He drove aimlessly until he happened upon a detour that forced him to turn off his course, cutting down his chance to find a hotel. Damn. The need to lie down and close his eyes was overwhelming. He continued driving down side streets until he stumbled upon a new highway.
Hell, maybe it was karma biting him in the ass. If he believed in such a thing, the scenario he found himself in might make sense. He was the reason she lost her job, and she was the reason he’d lost his. He’d blamed Sofia for trying to come between him and Rachel, and he’d lost Rachel even before he’d had her. Tit for tat.
Another detour sign was up ahead, so he turned off this highway and onto another. Where the hell was he? The neighborhoods were dwindling.
Call him naïve, but he couldn’t see Sofia ever intentionally hurting him. If she was the same woman from the dreams, she was nothing but loving and giving. She’d allowed him to be the person he once was in those dreams. He missed being that man. He missed having friends.
He missed her.
How could he yearn for a woman he didn’t even know? A knot of regret caught in his throat as he realized he might never find the answer.
Gray ran into yet another detour and he eased off the gas. What was going on with these roadblocks? Damn it if he cared. He turned the only direction the concrete barriers allowed, off onto a country road.
He chuckled as he noticed he traveled down the same path he’d taken on his bike ride the other morning. What the hell was he doing?
Driving to her house?
Lord knew it wasn’t a conscious decision. Those detours had confused him. Not to mention, his mind was all in a jumble. He was a total mess.
For whatever reason, he needed to see her. Talk to her. Touch her.
Kiss her.
No, he couldn’t do this. He’d hurt her enough, and she’d made it clear she never wanted to see him again. Plus, there was the whole issue of her thinking she could see the future. The last thing he needed was to get mixed up with a nutjob who lived out in the middle of Amish country.
A cute sexy nutjob with lips that begged to be nibbled.
Stop.
Going to see her was an all-around bad idea.
He pulled to the side of the road and prepared to make a U-turn. As he turned the wheel and made sure no other car was on the desolate road, the lights on the dashboard blinked and then shut down completely.
“You gotta be kidding me.” He turned the key in the ignition, attempting to restart the engine, but it was just as dead as his cell phone had been. Just as lifeless as his neighbor’s phone. Just as useless as his front door lock.
Aggravated, Gray let his head fall to the steering wheel. The freezing leather felt good against his throbbing head. Getting stuck out here in Amish country was the cherry on top of the shit cake.
He didn’t have a cell phone to call for help. In fact, he had nothing. No one.
Go to her.
The words breezed through heavily scented air, and Gray breathed it in.
Go to her.
Chapter Seven
The liquor and wine bottles were all lined up on the yellowed Formica kitchen table. Rows of them. Sofia had dusted and organized each one of them from largest to smallest. They were all ready to go back inside the liquor cabinet she’d already wiped down. She sipped the rest of her first glass of red wine and stared at the collection.
“Nana sure does have a lot of liquor.”
She wondered for a moment if reading minds was somehow bothersome to her grandmother. Maybe getting drunk helped. Although she’d never seen Nana inebriated…that she knew of anyway.
The wine was starting to kick in. Sofia pressed her numb lips together and hummed. Anesthesia via Pinot Noir. She wasn’t much of a drinker, that was for sure. One glass would probably do the trick to take the edge off. Perhaps.
“Perhaps not.” She laughed and poured a little more into her glass.
A knock on the door startled her, and she set the bottle down with a clank.
Who the heck could that be?
The humongous old grandfather clock in the corner said the time was just past ten o’clock. Sofia picked up one of the eleven oil lamps she’d lit as soon as the sun started to set and carried it to the door.
No peephole, of course and only one deadbolt. Did her grandmother think bad guys couldn’t make their way out to the country? Sheesh.
“Who’s there?” She pressed her forehead to the door and listened closely.
“Sofia? It’s Gray.” He cleared his throat. “Grayson Phillips.”
Sofia jolted back a step as her lungs deflated.
Bad guys certainly could make their way out here.
But why? And really? Only one way to find out. She opened the door a crack to make sure the man on the other side was indeed Gray. The porch was dark, unlit, but the moonlight struck his strong profile. Shadows hit in all the right spots to make his perfectly angular face even more masculine and handsome. Yeah, it was him, all right. In all of his deceptive gorgeousness. The question was what was he doing at her Nana’s house at this hour? At all?
“I know this might seem odd,” he said. “But can I come in for a moment?”
“No.” She slammed the door and held her breath, her heart thumping against her ribs. She’d made up her mind never to see him again—hence, stopping the dreams and a future with the jerk from happening—and this little invasion was so not helping.
“I know you’re angry with me,” he said through the door. “I’m sorry for the way I treated you.”
A little too late, pal.
“Can I please come in? I promise I’ll be nice.”
Sofia glanced down at what she was wearing—pink stretchy shorts and a matching tank top, her usual pajamas. No way was he coming in.
“I know I don’t deserve any of your time.” He sighed. “I really need to talk to someone, and you’re the only someone I want to talk to. The only one I can talk to.”
Huh. He sounded miserable. Not mean miserable, like before. More like tormented miserable. Desperate.
Curiosity made her open the door again. Only a tad, though, so the light from the lamp would show if his facial expression matched the sound of agony in his voice.
It did. His dark brown hair was a mess, tousled as if he’d run his hands through it too many times. A streak of mud or grease stained his forehead. His blue dress shirt was unbuttoned and rolled up to his elbows. The white t-shirt underneath was stained with a smeared handprint.
“Why are you such a mess?”
“My car broke down up the road.” He lifted his grease-covered hands. “I tried to fix it, but I don’t have a clue what’s wrong. I usually know my way around an engine but… Well, you get the picture.”
“You were on the way here? To see me?”
“No.” He answered without delay and took a step forward, standing only a few inches from the door. “Not at first.”
Sofia pulled the lamp back in and heaved the door shut.
He stopped it with his foot. “Wait. My twin brother died.”
~ * ~
Gray didn’t know why he’d blurted that out, but it got her attention.
“Really? When? Are you okay?” She let the door fall open, revealing her curvy body covered only by a tiny pair of shorts and a tank top that didn’t quite cover her navel.
God help him.
She made an attempt to pull her top down. The stretchy material snapped back up.
“Um.” Gray gathered his senses. Just one kiss. She had to let him in if he kept hustling his sob story. She was sweet like that. Wasn’t she? “It happened six months ago. I just found out my fiancée, no, ex-fiancée, slept with him a week before he died.”
“You’re kidding.” She wrinkled her nose.
Adorable.
“No. She gave her virginity to him while I was away on business.” He was pushing it, but the sob story was working.
“Oh, my gosh. You just found out today?”
Gra
y nodded. “I told her I never wanted to see her again. Then I drove home and found my door lock was jammed. I couldn’t get in.”
“Having a bad day?”
“You could say that.” Gray leaned forward against the doorway and tried to look grief-stricken.
Yep, he’d officially lost all self-respect.
But it was working.
She pushed a lock of hair behind her ear and seemed to think for a moment. “Well, I guess you can come in for a drink. But then you have to leave.”
“That’s perfect.” Yes. “Thank you.”
She turned with the lamp in her hands, showing him her backside. Across one luscious butt cheek read the word “Sweet.” The other read “Dreams.” The fitting phrase caught his eye and made him chuckle.
She spun around. “Keep laughing and you can show yourself back out the door. My Nana bought these pajamas for me.” She shrugged and added in a less confident voice, “She likes to shop the clearance racks.”
“No. I like them. Really.” He closed the door behind him without breaking eye contact. “Very appropriate.”
“Sometimes,” she mumbled, and led him to the kitchen.
Gray peeled his stare away from her for a moment to notice the many bottles that covered the table.
“I was cleaning out Nana’s liquor cabinet. It was kind of dusty.” She gestured to the cast iron double bowl kitchen sink. “Want to clean up?”
“Sure.” He washed up and then pulled out a chair at the table and sat. Not until then did he realize the lights were out. Lord, where was his head? The only thing that lit the house were oil lamps bunched together on the wooden butcher block set in the center of the kitchen along with one or two hanging from the walls.
How odd.
“Pick your poison,” she said, with her hip pressed against the table.
“What?”
“What would you like to drink?”
Without thinking, Gray handed her the bottle closest to him. “Did the electricity go out?” He wouldn’t be surprised if he’d brought his bad luck with him. Or maybe this was part of Sofia’s eccentricity.
“No.” She smiled as she poured what appeared to be whiskey into a glass. In the low light, her lips looked soft, and her eyes glistened. “My grandmother, I call her Nana, believes that electricity and phone lines give her migraines. That’s why she lives out here amongst the Amish.”
“Interesting. So this is your grandmother’s house? Is she home?”
“No, I’m house and cat-sitting for her.” She set the glass in front of him and lifted her body up to sit on the butcher block next to the lamps. “Isn’t it strange that you came here tonight? I mean, I don’t live here. I live in Indianapolis with my mother. If you’d shown up here any other time, Nana would’ve opened the door.” She laughed softly and continued. “Not that she would’ve minded having a hunk show up at her house.”
“So you think I’m a hunk?”
Another laugh.
Gray liked the sound of it, a soft, sultry sound. Her laugh reminded him of a certain dream he’d had. Nothing was more exciting than playful sex. For the first time, he allowed himself to wonder if real sex with Sofia would be as thrilling as in his dreams. Now that Rachel was out of the picture, nothing and no one kept him from fantasizing, or acting out his fantasies.
He shot down the whiskey, keeping a keen eye on the fantasy in question. He was free to do whatever the hell he wanted and it felt great. He didn’t have a job or a definite future with a woman. His life plan was a complete joke. Wasn’t it amazing that the world wasn’t falling down around him?
“What are you smiling about?” she asked.
“Sorry. I didn’t realize I was.”
“You don’t have to apologize. I was just curious. It’s the first time I’ve seen you smile, is all. I mean, aside from the dreams.” She lifted her wine glass and sipped.
“I lost my job this morning,” he blurted out.
Again. What was it about this moment here in time with her that made him want to reveal his life story? The good, the bad, and the ugly.
She whistled. “You sure had a heck of a day.” Her body lengthened as she let her feet fall to the floor. She crossed the small distance separating them and poured him another round.
Gray let his gaze roam over her as she stood before him. Her rounded breasts stretched the cotton fabric of the pink top she wore. Her nipples were slightly erect. No apparent bra.
“The day’s getting much better.”
~ * ~
Sofia told herself it didn’t matter that his fiancée was out of the picture. It didn’t matter that he’d apologized and was being somewhat decent. It most definitely did not matter that he was sitting there, staring at her as if she were his last hope. Looking helpless with his tousled hair and the grease mark on his forehead he’d forgotten to wipe clean.
She ignored the desire to sit on his lap and make his bad day a whole lot better. She wasn’t responsible for his happiness and she wasn’t buying his sudden interest in her.
Determined to stay focused, she finished pouring the whiskey into his glass and retreated back to the butcher block, a safe distance away.
“Thanks for the refill.”
“You’re welcome.” Darn. She’d forgotten she’d only invited him in for one drink. How was she going to send a drunken man out into the dark night without a way home? Why should she care?
He didn’t care about her. He’d made it clear that morning in his office and at the restaurant when he’d gotten her fired.
He downed the drink and shoved his hand through his hair. “I really appreciate you letting me come in, Sofia. It says a lot about your character. You’re a kind person, aren’t you?”
Sofia shrugged. “Not everyone is a coldhearted jerk.” As soon as the words left her mouth, she regretted them. The man had already been through enough today.
“Ouch.” He brought his hand up to his heart, covering the smeared handprint.
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be. I was a jerk to you. And I’m sorry. If I could take it all back, I would.”
She let his words soak in. They felt good to hear, she had to admit. But it didn’t change a thing.
With empty glass in hand, he stood to his full six-foot-plus height and stared down at her. Sofia scooted back farther on the block, unsure of his next move. If he wasn’t a man she’d gotten to know in her dreams, she might have been frightened of the lazy, sexual look in his eyes.
Instead, it ignited her. A surge of want dipped low inside, reminding her of what it felt like to make love with this man in her visions. To see him naked, running her fingers across his strong, lean muscles, sweating as he lay on top of her, driving his thick, hard erection inside of her until she—
Stop it, Sofe. She gulped and attempted to gain control. Stop. It. The only reason he was here was because he’d lost everything else. He hadn’t intended to come here. To him, Sofia Good was the last resort. A substitute. A replacement to buffer his hurt pride, his busted ego. The dreaded rebound girl.
Too bad. Because she refused to be anything but someone’s top choice.
To break his stare, she thrust the bottle of whiskey into his gut. “Here.”
He didn’t falter as he slowly took the bottle from her grasp, then finally poured himself another round. “Thanks.” His dimple showed. “You know, this stuff isn’t too bad.”
“Glad you approve.” She tried to avert her gaze but he was too close. And she just couldn’t bring herself to tell him to move away. Not yet. Not when he smelled like the man from her dreams.
She sniffed again, rubbing her nose to cover her actions. The faint hint of musk aftershave and the night air. Despite the grease on his shirt, he smelled clean and…manly. Strong and welcoming.
Damn. Too much like the dreams. Yet the man before her had yet to prove to be anything like her Gray.
He set the bottle on the table, then turned toward her again, not giving her enough space to br
eathe steadily. The look in his heavy-lidded eyes made her wonder if he might lean in and kiss her…or maybe do more than that. But instead of ravaging her, he simply swiveled and stood beside her, leaning against the butcher block.
He sighed softly and looked down at his glass, swirling the liquid around, thinking about something. Up close, Sofia was even more convinced the man was way too attractive for his own good. For her own good, actually. She wrapped her arms around her belly to keep from reaching out and touching him.
Although she knew exactly how she wanted to run her fingers over his jaw to his chin, up to his powerful lips. Into his hair, ruffling it a bit more to make him look less like an uptight businessman and more like her sexy, kind, happy-go-lucky fantasy man.
The two couldn’t be more opposite…which confused her on a number of levels.
“So,” he said, breaking the silence and startling her. He looked at her from the corner of his eye. “You said you dream of the future? What’s that about?”
Right. That. “Oh, well, yes. Sort of.” She wasn’t exactly prepared for that question. Having hidden that fact from most of the people who came into her life in the past for obvious reasons, she was used to avoiding the subject.
“Sort of?” He turned toward her with a look of interest. The hand that held his glass brushed against her thigh.
Focus, Sofe. Stay strong. “Not sort of. I do dream of the future, but I can change it. Prevent certain things from happening.”
“Things like me?”
“Like murders, accidents, and horrible attacks on innocent people. And yes, I can prevent you from happening.” She dared meet his gaze. His coffee-brown eyes were soft. The dimple on his cheek deepened as he grinned with apparent amusement.
“Have I been so awful that you’ve grouped me with your nightmares?”
“They’re not nightmares. They’re real, and they’re going to happen if I don’t stop them.”
His grin faded to a frown as he brought the glass up to his lips and drank. The remoteness in his eyes returned.
“It’s all right if you don’t believe me. It doesn’t matter what you think of me, now or ever, since I’m going to do you a huge favor and stop those dreams for you. All we need to do is say good-bye right here, right now.”
Bewitching You Page 8