Chapter 16

Grayson

The past couple of days, I kept to myself. I didn’t want to mingle with everyone. I didn’t feel like plastering a fake happy smile on my face when everyone discussed and organized the wedding. I wanted to be left alone. I let Carter handle some things solo. I was willing to bet a part of him was happy I was out of the way anyway. I knew they were getting irritated with me, and I knew why. I had been a dick from the start. And even though I had my reasons, I had to admit it was unfair of me to stop the wedding. Carter had been hurt in the past, and he’d been able to move on and find happiness again. So, why couldn’t I?

It just wasn’t that simple.

I was starting to realize that no matter what I did, Carter and Abigail were going to get married. I couldn’t stop it no matter what I did. I had to accept it and try to make my peace with it or risk losing my best friend forever.

Callie had been a good friend to Abigail, and by extension, a good friend to Carter. She was making his dream come true too. I had been a dick to her as much as I had to everyone else, and I was starting to think I owed her an apology. She had come to shit all over me at the bar, but she’d had a reason, and I finally had my head out of my ass enough to realize what I’d been doing. She hadn’t deserved any of what I had done. None of this had been her fault.

I wanted to talk to her.

I went to her offices on Monday. I expected that was where she would be, but when I arrived, the offices were closed. The posted hours on her door told me she was closed Mondays and Tuesdays unless she was there by appointment. Fuck.

I pulled out my phone and dialed her number, pressing the phone to my ear. I waited for her to answer, hoping she would even though she had no good reason to want to talk to me. Surprisingly, she answered.

“I don’t have a lot of time to talk,” she said, which told me she had known it was me.

“I won’t be long,” I said. “I was wondering if you’d be willing to meet up for a drink tonight to chat. I want to get a few things off my chest.”

Callie hesitated for a moment before she agreed. I was surprised but glad. I had expected to have to beg a lot more before she agreed to see me. I didn’t mind having to grovel a little, but I was relieved I didn’t have to. I arranged with her to go to a restaurant she knew. I had no idea what restaurants were around town. I would meet her there at eight. To pick her up felt too much like a date, and it wasn’t what this would be.

As much as I was interested in her, as much as I was attracted to her, this was about apologizing.

The restaurant Callie had chosen was a nice place, easy to find and nothing too dressy. I didn’t feel uncomfortable.

I was taken to a table in the back where Callie was already seated, drinking a glass of water. She looked weary when she saw me and stood up to greet me. I held out my hand, not expecting her to accept a hug. She took my hand and squeezed it before we sat down again.

“Do you want to order something to drink?” Callie asked and lifted her hand to flag a waitress. When the waitress arrived, I ordered a whiskey. I needed something to back me up.

“Are you eating?” Callie asked.

I shook my head. I had too much to get off my chest.

We made small talk for a short while, talking about the weather, about how close it was to the wedding, about the plans that were still left to be made.

“I’m sure you didn’t come here to talk about the wedding plans,” Callie said after I’d finished my first glass of whiskey and ordered another. She ordered wine, and I felt better that I wasn’t drinking alone anymore.

“I didn’t,” I said. “I came to apologize for my behavior since we met. I was rude and inappropriate, and I’m sorry about that.”

Callie looked at me like she wasn’t sure what I was playing at.

“You’re apologizing for it now? What changed?”

I pulled up my shoulders. “I realized it doesn’t matter what I do. Carter is going to marry that woman.”

“Abigail.”

“Abigail. Sorry. I’m here because I realized I can’t do anything to stop this. I’m giving up.”

Callie shook her head. “I don’t understand,” she said.

“I’m here to say I’m sorry because I know I was wrong.”

“That’s not what I don’t understand. I get that. What I don’t understand is why you’re so set against them getting married. I know it’s fast, and I was a little uncomfortable with that too. But you must have seen how good they are together. They really do love each other.”

I nodded, turning my glass around and around on the table.

“They are in love. But you see, this isn’t the first time Carter was so in love. This isn’t the first time for any of this. He was married before.”

Callie gasped. “What happened?” she asked.

I swallowed hard, struggling to spit out the words.

“She died. She was in a terrible car accident, and she didn’t make it through. Their wedding anniversary would have been this past Saturday. Their wedding date is so close to the previous one. It’s getting to me.”

I took a deep breath. I struggled to keep a handle on my emotions, but I would get through this. It was important that someone knew. Carter was ignoring it. John was pretending everything was fine. I was the only one who seemed to still be in mourning of everything that had been lost. Someone else ought to know.

“That’s why you were so upset on Saturday,” Callie said, putting two and two together. I had been a mess that day, barely able to hold a normal conversation while everyone had celebrated the coming wedding like it was the best thing that had ever happened. But I had seen the best thing that had ever happened. I’d been there, and I’d witnessed it firsthand.

“I’m so sorry to hear that,” Callie said. “That’s so tragic.” She looked genuinely sorry about it, and I appreciated her sympathy.

We sat in silence for a moment, and I knew she was digesting the information.

“If you don’t mind me asking,” Callie said, breaking the silence, “Why does this affect you so much? I know Carter’s your best friend, and naturally, you feel his pain, but why are you so opposed to the match and so affected by his tragic past?”

I took another deep breath and blew it out with a shudder. This was the moment of truth. This was where I had to put my pain into something someone else could hold in their hand. The bitter truth was like a pebble in my mouth, and if I wasn’t careful, I would choke on it.

“Carter’s deceased wife was my little sister, Jenna.”

I saw the facts hit Callie like a physical punch. I saw her face change as she put everything I had said and done into perspective, as she tasted my pain. A lump rose in my throat, and I felt like a fool for wanting to cry about it, for being in public and not having a handle on my emotions. I took deep breaths again and again.

“Grayson, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”

I shook my head. “Not a lot of people do. The few who do know pretend that it never happened. They’re so set on moving forward, they’re forgetting what happened. That hurts almost more than Carter remarrying, that he’s found someone to love again when Jenna was perfect. In every way.”

Callie nodded and swallowed hard as if she felt like crying too. She reached across the table and took my hand, squeezing it. The physical touch, the warmth of her sympathy, was something I hadn’t felt in a long time.

“I can’t begin to understand your pain,” Callie said. I looked up at her, and her eyes were drowning deep, filled with something I imagined to be compassion.

“But I am here for you if you want to talk about anything. I understand why you’ve acted the way you did now. I don’t think it was right, but I get it. And I can be here for you.”

“Why?” I asked.

She pulled up her shoulders. “Because I was in an accident a while ago too. I was lucky to be alive. I think about that every day, about what it means to be alive.”

“A car accident?” I asked.

Callie nodded. “Since then, I’ve been trying to touch the lives of the people I meet when I can. I was spared for a reason, you know?”

I nodded. “I wish I could be so noble about it.”

“We’re not in the same boat. But I’d like to be there for you. I’m sorry you’re hurting.”

No one had said that to me since Jenna had died. Everyone had said that they were sorry for my loss. Everyone had told me how sorry they were she was gone. But no one had told me they were sorry I was hurting. After a while, the pain had become something I was used to, but the loneliness that came with losing a sister was something not even Carter had been able to understand.

“It’s easy for Carter to marry again. He’s replacing Jenna in a way. It will never be the same, obviously, but he’s filling that emptiness again. But I can never do that. I can never get another sister.”

Callie leaned forward and hugged me. It was so unexpected, it caught me off guard. I closed my arms around her body and held tightly onto her. She was alive and well, and I had to hold onto it as tightly as I could. My emotions raged inside me, and I felt like they were going to rip me apart. I didn’t know how to keep it all in, how to handle it without a release.

As if Callie knew what I was thinking, she moved her face to mine, her lips inches from mine, almost an offering.

And I took it. I kissed her. My hands slid up to her hair, and my tongue slipped into her mouth, and I needed to be with her. I wanted her so badly. My dick was suddenly hard in my pants, my body aching for her.

I broke the kiss, and I was breathing hard as if I had been running. I swallowed hard.

“Do you want to come back to my place?” Callie asked.

I nodded. At that moment, I loved her. I loved her for trying to save me. I loved her for knowing what I needed. I loved her for giving me an escape from the bitterness that ate away at my insides until I was only a shell of what I used to be.