An Ounce of Hope (A Pound of Flesh #2)(71)
He couldn’t remember ever having such a dire case of blue balls and he hated that his patience was fraying. Jesus, the girl had been through a shitload of heartache and Max understood her timidity, but Grace’s obliviousness to her own attractiveness had him wanting to throw her down on any nearby horizontal surface and make her forget why she was afraid of sex in the first place.
Since she’d tried to seduce him in her sexy red underwear and then proceeded to vomit up several dollars’ worth of alcohol, she’d seemingly taken a step back from him. She was still the easygoing, playful Grace whom Max had grown to know, but the caution he’d seen in her eyes the first time they’d met had returned. And, if Max was truly honest with himself, its appearance had hurt. He’d asked her if she was all right, if he’d done something to upset her, to scare her off, but she’d laughed and waved a dismissive hand at his concerns, telling him that she was fine.
Yeah. That shit was right. She was fine. Too damned fine.
He rubbed a hand down his face, noticing another brushstroke of blue paint on his palm. Yeah, he’d even started painting again in an effort to curb his salacious thoughts, to try to stave off the cravings he had for Grace, but it wasn’t working. His paintings were, as always, frantic and hurried in their creation, his frustration filling the canvases as quickly as he set them up.
Maybe this was why addicts were told not to start any type of relationships when they were first recovering. It would certainly make sense. Max’s desire to lose himself in Grace’s body was as strong as his need for coke had been when he first entered rehab.
“Shit.” He sat up, still holding the phone to his ear. “Look, man, I’m gonna go. I got some stuff to take care of.”
Carter huffed. “Fine. You know where I am if you change your mind. You take care, you hear me?”
Max smiled despite himself. “I will. Later, brother.”
He ended the call and threw his cell next to the remote before he changed into a clean pair of shorts, grabbed his Vans, and yanked them onto his feet. He slipped his wallet into his pocket, collected his rental keys, and lifted the painting that had been propped up against his room wall for a number of weeks, hoping it was the icebreaker he and Grace needed.
As she always did, Grace opened the door to her house with a beaming smile. The sound of Marvin Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up” was playing in the background. How ironic.
Max smiled back, fidgeting and unexpectedly nervous. “Hey.” His eyes traveled down her strapless blue sundress to her bare feet. He smirked at the blue polish on her toes.
“Were we supposed to be meeting for a run today?” She frowned. “I thought you had to work with Vince.”
“No. I mean, yeah, I did work,” Max replied, flustered. “We finished early so, I, um, I wanted to bring you this.” He held up the painting she’d commented on the day she’d brought pizza to his room; the day she’d let him see her naked chest, suck on her nipples, and—
“Really?” she exclaimed, her eyes wide and excited. “I can have this?”
Max shrugged, handing it to her. “Sure. I said so, didn’t I?”
Grace grinned. “Thank you. It’s wonderful.” She spent a moment looking at the canvas of gold, browns, and caramels, and a soft look of something that made Max’s stomach clench flittered across her face. “I know exactly where it’ll look amazing.” She glanced up and tilted her head toward the interior of the house. “I have to be at the bar in a few hours, but you wanna come in? I’ve just made some lemonade.”
Max took a deep breath and nodded. “Sounds good.”
The house was truly fantastic now that Grace had all her furniture. Her photographer’s eye made sure that all the deco was tasteful and she’d utilized the space perfectly. Max took a moment to appreciate the soft colors of green and cream in which she’d painted the sitting room, and the deep brown leather sofa and light wood coffee table in the center of it. A green rug lay on the floor by a large bookcase of the same beech-wood tones while the walls were punctuated with sepia photographs that Max assumed Grace had taken, leading up the bare wood stairs to the upper level. The July sunshine filled the space through the French windows, which Grace had propped open, bringing the natural colors of the surrounding forest into her home.
He noticed a canvas photograph of two kids on a beach, a boy and a girl—a teenage Grace—neither of them older than sixteen, arms around each other, the braces on the boy’s teeth clear to see, his legs, like his body, long and gangly.
“My brother. He looks entirely different now. He took a long time to grow into himself.”
“He’s younger than you?” Max asked.
“Yeah, a year, but he’s the one who looks after me.” She looked over the other photographs in the room. “I need to get some recent photos of him, but he’s about as fond of having his picture taken as you are.”
Max’s gaze moved to another photograph, this one in a wooden frame. It was black-and-white and appeared sun damaged, leaving the image faded in parts. A tall black man with an exceptionally cool Afro, dressed in tight-fitted shirt and jeans, stood with his arm around a striking dark-haired white woman whose smile was as big as the one Max saw on Grace’s face when she laughed.
“Mom and Dad,” she said softly, looking fondly at the picture. “Mom was from Preston County. She met dad in DC. They were together for twenty years before he passed away. Mom managed ten years without him.” She glanced up at Max. “Heart disease.” She looked back at the picture. “Kai and I always believed she died of a broken heart.”