The Dare (The Bet 3)

I took a leap of faith anyway.

And moved to straddle him. His groan was all the encouragement I needed as I tugged his shirt over his head and threw it on the floor.

"Beth, we shouldn't—"

"Shh…" I brushed a kiss across his jaw, and his grip tightened on my hips. I thought he was going to pull me against him; instead he gently lifted me off his body and sat me next to him.

Voice hoarse, he whispered, "I want to, Beth. I do, but I can't. You've had a lot to drink and it's just… that's not the fairytale you want, sweetheart."

"But I want you." I reached for him again.

He tugged me into his body and kissed my temple. "Sleep."

That was how we went to bed.

Both of us blanketed in a chilly silence. With things left unsaid. Me wanting him, him wanting me, but admitting yet again, like every other man in my existence, that although I was good, I wasn't good enough for him. Or maybe it was different with Jace. He liked me. He could give me his heart, but it seemed it had already been given very flippantly a long time ago. And I knew something about hearts, once they've claimed another as their own.

It was near impossible to forget.

My heart ached with the knowledge that it was entirely possible that each day I spent in Jace's presence was another piece of my heart he was unknowingly taking. And I was willingly giving it. Hoping that, by the end, it wouldn't destroy me.

Chapter Twenty-one

"Crackerjacks!" Grandma slammed her fist onto the table. "I'm trying to tell you a story, Gus! Stop interrupting!"

"I'm just trying to understand how their love story ends with a kidnapping, that's all, ma'am."

"No, you're frying my very last nerve, Gus, and I won't have it. I'm eighty-six, and though I look strong, it wears on me, it—"

"Ma'am?" theaAgent whispered. "Ma'am?

He slowly rose up from his chair and tapped Grandma on the shoulder.

With a snort, she opened her eyes. "Oh," she stretched, "such a good sleep. You were saying?"

Jace

"Grandma." I cleared my throat, managing to only clog it further as she held out the pencil and paper. "I still don't understand what you're asking me to do."

For the last half-hour, Grandma had lectured us on how to keep a relationship strong… in the bedroom. My ears had bled, and I'm pretty sure, given the circumstances, a few of my sperm had just given up and died.

I wouldn't blame them. I'd wished for death when she'd gone into graphic detail about her late husband, Bill. Apparently in his final years he'd gone blind in his right eye, but Grandma wanted to be sure that we understood that physical ailments should not deter us from participating in what she weirdly referred to as Charades.

What followed was an actual pie chart about erogenous zones that are awakened when other parts of the body are physically… on the injured list. Our torture in hell had ended with pictures. Not normal pictures, because that would be too easy. She erected, poor choice of words, I know, a felt storyboard that I could have sworn my Sunday School teachers used to use in order to tell us Bible stories, and then told us a story about Sad Sam and Happy Hannah, and how Sad Sam turned into a Surprised Sam when Happy Hannah learned how to take Grandma's advice.

There was a poem.

And finally a song that was sung to the tune of "Mary Had a Little Lamb."

I would never eat lamb again.

I thought the torture was done, until Grandma gave us pencils and said we had a pop quiz. The questions had to be the stupidest ones I'd ever had anyone ask me, and I'd had a lot of stupid questions.It was part of the job.

"Write out your answers on this piece of paper and discuss."

"But the questions are stupid."

"So are you, and I don't go telling it to your face, now do I?"