“Oh yeah?” I say, kneeling before her and pulling her off the bed into my arms, her legs slide around me as she gasps, struggling against me.
“You think this is about money, that it has always been about money. Well, that ends today. Every cent I paid you that lined Nick Monroe’s pocket is forgotten. It’s finished, I’m ashamed I ever offered it. That money was dirty; it belongs with that fucker, and he can have it. Everything else, from this point on, is a choice.”
I pull her forward, my hands splayed over her back, keeping her in place.
“You want me to leave? You want to never see me again? Fine. I will respect that, but I have to tell you everything before I do.”
She leans back, staring at me with a shocked look on her face.
“I’m all in. I have been since the second you walked into my conference room. I didn’t know then what I know now, that you would irrevocably change my life for the better.”
She shakes her head. “You wouldn’t even have looked at me twice if I hadn’t stripped down to my underwear that first day.”
“Bullshit.”
“I’m anescort, Gray. I’m not stupid.”
“You know what’s really stupid?” I say, my voice getting lower and angrier as I look her in the eye. “If you had just told me at the beginning what was going on, if you had been honest with me, I could have helped you weeks ago, and all of this could have been avoided. That’s why I was so pissed off at you after I got you out of Monroe’s warehouse. Why the fuck didn’t you just tell me?”
“It’s not your job to?—”
“Yes, it is,” I say emphatically. “Iwantit to be my job, Jax. I don’t want an escort, I don’t want anyone, except you. You’re a confusing, angry, infuriating mess, and I love you.”
We both freeze as she stares me down, her breath coming faster as she screws her eyes tightly shut.
“You don’t love me, Gray.”
I hadn’t meant to say it. Not yet. But nothing in the world has ever felt as real as those words.
“I do. I think I’ve loved you since the day you punched a guy nine times your size in a boxing ring.”
She snorts, pushing me gently away as a little laugh breaks free, and my heart soars as her eyes soften for the first time in hours.
“You’re an idiot.”
“I want to be with you,” I say solemnly. “Just you. Just us. Please. Come back to my apartment. Let me take care of you, and we can deal with everything else tomorrow.”
Chapter 45
Jax
“Ican’t come back to your apartment,” I say as Gray leans back, watching me curiously.
“Why not?”
“Because my brothers are all fucked up right now. Scott’s been beaten up twice in the space of two weeks, and Flynn owes you half a million dollars. You should go home. We can talk tomorrow.”
“What did Ijustsay?”
“That you’re not going anywhere.”
“Damn straight.”
“Are you just here because you need to get laid? Because there are cheaper?—”
“Shut up, Jax. Were you even listening to me?”
I swallow, unsure how to feel about what he just confessed to me. It’s all such a shock, I don’t even know what to say. His hands move up my back, and I wonder if he’s going to peel the towel from around me.
