CHAPTER 6

“Do you want to tell me what happened to you at the party?” Emily asked quietly in the dark, her body spooned with Grady in his huge bed.

“I got shot,” he answered gravely, his baritone vibrating against her ear.

She knew that he was hedging. He knew exactly what she was talking about. “Before that. Your panic attack,” she said patiently.

“I don’t like parties,” he said hesitantly, stroking his hand along her hip absently.

“It’s more than that. But if you don’t want to share it with me, it’s okay,” she told him softly.

She might have ended up going to business school for her MBA, but she’d done her undergrad work in psychology. She recognized social anxiety when she saw it.

“It isn’t that I don’t want to share everything with you. I’m just not really sure how to explain it,” he admitted reluctantly, letting out a long, masculine sigh. “When I was young, I stuttered pretty badly.”

“Lots of kids do. And you obviously outgrew it.” But she knew it probably hadn’t been easy. “Kids can be brutal sometimes. They teased you?”

“Yeah. But it wasn’t so much the teasing at school. It was at home.”

“Your siblings?” she asked, confused.

“My father,” Grady said, his voice rough. “I was a Sinclair, and no Sinclair is supposed to have any defect. I could never get my words out, and my father thought I was stupid. He never let a day go by without reminding me that I wasn’t the son he wanted. I was supposed to be social, one of the Sinclair elite. I wasn’t. I was a computer geek. I didn’t really like business. And I had no desire to play the socialite games. None of it was real.”

Emily’s heart felt like it was in a vise, seeing visions of a young Grady feeling like he never measured up to his father’s rigorous standards. “But you’re a genius,” she argued. “Look at all you’ve accomplished.”

“Didn’t matter. I wasn’t like him. And he didn’t think I was smart. He thought I was defective. Even though I did eventually outgrow my stuttering, he never saw me as anything but an idiot.”

Not sure if she wanted to know, she asked hesitantly, “And the party thing?”

“We had the Sinclair annual Christmas party every year, an event that every Sinclair had to attend. My father was an alcoholic, and he got even more verbally abusive when he was drinking. Since he couldn’t claim me or accept me as his son, he did his best to humiliate me every year, showing all of his rich friends that he shunned me, making me the family joke. And almost every one of them went along with it, laughed it up with him about me being the Sinclair moron. I guess it’s okay to have one of those, but he couldn’t exactly claim me as part of his family. I was nothing to be proud of.” Taking a deep breath, he finished, “I was always . . . different.”

“I’m glad you’re different. It’s better than being a carbon copy of a mean drunk,” Emily said fiercely. “No wonder you learned to dread Christmas. Did you celebrate at all as a family?”

“Only the party,” Grady admitted. “We were Sinclairs,” he said, as though that explained everything. “We decorated because of the party.”

“Where are your parents now?” she asked, wondering if she could strangle his father for putting those kinds of fears and insecurities into an innocent boy.

“My father is dead. He passed away right after the Christmas party when I was eighteen. My mother remarried and moved to Europe. We almost never see her. I think we were a part of her life that she wanted to forget. I don’t think she was ever happy,” Grady mused.

Emily breathed a sigh of relief. She didn’t want to commit murder, and if she were in the same room as his alcoholic father, she might have been tempted. “Are you close to your siblings?”

“As close as we can be considering we’re never together,” he answered quietly.

She had a feeling they had all suffered from being brought up in a home with very little love and an alcoholic father with a short fuse. “How did you ever turn out so special?” she queried softly.

“You mean different?” he asked, confused.

“No . . . special. Extraordinary. Incredible.”

“You think I am? I’m odd,” Grady said nonchalantly.

“You are not odd. You donated a ridiculous amount of money to the Center when a much smaller amount would have saved it. I know you won’t admit it, but you care about the programs there. You’re the kind of man who sends Lord knows how many men out just to find one man who stole from a charity. You made the effort to get me a Christmas tree even though you don’t like Christmas. You’re incredible,” Emily answered emphatically. “And don’t you ever say you aren’t. You’re the most unique man I’ve ever known.”

“Is that good or bad?” he questioned, sounding slightly amused. “ ‘Unique’ sort of sounds the same as ‘different.’ ”

“It’s not. And I think you’re wonderful,” she answered decisively. “You are special, Grady. You just don’t see it. You’re brilliant, kind, giving—”

“Ornery, antisocial, irritating, and the Amesport Beast?” he added.

“None of us is perfect, and the only reason people said that is because they didn’t know you,” Emily answered with a delighted laugh. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to live with your good deeds now because you’re the local hero.”

“I only care about you. I want to be your hero,” he answered hopefully.

She turned carefully, trying not to put any pressure on his wound. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she stroked his hair, her heart flip-flopping as she rested her cheek against his rough jaw. Grady was so much more than her hero. He was becoming her everything, but she simply answered, “You are. Believe me . . . you definitely are. You probably saved my life.” She kissed him lightly on the forehead, wishing she could take away the pain of his childhood. She couldn’t, but she could try to teach him that his past didn’t have to define his future.

“You know the old Chinese proverb . . . If you save someone’s life, you’re responsible for it forever,” he answered contentedly.

“Don’t worry. I won’t hold you to that,” she commented lightly.

“I want you to hold me to it. Forever,” he said sleepily, wrapping his arm around her waist just a little bit tighter.

Emily wasn’t quite sure how to respond. Her heart skipped a beat, but she didn’t want to read too much into what he said. He was hurt, exhausted, and under the influence of the pain pill he had taken before they’d crawled into bed.

It’s better if I don’t say anything. Then I won’t get hurt. Again.

It was cowardly, and she knew it, but everything was so real and so incredibly intense with Grady. She wanted to be prepared, because the pain of losing the fragile relationship they were forming would probably kill her.

Exhausted, they fell into silence, and finally slept.

Grady discovered quite a few new things about Emily Ashworth over the next several days. He learned that she loved Christmas carols, and she sang along with them completely out of tune. But her enthusiasm made up for her being a little off-key, so he found it pretty adorable. Her Christmas cookies were out of this world, and she couldn’t make them fast enough to keep any around for long. She’d tried to hide some, but Grady had managed to ferret them out almost immediately, sneaking into the kitchen when she wasn’t looking and wolfing them down like he’d never had Christmas cookies before. He had . . . years ago . . . but they hadn’t been anywhere near as good as Emily’s. He’d also learned she cried over Christmas movies that were her old favorites. She professed to love them, but they made her cry. What she called “happy tears” weren’t really something he was familiar with. Why would someone cry when they were happy?

The laceration on his side was healing, but not quickly enough. Grady relived that first night in the shower with Emily over and over in his mind, his need to bury himself inside her and claim her nearly an obsession. He walked around with a constant erection, but Emily refused to let him do anything she considered physical, so he was in a continual state of frustrated lust.

Still, they were the happiest days he could remember. Doing the simplest of things with Emily was special. And the more time she spent in his house and in his life, the more he knew he was never letting her go. He couldn’t even think about not having her with him anymore. He thought of her as his own Christmas angel. And she had landed on his doorstep.

Mine!

She was his . . . she just hadn’t realized it yet. Hell, she even had him loving Christmas. It was now his favorite holiday, the memories of the past being obliterated by Emily and all the things she did just for the joy of doing them, never expecting anything in return.

Grady lifted his eyes from his computer for a moment to watch Emily, sitting on the floor of his office, sorting out boxes of paperwork. In a pair of worn jeans and a bright red sweater, she was absolutely mesmerizing. With Emily, it wasn’t one single feature or personality trait that drew him . . . It was the entire package. There wasn’t one single thing about her that didn’t have him completely fascinated. Okay . . . her stubbornness drove him crazy occasionally, but even the annoyed looks she gave him were pretty damn cute. He watched her face as various emotions changed her expressions: irritation, confusion, concentration, and finally elation when she figured something out.

He had to clench his fists on the desk to keep himself from getting out of his chair behind his desk and taking her right there on the floor. He’d had a small taste of her sweetness, but it wasn’t enough. And she’d refused to let him get any more than a kiss since that afternoon, her fear of him hurting himself making her back away every time. There was no sweeter sound than the arousing little noises and moans that escaped from her lips when she was climaxing. Watching her had been the most satisfying experience of his life, and he wanted to see her face when he was deep inside her heat, losing himself in her softness while he pounded her into orgasm.

Grady wasn’t sure how much longer he could wait. Watching her like this was torture, and work was impossible, although he was trying to get some stuff done on his current project. If she was close, he wanted to watch her. If she wasn’t, he wanted to seek her out. He was pretty much screwed either way.

“How can a billionaire possibly be so disorganized?” she said distractedly, sifting through another box of papers, her brows drawn together in disapproval. “And why do you create these awesome businesses just to sell them off?”

Grady smiled, knowing his filing system drove her crazy—basically because he didn’t have one. “I like creating them, but I don’t like managing them. Once I’m done putting everything together, I’m ready to start another project.”

She glanced up at him with a frown. “But every business you’ve started has gone on to be a huge Internet sensation.”

Grady shrugged. “I get paid well for them. I’m not social, and I don’t interact with people all that well.”

“What are you working on now?” she asked curiously, pulling another pile of papers out of a box and setting them on her lap. She was determined to organize him.

With his history and personality, it probably wouldn’t make sense to her at all, but he answered, “A new social media site.”

She was silent for a moment as she stared at him, probably trying to figure out if he was really serious. “Why?” she asked hesitantly.

Grady shrugged. “Because I can, I guess. Those who don’t socialize develop social media sites for others who do.”

She looked at him incredulously, and then burst into laughter, her delighted shrieks echoing in the large room. “Oh, Grady, you’re brilliant. And your communication is fine. You just never let anyone really know you. Is there anything you can’t do?” She was still holding her stomach and gasping for breath from her fits of laughter.

Get you to let me fuck you.

The one thing he wanted, he couldn’t seem to accomplish. Aloud, he said, “I obviously can’t file.”

“I don’t think that it’s a matter of not being capable—you obviously just don’t want to do it,” she answered, her skeptical look challenging him.

Busted!

“Paperwork is boring and tedious,” he answered defensively.

“So what . . . you build an online business with your genius, sell it off, and just throw the contracts and everything else into a box when you’re done?”

Grady fidgeted uncomfortably, ’cause really, she was pretty damn close to the truth. “Of course not,” he said irritably. I also deposit the check, or get the wire transfer into my bank.

“Grady Sinclair, I can follow your last five years of work from the mess in these boxes,” she told him ominously. “But none of it is organized.”

“The tax stuff is all in the computer,” he argued, beginning to enjoy himself. Obviously, his record keeping offended her ultraorganized MBA personality.

“Do you even know how much money you have right now?”

Grady smirked. “A lot.” He had a financial manager who kept him on top of things, but he honestly didn’t know the exact balance of his accounts every single day. That was why he paid the best in the business to do it for him. “I look occasionally and the balances are always going up, so that’s good, right?” Okay . . . he was yanking her chain a bit, but he loved to watch her reactions.

Emily threw her hands in the air in frustration. “But what if it’s not invested properly? What if you could be doing better . . . but you aren’t . . . because you aren’t watching things?”

God, he loved watching her stubborn, protective look. Emily was trying to watch out for him, and his heart soared. But the worried look on her face got to him. He got up and walked to where she was sitting and picked up the laptop computer next to her. Holding the computer with one hand, he logged in to a website and handed the computer to her. “My portfolio is fine. See for yourself.”

She took the computer from him and stretched her legs out, propping it on her thighs.

He walked back to the desk and sat back down in his chair, watching her face as she flipped from one page to the next, her brows wrinkled in concentration. Smiling, he propped his feet on his desk and crossed his hands over his abdomen. Watching Emily had become his favorite activity. “Happy now?” he asked, after watching her analyze everything for several minutes, catching on to the workings of the portfolio tracker site very quickly. “Do you think my financial manager is doing a good job?”

“He’s more than good,” she said, her voice dripping with admiration. “He’s incredible. Who is he?” Her head was still down, her complete focus on the numbers.

“Jason Sutherland,” he answered, disgruntled, and not quite sure he liked the reverent expression on her face as he said Jason’s name.

“The Jason Sutherland?” she asked, her tone reaching the point of awe.

Grady nodded abruptly, now certain he hated Jason.

“My idol,” she sighed, setting the computer to the side as she looked up at him. “He’s incredible.”

“He’s not that great,” Grady grumbled, knowing he was lying. Jason was one of the most intelligent men he knew, but he wasn’t going to admit it when Emily had that dreamy look on her face.

“He doesn’t do personal portfolios. He doesn’t need to. He’s already worth billions, the golden boy genius of the investment world. I know you’re a wealthy man. Um . . . okay . . . really wealthy, but he doesn’t do portfolios for anyone but himself. He was already incredibly wealthy when I was in business school. I used to study his investment strategies. And he’s so young.”

“The same age as me,” Grady answered, wanting to not talk about Jason anymore. Emily looked too enthralled, and it was irritating him.

“How do you know him?”

“He’s my friend. I’ve known him since childhood,” he grumbled. “I suppose you think he’s gorgeous too?” Most women did, and the female adoration Jason got had never bothered Grady before, but it bugged the hell out of him now.

“Nope. I’ve never met him, of course, but I don’t think he looked the least bit attractive in his pictures. But he’s incredibly good with investments,” she answered, rising to her feet.

“You don’t think he’s hot?” Grady questioned, his voice full of disbelief.

“No,” she answered quietly, her hips swaying as she moved closer to Grady. “He’s too pretty, almost too perfect. I much prefer tall, dark beasts who make generous donations to charities and aren’t obsessed with their money.” She bent over and kissed him softly, lingering just long enough to make Grady nearly insane.

Her scent enveloped him, and her lips tasted like sweet coffee and sin.

She moved back slowly and rested her forehead against his. “I’m on to you, Grady Sinclair. You donate millions to charity. I thought your donation to the Center was incredible, but you do that all the time, don’t you? I saw some of the receipts, and I have a feeling there are a lot more I haven’t seen yet.”

Grady shrugged and swallowed hard before answering. “I don’t need the money. They’re all good causes.”

“I find men who donate millions quietly to charities without wanting people to know how generous they really are incredibly hot,” she said in a husky whisper.

Right at that moment, Grady wanted to donate most of his fortune to charity so Emily would find him even hotter. Christ! If he didn’t get inside this woman very shortly, he was going to spontaneously combust.

Mine!

“Did you actually think I was hot for your friend? Were you . . . jealous?” she asked slowly, as though she didn’t believe it was possible.

“Yes,” he answered immediately. “He might be my friend, but I wanted to tear his head off because I thought you wanted him. Does that scare you?” Honestly, it kind of scared the hell out of him.

I’m losing my fucking mind. I like Jason. He’s a good guy. But one mention from Emily that she admired him, and I’m ready to lose it.

“No. I’ve just never had a guy who wanted me that much,” she answered in a tremulous voice.

“I do,” he growled, grabbing her around the waist and swinging her onto his lap.

“Careful,” she scolded, trying to wriggle off his lap. “You still aren’t healed. Let me up.”

He wanted to tell her she was healing him, and his gunshot injury was doing fine too. “Kiss me first,” he demanded, spearing a hand through her hair, but waiting for her to kiss him because she wanted to be as close to him as he wanted to be to her.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” she said nervously.

“Then you damn well better hurry up and kiss me, or I’m going to expire right here in this chair.” Shit, he was desperate, and he needed some connection to her right now. His cock was trying to burst out of his jeans, and he knew she could feel it cuddling up to her ass. “Stay here and let me keep your ass warm,” he told her gruffly, putting mild pressure on the back of her head. “Kiss me.”

Emily nibbled on her lip, as though she were considering the risks and benefits. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m dying,” he rumbled. “Kiss me or kill me.”

Emily giggled and boldly lowered her mouth to his.