“Let’s not leave it like this tonight. Let me take you to bed,” he said, tugging on her hand, trying to pull her into his arms.
“I can’t, Cam. Not tonight,” she replied, not pulling back, knowing it would do her no good.
“Gracie, I care about you. We’re good together.”
“Please, Cam. I can’t take any more tonight. Please just let me go.”
“Do you mean forever, Grace?” he asked, his hand tightening on hers. “Or do you mean just for tonight?”
She said nothing for several heartbeats. Could she let this man go? Or was he once again wedged so deeply within her soul that losing him would destroy her? She really didn’t know.
“I don’t know, Cam—I just don’t know,” she whispered.
“Okay. For tonight I’ll give you space,” he told her, and then released her fingers.
Grace climbed slowly up the stairs, knowing she couldn’t turn around for fear that she’d go running back to him. But she desperately wanted him to run to her, to tell her he’d been a fool and that he would never hurt her again.
But even if he did that, she wouldn’t believe him—not tonight, at least.
“I’m here when you’re ready, Grace.”
His words stopped her on the landing at the top of the stairs. She blinked and nearly turned back to him, but then she walked away, to the guest room. It was time to leave his house.
The world was lucky he was sitting behind his desk. Cam had been growling at anyone who got within three feet of him ever since Grace had moved out of his place and started refusing to take any of his calls.
Sure, she was staying with Spence and Sage, and he got nightly reports to the effect that she was safe and sound, but that didn’t help his mood any—it didn’t help his mood at all. Because what Cam wanted was Grace back in his home and back in his bed.
So they’d gotten into a fight. It wasn’t something they couldn’t fix—their wounds would heal—but the next day, when he’d woken up after only a couple of hours’ sleep, she’d already left.
At first Cam had panicked, thinking that someone had managed to break into his house and stolen her away. But then he found the note, saying she was going to Sage’s.
He called Spence, of course, to make sure that she was, in fact, there. Knowing she was safe had helped, and that day he’d even been angry enough with her to think he was glad to be rid of her.
But then the week had dragged on and the more he missed her, the angrier he became with the rest of the world. When he wasn’t thinking obsessively about her, he was thinking obsessively about her case. He needed to know how to help her and, more importantly, how to help them.
“Can I get you anything else before I go, Cam?”
“No. I’m fine.” It was a wonder his legal assistant didn’t march right out of his law offices after telling him where he could shove his bad mood.
But instead of yelling at him as he deserved, as he almost wanted, she just left him alone, like everyone else was doing.
And why? Because his thoughts were pinpointed on one woman—one dark-haired, exotic-eyed, beautiful, frustrating woman. Grace. It was always Grace, always had been Grace. She was his first love, and he had no doubt she would be his last.
But would she allow him to stay in her life? That was an entirely different matter. She was strong and independent, and the bottom line was that she just might not need him as much as he needed her.
“Cam, I have to talk to you.”
Cam looked up to find Sage in his doorway. “Of course. Is everything okay with my brother?”
Concern flashed through him at the worried look in Sage’s eyes. She was normally a cool, collected woman. Right now, she didn’t look so calm.
“Before I talk, I really need a drink—a stiff one.”
She took off her jacket and sat down while Cam went to his liquor cabinet and poured them each a scotch. He had a feeling he would need it, to judge from the expression she was wearing. His body hummed with tension.
“Your brother is fine, Cam. I should have said that right away,” she told him after taking a long swallow of her drink.
“Then this is about Grace.” It wasn’t a question. There were very few people who would cause Sage to look that way while talking with him.
“It’s about Grace,” she said, and her eyes filled with tears.
“You’re going to have to explain to me what’s going on,” Cam told her, frustrated at all the preliminaries. Okay, she hadn’t been in his office all that long, but it seemed like forever.
“You know she’ll murder me if she knows I’m talking to you, right?”
“No, she won’t, Sage. You’re her best friend, and she trusts you. I’m the man who loves her, and she’ll learn to trust me again.”
“I know you love her, and that’s why I’ve come to you with this.”
“Then tell me, please.”
Cam got up and grabbed the bottle of scotch again. He had a feeling that they were going to need a lot more of it before this conversation was finished.
“You know about her relationship with Jimmy, right?” Sage downed her drink and pushed it toward him for a refill.
“Yes, Sage, I know about it, and I’d really rather not discuss that aspect of her life. Unless you know something to tie him to the embezzlement case—and I wouldn’t be a bit surprised—I don’t want to discuss that man.”
“I don’t know if he’s involved, but I do know he raped her, shamed her, and then held something over her head for years. She finally walked away when she found him in bed with her mother, but I have a feeling he’s the one behind these little acts of terror against her.”