Things Remembered (Accidentally On Purpose Companion Novel #3) (5 page)

I picked the phone up.

I put the phone down.

I picked the phone up.

Chapter Four

Grant fucking Alexander had the power to screw up not just one day, but two consecutive days in one shot.

I barely slept. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Sharice’s dead face and Grant’s grief.

Lying awake wasn’t much better. Vapory, jagged fragments of memories of that night poked at the edges of my mind. I would try to grasp them, but then they just slipped through my fingers, returning to the thick, churning gray fog that clouded parts of my past.

Then there was Grant himself. There were memories of him that had nothing to do with Sharice. His body wrapping protectively around mine. His lips. The taste of his mouth. His words…especially the last ones he had said to me before exiting my life.

I picked up my phone often during the night, poised to make the call that could make the unease in my heart cease, at least for a while. I always put it back down without dialing.

I didn’t fall asleep until near dawn, and that short sleep had been restless. I dreamed of jeering laughter, rough hands on my body, and the smell of the breaths on my face from people I could not see. The voices were recognizable, only because they had been with me for so many years.

When I left for work in the morning, I wasn’t in danger of being late, but my schedule was thrown off. I would definitely run into The Mommies again and I didn’t think that I’d be able to just smile and coo about their alien life form children.

Running into them wasn’t the worst thing that could happen in my day, but I hated having my routine interrupted. It was one of the very few things I had some control over and I hated for that power to be taken away. If I ever saw Grant Alexander again—which I hoped I didn’t—I’d throttle him.

Off my routine or not, I still planned to get my coffee and pastry. I couldn’t let things get
completely
out of hand.

I didn’t live too far from the office, so I always walked to work. The city streets were busy at my usual departure time, but not too bad. Twenty minutes made a world of difference. There were three times the amount of people mindlessly buzzing to their hives. I was bumped more often than I cared for, and when crossing the street, I felt like a sheep. I half expected a dog to nip at my heels to keep me inside the crosswalk.

I was almost at the coffee shop when I saw him standing against the building, holding a coffee and a paper bag. I probably would have spotted him sooner if the sidewalk hadn’t been so crowded, but I was too close, because he saw me, too. It was possible he saw me long before I saw him.

He was dressed in a dark blue, fitted suit. His white shirt was free of a tie, however, and unbuttoned a few buttons. He looked like a damn magazine ad.

I intended to ignore him. Totally ignore him. I was already off track; I couldn’t allow for any further distractions. Ignore. Ignore, ignore, ignore.

As I approached, Grant stepped away from the wall and wordlessly extended his arm, offering me the cup and paper bag he held in his right hand. Unintentionally, I halted. I looked confusedly at the cup and bag and then at his dark eyes.

“What the hell is that?”

“An extra-large coffee, light and sweet, and a chocolate croissant,” his velvety voice announced.

I took a step back, surprised, and a little freaked out. That was my exact order, day in and day out. I never deviated from it, but how did
he
know that?

“Are you stalking me, Grant Alexander?” I asked accusingly.

He gave me a small smile. “I was a few people behind you in line yesterday.”

I looked at him skeptically. “I didn’t see you.”

His smile widened. “No, but it’s okay. I forgive you. Come on, take the coffee, beautiful. You’re hurting my feelings.”

I didn’t take the coffee or the croissant. Instead, I gave him attitude. “Don’t call me that.”

“Why not? It’s what you are.”

“It’s not my
name
,” I said icily. “You’re a big black guy. You don’t hear me calling you Big Black.”

My comment didn’t have the desired effect because Grant raised his eyebrows in amusement. “That’s different.”

“It’s not different. Besides, you don’t even know if I have a boyfriend or a husband, and you’re calling me pet names and following me around like a little puppy.”

He nodded his head once as his amusement faded some. “I would have called you beautiful and waited here for you regardless as a friendly gesture. However, I concede to your point.”

“Thank you,” I said haughtily.

“Do you?”

“Do I what?”

“Do you have a man?” He leaned toward me a little. “Or a woman.”

“Single and hetero.”

He nodded again. “Good. Then there’s no issue with me buying you a coffee and a croissant.”

Once again, he tried to hand me the coffee and bag.

Indignant, I said, “I can purchase my own coffee and croissant.”

“Of course you can, but you’ll be waiting in line forever, and this was the last chocolate croissant.”

I glanced past him into the coffee shop. The line was very long, practically out the door, and I had no reason to doubt him on the croissant. Who would lie about pastries?

“I saw you coming a block and a half away,” Grant said, confirming my earlier thoughts. “I went inside and ordered and got out here just in time. The coffee is still piping hot.”

He carefully shook the cup at me. I still didn’t take it. I looked up at him.

“Why are you doing this?”

“You seemed like you were in a hurry yesterday morning.”

“I wasn’t just in a hurry, but I think I was pretty clear about not wanting to see your face.”

He continued on, patiently, pretending that I hadn’t spoken.

“I don’t want to slow you down, but I want to talk to you. I thought I would shave off the extra minutes it takes for you to stop here and take them for myself.”

I felt my heart slow for a few beats before picking up at a faster tempo. It was rather startling because I had not felt anything like it in a long time, at least not while I was sober.

“What if I don’t want to give you those minutes?”

He took one step and closed the distance between us. He looked down at me speculatively for a few seconds.

“It doesn’t really matter. I’ve already taken them.” In a low, commanding voice that could probably melt icecaps, he said, “Now, Mayson. Take the coffee and bag. It’s obvious you’re running late today, and now so am I.”

To be perfectly honest, I usually didn’t care about the feelings of others. Unless they were a friend or family, I just didn’t give a shit. I always said what I meant and I meant what I said. The only time it was necessary to bite my tongue was at work so that I could keep my job.

I shouldn’t have cared about Grant’s stupid pride or the money he’d spent trying to be a nice guy. No one told him to be a nice guy. That was all his idea. But the bottom line was…he had purchased the last chocolate croissant. Most likely, if he hadn’t, it would have been sold to someone else, and then where would I be? In the office, surrounded by The Mommies, with nothing to look forward to.

Grudgingly, I reached for the cup and bag. As my fingers grazed his, I had the sudden sense of déjà vu. Grant’s fingers from another place and time lightly touching mine appeared in my mind, cracked and fragmented. It was like trying to make out images on the other side of shattered glass.

“Mayson?” His voice was filled with concern as he took a step closer to me.

“Um…thank you,” I said abstractedly.

“Are you okay?”

I scowled as I fully arrived back at my senses. My sense of smell also returned to me. I smelled the coffee and fumes from the cars and that grimy yet delicious city smell, but I also smelled him. It was a clean, soft, but masculine scent. Too many men douse themselves in aftershaves and colognes that you can smell two city blocks away, but I didn’t smell Grant until he stood in my personal space. Literally. He was toe to toe with me.

Damn he smelled good, and familiar…but damn he needed to get the hell out of my personal space!

Still scowling, I backed up a few steps. “I said thank you,” I snapped at him.

His laughter had a deep timber that reverberated through my body.

“You’re very welcome,” he said as his eyes moved over me.

My god, I felt a bead of sweat on my neck that had nothing to do with the weather.

Grant gave me another smile and walked away in the opposite direction without another word. I stupidly watched his back for a few moments, until his form was swallowed up by a group of businessmen.

I continued on to my own destination, all thoughts of throttling the man forgotten.

I sat in my car, in the driveway of the house I grew up in, gathering the strength and patience I would need to go inside and sit through another meal.

After my sleepless night and my strange morning with Grant that further bollixed my day by leading to a series of mistakes, mishaps, and unwanted communications, the very last person on Earth—in the
universe
—that I wanted to see was my mother and her family. I would have rather thrown myself in front of a SEPTA bus.

I had considered it, a matter of fact, but the chances of getting paralyzed and then being in her care for the rest of my life was a frightening and disheartening prospect. That and my burden of guilt that I had been carrying for eighteen years were the only reasons I showed up to the monthly dinners.

With resignation, I got out of my car and walked to the door. Twenty years ago, it had been my own home and I would have just let myself in, but it had not been my home for a very long time.

I rang the doorbell and waited.

A few seconds later, there were quick, light footsteps in the hall and then the door swung open.

My mother was in her late fifties, but could pass for my slightly older sister. The old adage that black don’t crack was very true in her case. There wasn’t a wrinkle to be found on her face. Her skin was firm and smooth, her hair was still thick and healthy, and her boobs weren’t hanging to her knees. She was a little thicker in the waist than she had been when I was a child, but it only proved to enhance her beauty.

I wished that there was just one thing, one little thing wrong with her body to make me feel better. A few hammer toes, wobbly knees, or ashy elbows, but no. Not my mother. She was disgustingly perfect.

“You could have let yourself in,” Mom said as she stepped back to let me pass.

I tried to keep the contempt out of my voice. “It’s not my house.”

“It’s as much your home as it is Taylor’s.”

“Except that it is Taylor’s home and not mine,” I pointed out.

She didn’t respond before extending her slender arms for an awkward embrace.

“Dinner is already on the table.” She eyed me with some speculation. “You’re late today. Are you okay?”

Translation: “You’re late today. Are you late because you’re doing drugs again?”

“I worked late,” I lied.

I didn’t actually work late. I had been at the office, but I hadn’t been working. I’d pretended to work, doing tasks that didn’t really need to be done, but my procrastination could only carry me so far.