Play It Safe(75)

All things Gray.

I wanted to glory in this. I wanted to burn it in my brain so I’d have it forever. But I didn’t have it in me. All I did for a long time was just cry.

Shit. Just like always.

All these years, years of tears and Grayson Cody never leaked out of me.

Still crying, suddenly I felt his body tense then we were up. He held me close with one arm around my back but carefully dropped the arm behind my knees. My sandals hit floor but he held me tight to him, his body still tense and I would know why when I heard, “What the f**k?”

Lash.

My face, still stuffed in Gray’s chest, turned and I saw Lash.

The problem with that was Lash saw me.

And he lost his mind.

Quickly advancing, he whispered menacingly, “What the f**k?”

“Calm, man,” Gray warned, his arm coming up, held straight, palm down, a caution at the same time a placating gesture.

“You did it to her again. She used up every f**kin’ penny in her savings account to cover your ass and here you are and here she is, a f**kin’ mess again because of you,” Lash shot back and as he spoke, Gray’s body got tighter and tighter.

“Lash –” I whispered, shifting to go to him but Gray’s arm locked tight.

“Calm down and I’ll explain,” Gray ordered.

“Fuck that, let her go and get the f**k outta here and for f**k’s sake, if you ever gave even one, little, microscopic shit about her, stay out of her life,” Lash returned.

“It is not what you think,” Gray told him.

“It’s exactly what I think, ass**le. You did not pick up the pieces. You probably enjoy your birthday when every year that f**ker comes around, she locks her shit down so tight so it doesn’t come flyin’ apart it’s a wonder she can move. You do not take her back day and night, keepin’ the wolves at bay so she won’t get a wild hair up her ass, let one of ‘em in, give so much of her heart there’s nothin’ left so they can destroy her again. Do not f**kin’ stand there with her in your arms, her face red and wet and tell me I don’t know what this is. I know what this is, motherf*cker, and I know you need to get out.”

“I thought she was yours,” Gray lied quietly, for Lash, for me and I felt something warm glide through me, shocking my system as it drifted through a cold I thought would never go away.

But Lash’s head jerked, realizing what he gave away before he covered.

“Rue’s not anyone’s. She’s Rue’s.”

Gray let it slide and told him, “Somehow, we got played.”

“What?” Lash clipped.

“Somehow…we got played,” Gray repeated with an added hesitation and some emphasis.

Lash crossed his arms on his wide chest. “What the f**k does that mean?”

“I see, she’s with you, that what’s gonna go down next is not gonna go down well with you but before she took off, Ivey left a note I did not get explainin’ what went down with her. I thought she bailed on me. She did not. So someone played us. We don’t know who but Ivey just figured out her brother was more than likely involved. Knowin’ her brother, and I don’t know you, man, but I hope you’ve been saved meetin’ that piece of shit, this is undoubtedly true. This rocked her and it’s rocked me. Worse, Ivey came back and saw me with my cousin. She didn’t know it was my cousin but it was. Chandler’s livin’ in Denver now but I show Ivey a picture, it’ll prove what I say is true. We got played then there was a misunderstanding and we lost seven years to that shit. So what’s gonna happen next, you love her like you obviously do, you’re gonna have to give her and at the same time you’re gonna give it to me.”

Lash was staring at him clearly as stunned and thrown as I was, pain also in his face, understanding, heartbreak, all of this for me but Gray didn’t give him any more time.

His arm that was still held out toward Lash, a gesture of holding him off as well as pacifying him came to me, his hand cupping my jaw, tipping my head back until he caught my eyes.

Then the pads of his fingers dug in and the look in his eyes, the burn there, burned through my insides.

“We cannot take this further with him here. But we gotta talk about this, Ivey. We were played. I don’t know who or why or how but I got some good f**kin’ guesses. Someone took you away from me and used Casey to do it.” His faced dipped close and that burn in his eyes grew hotter corresponding to the heat in me. “Never before, never since have I felt for any woman, f**k, anyone the way I felt about you. I want that back. I want my girl back. She’s in there, Ivey, I saw her and you got it in you to give her to me. But you gotta make that decision, dollface. You gotta think about it, make your decision and I hope when it’s made, you’ll come to me. You know where I live. I’ll be waiting.”

Then I lost sight of his deep blue eyes with their beautiful russet tipped lashes when his face moved in close. He touched his mouth to mine then he let me go, strode by Lash, through the room and disappeared out the door.

My eyes moved to Lash who was twisted and looking at the door.

Then he twisted back and his eyes came to me.

Mine again filled with tears.

“Fuck,” I hissed, lifting my hands to cover my face.

I felt Lash’s arms close around me and heard his whispered, “Babe.”