Sweet Surrender (Sweet #1)(81)

“Micah’s gone.”

She felt a surge of elation. As much as she’d enjoyed the erotic experience of having two men, she wanted so much for it to be just the two of them now.

“Come sit down on the couch with me. I want to talk to you,” he said quietly as he guided her toward the sofa.

He sat her down and took a spot across from her. He picked up her hand and kissed her fingertips before slowly lowering it to his lap.

She stared inquisitively at him. It was obvious he wanted to say something. Anticipation beat heavy in her chest.

“Faith, the last few days…they’ve been just incredible. I don’t have words to describe them.”

She smiled. “I know,” she said. “For me too.” She took a deep breath and knew that this was it. She wanted to tell him how she felt. It was the perfect opportunity.

She looked down for a moment as she collected her courage, but Gray nudged her chin upward with his finger.

“I hear a but in there somewhere,” he said.

She shook her head. “No but.” She looked him directly in the eyes and hoped he could see the love shining in hers. “Gray, I love you.”

Fire surged in his eyes at her declaration. He started to speak, but she laid a finger over his mouth. “Let me finish. I have so much to say.”

He nodded, and she let her finger fall away.

“I should feel weak right now. Giving up control the way I did should make me feel smaller somehow. But I don’t. In fact, I’ve never felt more empowered than I do right now. More in control of my own destiny. Maybe I didn’t really know before exactly what I wanted, but I do now. I want you. And I realized why another man has never been able to satisfy me. It’s because I didn’t make the emotional connection with them that I did with you. I didn’t trust them. And trust is everything. Without it I couldn’t really let go of that control, and as long as I was holding fast to it, I was destined to remain disappointed.”

He gathered her hands in his again and lifted them both to his mouth. He kissed first one and then the other. “You are such an incredible, honest woman,” he said in a shaky voice. “Weak? I don’t think you could ever be weak. What could possibly be more powerful than admitting your needs and not being ashamed or afraid to embrace them? People spend their entire lives hiding from their true selves, living out farces and fantasies, never embracing reality. By offering your surrender, by meeting your needs and desires head-on, you’ve freed yourself from the worst sort of bondage. And nothing is more powerful than that. Or more courageous.”

He reached out and touched her cheek with the back of his finger. “I love you, Faith. Lord knows I’ve tried not to. I wanted to believe that you were playing games. That you couldn’t possibly give me what I wanted. But you’re what I want. What I’ll always want.”

She stared at him, too overwhelmed to do anything more than gape numbly in shock. She closed her eyes and willed the tears not to come. But one slipped down her cheek.

He tenderly thumbed it away. “Open your eyes, Faith, and look at me.”

She blinked, his face a shimmery glare as she looked at him through a tear-thickened sheen.

“There’s something else we need to talk about,” he said quietly.

She frowned at the worry she heard in his voice. Before she could ask him why, the front door exploded inward. Gray shoved her to the floor and bolted to his feet.

“Don’t move a muscle, or your buddy here gets it.”

Faith looked frantically around Gray from her position on the floor to see a strange man holding a gun to another man’s head. Fear and desperation radiated from the gunman, and his hostage looked pissed. But strangely unafraid.

Gray held his hands up in a placating manner, but on the inside he was cursing a blue streak. Beside him, Faith scrambled up from the floor. Gray grabbed her wrist and yanked her behind him. His first priority was her safety.

“I’m going to take a guess here and say you’re Samuels?” Gray said in an even voice.

The gunman sneered. “Does it really matter who I am?”

“It does if you killed my partner.”

Faith huddled close to Gray’s back, clutching at him with her hands. He still had a hand on her wrist as he held it behind his back, and he rubbed up and down her skin in a soothing manner. He could feel how frightened she was, and it pissed him off all the more.

How the hell had Samuels found them? And for that matter, how did Mick end up mixed up in this? Mick’s threat about taking Samuels down himself echoed in his mind. Damn fool was going to get them all killed.

“What do you want?” Gray demanded. “How the hell did you get here?”

“I want the girl,” Samuels said.

Gray felt Faith tremble against his back, and he squeezed her hand reassuringly.

“That’s not going to happen,” Gray said in a dangerously low voice.

“Let her go,” Mick said bitterly. “She doesn’t matter.”

“Shut the f**k up, Mick,” Gray growled. “What were you thinking, going after Samuels alone? Are you just trying to get us all killed?”

“Both of you shut up,” Samuels barked. “The bitch’s mother is anxious to see her. I’m sure her old man will be willing to cough up some cash if he wants to see her alive again.”