Lucy, Harley’s mom, bounces a giggling Aria on her lap as she sits and talks with some of the other women. Harley’s dad, Micah, known to the original Cerberus members as Snake, is off to the side half-heartedly speaking with Kincaid, but it’s clear he’s worried about his son.
Harley has a blank look on his face as his fingers grip the soda in his hands to the point of denting the can.
As shitty as it is, I’ve avoided the man. I don’t have a damn clue what to say to him. I know nothing will make it better. He probably hasn’t even noticed my lack of approach, but I’m still feeling guilty about it.
The man smiles when people talk to him. He nods his head and answers questions, but it’s like no real lights are on in his eyes. He’s empty, blank, missing the most important part of him.
As changed as Grace is by what happened to her, it’s clear that this man will also never be the same. Tragedy has hit him in the chest and cut him off at the knees. He’s bleeding out right in the middle of a roomful of people and we’re impotent to help him.
Grace walks into the living room with a tray of finger foods, her eyes trained on it like she’s afraid the thing is going to jump out of her hand as she walks it to the coffee table. She fumbles the full tray while holding it in one palm as she tries to pull the empty one at the same time.
Delilah notices her troubles and helps her, earning a grateful smile from Grace.
It’s clear the woman is out of her element, and I imagine the woman that spent eight years in the Navy didn’t spend much time serving people.
I don’t step in to help because I’m certain she’d glare at me if I had done the exact thing that Delilah did. It speaks of the differences between us. She doesn’t want help from me. She’d never ask for it. The last time she leaned on me for something, it ended with me having sex with her and leaving the second I got the chance. She’s here because Kincaid offered a place of refuge, not because of me. She’s not the first woman to seek the comfort this place provides, I realize, looking around the room.
Delilah, Gigi, and Ivy grew up here, their fathers original members of the club. When Simone was in trouble, this is the first place she could think of. Mia didn’t feel comfortable with anyone but Scooter after she was rescued from her abductors.
I have to keep in mind that this isn’t Grace’s final chapter. She’s not here for me or because of me.
That shouldn’t bother me as much as it does, but I can’t seem to get a clear read on my own emotions these days. I’m hot and cold, needy, and independent.
“Just like that bipolar fucking cat,” I mutter.
“I thought you were allergic to cats,” Legend says as he walks up.
“Rabbits and guinea pigs,” I correct.
“For someone who is so adamant about nothing going on, you sure seem incapable of keeping your eyes off of her.”
I drag my eyes away from Grace, guilty of his accusation, but I don’t look at my friend.
“For a man so in love and happy, you sure do worry a lot about what I’m doing these days,” I mutter, cringing at the taste of my soda when I once again forget it isn’t alcohol.
“I have to make sure I’m around the second you start eating crow.”
Now I scowl at him. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“I’ll be the biggest damn bird we’ve ever seen, Mr. I’m-never-settling-down.”
“I’m as free as I ever was,” I argue.
He claps me on the back, jerking me forward because I’m once again staring at Grace as she smiles at Ugly when he speaks to her.
“Tell those lies to someone who’s willing to believe them.”
He walks away before I can argue further with him, and it makes me want to double down on those claims he mentioned. I never wanted a woman after Grace’s rejection. Hell, I purposely sought out women who wouldn’t stand a damn chance, and that’s another shitty part of my personality, but none of my friends know I spent most of my time with blue-eyed blondes because even though all of them were pretty, none of them were as gorgeous as I found Grace. I could never get trapped or settle down with someone I considered less than the only woman I opened my heart enough to love.
See? So shitty. Maybe my position at Cerberus isn’t as deserved as Kincaid thought when he hired me years ago.
“How’s she settling in?” Apollo asks, giving me the chance to stop looking like a creep and staring at Grace.