Stinger (A Sign of Love Novel)(29)

"Canoodling, Grace? Jesus, I don't even know what the f*ck that is."

"You're mad," she said, biting her lip.

"No, I'm not mad. I'm just ready to leave."

She nodded and started grabbing her stuff too, putting it into her bag. It was then that I spotted Tawny Anderson, a girl who worked for the same company I did. She was a beautiful redhead with a killer body. I hadn't ever made a film with her, but she had propositioned me for some extracurricular time on many occasions. I had never taken her up on it.

She was standing at the bar a couple feet away with a girl I didn't recognize. "Hey Tawny," I called and she turned around, her eyes lighting up.

She walked over to me and met me right in front of Grace's chair. "Carson!" she squealed, kissing my cheek and pressing her large breasts into my chest.

I smiled suggestively at her. "Hey baby, how are you?" I asked, pulling her into me and gripping her ass.

"I'm great, gorgeous. I heard you had a family emergency. Anything I can help with?" She ran one finger down my chest.

"Maybe. What did you have in mind?"

"I'm sure I could think of something." She giggled. "But I thought you didn't mix business with pleasure."

"I might be able to make an exception for you," I said, raising my eyebrows and squeezing her ass tighter.

That's when Grace cleared her throat, and me and Tawny both turned our heads to see her standing there with her shoes and cover up on and her bag on her shoulder, looking for us to move so she could get by us.

"Who's she, Carson?" Tawny demanded.

"She's no one, babe," I said, and the look that came over Grace's face nearly brought me to my knees. She looked like I had just slapped her in the face and kicked her while she was down. I felt that look like a punch in the gut.

Grace didn't wait for us to move, but instead pushed past us, knocking Tawny off balance. "Watch it girlie!" Tawny said angrily. Grace didn't even look back.

"Anyway," Tawny said, turning back to me and taking my hand and replacing it on her ass, "where were we?"

I was such a stupid f*ck up. Holy Christ. What had I done? I was so f*cking hurt when she made me feel like an embarrassment, like a nothing in front of her friend. I had automatically reacted, trying to make her feel the same way too. And I'd succeeded. And it felt like shit. "Sorry, Tawny, I gotta go," I said, taking her by the shoulders and physically moving her out of my way.

"Wait, what? I thought we were gonna hang out!" she whined.

"You were right," I said over my shoulder. "I don't mix business with pleasure. Almost forgot for a minute there."

I jogged in the direction Grace had gone, looking around and finally spotting her going through the door to the hotel. I raced after her.

When I got inside, I ran to the elevators, hoping to find her waiting for one. I had f*cked up. I had to make this right. She wasn't anywhere to be seen. I flashed my room card to the guard and pressed the "up" button furiously, swearing under my breath. When the elevator finally came, I jumped on and when a few people tried to follow me in, I held my hand up and said, "Sorry! Emergency! No one else is gonna ride this elevator!" They stepped back, confused, as I pushed Grace's room floor. No one else was gonna slow me down in getting to her. Panic coursed through me. Shit, I had done this. I had f*cking done this.

When the elevator doors opened, I raced down the hallways and as I turned the corner, I saw Grace almost to her room, taking out her key card. When she heard me behind her, she turned, surprise filling her expression, the hurt still clear in her large, blue eyes.

She turned back around to her door.

"I'm sorry, Grace," I said, desperately.

She halted. "Nothing to be sorry for, Carson. You obviously have a life. I got in the way of it for a minute there. Please, don't let me interrupt the plans you have with Tawny."

"I don't have any plans with Tawny, Grace. I did that because I didn't like what happened with Parker. It made me feel like nothing and I wanted to do the same to you. It wasn't fair and I f*cked up, and I'm sorry."

She studied me for a minute. "I understand. I'm sorry too. But this," she gestured between me and her, "isn't going to work. Not even for a weekend. I've had a nice time. But we both need to get back to our real lives. We don't make any kind of sense."

She slid her key in the slot at her door and when I heard the click indicating that it was open and she was about to go inside, I breathed out, "No one else has ever made me feel the way you do. Not even close. It scared me, Grace, and I reacted. But it's because you are far from nothing to me. You are far from nothing to me," I repeated, begging her with my eyes to forgive me.

She looked at me for another couple beats, expressionless and my heart dropped. Then she finally looked down at the floor and looked back up at me. "Do you wanna come inside, Rick?" she asked.

I laughed out a relieved laugh. "Yes, Buttercup, I do."

She nodded and held her door open to let me in.





CHAPTER 9


Grace



I held the door open as Carson walked in behind me. The lump that had been in my throat during the entire walk from the pool up to my room was starting to recede, but I still felt the lingering hurt over watching Carson with Tawny and what he had said to her about me. I had asked myself all the way up to my room why that stung so damn much that I wanted to roll into a ball and cry. But I had hurt him too. I just hadn't realized it at the time. I thought he would understand why I couldn't flaunt the fact that I was spending time with an adult film star. That was the kind of thing that could come out later and ruin my career as a lawyer–especially in D.C. where politics always came into play. I had thought he would roll with it and laugh it off after Parker walked away. It's why I had come up with that dumb name on the spot–trying to put a private joke out there for Carson. I hadn't meant to make him feel like he was nothing, that's not how I felt. But our lives didn't mix. Those encounters at the pool made that blatantly obvious. This was supposed to be a weekend of fun, of letting go temporarily, and then going back to exactly what I had been doing before I came to Vegas. Was this thing with Carson morphing into something dangerous for both of us? If feelings got involved, even on a basic level, where did that leave us when all was said and done?