Forsaking Gray (The Colloway Brothers Book 1)

by Kreig, K. L.

  “You’re a fucking vision,” I rasp, withdrawing almost all the way before pressing into her again, slowly this time. I watch my cock, slick with her juices, sink into heaven and close my eyes in pure ecstasy. Nothing in my life will ever feel as good as this. I slowly push into her again and again until she begs for more.

  “Harder. Harder, Gray.”

  I lean down and gently bite her shoulder, whispering, “No, angel. I’m going to make you come undone. Mindless with desire.”

  “I am,” she pants. “I already am.” She reaches around to grab my ass, trying to make me move faster. I move them back.

  “Don’t move,” I growl. Ecstasy calls us, but I deny it. Not yet.

  Holding her in place, I savor our joined flesh as I thrust slowly, intent on setting my own pace. But all too soon pure euphoria engulfs every cell in my body and I can’t hold back any longer. As her walls pulse, I stand, tighten my grip on her hips and drive harder and rougher, wringing every morsel and shred of rapture from Livvy’s lips before we both fly apart. My apartment fills with our cries of passion and professions of love.

  Minutes later, I’m still inside her heat, our breathing finally evening out. My legs feel like Jell-O and my body is spent, but I’ve never felt more content in my life. I’m going to marry this woman. And if I have my way, it will be soon.

  Chapter 37

  Strong, comforting arms hold me and I lay quietly, relishing every single body part that’s still sore and tingling. I slowly replay each sinful moment on the table, on the couch, in the shower, against the wall. The way I sucked him off in front of his full-length mirror was one of the most erotic things I have ever done. The ecstasy that pinched his face and every corded muscle while he held my hair to guide himself in and out of my mouth was a sight that will be forever branded into my memory.

  Gray gave me so many orgasms I lost count. I remember the exact whispered words when I told him I couldn’t take any more. “I’ve had years to learn your body like only I can. I know your every moan, your every tremble, every hitch of your breath, and what each means. I know when you’ve had enough and you aren’t even close, angel.” The words still send shivers down my spine.

  His soft snore indicates he’s still in a deep sleep and while I have to use the bathroom, I don’t dare move. I can’t. I’m soaking in the feeling of his body underneath mine, and the scent of sex that still permeates the air all around us. It’s only eight a.m. and I should still be tired, but I’m not. My body hums like low volt electricity runs just beneath the skin.

  I drink in his beautiful face while he’s so tranquil. He looks younger in sleep. His thick, inky lashes lay gently on the top of his cheeks. I always wondered why some men get blessed with lashes that women pay to duplicate. Of course, I could say that about every feature on Gray’s face. His full, pink lips are perfect and I love to run my tongue along the dip at the top. Sharp, angular cheekbones are high and sculpted. And his eyes. His eyes are simply enthralling. Whenever they latch onto mine, they trap me in their depths and I never want to leave. I clearly hear every word he silently speaks with them. It’s like we have our own secret, wordless language.

  The urge to spill my past was on the tip of my tongue all night, but it kept getting pushed back inside with each round of new pleasure he’d give me. I was greedy. I didn’t want it end. And I knew with my confession it would. By the time neither of us could take any more, shortly after three, I fell asleep in his arms within seconds. I woke up in exactly the same position.

  My mind is still in a sexual haze, remembering how many times and ways we made love. Gray was true to his whispered promises earlier. He always is. It was almost as if we were trying to soak in as much of each other as possible because it would be our last night together.

  How prophetic.

  Chapter 38

  “Angel, let me come take care of you,” I urge.

  “No. I look like death warmed over, and I don’t want you to get sick.” She sounds weak and tired.

  “I’m afraid it’s too late for that. We had our tongues in almost every body part possible last night, so if you’re sick, I’m already infected. Let me come over and rub your back.”

  Livvy had spent most of the day throwing up, convinced she had gotten the flu from Addy, who was sick with it last week. She insisted she go home to recuperate. I’d vehemently disagreed, but lost the battle. As her future husband, it’s my job to take care of her in sickness and health and I told her as much. Then she promptly ran into the bathroom and dry heaved because there was nothing left in her stomach.

  “I’ll be fine. I think maybe you wore me out last night and my defenses are weakened.”

  I smile. “Exactly how weakened are they?” I ask in a low voice. Weak enough to agree to marry me if I ask? Weak enough to tell me why you left?

  She chuckles lightly but takes a few moments to respond. When she does, I suck in a breath. “Pretty weak.”

  “Livvy…” It’s one word, but it says so much. Pleads for everything she’s been denying me. Answers.

  The silence is deafening. Will she tell me anything? Will she finally trust me with the truth? Do I really want to know?

  “I’m sorry I hurt you, Gray,” she says quietly.

  Yeah, I’m sorry too. “Will you ever tell me why?” Now that she’s opened this can of worms I can’t stop myself from asking. It’s been close to a month since I hired Robert Townley. The only time I’ve heard from him was four days ago, and it was short and sweet. “Have a lead I’m following.”

  “I…I want to. I just don’t know if I can.”

  I sigh and lean back against the headboard of my bed. “This secret, whatever it is, is going to eat away at us until there’s nothing left.” I don’t want to put a voice to it because it makes it too real, but I have no other choice. No matter how bad this is, she needs to tell me if we have any chance of making it.

  “I know,” she whispers.

  “Dammit, Livia. I want to marry you, have kids with you and grow old with you. I want to just simply accept that you’re back in my life, but the truth is, I don’t know when you’re going to pick up and walk back out of it again without a goddamn word, and I’m telling you right now, that will annihilate me.”

  “I won’t. I swear it. I’m not going anywhere, Gray. I love you.”

  The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them. “You loved me before.”

  She sucked in a sharp breath. “I never stopped loving you. I just…had to go away for a while.”

  “Why? Tell me why.”

  “Gray, please. Give me some time,” she pleads. And it just makes me angry, this lack of trust she has in me. In us. We’ve been back together for a month and not one word. It’s always the elephant in the room, except either the room is shrinking or that big, fat, grey animal is getting bigger because it’s getting to the point where it can no longer be ignored. My resentment is burning hot again and it’s clear that poisonous cloud has completely escaped its confines and I don’t know if I can shove it back in.

  “Time? You’ve had five years, Livvy. Five years to contact me and put this to rest, but you didn’t. And we wouldn’t even be together if I wasn’t the one to pursue you. Again.” And if I’m honest, that’s probably what hurts the most.

  “I—”

  “You know what, you should get some rest. We’ll talk about this another time.”

  “Gray—”

  “I love you, Livvy.” And I hang up before she has a chance to respond or I say something I’ll truly regret. Words are powerful weapons, once spoken you can’t take them back and it’s impossible to sidestep the venom they spew. I want my forever with Livvy and if I start spouting off words that come from a place of hurt, I know I’ll just make things worse.

  For the next few hours, I pour myself into work and I try to forget it all. The hurt. The pain. The betrayal. I try to forget the days that I drank myself into a stupor to numb the bone-deep agony. I try to convince myself it�
�s probably a good thing she went back home tonight, but I never was a very good liar. Even as angry and hurt as I am, I still want her by my side. And what kind of fool or sucker does that make me? I’m an addict and Livvy is my drug of choice, no matter how harmful she may be for me.

  Finally at midnight, I’m exhausted. I’ve fallen asleep sitting up twice already. I’m just turning off my reading lamp when I get a text and as I read it, I realize all the euphemisms and idioms created about skeletons in the closet are true. That door is better left closed. With a fucking industrial sized padlock so thick there’s no way to ever pry it open.

  Seconds, minutes, hours tick by as I stare at the three words that send my entire world spinning and crashing to the ground once again, destroying every shred of trust I had foolishly and carelessly rebuilt with Livvy.

  These would be the words to end us and now it’s crystal clear to me why she kept her silence. She betrayed me in the worst possible way.

  “She was married.”

  Chapter 39

  It’s Monday morning and I haven’t heard from Gray since we got into an argument and he hung up on me Saturday night. I tried calling him several times yesterday, but my calls went to voice mail and my texts went unanswered. I considered taking the train into the city, showing up unannounced at his apartment but decided against it. And frankly, I was being a chicken because I knew if I showed up at his place, I wouldn’t be able to avoid it any longer. But I also know I can’t wait any longer before telling him every despicable detail. My stomach is twisted into a million knots that I have no hope of unwinding at the thought of him knowing my deepest shame.

  My fairytale is at its end, only in this final chapter, I’m no longer the princess that the prince will woo, and we won’t ride off into the sunset and live happily ever after. No. I’m the witch, the sorceress, the bad guy. And I’ll single-handedly deliver the poison straight to the prince’s heart. The poison which will effectively kill his love for me. In this sad and imperfect ending, no one survives unscathed.

  Knowing what fate has in store for me, in between bouts of throwing up yesterday, I cried. I sobbed. I ached. Addy comforted me, not knowing what was wrong. She never once asked, never cajoled. She was just there for me. And when I asked her why, she simply said because she’s my friend and that’s what friends do.

  I’m still not feeling much better this morning, but managed to drag my ass into work. It’s now eight-thirty and I haven’t heard from Gray. He’s already missed two meetings and I’ve called him twice. I’m starting to get a very bad feeling that I may have waited too long or pushed him too far. No matter how upset he is with me, Gray not showing up to work is not like him. He’s dedicated and devoted to his company. I’m getting very worried, so I do the only thing I can.

  He answers on the second ring. “Asher, it’s Livia.”

  “Yes?” It sounds like I’m the last person he wants to talk to. Well, guess what? Right now, the feeling’s mutual because I know in about two seconds, I’ll feel his hatred for me like a switchblade to the gut.

  I take a deep breath. “I can’t reach Gray and he’s already missed two meetings this morning. I’m worried.”

  A string of low curses flows fluently under his breath. “What did you do?”

  It hurts, but I deserve that. “We got into an argument on Saturday night and I haven’t heard from him since.”

  “Fuck! Jesus, Livia. I knew things between you two would end this way,” he hissed.

  Me too. “Please, just make sure he’s okay and let me know what I should do with his calendar.”

  “I’ll call you back as soon as I know something.”

  Not knowing what else to do, I go ahead and cancel his meetings for the morning, but all the while I’m thinking the same thing I thought to myself weeks ago when he moved me into this position. This was a bad idea. We are too intertwined with each other’s lives and when that cord severs, which I knew was inevitable, it will be that much harder to deal with the shit pile we’ll both be left with. And not only will I have lost Gray for a second time, I’ll also be out of a job. But I let him do it without barely a protest. I needed to feel that connection with him again and, I too, wanted to spend every single second of every single day with him.

  To keep my mind busy, I go through Gray’s emails and find the invoices that need his signature. I print off two that came in over the weekend. I enter them into the system but am missing the tax ID number on a new vendor, so I call them.

  “Townley Consulting,” a young voice cheerfully answers. I wish I could answer the phones this morning with half as much enthusiasm. As it is, I can barely muster a mumbled hello.

  “Yes, I have an invoice for thirty thousand dollars sent to Mr. Gray Colloway over the weekend, and I need a couple pieces of information before I can process it.”

  “Certainly. What do you need?”

  I look over my form to make sure that I get everything I need because I don’t want to have to call her back again. The first time I did this, I had to call the vendor back three times. “Umm, tax ID and…type of services rendered. I need a description.”

  She puts me on hold for a couple of minutes and returns with the information. “Okay, the tax ID is…” she rattles off a series of numbers quickly. “And the type of service is a background check.”

  Background check? Oh my God. Pieces are clicking together so fast I can actually hear them. My hands shake and my lungs feel like I can’t get enough air. “Can you be more specific,” I ask, trying for nonchalant, but failing miserably.

  “I’m sorry, but it’s confidential. I can’t give you any more information than that.”

  “Yes, of course. Thanks,” I mutter before hanging up. Just as I disconnect, the phone rings again.

  Asher.

  “He’s fine. He’s working out of his New York condo for the week. He said he’d take his meetings by phone.”

  The final piece falls into place. Suddenly this bad feeling I’ve had in the pit of my stomach since yesterday solidifies into a solid, hard mass. Thick, heavy and suffocating. It’s threatening to choke the life out of me.

  Gray knows. That’s why he’s been avoiding me.

  “Did…” I had to clear my throat before I continued. “Did he say why?”

  “He just said he had some shit to sort through.”

  “Okay. Thanks, Asher,” I manage to strangle out. I hang up and sit there staring into space for the longest time, dumbfounded.

  The betrayal I feel at his actions is white hot. He told me I could trust him. He had me believing I could tell him anything and he would understand. I was finally beginning to think it was true. That it may actually be possible to break open this deep wound that was nearly healed, bare my stained soul to him and that he may possibly understand. Accept me. And still love me, regardless.

  But it was all lies. This entire time he had someone checking into my past. A past that was supposed to be buried so deep no one would be able to find it. That’s what Grant had said. Yet, somehow he had. And he didn’t even have the balls to confront me to hear my side of the story.

  It makes me angry, even if it is unfounded. Even though I know that I’m the one that dug this fucking crater that we’ve both fallen helplessly into, but it doesn’t stop the sharp sting of his duplicity.

  I wonder what he knows. I have to know what he knows. I have to get him to talk to me.

  Me: why did you run away?

  Several minutes go by and, once again, I don’t think he’s going to answer, but when he does, his caustic words shatter my fragile heart.

  Gray: that’s rich, coming from a woman who probably holds the world record in that sport

  Me: gray, what’s going on? please come home. i’m ready to talk

  Gray: it’s a little too late for that livia. i know

  My blood freezes and my heart sinks. So it’s true. He does know. He went behind my back, digging into my private life. And he paid a lot of fucking money to do it. Oh my Go
d, I can hardly breathe. My fingers tremble. The keypad is blurry through my watery eyes as I type my response. Even though I was dreading it, I was going to tell him on my terms, in my own way. Eventually.

  Me: u know what exactly?

  Gray: everything

  Nonononononononono.

  Me: meaning?

  Gray: u did what u swore u wouldn’t. u annihilated me

  My hands fly to my mouth and my cell drops to the carpeted floor. It lands face up, and even feet away, his words mock me. He knows the truth. He knows I left him for another man, even though I didn’t want to. Does he know why? Does he know I was raped, tortured, beaten? Does he know about the baby? I lean over the garbage can and dry heave. I couldn’t keep anything down before and now my stomach churns like a wild carnival ride. A ride that I want off of, but I can’t find the exit.

  ______________

  The next few days pass by in a blur. I barely function. I come to work, answer the phone, but I couldn’t tell you what I do from eight to five. I’m like a robot, set on autopilot. I don’t remember walking to and from the train station. I can’t sleep, but when I do manage a couple of hours, they aren’t filled with hauntings from my past anymore. They are filled with glimpses of a future that I will never have.

  The one that troubled me most and sent me into a near tailspin was a vivid dream of Gray and I having a baby. We had a boy and he was tiny and pink and perfect. We named him Jax. After I had awoke in hysterics, Addy had to sleep with me that night, holding me like a child. She begged me to call Dr. Howard and make an appointment, but I don’t think I can possibly transform my pain into words that will make any sense.