Total pages in book: 137
Estimated words: 128307 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 642(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128307 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 642(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
In silence, we breathe as one as the wiggles under our conjoined hands narrow the space I’m endeavoring to place between us. I ought to create some distance, but I can’t. This is the only semblance of normalcy I have, and it is a fight not to clutch it as if it is my only lifeline.
Once Macy’s silent comfort assures me I’m not drowning on land, I say, “I should…” My reply starts confidently, but it trails off. I have no interest going back to the confusion I can’t unravel. It is safer here. More familiar.
But those points also reward Macy with the ability to read me as only she can. “Yeah. Me too.”
When she inches back, the soft cotton of her shirt slips over her swollen stomach before it bunches around my hand I still can’t move. My touch lingers for longer than anyone could classify as professional, but Macy doesn’t pull away. She rewards me another brief stint of comfort I’m unsure I deserve, before she eventually whispers, “Goodnight, Grayson.”
Though it is a fight, I manage a weak farewell. “Night.”
As she slowly paces away from me, I almost admit that my earlier confession that Cameron’s appearance changes nothing between us was about more than work, but I can’t force the words from my mouth. Instead, I watch her disappear into the darkness of her room, leaving everything unsaid.
I remain in the bathroom for several long minutes with my heart in my throat and my mind a jumbled mess of confusion. My focus should be on Cameron’s reappearance and the reason she’s too scared to tell the truth, but before my head can overrule my heart, I march to Macy’s closed bedroom door and grip the doorknob for dear life.
I’m about to knock when my phone buzzes. Confusion swamps me when I peer at the screen. A message from Macy is highlighting my face in the darkness of the hall.
When I open her message, guilt slams into me. She forwarded me the photo she snapped of Cameron earlier.
Cameron’s haunted expression ends my selfishness, and the remembrance of my responsibilities crashes back into me.
This isn’t about me or my feelings.
I am an agent. I have a job to do. But I swear, in that bathroom, there were just two people with insane chemistry. And for the first time in a long time, it is more than enough.
26
MACY
With my heart in tatters, I stare at the lip of my bedroom door, waiting for Grayson’s shadow to disappear from beneath it. Only when his footsteps fade down the hallway do I answer the screaming demands of my lungs. I exhale a slow and shaky breath while fighting like hell not to curse my stupidity.
My heart is pounding. Not in fear. Well, not the kind of fear I’m used to. This is different. Unique. It is raw and edgy and makes me wonder if I even know who I am anymore.
I pushed Grayson away.
Me.
I never thought I’d see the day.
Although I hate that my morals forced me to send that message to Grayson, it was the right thing to do in this situation. He needs to remember his priorities, and I don’t want him to misconstrue the trajectory of his moral compass because of a burden that isn’t his to bear.
I am pregnant, but I am not vulnerable. Some of the strongest women I know are single mothers, and I plan to emulate them when I take the next giant step into motherhood.
Sitting on the edge of my bed, with my phone in hand, I stare at Cameron’s unmistakable expression. As I look at her through the eyes of a woman instead of an agent, an uncomfortable knot coils tightly in my stomach. She’s scared; I don’t doubt that, but her eyes are full of secrets—secrets I’m confident Grayson doesn’t want to acknowledge.
That’s why he’s still here, helping me, isn’t it? He doesn’t want to face the truth any more than he wants to acknowledge that Cameron deliberately forgot him.
While drinking in glossy black locks hanging halfway down Cameron’s back, I picture Grayson doing the same. Is he staring at her picture-perfect face, searching for answers? Or is he looking for something to fill the void that’s been eating at him for seventeen years?
When I stood across from him in the bathroom, relishing the tingles his briefest touch ignited, I wanted so badly to fill that void. I’ve wanted him for so long. But not like this. I refuse to be the consolation prize or the woman a man turns to solely because the one he truly wants refuses to admit he exists.
I deserve more than that, and so does Grayson.
He’s been waiting for this day for seventeen years. Every case and every sleepless night he’s had has been for Cameron. And now that he’s finally found her, she won’t even look him in the eye.