“Where I’m concerned, Sloane? You can have whatever you want.” Griff winks one of those deep blue eyes at me and sets the menu in front of me. “Will you order? I could use a break from the glasses. I’ll take the orecchiette pasta with duck confit.”
Pasta. I’d kill for a plate of pasta.
One more night, then I can eat whatever the heck I want.
“I’ll order. But…where are you going?” Griff stops halfway across the room and turns back to me. “Making sure Marina didn’t lock the door. Jacob walked her back here and made her promise she wouldn’t go out, but in this business, Sloane, you trust, but verify.” The latch turns easily, and the moment he cracks the door, I can hear Marina snoring over the sound of some violent action movie.
“She won’t stir until morning. Marina never gets drunk, so her hangovers areepic.” After I order our food, I push to my feet, wincing as my cramped toes protest. “I need to get out of this dress. If room service rings, I’ll let you know.”
Griff looks like he wants to say something, but instead, nods and heads for the bathroom. And then it hits me. He slept with me last night. We both admitted this wasn’t pretend. Yet his clothes, his toiletries? The case for his arm? They’re all still in the main room. Relegated to corners like he’s some sort of second thought.
“Griff?” I call from the doorway. He’s staring out at the lake again, but he still has his glasses on, thank goodness.
Whipping around, he goes from almost relaxed to on full alert in a single breath. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I just thought maybe…you could move your stuff in here?”
“Are you sure?” Staring at me like he can’t quite figure me out, he waits for me to nod. “Okay. You want to change first?”
“No. I’m not afraid of you seeing me, Griff. Of everything that comes after? Yes. But not of you seeingme. The real me.” It’s the truth—mostly. I am scared, but not in the way he probably thinks.
To prove my point—both to myself and to Griff, I stand in front of the mirrored bathroom door and start taking off the dress one hook, zipper, and strap at a time. Wardrobe put me in a one-piece bodysuit underneath all the layers of silk and chiffon, so even when the dress falls to the floor at my feet, I’m still wearing the equivalent of a nude strapless bathing suit. Albeit one with a push-up bra built in.
Griff stops in the doorway, his duffel bag slung over his shoulder, and his jaw half-open.
“You realize more of me is covered now than when I was in that lace negligée, right?” I ask after I turn to face him.
“Doesn’t…uh. Shit.” He clears his throat. “Yeah. But you were also twenty feet away, in public, and now you’re not.”
“You’re kind of cute when you’re embarrassed.” Picking up my dress—Beauty and Stylegave me this as a gift for participating in this show—I toss it over my arm and head into the bathroom. I wasn’t lying. Being naked in front of Griff wouldn’t bother me. If this were still a cover story, a fake relationship I knew would end the moment I’m no longer in danger? I’d strip down in a heartbeat, just to see his reaction.
But it’s not. This is real. And if we get naked, we’ll do it together. Even if we don’t do a damn thing more than that—tonight or ever—I want this to be special. For both of us.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Sloane
The room feels different now. Griff doesn’t have a lot of “stuff.” His tux and suits hang in the closet, the case for his arm sits next to the dresser, and he left his duffel bag in the corner. But having his things mingling with mine? I didn’t think the added intimacy would be so very powerful.
Over dinner—where I steal more than a couple bites of his pasta—I tell him a little about what happens in a runway dressing room, and he shows me the video of the audience he took with his glasses.
Dimitri isn’t there. Neither is Pavel Andrei. Not a single person looks out of place, but apparently his team is running some sort of facial recognition program on everyone “just in case.”
After Griff sets the tray back outside the door, he flips the switch for the gas fireplace and sits close enough, our thighs touch. “Ripper texted me during the show. Rodney Carriger was killed down in Mexico two weeks after Volkov got out of prison.”
I should feel…something. Pity? Shock? Anything. But I’m numb.
“Sloane?” Griff rests his hand on my arm. “Say something.”
“Like what? I don’t even know if I’m sorry he’s dead. He made me feel even more ‘invisible’ than Dimitri. At least when I was trapped in that life, I wasn’t alone. The other girls and I…we were together. Not friends, because he never would have allowed that. He rotated us between houses all the time so we couldn’t get too close to anyone. But Rodney…he told me every day how I had nothing—was nothing—without him.”
“You werenevernothing,” he says, his tone so possessive and full of anger, I’d be afraid if he weren’t looking at me like I was his whole world.
“I was.” He starts to protest, but I shake my head. “Let me get this out. Please.”
If we’re going to try to make this work, he has to know all my dirty secrets and broken pieces. Even if telling him kills me.
Taking his hand, I guide his fingers to the back of my neck. “Do you feel this?”
