“He might be a hard-ass, but even he takes this time of year off.” My eyebrows lift. “Aren’t you doing anything with your family?”
“Parents always spend the holidays in Florida, and I’m an only child.” He shrugs. “Never been big on it, as holidays go. Fourth of July is much more my speed.”
“Fireworks, beer, BBQ, and bikinis — I wonder why.”
His eyebrows waggle, a flash of his old mischief. The man is incorrigible.
“Enjoy your time off while it lasts — I’ll see you after the holidays, Dunn. Are you going to Sloan’s New Year’s Eve party?”
“I may make an appearance. I may go out with Ryder.” He shrugs. “I don’t like to commit to any one thing.”
I know he’s talking about parties, not relationships, but I have to bite my tongue to keep from snapping,Yes, I figured that one out on my own, thanks.I’m not sure what else to say, so I just undo my seatbelt and reach for the door handle.
“Kat.”
I pause, arm midair, taken aback by the emotion suddenly infused in his voice. I’m afraid to look at him, so I stare at my hand, stuck in limbo, shaking slightly as I hold it aloft.
“I know you think I’m an asshole. I know I’m the bad guy in your story. Trust me, I know.” He swallows audibly. “If I was a better guy, I’d go on being the villain you seem to need me to be. I wouldn’t apologize or ask for your forgiveness, because I know I don’t deserve it after all the shit I’ve put you through.” He pauses. “But I’m not a better guy. So I’m asking.”
I inhale sharply.
“Forgive me. Stop hating me,” he pleads softly. “Not because I deserve it. But because I won’t survive if you keep thinking I’m scum.”
“Why now?” I ask, almost inaudibly. “What’s changed? You didn’t seem to care what I thought of you a month ago. You didn’t seem to give a shit about making me angry yesterday, or a week ago, or the decade before that, for that matter.”
He expels a sharp breath. “I don’t have an easy answer for you. I wish I did. All I can tell you is… I hate this. I hate you hating me. I hate waking up in the morning, knowing you’re going to spend the day wishing you were somewhere else. With someone else.”
“So you want me to forgive you because my anger is an inconvenience?” I shake my head. “Sorry, that’s not good enough.”
“No!No. I want you to forgive me because it’s killing me to be this fucking close to you and not be able to touch you or talk to you or laugh with you. I want you to forgive me because it’s Christmas and at Christmas, you’re supposed to put aside all the miserable shit that makes your life hell for three hundred and sixty-four days out of the year, and be thankful for the rare things that make you happy.”
I look back at him, at the pleading look in his eyes, and for a fleeting instant I want to break down and give him everything he’s asking for. A crazy, delusional part of my brain sees the shadowed parts of this broken boy, and recognizes them as the match for my own terrible darkness.
Maybe it’s only fitting for someone like me, stitched together with damage and destruction, to wind up with someone like him. Maybe, if I stretch my arms out in the darkness, I can grab hold of him, because he lives there too. Maybe choosing shadows won’t be so bad, if we’re stuck inside them together.
“You make me happy,” he finishes in a whisper. “Even if I’ve done a shitty job at showing it. And I don’t know what the future holds. I don’t know if this —us— has a shot in hell at working. But I promise, I’m going to do better. Whether it’s just as friends or something more… I promise, Kat, if you’ll just give me a chance to make this right, I’ll prove it…”
I reach out and put my hand over his mouth, stopping his words.
“Don’t. Okay? Just… Please don’t. Don’t say something you don’t mean just because you’re lonely and sad and it’s the holidays. Don’t tell me you miss me because it’s tough to be alone.” My eyes hold his. “The thing I’m learning is, it’s okay to be alone, Grayson. Good, even. It helps you figure out who you are and what you want, without other people’s influence.”
“But—” The word is muffled against my palm.
“You’re searching for something missing in your life. You think that something might be me, but it’s not.” I pull my hand away. “You’re not looking for me; you’re looking foryou. You’re lost. And that’s okay — everyone is a little lost. Look who you’re talking to.” I sigh. “I don’t know much, but I do know you can’t find yourself by getting lost in someone else.”
Indecipherable thoughts are swimming in that set of infinite eyes.
My voice is cautious. “You know what I want for you, more than anything?”
He shakes his head.
“I want you to figure out who you are — without the cameras or the press or the drama. I want you to look in the mirror and like the man you see looking back. Not because he’s rich or famous or good in bed. Not because women lust after him or men want to be him.” I smile softly. “Because he respects himself. Because he knows who he is and what he wants,trulywants, out of life.That’sa man I’d be interested in getting to know.”
His face flickers through so many emotions in such a short span, I can’t keep track of them all. Nor do I want to.
“Merry Christmas, Grayson,” I whisper, my eyes holding his for a long moment. I reach for the door handle. I’m halfway out, when his voice stops me again.
“Kat?”