyes even as I made it to him then moved by him and hurried into the hall, down it and down the stairs.

Grandma Miriam’s room was around the stairs and at the end of the back hall that ran parallel to the front hall which went to the kitchen. Gray told me he renovated their old den with a handicapped accessible bathroom after she had her accident but I’d never been back there.

Still, upon entering her room, it didn’t look like a renovated den. It looked like it had been a bedroom since the house was built. Clearly, he’d moved everything as she had it wherever she used to sleep and put it in here.

Again, an indication of how sweet Gray could be.

The bathroom door was closed. I went to it and knocked.

“Mrs. Cody, are you okay?”

Silence then, “Gray call Shirley?”

“Gran,” Gray called from behind me, “Shirley lives forty-five minutes away. Ivey’s here, you need somethin’, she’ll help you out.”

Gray had shared that his grandmother’s spinal injury was located low on her spine and it was a “partial” which meant she had total control of her torso and some control of her legs. That said, they were weak and the control unpredictable so her legs couldn’t support her if she was in a walker or they would give out at random times. They knew this because they tried.