Grip Trilogy Box Set

His eyes soften, like I k

new they would, and he laughs, cupping my neck.

“You think you can charm your way out of that hard fuck you have coming tonight, don’t you?”

“When have I ever run from a hard fuck?” My voice comes out low and sultry, my smile slow and only for him. “I’m earning it.”

A hand on Grip’s shoulder pulls us out of each other.

“They’re going in,” Amir says, eyes discreetly lowered. “Just letting you know.”

“You ready for this?” Grip asks.

“You’re the one who has to speak. I just look pretty and eat rubbery five-thousand dollar chicken.”

Apparently I know my stuff, because that is all that is asked of me for the rest of the night. Our table is full of people much older than we are, community activists who probably couldn’t give a flying fig about what’s trending on Twitter. I doubt any of them know what a “thot” is either. And I’m so grateful.

Grip is extraordinary in this context. His background and child- hood mean that he is in touch with real need like many celebrities aren’t. It isn’t just something he shouldn’t forget. His mother still lives in the house where he grew up. His cousins and aunts and family are all still in that community. He talks about how he would have gone hungry at school if there hadn’t been a free lunch program, and about the years when he was younger and his mother was on welfare. He smiles when he tells us how proud she was when she no longer needed it.

I marvel again at how we found each other, at how natural it has felt with us from the beginning, considering how vastly different our lives have been. Like someone gave him the answers to a test, as if he had a Bristol cheat sheet that no one else received. I can’t take my eyes off him. He thought I watched him before. Now that he’s mine, now that we’re together, it’s even worse. He rivets me, and it doesn’t scare me anymore. Maybe I do love him too much and don’t have boundaries. I don’t care. This love is the stuff of magic, of fantasy, but so raw and real I can touch it. I can taste it. If for some reason I fall, how many can say they soared this high?

“You were excellent,” I whisper to Grip as we stand from the table to leave. Amir sat at a separate table designated for security and bodyguards, so we wait for him to make his way over to us.

“Thank you, baby.” Grip leans down to my ear, his voice dark and dirty. “Knowing you are naked under that dress has been driving me crazy all night. The napkin was barely big enough to hide my hard-on.”

There is some secret switch he planted in my body that responds to him instantly. Heat and wetness collect between my thighs. For a moment, I consider dragging him to the nearest bathroom stall and slaking my lust before we make it home, but a voice from behind me dumps ice all over the flame building inside me.

“Bristol,” my mother says. “Good evening.”

I turn to face her, braced for her censure. I may have ignored several of her calls when the footage of Grip and me leaked.

“Mother, hello. I didn’t know you were here.”

“Well, it’s a big crowd.” She glances around the ballroom. “Betsy’s here, too, somewhere.”

She shifts her eyes to Grip.

“That’s Parker’s mother, by the way.” She looks at my hand linked with Grip’s. “We’ve been best friends more than forty years.”

“It’s good to see you again, Mrs. Gray,” Grip says politely.

He and my mother haven’t been around each other much, but he knows more about my family’s dark secrets, dirty laundry and skeletons than just about anyone else.

“Marlon, good speech tonight,” Mother replies stiffly before looking back to me. “Maybe my messages got lost in the . . . chaos of your life, Bristol. I needed to speak with you quite urgently.”

“Really?” I frown and twist my mouth to the side in concentration. “Not sure how I missed that. What did you need?”

She squeezes her eyes at the edges, shoving as much condemnation into her narrow glance as possible.

“Maybe we could speak privately,” she says.

Amir walks up, his eyes moving between the three of us before finally connecting with Grip. He lifts his brows and tilts his head, a silent query. Grip just nods, but keeps his eyes on my mother.

“Mother, this is our friend Amir.” I give Amir a warm smile, hoping it defrosts the atmosphere my mother is creating. They exchange brief pleasantries, but the ice remains untouched.

“We need to get going, Bris,” Grip says softly. “But there was a room they had for me before I got up to speak. If your mother wants to talk before we go, we could swing that.”

I search his face, tightened into impassivity, giving nothing away.