“He asked me to. He said it was important.”
“Well then, maybe he should have called about it last week when it was less urgent!”
“Jenny, don’t yell. I’m already on the interstate.”
I figured she’d be frustrated, but I hadn’t anticipated anger. I expected a no-holds-barred reaction, but I assumed she’d be mad at Gray, not me.
“I don’t understand why you’d allow him to play these games with you. You did this same shit with Will. At least with Will, you had known him for a few months, and then he’d been good to you for a few more before you got sucked into his shitstorm. What is the draw to Gray?”
I tried to lighten the mood. “Have you seen him?”
“Not funny, Annie. If all you’re interested in is looks, there are tons of good-looking guys out there who won’t treat you like you’re insignificant. So what is it?”
I paused to formulate an answer I wasn’t sure I had. There wasn’t a way to express the feeling that had taken me over the first time I’d seen him or the connection during dinner. I’d shared things with him on the phone I hadn’t told people I’d known for years. My trust in him was unexplainable as was why I compromised and came home other than I was weak when it came to men in my life. There was no more explanation for either of those things than why it never dawned on me to tell an adult and get Will out of his circumstances.
“I don’t know. I mean I know what it feels like, but I can’t express it in rational thought. There’s just something about him.”
“Yeah, there was something about Will and his fucked-up situation too, and it left you covered in bruises, hiding some of the worst things I’ve ever heard, and essentially estranged from your parents.”
“That was entirely different.” She wasn’t comparing apples to apples—hell, she wasn’t even in the same orchard.
“The only difference is that was then, and this is now. I don’t want you hurt again. Annie, I never thought you’d recover after the funeral. Of all people, I know how much you deserve love…healthy love.” Her tone softened when she heard me sniffle.
Every time his death came up, I cried. My suffering had all been in vain. At the end of the day, I hadn’t saved him.
“Annie, I know you believe there’s something special about this guy, or you wouldn’t have let him in. I’m well aware you have to feel something significant for him to even get the door to your heart cracked. But we both know you’re fragile…and still grieving. Not just Will, but your youth, your parents, everything you lost. You’re coping, but struggling. That’s not a secret between us—the rest of the world, yes…but not me. This guy is getting a very vulnerable version of who you are. Be careful. Okay? You don’t have to be perfect, and you don’t have to let some douchebag manipulate you.”
The tears flowed as she talked. Nothing she told me was new. She had been the only person I confided in. In high school, she’d been the only friend who’d stayed around after the court hearings—after the truth about Will’s childhood came out. Jenny was my best friend and had proved it time and again. Someday, I would move past this and forgive myself for not being stronger. I’d stop accepting blame for his death and allow myself to be content again.
“I only want to be happy, Jenny. I don’t deserve it, but I want it.”
“Why the hell don’t you deserve it?” We’d had this discussion more times than I could count, and the end result was always the same.
I shrugged as though she could see me through the phone and wiped my face with the back of my hand. Her audible exhale told me of her frustration, but it was because she loved me and wanted me to love myself. That was something I worked on every week in therapy, and sadly, had gotten better at doing so but was still this bad off. I loved my professional persona, but that confidence didn’t translate into my personal life.
“Annie, Will’s situation, his death, none of that was your fault. You were a kid. Hell, you’re still a kid for all practical purposes. I wish you would let it go and allow yourself to breathe clean air that’s not tainted by the Murphrees. I want you to look out the window and see the sun and believe it’s shining solely for you. You can’t imagine what I’d give for you to see yourself the way the rest of the world sees you. You’d be in awe like I am.”
We sat on the phone in silence for several minutes. She didn’t need me to speak. We were comfortable with each other’s company without filling the void. More times than I could count, she’d held me while I cried, never uttering a single sound, just to remind me I wasn’t alone…and she’d keep doing it until I believe it.
When I neared Greenville and had to check my phone for directions, I let her go and told her how much I love her. She threatened Gray and what was good for him to make me giggle, and we disconnected.
I followed Gray’s directions to Topher’s house, suddenly thinking how odd it was he hadn’t said “come to my house,” but rather Topher’s. My mind wandered down rabbit trails it needed to avoid. I over analyzed every minute detail of everything I’d ever witnessed and every word he’d said—past, present…it didn’t matter. My brain never shut down, and I drove myself crazy obsessing over irrelevant information.
Gray’s truck was right where he said it would be, and I pulled in beside him. He sat on the front porch steps, waiting, and came barreling toward me as soon as I put the car in neutral. I watched him, thinking he would come to my side of the car, possibly even open the door for me. Instead, he walked to the passenger side and slid inside. He looked like shit and didn’t smell much better. It didn’t appear he had slept in days, but I couldn’t tell if the emotion on his face was sadness or fear. His normally bright blue eyes were almost muddy and dull, as though the life had been taken from them, with deep bags lining the bottom lids. I’d swear he’d been crying.
The sun was unusually bright—or possibly me noticing was strange—but the surrounding air was too quiet, and the light streamed through the windows in an unnatural way, spreading rays in odd directions. The hum of the air conditioner in the car did nothing to eliminate the vast silence—if anything, it drew attention to the fact Gray sat next to me broken. My heart cinched, wondering what had produced his sullen demeanor.
I shifted in the seat and turned to him. “Gray?” There was no response, and I watched as he stared out the window into the horizon but at nothing in particular. I reached out, putting my hand on his forearm, and tried to bring him into the present.
He looked me straight in the eyes and pierced my soul.
“What’s wrong, Gray?” The urge to wrap my arms around him and coddle him was strong; whatever it was couldn’t be that bad, but I didn’t understand why he’d called me here or what was going on. It had been over a week since I’d talked to him, and in retrospect, I didn’t know much about him.
“Annie, I need to tell you something.”
The hesitation and evasiveness drove me insane.
“I haven’t called you in a week, trying to figure out the best way to go about this, but there’s no easy way.” His tone reeked of hopelessness. “I should’ve told you before we ever spent any time together, or in one of our countless phone calls, or thousands of text messages, but once I’d gotten a taste of you, I wanted to spend every free moment I had in your presence. Then, I didn’t have the balls to tell you because there was no doubt you were going to walk away.” His words were genuine, as was his apprehension, and the sorrow in his eyes made my stomach turn. “I haven’t slept in days, drank way too much, but couldn’t come up with any other solution. I owe you the truth,” he stated as he looked down, unable to make eye contact any longer.
“Gray, whatever it is can’t be that bad. I mean, what happened? Did you get fired?”
He shook his head but offered no information, so I figured I’d keep guessing.
“What, do you have kids?”
Again, he shook his head but didn’t give me a verbal response.
“Have some crazy STD?”
No again.
“Geez, Gray, you’ve got to help me out here. I mean the only other thing you could possibly tell me is you’re married.” I laughed as the preposterous words came from my mouth.
His eyes met mine, and I waited for his head to shake, for him to deny it, but he just held my stare in devastation. The laughter died on my lips, and with it went my smile. I was consciously aware of the way my face fell, along with my expression. My mouth remained ajar, and instantly, nausea hit me.
“You’re kidding, right? You can’t be serious?” My mind spun out of control.
“I’m sorry, Annie. We’re separated, but yes, I’m married,” he finally admitted in a whisper. The truth of his admission was a hard fact to swallow.
I was twenty-one years old. I didn’t know married couples, much less anyone separated for the love of God. I sat in silence, staring out at the same horizon that entranced Gray, unwilling to make eye contact with him and unable to process the information. I had kissed another woman’s husband. I’d held the hand of a man who wore another woman’s ring. I hadn’t known he was taken, but I felt dirty.
“How long?” I asked.
The question confused him. “How long what?”
My tone was monotonous, emotionless. “How long have you been separated?”
“A little over six months. I’ve been crashing at Topher’s trying to figure out what to do from here and get back on my feet.”
I wanted to believe his answers, trust he had come clean and everything he offered was the brutal truth, but I wondered whether to put any faith in anything that came from his mouth. I’d been here before, not with a married man, but with someone whose words and actions didn’t match. I’d fought for years to force those two things to align, and in the end, it killed him and me.
“What’s her name?” The questions were dumb, irrelevant, but for some reason, I needed to make this woman real in my mind, to fully comprehend what he was saying to me.
“Abby.” His voice held zero emotion. “We’ve been married two years, but it was a mistake from the beginning.”
“Then why did you go through with it?” His elementary response irritated me. He’d been an adult when they walked down the aisle. If it wasn’t right, he shouldn’t have done it.
“I don’t know. We’d been together since high school. When she graduated from college, it was just expected that we would take the next step. I thought at the time I was making a mistake but convinced myself it was the cold feet all men got before popping the question and saying ‘I do.’ But the doubt never went away, not even after we said our vows. I tried to make it work, but when she wanted to buy a house and talked about babies, I knew if I was going to leave, it had to be before we put down roots.”
A long silence lingered in the car while he allowed me to process what he’d dumped in my lap. He looked at me as though he expected a response, but I didn’t have one. Part of me wanted to cry, and part of me wanted to pop him in the mouth. I knew what his wife felt like—she’d done everything right, taken the steps she was supposed to, but in the end, he was still unhappy, and she’d lost…failed. I hadn’t been able to make Will happy either, regardless of the steps I took or what I had done. It wasn’t enough. Nothing in his voice indicated he still harbored any emotional connection to this woman, but regardless of his personal commitment to her, in the eyes of the state, he remained legally bound to her until a judge said differently.
“Why are you telling me this now?” I kept my stare trained on the front porch steps, unable to make eye contact with him.
“She called Topher while we were at Matt’s game. He thought I had told you and assumed Abby wouldn’t care where I was. It all blew up. The voicemail I listened to when we got back in the truck was him—angry. He was pissed I’d put you and your career in jeopardy and pissed I’d hurt Abby even more. Everyone at the DC knows I’m married, Annie. He didn’t want someone to mention it and had it occurred to me, I wouldn’t have let it happen. He and Abby are friends, and he didn’t want either of you embarrassed by my stupidity. Rightly so.”
The sigh that escaped his mouth carried more emotion than any of his words. He’d been on autopilot getting through what he’d had to say, but that exhale carried the weight of his burdens and left him somber.
“I thought maybe if I told you myself, there might still be a chance to salvage this. Topher’s been after me every day in the DC since then, cornering me, pushing me. I knew what I had to do. I needed to tell you, but until the truth came out, I got to pretend you might still be mine. I let myself believe you could forgive the indiscretion.” His voice trailed off, and silence filled the air. It was thick and uncomfortable and choking the breath out of me.
“I need to go, Gray.” Panic and an uncanny need to escape suddenly filled me.
He’d expected it. He was upset but had resigned himself to accept my response. His mental anguish wasn’t my priority right now, I refused to give it any headspace. I was hurt—seething mad. My mind couldn’t process when or how I expected him to have conveyed this information, but somehow, he should’ve worked it into the conversation.
“Annie, I know you’re upset. I don’t blame you, but I didn’t want you to find out from anyone else. I really do care about you—more than I realized until I spent ten days agonizing over what you’d do.”
This wasn’t all about his deception, and I guess it should’ve been, but the suffocation, the weight sitting on my chest, threatened to send me spiraling. I really do care about you; the words echoed in my mind on repeat for years. Will had chanted them like a mantra each time he lashed out. My lungs refused to function, unable to take air in or out, not with him, in this car. I needed out. Out of here, away from him.
“I want the chance to get to know you, but if you don’t want to see me, I get it. I won’t contact you, and I won’t make any commotion for you at the DC.” Gray reached for the door handle and pushed it open.
I only vaguely heard his last couple of sentences, my focus never leaving the stairs. I watched them so intently I could’ve probably counted the number of splinters in the wood. I couldn’t look at him, or I’d lose it. I was on the verge of a meltdown like I hadn’t experienced since the first few weeks after losing Will. I wouldn’t cry in front of him. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of witnessing that weakness. He leaned over, kissed me on the cheek, and then said, “I hope you’ll call me.” With that, he got out of the car and closed the door.
I put my car in reverse—completely numb.
I spent the next few days mulling over the information he’d dumped on me. I’d gone to an appointment with my psychiatrist and cried more. He’d been sympathetic but believed my apprehension had more to do with my unresolved issues surrounding Will than the knowledge of Gray’s separation. But in both cases, I had accepted blame for other people’s actions outside of my control. The internalization was the most damaging. Unwilling to let anyone see a crack in my façade, I bottled up my emotions and squeezed and squeezed until the package of hurt became small enough, compacted enough, to push into the recesses of my mind. I’d done the same thing with large aspects of my relationship with Will, and it had since bitten me in the ass.
I harbored this link to this guy but knew virtually nothing about him, which he had proven in the car. The news was like a slap in the face, but I thought about the time I’d spent with him and how much I’d loved his company. His quirky playfulness, that smile, the way his eyes warmed me to the core, and ahh…the way he had to bend down to reach my lips to kiss me because he was so much taller than me. Every bit of it was appealing and engaging. He was endearing, sexy, and dangerous all at the same time. But more than that, he’d captured that same tiny piece of me Will had and held it firmly in his grasp.
I couldn’t have escaped if I’d tried. It wasn’t in me.
Here lay my chance to right the wrongs I’d made with Will.
I hadn’t seen Gray so far this week, but tomorrow was Friday. I needed to say something to
him, even if I told him I shouldn’t see him anymore. I had to acknowledge the situation and quit avoiding it. I had looked at this from every angle and point of view possible. I was disappointed he hadn’t been upfront with me, but I couldn’t blame him. I wouldn’t have spent any time with him had I known. Lynn not telling me ticked me off, and I was sure she was aware Gray had a wife—although, I’d yet to confront her and probably never would. It took a lot for him to come clean—that much was evident in the agonizing fear in his eyes. Maybe he had made a mistake when he was younger—hell, I’d made tons of them, and they resulted in death, not divorce. I couldn’t convince myself he should be punished for that the rest of his life, even though I justified punishing myself daily, ironically. Unfortunately, I hadn’t persuaded myself I should be with someone who didn’t make their marriage work, either. I didn’t know if that meant he’d never be able to make one work or just not that one. But it boiled down to not knowing if any of this pertained to me. He hadn’t left her to be with me. It gave me a little peace knowing they separated several months before I’d ever stepped foot in the distribution center. The mental war, the back and forth, had gone on for days, and while I wanted the chance to atone for my sins, right my wrongs, I was no closer to a decision in letting him do the same.
It dawned on me…there might not have been a decision for me to make. Gray hadn’t asked me to continue seeing him. He’d said he wanted to get to know me, which indicated spending more time together, but he hadn’t put up much of a fight to get me to accept it. There hadn’t been any calls or texts, just silence on his end. He said he would leave me alone and allow me to process the information, but a small part of me wanted him to up his game, to pursue me. I didn’t want to be the rebound girl, nobody does. Maybe his silence was the answer to my question. I needed to walk away before this got out of hand and my heart ended up in a bigger mess than it had been in for the last two years.
I hated dating.
Bound (Bound Duet Book 1) Page 6