“Why don’t you date?” The words were out before I could censor them. Damn alcohol.
He didn’t skip a beat. “Why don’t you do one-night stands?”
“Shit, you sure know how to turn a question back on a woman,” I noted. “But seriously, the commonly accepted thing for people to do is date, so what’s caused you to stop?”
“Is it the commonly accepted thing to do, or is that just what they sell you in the movies and TV?”
I frowned. “I’m pretty sure it’s the accepted thing.”
He shrugged. “In my world, nothing is commonly accepted except for the belief in each to his own. I don’t do things just because society tells me to. The world’s too fucked up to even begin to know what’s best for me. I say, figure out what shit works for you, then do that, and fuck what anyone else has to say about it.”
For a man of few words, he was giving me a lot tonight. And I never wanted him to stop speaking because I loved everything coming out of his mouth. Griff was the kind of man who, even if I didn’t agree with something he said, I could appreciate the thought and time he’d put into it. And I could respect the hell out of a man like that.
“I take it you’re not going to share with me why you don’t date, then?” I asked, still wanting to know his reason.
He reached for the bourbon and poured us both a drink - his neat, mine with diet coke. As he slid my glass to me, he said, “I’m more interested to know why you don’t like one-night stands.” He threw back half his drink and waited for me to speak.
I passed him the bottle of bourbon while I picked up my glass and the coke. “I need to sit for this conversation,” I said, and turned to walk into the living room.
I settled myself at one end of the couch and watched as he joined me, taking a seat at the other end. Keeping himself as far from me as he could. “Do you have family, Griff? I mean, I know you have your aunt, but do you have a family who love you and care for you and make you feel special?”
He blinked rapidly and sucked in a deep breath. When he put his drink to his mouth and downed what he had left, I figured I’d hit a nerve. “Not anymore,” he said, his voice hard, his body just as rigid.
Shit, I hadn’t expected that, but I figured he wasn’t the kind of man who would want me to dwell on his admission, so I carried on. “You did once, though?”
“Yes.”
I drank some of my drink, swallowing the alcohol and the shitty memories that reared their ugly heads. “I never have. Well, not unless you count the few years I had with my parents when I was younger, but I don’t count those years because I was too young to remember them, let alone for them to mean anything. All I had was the foster care system from the age of nine, and let me tell you, there wasn’t any love or care or being made to feel special in that system.”
“Yeah, so I’ve heard,” he murmured.
“I want to feel loved and special. I don’t want to ever know the feeling of being discarded ever again, like I did over and over with the families who were happy to have me for the money they made off the government, but quick to discard me when I no longer suited their life anymore. You hear stories of kids who are abused in the system. I never experienced abuse, but neglect and lack of love fucks you up, too. So, after a couple of one-night-stands when I was younger, I decided they weren’t for me. I’d rather have no sex than casual sex that means nothing, and makes me feel like shit all over again when the guy leaves without a second glance.” Shit, this was dredging up feelings I usually did my best to avoid; feelings I buried so deep I didn’t even know where to look for them anymore.
He sat watching me, and I knew he was processing every word I’d said by the thoughtful look on his face. Ghosts of the past filled the room, lingering like a nightmare you wanted to forget, but couldn’t. And I sensed they weren’t only my ghosts. I sensed that Griff carried ghosts the way most people carried happy memories.
“I had love once…well, at least I thought I did. Fuck, I thought I had something special, but that’s the thing about love – how do you know when the other person feels the same way? How do you know they’re not playing you, and hedging bets between you and someone else? That makes you feel like shit. I won’t go there again,” he said, and I watched him sitting in his pain, and my heart hurt for whatever he’d gone through. I wanted to slap the woman who’d done that to him, because she’d taken a man who was open to love, and made him close his heart to the possibilities of everything love had to offer.
“We’re not all like that,” I said softly.
“Neither are the men who know how to treat a woman right for one night only,” he replied, watching me closely, and I felt like we were at a checkmate. Both clinging to what we needed, neither willing to bend.
Not sure where to take the conversation now, I sat in silence, and then Griff stood abruptly. He looked down at me with an expression I couldn’t pick, but if I were to try, I’d say he seemed torn over something. “It’s late. I’ll let you get to bed,” he said before leaving me to take his glass into the kitchen.
I followed him, wanting every moment I could have to watch him. Even the way he moved was a turn-on. His body moved with a sense of authority and power, and I’d always found men who had that take-charge attitude hot.
Leaning against the kitchen counter, I waited while he rinsed his glass and placed it next to the sink. When he faced me again, the desire I saw in his eyes made my core clench.
He closed the distance between us and stepped into my personal space. Although his body remained rigid in the way I was grasping was Griff’s way, and although he kept his emotions tucked away and his face bare of them, his desire rang out loud and clear.
He wants me.
But he’s denying himself.
In that moment, I felt everything he was feeling.
Want and denial seemed to be something we had in common.