Irresistible Lies (11 page)

Just
a little while. Just to see what could happen.

 
“Do you want to watch a movie?” he
asked.

“A
movie?”

“Yeah.
We can see if there’s anything good on television.”

Say no
, she told herself. This was a bad idea.

Then
again, it was just a movie. She could watch with him for a little while and
then go to bed. It was innocent. Harmless.

“Okay,”
she said. Her voice came out like a guilty squeak. “In your room?”

“Yeah,”
he said, smiling. “Meet me in a few minutes. I want to change out of this
suit.”

She
swallowed hard, thinking of him undressing. “Okay.”

He
gave her back her key, and they separated. Back in her room alone, Grace went
to the bathroom and splashed cold water on her face. What the hell was she doing?

Then
she realized she had makeup on, and it was now unattractively running down her
face. She took the rest of it off, kicked off her heels and brushed her hair.
She looked in the mirror, finally seeing the familiar Grace she knew.

This
Grace was not the carefree one from earlier. This Grace was kicking herself for
agreeing to watch a movie with Jamie. This Grace had a son to consider.

“Nothing
is going to happen,” she told the girl in the mirror. “I’ll stay for a half
hour and then go to bed. No big deal.”

Decision
made, she slipped out of her dress and pulled on the old pajamas she had
packed, having thought no one would see them. The shorts were pink with ice
cream cones on them, and she paired them with an oversized v-neck pink tee
shirt. After quick consideration, she decided it would be a good idea to leave
her bra on. The tee shirt was low cut and practically transparent.

Jamie
had seen her in a lot less, but that was years ago. She wondered if he would
notice how her body had changed since having Jake. He probably just thought she
had taken to wearing padded bras or something.

She
padded over to the connecting door and knocked lightly.

“Come
in. It’s open.”

She
opened the door to find Jamie lying on top of the covers on his bed, wearing
gray sweatpants and a white tee shirt, his strong arms on display. She knew he usually
slept in boxers and was grateful that he had decided to cover up.

She
felt his eyes run over her body greedily, lingering on her breasts. She
suddenly felt naked.

“Hi,
there,” he said.

This
was a bad idea, but she was in too deep to turn back now.

“What
are you watching?” Her voice was timid. She made her way to the bed slowly and
took a seat on the corner farthest away from him.

“
Knocked Up
,” he said. “We saw this in
theatres together, remember? It’s the one where the guy gets the girl from his
one-night stand pregnant. It’s funny.”

She
felt her stomach flip. Now she was positive the universe was screwing with her.
“Anything else on?”

“Sure,”
he said, handing her the remote. “You pick.”

She
flipped through channels, not landing on anything. She was too nervous to pay
attention to what was happening on the screen, thinking instead of how close
Jamie was to her and how few clothes she was wearing.

She
shouldn’t be here.

“Grace,
you don’t have to sit on the edge of the bed like that.”

She
turned to look at him, startled, and saw he was serious. “Relax. It’s okay.
Just relax.”

Easy
for him to say.

She
took a deep breath and moved to recline on the bed, careful to leave plenty of
distance between them. He didn’t move a muscle, which made her feel a bit better.

“I
won’t bite,” he said.

“Sorry,”
she said. “I’m all nervous. This is... weird.”

“How
so?”

She
took a deep breath before answering. “What are we doing here?”

He
frowned. “We’re hanging out.”

“So...
we’re friends now?”

“We’ve
always been friends. You think we stopped being friends just because you
decided to run away and avoid all of my calls for years?”

His
tone was light, but she could hear the hint of anger there. “It wasn’t like
that.”

He
laughed, but it wasn’t genuine. “Yes, that’s exactly what it was like.”

“I
had my reasons.”

“Tell
me them.”

“No.”
She shook her head. “I don’t want to talk about this.”

He
inched closer to her, and from the look in his eyes she could tell he wasn’t
going to let the subject drop. “I missed you. Doesn’t that count for anything?”

“You
should have thought of that before you broke up with me.”

He
smiled sadly. “You’re never going to let me off the hook for that, are you?”

“Nope.”

“I
think I’ve more than paid for it.”

“Maybe.”

“You
can really hold a grudge.”

“You
knew that about me.”

“I
thought it would be different with me,” he said. “I never thought you’d just
cut me out of your life like that, like I was nothing to you.”

She
looked away from the intensity in his eyes and sat up so that she was facing
him and no longer reclining and vulnerable. “I did what I had to.”

He
grabbed her hand and held it. “How so?”

 
She tried to pull away from his grasp,
but his grip was strong. “Jamie, let me go.”

“No.
We’re finally going to talk about this. You’re going to tell me why you ran
away.”

Her
heart picked up speed, and she felt real fear.

How
was she ever going to get out of this one?

Chapter 10

“This
was a mistake,” Grace said, her voice shaking slightly. “Let me go.”

“No.”

She
watched Jamie, her eyes wide, as he brought her hand to his lips and kissed her
wrist. Her pulse was racing wildly, and she knew he could feel it.

“Relax,
Grace. I just want to talk.”

“I
don’t.”

They
were sitting on the bed, face to face. He closed the short distance between
them, his grip on her wrist like a vice.

“Jamie,
don’t do this.”

“Tell
me why you didn’t answer my calls. Tell me why you didn’t come to graduation.”

“I
can’t.”

She
saw the intensity in his eyes and the hurt and anger there, and she wished she
could run away from it.

“Do
you have any idea what it was like for me, wondering if you were okay and not
knowing?”

“Stop
it,” she said. “I don’t want to hear this.”

“The
first few weeks, I thought you were punishing me and were going to call if I
just waited. You never did. For months, I couldn’t think of anything else. I actually
went to your house and begged your parents to tell me where you were. I was
sick about it.”

She
remembered those months. She erased his messages without listening to them and
avoided all of his calls. The first few months of her pregnancy were
terrible—she was overwhelmed and confused and had the worst morning
sickness. The more miserable she was, the more she blamed Jamie.

And
she had known, deep inside, that she was doing him a favor. Jake was a blessing
in her life, but he would have been a curse in Jamie’s.

For
so long, his words had haunted her. He wasn’t ready for her. It was too
serious.

She
had cried herself to sleep so many nights, feeling in her heart that he had
used her and cast her aside. She hadn’t been enough for him when he was all she
ever wanted.

What
a stupid fool she was.

“You
were sick about it? How do you think I felt? I loved you. Don’t you
understand?” She felt a physical pain in her chest as she spoke, but she didn’t
want him to see her cry, not after all these years. “You were everything to me,
and you threw me aside like I didn’t matter. Do you have any idea how that made
me feel?
Worthless
.”

“I
called you the very next day because I knew I had screwed up,” he said.

“It
wasn’t something you could just undo. You had told me everyday for two years
that you loved me and that we were going to be together forever.” She felt old
wounds reopening and tearing at her heart. “For you to change your mind like
that... I trusted you. You destroyed that. You destroyed me.”

“I
never changed my mind.” He let go of her wrist to cup her cheeks, gently
holding her face so she couldn’t look away from him. “Grace, I broke up with
you because I loved you. I wanted to make something of myself so I could
deserve you and give you all of this, everything you saw today. I thought in
order to make that happen, I needed to put some distance between us.”

He
leaned toward her so their foreheads were almost touching. “I was so wrong. I
was so stupid. You have to know that I am so, so sorry.”

Maybe
he meant what he said, but it didn’t matter now. “Why are you telling me this? It
can’t be undone, Jamie.”

“Don’t
say that.”

“You
don’t get it.” She felt a hot tear burn its way down her cheek. “We can’t go
back in time and change what happened. It’s too late.”

He
wiped her tear away with his thumb. “It’s not too late. I can make this right.”

“No!
You’re not listening to me.”

“I’m
not.” He set his jaw, determined, and gripped her shoulders. “I’m not going to
listen to you. You are done punishing me for this, Grace. It ends tonight.”

She
tried to pull away, but he held her still.

“Let
me go.”

“Not
a chance.”

She
closed her eyes, feeling exhaustion in every part of her body. She felt like
she had been fighting a war with herself all week that there was no way to win.
Give in to Jamie and she would lose. Resist him and she would lose.

“Open
your eyes, sweetheart. Look at me.” His voice was so gentle it almost made her
cry again.

“I
can’t,” she whispered. “I can’t do this anymore. I’m so tired, Jamie.”

He
pulled her to his chest and held her to him, soothing her with a gentle hand
trailing up and down her back. She pressed her face into his chest, breathing
in the familiar scent of him, trying not to cry.

“Why
are we putting each other through this?” she asked him, her voice breaking on
the last word.

The
hand on her back stopped moving and he pulled her away from his chest so he
could look her in the eyes. Slowly and gently, he pressed his lips to her
forehead, a gesture so tender it was agonizing.

“This
has been a hard week, hasn’t it?”

She
nodded, biting at her lip to stop herself from crying again. She was so
mentally drained she felt physically weak.

“I
know,” he said, moving his hand to massage the back of her neck. “I’m sorry.
I’m sorry I put you through all of this.”

She
drew a shuddering breath and tried to pull herself together. “It’s not all your
fault. You didn’t ask for any of this, either. You didn’t ask to walk back into
my life, it just happened.”

The
hand on the back of her neck stilled. “That’s right. This has been hard on both
of us.”

“I
know. I’m trying to look at it in a positive way, but it’s difficult. I guess
we can say that we have gotten closure.”

“Closure?”

“Yeah.
I think that’s the reason fate threw us into this crazy reunion. Now we can
part ways knowing the other person is happy and that our breakup, no matter how
much it hurt at the time, was for the best.”

She
tried to give him a small smile, but she could tell by the look he was giving
her that she had said something wrong. The gentle, understanding look in his
eyes had been replaced by something darker, although his voice remained calm as
ever.

“So,
what you’re saying is that this past week, seeing me again... It has given you
closure?”

“Yes.
So what?”

She
saw the muscle in his jaw twitch. “If I were to walk right back out of your life
tomorrow, you wouldn’t care?

“What’s
the problem with that? Should I be miserable about it? Would that make you
happy?”

Before
Grace could so much as think, he maneuvered her backwards on the bed so that she
was pinned beneath his weight.

“Get
off of me!” she hissed at him. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

He
raised a brow, that devilish grin back on his face. “You shouldn’t say things
you don’t mean, sweetheart.”

Despite
Jamie’s attempt to be nonchalant, Grace could tell he was angry, and for some
strange reason it turned her on. Her body was quickly responding to the feel of
his hard chest against her and his hot breath on her skin as he leaned closer.

She
wanted him badly, and she hated herself for it.

“Get
the hell off of me.” Grace halfheartedly pushed against the wall of his chest,
but he didn’t budge.

“You
don’t mean that.”

“I
will scream.”

His
eyes flashed. “You don’t mean that, either.”

“Yes,
I do. I don’t care if you get in trouble. I don’t care about you.”

“See?
This is exactly what I’m talking about.” He bent his head down so that his lips
were brushing hers. “Don’t. Lie. To. Me.”

She
sighed, hating how good his lips felt. “You’re a bastard, Jamie.”

“Only
when it comes to you, babe.”

Without
warning Jamie claimed her mouth with his, using his tongue as a weapon that
left her completely at his mercy. She contemplated resisting but abandoned any
attempt when he further increased the pressure of the kiss, his demand leaving
her lightheaded.

The
taste of him was so achingly familiar that her body responded with a life of
its own, arching against him and begging for more. She ran her hands over his
muscular back and pulled him closer, unsure if they could ever be close enough
to satisfy her.

She
moaned as he tore her mouth from hers and moved it to her neck, trailing hot
kisses down the length of it.

“Do
you have any idea how delicious you are?” he said, nibbling her ear and sending
shivers down her spine. “Did you really think I was going to let you just walk
out of here without getting a taste of you?”

His
hand found the bottom of her shirt and inched its way up. She moaned as his
fingers burned his way up the soft skin of her stomach and stopped
tantalizingly close to her breasts.

“Do
you want me to touch you, Grace?”

She
was afraid to say anything, both afraid of him stopping and encouraging him to
go further. She arched her body against him, hating that it was betraying her
mind so completely.

“Tell
me. Tell me what you want.”

“I
can’t,” she whispered.

“Yes,
you can. Tell me. Tell me you want this.”

She
opened her mouth to beg him not to stop, but sense chose that moment to kick
in.

Jake.
She pictured her son in her mind and felt like someone had just thrown a bucket
of ice over her entire body.

“Jamie.”
She made her voice as serious as she possibly could and looked him straight in
the eyes. “No. I don’t want to do this. Let me go. Now.”

He
moved off of her instantly, confusion written all over his face. She seized the
opportunity to hurry off the bed and into her room, where she slammed and
locked the connecting door.

He
had tried to follow her just like she knew he would, but she had been a split
second ahead of him.

“Grace,”
he said. “Open the door.”

“No.”

“Grace,
please.”

“Leave
me alone.”

“Open
the door. We need to talk about this.”

Grace
ignored him, collapsed onto her bed and burst into tears of self-loathing. She
had almost slept with Jamie. She had forgotten everything that mattered,
including her son. What the hell was wrong with her? She was the worst mother
in the world and a terrible person.

“Grace...”

She
put a pillow over her head to drown Jamie out. She heard the pain in his voice
and knew he could probably hear her crying, but she refused to open the door.

She
had already let him get far too close to her.

Now,
she was afraid that it was too late to protect her heart.