Holding Out: Returning Home Book 4

by Serena Bell

  Griff could have told CJ a whole lot more than that, but he kept his mouth shut. This wasn’t about him; it was about CJ.

  “You’re just one of us now, that’s all. You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to, but you should know that if you do want to talk about it, pretty much any guy here will listen. And understand.”

  CJ didn’t move. He didn’t acknowledge Griff’s words in any outright way. But Griff could feel the tension leaving the kid’s body, inch by inch. Shoulders dropping, jaw releasing, heart slowing.

  CJ had no way to know that Griff was a total and complete hypocrite.

  Now he reached across the table and clapped CJ on the arm. “You want a tip, kid?”

  “I can get my own pussy.”

  Griff felt a growl form in the pit of his stomach, but made himself breathe slow. It was a trick he’d learned a long time ago. If you were calm, you made the people around you calm. “Not if you talk that way, you won’t.”

  CJ’s eyes flicked up from the table. “You telling me how to get laid?”

  Okay, so maybe the kid was hotheaded. Not surprising in a twenty-something guy who’d been back from the Middle East for all of about ten minutes, but . . . Griff noted it.

  “I’m telling you to have some respect,” Griff said. “That’s step one. Step two is, remember you’re not convincing her. You’re letting her convince you.”

  “The fuck?” CJ demanded.

  “Listen to him,” Jake said. “He has a one hundred percent success rate.”

  “Nah, that’s bullshit. He’s full of it,” Griff told CJ. “Maybe ninety-eight percent max. But I’m right about this. Women—hell, everyone—want to be listened to. To feel like someone gives a shit about who they are. So, you go up to someone and you’re really curious about who they are? They want to open up. Talk, fuck, whatever.”

  For some reason, that flashed him back to sitting on the couch with Becca. Which in turn made him think of her proposition. Basically, he hadn’t been able to get it out of his head since she’d issued it. He’d had quite the restless night last night, asking himself the entirely hypothetical question of what he would do if he were in charge of taking Becca’s V-card. Which was just more of the bullshit she wanted to avoid, right? She didn’t want it to be flowers and candles and a big deal. It would just be sex. Clean, simple—

  But he couldn’t quite banish the idea that he could make it something special. Something memorable for her.

  Damn it. He wasn’t going to make it anything.

  She was going to find someone else to do it.

  And that . . . that fucking rankled.

  “We call him Dr. Griff, the looooove doctor,” Hunter said. “And this—” He gestured to the bar around them. “—is his office.”

  “Nah,” Nate said. “Everyone knows Griff’s office is the archery range.”

  CJ cocked his head. “How’s that?”

  “You ever been to the range with Griff? You’ll end up pouring your guts out. It’s way better than the therapist’s couch. You think you’re going out there to jab arrows in a big target, but what you’re really doing is fessing up to all your crap.”

  “Look who’s talking,” Hunter said to Nate. “Speaking of guys who should open a head shrinking practice.”

  Griff didn’t know the whole story of what had gone down between Hunter and Trina, only that Hunter had come back from Afghanistan with a year missing from his memory, including his whole relationship with his girl. Now they were married, and soon their adoptions of each other’s kids would be finalized. So whatever advice Nate had given him seemed to have worked.

  “I’ll leave the headshrinking to Nate,” Griff said. “I’m not qualified. I’ve got enough of my own crap. But if you want a wingman?”

  He addressed this last to CJ.

  “I’m your guy.”

  6

  “Can you believe how huge Sam is?” Alia asked Becca, inclining her head in the direction of Mira and Jake’s son.

  It was Monday afternoon and Mira and Jake’s Memorial Day picnic was in full swing. Sam had organized the kids into a game of Ultimate Frisbee. The age range was huge, the skill range even wider, but Sam seemed unconcerned, corralling five-year-old girls in Wonder Woman dresses and pimpled teenaged boys with equal ease. He was a natural-born leader, like his dad.

  “No,” said Becca. “Is he taller than Jake?”

  “I know, right?” Alia said. “That first picnic you and I came to, Sam was so skinny you could have snapped him like a toothpick.”

  “I love it,” Becca said. “It’s probably my favorite thing about these picnics. Seeing the kids grow up, and change.” She sighed. Seeing the families warmed her heart—and also set off a wave of longing. She wanted a family, too, someday. If she could ever do some growing up and changing of her own, and stop exclusively dating self-involved pricks.

  “Not the hunky servicemen?” Alia teased.

  “That, too,” Becca said, grinning.

  She couldn’t help it, her eyes sought one in particular, not for the first time that day.

  She’d been trying not to watch Griff all afternoon, but wherever he went, she knew where he was. Chatting with Jake, throwing his head back as he roared with laughter or listening intently as Jake told a story. Tossing a football back and forth with Sam, thick biceps and triceps appearing where his T-shirt rode up his sculpted arm.

  Nate came over with a fussy Robbie in his arms.

  “I think this dude desperately needs a nap,” he said.

  “I got it,” Becca said. “You guys go get some food.”

  Alia and Nate shot Becca looks of gratitude, but then Alia, ever the big sister, said, “What about you?”

  “I’ll jiggle him till he passes out and then—can I put him in the stroller?”

  “Perfect,” Alia said, sounding relieved. “Thank you. I can’t even express how much having you here this weekend is helping. I feel eighty percent more like an actual human being.”

  Becca did what she’d said she would, bouncing and jiggling Robbie against her shoulder until he melted into a puddle of baby sleep. Then she found where Nate and Alia had parked the stroller under a tree and settled him in. He stirred and for a moment she thought he was going to wake and spoil her plan, but he sighed heavily and relaxed his fat little body into the curve of the bucket seat.

  She looked up and her eye caught Griff, leaning against a tree not too far away, watching the Frisbee game, a half-smile on his face. She knew she should look away, but she couldn’t take her eyes off his broad chest and narrow hips, the way his jeans outlined his solid thighs, the scruff clinging to his jawline.

  It didn’t make any sense. If anything, his rejection of her the other night should have made him less appealing. She didn’t want to be the kind of woman who wanted a guy just because he didn’t want her. But the truth was, that might have been part of it.

  What had he said?

  What kind of idiot would turn down the chance to be a girl’s first time?

  But then he had.

  She knew what he’d meant. He’d meant, What kind of guy would turn down the chance to be the first for the woman he’s dating. He hadn’t meant guys should be lining up to take V-cards from random women in need of deflowering.

  He wasn’t Jondalar.

  He didn’t have the giant schlong of wonder and he wouldn’t ride her the way the stallion had ridden the mare as Ayla watched—

  Okay, enough with The Valley of Horses. One reason she was still a virgin was because she harbored these unrealistic fantasies around sex. She had to let them go, along with her childish expectations that her own Westley was going to rush in and give her life meaning. New Becca was a realist, and she would make things happen for herself.

  She couldn’t quite forget, though, that something hot had flared in Griff’s eyes when she’d thrown down her gauntlet. Fine. I’ll find someone else.

  She hadn’t really meant it. She wasn’t on some kind of mis
sion. She’d just had that impulsive and probably ill-advised idea that Griff could pocket her V-card and simplify her dating life. When she’d said she’d find someone else, she’d mostly just been needling Griff because she was, well, a tiny bit hurt that he hadn’t found the proposition appealing.

  But Griff hadn’t liked that. His eyes had told her so, clearly.

  7

  Griff watched as Becca wound her way toward him at the food table. She heaped her plate with egg salad, macaroni salad, green salad, corn on the cob, buttered bread—

  Any woman who could eat like that had to have a good appetite in other arenas, too.

  See, this was the thing. Ever since she’d made him think about what she had and hadn’t done with that curvy body of hers, he’d been seeing her in a whole new and extremely inconvenient light.

  Food. Food was what they were doing right now. He looked down at his own plate, heaped to overflowing, then at Becca’s. “If we had a scale, who do you think would win?”

  She looked up at him, eyes wide, then smiled in a way that made him feel like she was genuinely happy to see him. Which—okay, he liked that. No crime there.

  She assessed the two plates. “It only counts if you eat it all, though.”

  “Is that a challenge?”

  Her eyes met his. “Sure, why not? As you may have noticed, I am a fan of throwing down a good challenge.”

  He let that comment slide as he led her to a spot on the grass, where they sat side by side.

  “What’ve you been up to since Friday night?” She was wearing a flowy tank that shouldn’t have been sexy but was, partly because it was made of some gauzy fabric that revealed a lacy shadow, and partly because it was loose around the arms and he could see the peekaboo of her bra and the sweet, generous curve underneath.

  What he most wanted to ask was whether she’d had any success finding a willing participant for her virginity project, but he kept his mouth firmly shut. Returning to that topic was pure danger, since he didn’t trust himself not to lose his resolve and volunteer.

  She paused with a forkful of potato salad en route to her mouth. “Playing with Robbie, mostly. Trying to give Alia and Nate as much of a break as possible. He’s so stinkin’ cute. Have you gotten kisses from him yet? If you hold him up to your face, he does this little open-mouth thing. It’s adorable.” She wrinkled her nose, which was also, well, adorable. “What’ve you been up to all weekend? Other than out with Nate last night, which I know for obvious reasons.”

  She ate the bite she’d lifted to her lips. He watched her mouth, the way she tugged the food off the fork, then made himself look away. “Yeah, out last night with the guys. That was fun.”

  Even as he said it, he heard how lukewarm he sounded, which was strange because he’d had a good time. CJ hadn’t turned his drought around, but he’d worked his new skills for phone numbers and pocketed two.

  Griff, however, hadn’t been in the mood to do the same. He hadn’t seen anyone who made him want to bother. Which was rare for him. Not because he would stalk anything that twitched, but because he could always find something to like in anyone he talked to.

  He shrugged. “Otherwise, it’s just been the usual. I did some odd jobs Saturday, took a long bike ride and then lazed around like a slug on Sunday—oh, and spent a couple of hours on the archery range.”

  “I’ve never done archery,” Becca mused.

  Impulse had the words out before he could think better of it. “I’ll teach you.”

  “Yeah?” Her face lit.

  “Any time. Actually, I could teach you when we’re done gorging ourselves sick.”

  Now why had he said that? Standing behind her, tweaking her stance, looking over her shoulder as she lined up shots? While knowing that no one had ever gone where his dick suddenly and inconveniently wanted to go? Pure torture.

  “Sure! I’d love that.”

  And damned if he wasn’t glad to hear it. Because obviously he was a total masochist.

  “Hey,” said a voice behind them.

  Griff turned to find CJ there and instantly wished for him to go far, far away, possibly to another time and place entirely. But he forced himself not to be a tool. “Oh, hey, CJ.”

  Becca turned, too, and gave CJ the same smile she’d given Griff a few minutes ago. The one that made him feel like he was the only man who could ever bring it out of her—except unfortunately, that appeared not to be true. “Hey.” She balanced her plate carefully on one hand and extended the other. “I’m Becca.”

  “Oh, sorry, my bad.” Griff had dropped the ball on intros because—truth was—he didn’t actually want CJ to meet Becca.

  Damn.

  “I’m CJ,” the kid said. “It’s really nice to meet you.”

  He held onto Becca’s hand a beat too long and prolonged eye contact with her exactly the way Griff had advised him last night.

  Grrrrr.

  “So, what brings you to R&R?” CJ asked. “I haven’t seen you around before. I’d remember.”

  Oh, Jesus. Griff had to grudgingly admit, it was a nice touch. Not too over-the-top, but setting the tone. And judging by Becca’s blush and smile, she liked it. “Just visiting. My sister, Alia, is a PT here.”

  CJ lit up. “Oh, right, Alia. She’s great. I busted up my knee and she knew exactly what to do to fix it.”

  Becca sent Griff a sideways look. It seemed to be asking a question. Griff was afraid the question was, “What about him?”

  If he cock-blocked CJ and Becca when he knew they were both legit on the market, he was definitely an asshole. He bit down on his own frustration and managed a smile and a non-committal shrug.

  “Have you had the potato salad yet?” CJ asked.

  “God, yes, Mira’s potato salad,” Becca said. She’d demolished the whole scoopful he’d seen on her plate earlier.

  She would be greedy in bed.

  Griff shut his eyes. When he opened them again, CJ and Becca were smiling at each other. “It’s so good, right? This is my third helping,” CJ said, gesturing to the potato salad on his plate.

  Even though Griff had been using The Force to keep CJ from sitting, the kid lowered himself to the patch of grass on Becca’s other side. “So, are you hanging with your sister for the weekend or something?”

  “Yeah. I try to come down here whenever I can to see her and Nate and their baby. I don’t visit as often as I wish I could, though. I usually have to work Saturdays.”

  “Yeah? What do you do?”

  “I’m a receptionist at a day spa. Like a salon—hair, nails, all that.”

  “Wow. That’s neat. How long you been doing that?”

  He was using Griff’s patented technique of drawing out the subject, getting her to talk about herself, making her feel as though he was interested in her.

  The thing was, Griff never did it as a technique. He always was interested. And if he’d been the one asking Becca questions, he would have asked way better ones. Like did she really like her job, or was she just doing it until she could figure out the what-she-wanted-to-do-when-she-grew-up thing? And what, when she was really, really honest with herself, did she want to do when she grew up?

  “I need a beer,” he said abruptly. “Anyone else?”

  CJ looked at Griff as if he’d just remembered he existed. “No thanks, man.”

  Griff didn’t wait for Becca’s response as he rose to his feet and headed to the drinks table. He wasn’t thirsty, but he didn’t think he could stand to watch anymore.

  He scrubbed his hand over his forehead, the other one a fist at his side.

  Becca would never let CJ take her V-card, would she?

  Because Griff was positive: That guy wouldn’t be careful with her. He wouldn’t take his time.

  He wouldn’t insist, no matter how much she protested, that her first time could and did matter and that it wasn’t something to just throw away.

  He would never treat her the way that Griff would, if he could.

  8 />
  Becca’s fingers slowly formed into a fist in her lap. CJ was asking her his ten millionth question. It was like he was interviewing her for a job, and while at first it had been kind of flattering to be the subject of all that interest, she was . . .

  Well, she was bored.

  Her attention had started wandering. She kept catching herself not looking at CJ and instead searching for Griff.

  She took the last bite of food on her plate—not because Griff had laid down the challenge, but because she was desperate for an excuse to leave the interrogation. “Hey. I’m going to get myself another lemonade. And then I think I’ll probably check up on Alia and see if she needs any more help with Robbie.”

  “Are you headed home tonight?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Will you be back any time soon?”

  She hesitated. “Uh, not sure.”

  “Could I convince you to let me take you out to dinner next time?”

  She should be thrilled about the invitation. CJ had green eyes and dimples and he seemed to actually give a shit about who she was as a person. “Um, sure,” she said.

  “Here, you have your phone? I’ll give you my number, and you can text me if you’re planning to be in town.”

  “Um . . .” She’d left her purse, including her phone, in Alia’s office. “No, sorry. But if you give it to Alia, she’ll text it to me.”

  He nodded.

  “Nice meeting you,” she said, rising to her feet.

  He rose, too, and reached out his hand. When she put hers out to shake, he took it in both of his and said, “Great meeting you.”

  Something about the gesture felt—rehearsed. She took her hand back, relieved to walk away from him.

  She was hoping Griff had been serious about his offer to teach her archery. She’d never had much interest in bows and arrows, or any form of weaponry, before, but she wanted to know more about what made Griff tick, and she knew archery was something that mattered to him.

  She scanned the picnic-goers, looking for his rumpled hair and gray eyes, for the T-shirt that clung to his sculpted pecs, but she didn’t see him. She started a slow roam around the periphery of the picnic, stopping to greet people she knew, but she completed a circuit without finding him.