Saving Grace (8 page)

"Lea, maybe just give me some time, okay? Just let me...hurt, let me grieve
.
This stinks
. It hurts
,
Lea, it hurts so damn much.
"
I closed my eyes.
"
I searched for him for over 2000 years Lea. That kind of love and devotion should've been enough to conquer anything. It
should've gotten me more than
,
remember I always loved you, oh
,
look at those pretty new wings!
"

"But
,
Gray, what about you and Shane now? Maybe you guys can make something out of this...you could..."

"Stop
,
Lea. I don't get happily-ever-
afters
. Those are just for fairytales and porn." I tried to give her a smile. "I'll be fine. Please just let me deal with it my own way."

Lea nodded her head. "Yeah, well I still think you do really need to get laid though." And that's why Lea was my best friend, because she puts everything in perspective for me.

I nodded my head at her. "I know
,
Lea, I'll start living it up with you, but you've got to let me be sad about this and grieve first."

A soft knock on the door interrupted our discussion. Conner's head peeked in, his face twisted with concern, "Hey, you two okay in here?" he asked softy. Ethan's head popped in over Conner's with a matching worried expression.

I yanked on Lea's hand and hauled her up off the floor. "Come on
,
Lea. Help me get to oblivion,
it's
the only freaking place I feel comfortable in this skin right now," I whispered.

She swung her arm across the back of my shoulder and kissed my forehead. "Whatever you need me to do to help you get my best friend back to me. Please hurry though, because I miss her and I need to have someone to go shopping with," she whispered into my ear.

More people were sitting in the bar
when we finally walked out of the bathroom. The frat boys were still there; the leader of the group stared at me hard as I walked past. I met his gaze until
he
looked away. I could have easily had him take me into oblivion, but the thought was cut short by the memory of Shane's lips on mine. I looked to the front doors of the bar and wished I could just see him walk through them.

I sat down on the bar stool next to Ethan while Lea and Conner talked in
whispers between themselves. I looked past Ethan at them. Conner stood with his arms wrapped around her and she laid her head on his chest while they spoke. He looked down at her with such love in his eyes. Watching them and the way he looked at her, it made me think for a split second that maybe the world wasn't such a shitty place. Just for a second though
;
a split one
.

Ethan nudged me with his elbow. "Shot for shot Grace, after each one you tell me what's in that pretty little head of yours." His face was set in a serious smile, his brown eyes waited patiently. He poured us both a shot and slid my glass and his stool closer to me. Our arms touched as we both leaned on the bar.

I picked up my glass and clinked it up against his. "Shot for shot.
Tale for
t
ale
.
Drink up buddy." We both lifted the glasses to our lips and watched each other over the rim.

I gulped mine down first. "Remember that night you walked me home and I told you I was in love with someone?" I watched him nod. "Let's just say I guess I didn't know him like I
thought I did and he destroyed my heart. But
he didn't just destroy a small piece of my heart
,
he desecrated the whole thing
. I was the idiot who just handed it to him. Because for so long
,
I really, really believed...I had faith in him, but I was wrong. Your turn."

He swallowed his drink. "I knocked out my best friend and held him down while the cops cuffed him because I thought he hurt you. I wanted to kill him Grace." He studied my gaze waiting for my reaction.

I poured us another shot. I grabbed my
glass, slammed it back fast,
and slid my glass on the bar until it clunked into the bottle of liquor. I placed both my wrists on the bar and showed him my scars. "I've come close to death so many times. I'm more afraid of being here than I am being there."

Ethan's eyes widened when he saw the scars on my wrists and the tattoos that covered them. He raised his eyes to mine. We sat there staring at each other. Picking up another shot
,
he drank it back and cleared his throat, "I was in love only once in my life. She got pregnant
,
but when
s
he was only five months along
,
she went into labor
,
and
my daughter was stillborn. I visit her grave every weekend and lay down a single white rose on her headstone. The girl left me right after."

I entwined his fingers into mine. "Ethan, I'm so sorry."

He shook his head and stopped me from saying anything else. "Just don't say anything. Only Shane knows."

"Same here. Only Shane and Lea know," I whispered back.

He studied my face. A ton of emotions appeared across his features. "How close did you and Shane get? I know it's none of my
busines
s,
but Grace
,
I
gotta
know."

I tilted my head closer to him. "Why?"

His eyes drifted to our hands. "
Becaus
e,
Grace, I don't want to do anything else that will ever hurt Shane."

I shook my head and pulled my hands away from his, shrugging my shoulders. "You're going to have to ask him
tha
t,
Ethan. The last time I saw him he said some pretty amazing stuff to me, but I don't think he still feels that way now."

"How do you feel about him now?"

If there ever was a time when my old friend Jack Daniels shuts off my brain to mouth filter,
th
i
s
was it. "Don't call me one of his stupid girls. I never slept with him, but Ethan, I could lick that boy from head to toe like a big old lollipop.
He was the only one who ever made me forget who I was trying to hold on to.
"

"Hey," Lea cut in. "What the
eff
are you to alcoholics talking about? You're all hovering over each other like you
're
plotting to take over the world." She put her arms around both of us, "You know you can't do any of that fun stuff without me."

"Psf. I'm not an alcoholic. An alcoholic needs a drink. Look here," I explained raising my next shot to her. "I already have one. So
therefore,
I do not need one. Which makes me not an alcoholic."

"Yeah, okay. Whatever you say. Listen, Ethan can you make sure she gets home
okay;
we have to get out of here. I have work tomorrow. Oh, and don't let her go
anywhere
near any ice cream."

Ethan nodded to her and we all said our goodbyes. I wasn't going anywhere because I could still feel the heartbreak
,
and the bottle of Jack was still not empty.

"Hey
,
Grac
e,
l
et's
go back to my place and drink the rest of this."

I smirked at him.

He put his hands up in the air. "I promise I won't lay a finger on you."

I don't even remember how we got
there,
all I remember is thinking maybe I could lay down just for a minute in Shane's room
,
just to remember how nice it was to sleep in his bed.

I never made it to Shane's room.

It was four o'clock in the morning when I woke up on the floor in Ethan's room with a pillow under my head and an itchy blue blanket over me. Ethan was asleep on his bed, his breath even and slow
. A faint stream of light spread across his body, lit by his bedside table lamp.

O
h,
God, please no
.
Please, please, no
.
No, no, no
.
My heart pounded hard against my rib cage when I tried to remember what happened
to make me end up in Ethan's bedroom
.
We just talked
.
The intense rhythm of my heart
slowed down gradually when I remembered the last of the conversation we had and what a complete gentlemen he was. Even though nothing happened between us, it didn't stop the tears from coming when I thought about how out of control I'd become.
Thank
God,
I was with Ethan. Imagine if I had
drunk
with Tucker
.
He would have slept with me, married me and forced me to eat sushi all in one night without me even knowing it
.

Although
the situation was completely innocent
,
I felt a sudden pang of panic to get out of the room. I overstayed my welcome. I came here under the guise of hoping to see Shane again. Even though I was angry and hurt about the whole situation, I wasn't going to lie to myself
anymore
. I couldn't get him out of my head.
The last time we were together we almost, and I almost...My God, he
was
the only person I had met in the last two
thousand
years that could make me forget about my angel.

Without making a
sound,
I folded up the blanket and placed it with the pillow at the end of Ethan's bed.
The
gentle giant
did not stir
.

With my shoes in my hand, I quietly pushed the door
open
and idiotically stumbled into the hallway, falling over my own feet. My stilettos went flying and I slapped my hands over my mouth to stifle my giggles.
Damn, I was still drunk
.

The air in the
hallway felt different; heavier; thicker
,
damp. A sweet
,
minty
,
smell drifted through it making my thoughts turn to Shane again and remembering how it felt to wake up wrapped in sheets with him. My inner thoughts were like a category 5 hurricane
; blasting through my brain at two hundred miles per hour
. I had no clue what thoughts to hold on to now that I had no
angel to vow my love to. I was
lost in a violent storm
,
drowning
in the harsh currents of despair
. I heard a small whimper escape through my lips and realized I was crying.
Yet again.

"What the hell?" The low raspy voice slid right through me
,
rocking me back on the already unsteady heels of my feet. I had to sink my teeth into my bottom lip to gather the nerve to look at man
that
the voice belonged to.

Oh my God
.

Perfection
.
He was utterly the most breathtaking, painfully beautiful man I had ever laid my eyes on
. A stampede of frantic butterflies tore through my insides and I gulped down a deep breath of air
,
because I had somehow stopped breathing.

His dark hair was l
onger than I remembered and lay
wet and disheveled across his forehead. Drops of water glistened on his shoulders, his face,
and his
bare chest
.
Bare chest!
They shimmered along the dark contours of his tattoos making the story of our forbidden love dance with reflections of light. A soft white towel that hung low on his hips was a stark contrast to the hard toned muscles that tensed under the beautiful sun-kissed skin of his stomach and chest.