Give Me More--A Sexy Billionaire Romance by A.C. Arthur (detective books to read txt) 📕

she never meant to hurt Tobias.” Grace recalled feeling the overwhelming sorrow and regret in every one of Marva’s words as she’d shared that story with her.

“You can’t put this story out there, Grace. I’m begging you,” RJ said.

“Stop.” She held up a hand. “That’s not the story that’s going to my editor. I always start with an outline and from there I work in a draft mode. That’s what you just read. I was checking it earlier to make sure I didn’t leave out anything important in the final copy.”

There was no turning back now. So many rules had already been broken. She went to the laptop and pulled up another document before turning the screen to face RJ. “Here’s the real story.”

After staring at her a few seconds more, he reluctantly shifted his attention to the screen. Grace took the seat across from him at the table. Moments later, when he looked up at her again, it was with a look of sadness and regret.

“I didn’t know there were two stories,” he said quietly.

She shook her head. “And you didn’t trust me. I told you I wouldn’t write anything to hurt you or your family and I meant it. But you didn’t believe me. You didn’t trust that I’d protect you and the ones you love.”

“Grace—”

“No, let me finish. I’m not angry that you didn’t trust me. A long time ago I didn’t trust you.” She sighed. “I guess that’s our shortcoming, RJ. We have this amazing sexual connection and all these emotions for each other that we can’t seem to turn off. But we don’t have that one basic thing—trust.”

“Look, I’m sorry about my outburst. I thought you were betraying my family. But you can’t compare this to what happened to us before. They’re two entirely different scenarios,” he argued.

“I know what you thought, RJ. But I’d already promised you I wouldn’t write anything detrimental. I shouldn’t even have been writing this story because of our previous connection, I could’ve lost this job and possibly any future hope of being a respected journalist. I even changed the scope of the story and shared some of my interview notes with you. Yet you still stood here and jumped to the worst conclusion possible, which tells me you never trusted me to do what I said I would.” She used both hands to cover her face and breathe in and out deeply. “That night you proposed, I said no. Then I got up from that table and walked away. I never trusted you to understand my reasons for not wanting to marry you at that time.”

When he didn’t speak right away, she shrugged and lifted her hands as if in surrender. “The lack of trust between us is obvious.”

He sat back in the chair, shaking his head. “It was right there on the screen, Grace. What’d you expect me to think?”

She didn’t break eye contact. “I would’ve expected you to ask me for an explanation and then wait until I provided it to decide how you were going to react.”

He dragged a hand down the back of his head. “Well, it’s done. I apologized and we can move on.”

“Yes, we can,” she said. “We can move on.” Grace stood from the chair and went to the door. “I’m really tired now and I told Nina that I’d meet the girls in Riley’s room by seven tomorrow.”

RJ didn’t stand immediately, but he did look at her. For an instant she thought it was the same shocked and confused look he’d given her that night at the restaurant, but no, this look was different. It was disappointment and despondence. She wasn’t sure how much of that was attributed to her or what he’d just found out about his parents, but the fact still remained that everything between them was different now.

“You’re angry,” he said when he finally came to stand in front of her.

“No,” she said, and to prove her point she smiled. “I just don’t want to make the same mistakes I made before, so I’m telling you how I feel this time.” Against the incessant pounding of her heart, and the panic of losing what just hours ago she’d been ecstatic to find with him again, her brain insisted she keep going. “We should take some time to figure out if this is what we really want. This forever love the people around us seem to have. Because I don’t know, RJ. I don’t feel like I know anything about this anymore.”

He stepped closer to her. “You’re afraid.”

Irritated that he continued to blame everything she did or said on fear, she snapped, “And so are you! Which is why you could so quickly jump to the wrong conclusions about me. You’re afraid that what we’ve been doing these last two weeks and all that it’s made you feel might’ve been a mistake. You want what your brothers and sister have, but you’re afraid it won’t work out that way for you again. So yelling at me and threatening me came as your natural defense.”

And it had cut through her like a hot blade, leaving her to deal with the hurt she supposed she’d inflicted on him all those years ago.

His eyes glittered with intensity, his lips forming a tight line. “I wasn’t lying about how I feel about you and that has nothing to do with two weeks or ten damn years. I loved you then and I love you now.”

He was standing close, so close she could reach up and touch his face, put her finger on that muscle in his jaw that jumped as he clenched his teeth.

“I didn’t lie about my feelings, either. But you know what, RJ? We were in love before. And that wasn’t enough.”

“Grace—”

“This time, before we go any further, we should make sure we have what it takes to make it work. Because if not, we shouldn’t put each other through another ten years of heartbreak.”

He looked like he didn’t know how