The Vincent Boys (The Vincent Boys #1)(25)
“I am good,” I managed to say through the tightness in my throat. I felt stupid saying the words when just last night I’d lost my virginity in the back of his pickup truck when I should’ve been home mourning my Grana’s death. I closed my eyes tightly, trying to force my thoughts of Grana away. I couldn’t think about that now. I wasn’t ready.
“I didn’t say you were bad. You’re good, Ash. Were you not listening to me? You have this warped sense of what good is. Wanting to sneak out with your boyfriend and wanting to know you’re desirable and wanted by your freaking boyfriend or leaving a damn buggy in a parking spot doesn’t make you a bad person. It makes you a human.”
Tears stung my eyes. I wanted to believe him. I’d lived with guilt for so long because I wanted to do the things I’d been told were wrong. But this was Beau Vincent. He drank too much and did things to girls in public places I’d never done in my life . . . until I’d started spending time with him. Mom had always told me Lucifer was beautiful.
“I’d thought the Ash I knew was completely gone. I mourned her for a long time. Then one day in the lunch room Haley kept coming up to Sawyer and flirting with him right in front of you as if you weren’t there. When she turned to walk away you tripped her. Sawyer didn’t see it, but I did.” A grin tugged on the corner of his mouth. “When she’d been splayed out there on the floor I saw the little smirk touch your lips before you bent down to help her up, apologizing profusely. Until that moment I’d thought you were lost. I realized my Ash was under all the polish and politeness somewhere. After that day I started watching you and enjoying the moments I got a glimpse of the real you slipping out while no one else was paying attention. It’s why I said the things to you I did. I wanted you to react to me. I wanted you to smart off at me. Those moments when you couldn’t take it anymore and snapped . . . I lived for those moments.”
“You were mean to me because you wanted me to smart off to you?” I asked.
He nodded his head then bent down to kiss the tip of my nose.
“You really like my ugly side don’t you, Beau?”
“Nothing about you is ugly. You’re just as beautiful inside as you are out, but you don’t see it. That’s what kills me. Sawyer’s my cousin and I’d do anything for him. But he’s insane for keeping you up on some damn pedestal. I want the real you. The one that likes shimming out of a pair of shorts knowing you’re driving me wild. The one who runs through the woods to my truck, smiling like nothing else matters.” He cupped my face with his hand. “The real Ashton Gray is perfect and I’m crazy in love with her.”
My gut clenched. I had feelings for Beau. We shared a history together and now we had this summer, but love wasn’t supposed to factor into the equation. There was Sawyer standing between us.
Beau’s lips found mine and everything else fell away. I didn’t care about all the worries and arguments in the back of my head. I just wanted to be me. In his arms, I knew I could be.
Chapter 9
Everyone in the town somehow managed to pack themselves into the church in order to pay their respects to my Grana. I hadn’t been able to talk myself into going up and looking at her lying there all still and pale. They wouldn’t have done her make-up right. She was a make-up expert and always had herself fixed up pretty. I’d liked knowing I had the prettiest seventy-year-old Grana in the world. When Mom and Dad hadn’t wanted me to start wearing make-up yet, even after my begging and pleading with them, Grana spirited me off to stay the weekend with her so she could teach me the technique of ‘putting your face on’ as she called it.
Another tear trickled down my cheek and I reached up to catch it with the Kleenex someone had handed me earlier. So many times I’d stood on the third row with Grana while Dad preached. We’d write notes back and forth until Mom would cut her eyes over at us with a sharp warning glare. It always made us giggle. Grana would act like we were putting the paper away. In reality she’d just get sneakier. Grana was a lot like Beau in the fact she embraced the bad girl inside me. Thinking of Beau caused another lump to form in my throat. I was starting to depend on him so much. Sawyer would be home soon and everything would change.
Thinking about how I’d let my own selfish desires come in between Beau and Sawyer made the guilt in my stomach thicken. Beau made everything feel better. I craved him. And without question he gave in to me. He said he loved me. He wasn’t supposed to love me. I couldn’t come between Sawyer and Beau. Ending this was the only way to keep from hurting everyone.
“Hey.” Beau’s deep voice startled me and I lifted my head to find him standing in front of me. I hadn’t expected him to come tonight. Besides the fact he never stepped foot in the church except on Easter Sunday and Christmas Eve, I figured he would spend his night free of me with friends . . . or Nicole.
“Hi,” I replied in a hoarse whisper. “I didn’t expect you to . . .” I stopped myself from saying more.
He raised both blonde eyebrows then tilted his head slightly to the left as he frowned at me. I noticed his short blonde hair that normally had the messy sexy look was neatly brushed. My eyes drifted down over his broad shoulders and chest, taking in the pale blue button-up dress shirt I was positive he’d never worn until tonight. The shirt was tucked into a pair of tan slacks I’d also never seen him wear. When I lifted my eyes back up to meet his I smiled for the first time in hours, enjoying his obvious discomfort.