“I didn’t mean to overhear.” She swallowed tightly. “It all happened so fast.”
Lifting her hand, she dropped it to her side again helplessly.
If it was bullshit, he would explain, right?
She waited, watching him, knowing with every shuddering beat of her heart that he wasn’t going to explain a damned thing. Because to explain it would mean admitting it wasn’t bullshit, she thought painfully. Admitting that she was no more than a stand-in for another woman.
What was she supposed to do now? What was she supposed to say?
She looked away for a long moment, the shadows that filled the room from the tightly closed windows and the curtains pulled over them sinking into her heart.
When she turned back to him, she couldn’t help the trembling of her lips or the pain that lashed at her heart.
“Did you think of her when you were with me?” she whispered, unable to stop the words before they escaped. “Oh my god, I can’t believe I asked that.” She tried to laugh, but the sound was bitter and filled with self-disgust as she held up a hand in a staying motion as he started to speak. “I don’t even want to know. I don’t even think I can bear to know either fucking way.”
He shook his head, breathing out roughly, but he refused to say anything, refused to explain a damned thing.
“Does Kye know?” she asked painfully, her heart racing so hard, pounding in agony at her chest.
“There’s nothing to fucking know, Lyrica,” he bit out, his voice rough. “For god’s sake, what you heard was Elijah’s perception of one fucking comment made long before this summer. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about and he has no idea how close he is to getting his fucking ass kicked for hurting you like this.”
Hurt? This wasn’t hurt. It was agony. Because what he was saying felt true, but she could also feel the lie.
“Who is Betts?”
He flinched as though she’d struck him.
That was all the truth she needed to see.
She rushed past him, unable to stand there any longer, unable to face him or the tears she could feel burning in her chest.
Even as she ran, she expected him to stop her. She expected to feel his arms coming around her and pulling her back into the heat of his hard body. She didn’t. As she rushed out the door, she paused long enough to glance back at him. He stood where he had been before she moved, appearing to stare at the spot where she’d stood. Still, silent, and just as alone as he wanted to be.
SIXTEEN
“This is Natches. Leave me a message if you have to.”
Natches’s voice message usually managed to make her smile, but this time, she couldn’t seem to make the effort.
“It’s Lyrica.” She swallowed tightly. “Hell, you have my number . . .” Her voice broke as she fought back a sob. “Can you call me back, Natches? I really need to talk to you.”
She disconnected the call.
She couldn’t call Dawg. If she did, she would start crying the second he heard the pain in her voice and softly asked, “Hey there, baby sister, tell me what hurts.”
Dropping the phone into her bag, she stared around the bedroom. She had to pack her clothes. She’d just recently unpacked them when Graham had suggested there was plenty of room in his closet and dresser. Her hands had actually trembled as she’d put her things away, thinking of his claim that no other woman had shared this space with him.
Gathering her strength when all she wanted to do was rage, to run from the house and escape Graham and the pain building inside her, she bent and dragged her suitcase from beneath the bed where he’d stored it.
A shadow of something attached to the bed frame had her frowning and lifting the white dust ruffle to investigate further. The handgun attached to the metal rail surprised her. There was another on the other side of the bed.
Pulling back slowly, she straightened, then lifted the leather bag to the mattress and opened it quickly. She was turning for the closet when Graham stepped into the room.
His gaze went instantly to the luggage, the anger in his gaze darkening as he snapped the door closed behind him.
“You promised me twenty-four hours,” he reminded her, the low rasp of his voice sending a surge of awareness, of sensual trepidation up her spine.
Not fear. He’d never hurt her. But this was a part of Graham she had no experience with. A side of him she had never seen before. The dark, wicked eroticism on his face, the sexual knowledge that gleamed in his eyes and her own awareness that he wouldn’t hesitate to use it to hold her there.