“Ask me that question a year from now, please,” she said with a pointed look at the bottle of Riesling sitting innocently on our table at Plume inside The Jefferson, my preferred hotel whenever I was in the city. I took the hint and refilled her glass before she had to ask me.
“There is no way I’m waiting a damn year. A month works better for me.” I knew my teasing wouldn’t bother her, because she was used to me. I’d always talked to her this way. Flirting and dirty talk were my specialty.
“You can’t tell me you’ve ever taken any of that marriage talk about us seriously, Gray.”
“Of course, I take it seriously. We have far too much in common for us not to get married and have some Pinkarver-Lash babies the whole world will fall into a full-blown swoon over. You know I’m right, Pink.” The image of the two of us making one of those babies had me needing a discreet adjustment of my cock below the table. I could just picture her all spread out in the bed with nothing but skin between us. I could worship that body of hers—and I would—if she’d ever let me.
The look she gave me over her glass was a mixture of sadness and caution, her green and gold eyes flickering down after a moment to escape my scrutiny. I didn’t need any explanation of the reasons behind her feelings. The sadness was understandable, of course it was. Her fiancé—whom she’d loved even if the cocksucker hadn’t deserved it—had left her with little explanation, and he had done it very cruelly.
I knew where Reese’s cautionary feelings came from as well. Those were a result of my bad. The one time she let me know she wanted to be with me, I pushed her away. If only I could turn back the clock and change my answer.
“Do you remember when you gave me my nickname Pink?” she asked wistfully.
“I do.” I picked up her free hand and entwined our fingers. “You were at Mount Laurel for a Christmas party wearing a pink dress with white fur on the edges. I couldn’t resist the play on words because, well…immature college student mind at work and all.” I pointed a thumb at my chest. “I said, ‘You really are the cutest little pink elf in all of elfdom, so I’ma hafta call you Pink from now on.’ You were not bothered by my teasing even a tiny bit because you turned the tables on me and said, ‘I am Pink and you are Gray. The colors were already in our names, you big dummy.’”
She cracked a smile that lasted for too short a time before it went away. “I still have that dress somewhere, because I can’t bear to get rid of it.”
“Why do you keep it?” I asked, interested in her answer.
“Because it reminds me of a time when—when I-I didn’t know what hurt felt l-l-like…” she trailed off on a sad sob.
“I would take that hurt away from you if I could. He did you wrong and you have every right to feel sad, Reese. I just wish I’d given you a different answer before you ever met him, so you never would’ve had to go through any of this at all.”
“But where would that leave me now, Gray?” She took her hand away from mine and brushed the tear off her cheek with her finger.
“You’d be with me, and you wouldn’t be hurting or sad right now. I’d make sure of it. All you have to do is say yes to my question.”
Reese lifted her eyes up to mine again, but this time her expression looked a lot less vulnerable. The Steel Magnolia thing? She had that look in her eyes. “No, I would need more than that.”
“What more do you need? Tell me and I’ll do my best to give it to you.”
“I don’t think you can, based on what you said two years ago.” She picked up her wine again and drank probably half of the glass before putting it down with a small shake of her head. “So what has changed so much for you since then? Will you tell me where this marriage idea is really coming from?”
This was where my plan started to veer off the rails really fuckin’ quick. I wanted to be able to tell her I was in love with her, but every time I got to the verge of saying it, I dialed back. I didn’t want to be callus and say I loved her because there was a billion-dollar fortune at stake. I don’t think Reese wanted to hear that was my reason, any more than I wanted to admit it. “Our timing has not been good, I know—”
She cut my lame-ass excuse off like a sharp knife slicing through a tomato. “Tim said he loved me long before he asked me to marry him. You did just the opposite of that, Grayson.” Whenever Reese brought out my full name she had my full attention. It meant whatever she had to say was important and I should listen. It was weird we had such an understanding at this deep of a level, but we did. Pink and Gray did indeed know each other very well, and there was a whole lot of respect embedded in that knowledge.
“How so?” I asked.
“Well, two years ago you told me you couldn’t love anyone, because the emotion just wasn’t in your heart, and now you’ve just asked me to marry you—again.”
“But that was before—”
She held up her palm to shut me down. “Tim couldn’t follow through on the marriage, and you cannot deliver on the love. I know you care about me, Gray, I do know, but I need more than just your affection and the approval of our families. Neither of my proposals of marriage, from Tim or from you, are what I would
