Page 107 of Possession

The first stained glass piece I’d ever created.

Chapter 26

Grace

“Why do you have this?”

Was that my voice? It sounded desperately far away. So quiet when it seemed so loud in my head.

“I bought it.”

I whirled to face him. “You did not.”

He folded his arms. “I can assure you I did.”

I invaded his space, forcing him to lean back. “No, you didn’t. I never sold this piece. Ever.”

Blake’s eyebrows snapped down. “I bought this piece before I had any money. In fact, I ate ramen noodles for a month because I had to have it.”

Shock set me back a few paces. “No.” I turned back to the piece. I hadn’t seen it in eight years. It had been one of the last stained-glass panels I’d created before going off to college. In fact, the piece had been the center of my portfolio to get into the glass program. “Phil told me she’d never been able to sell it.” I laughed humorlessly. “She said she’d put it in her beach house in the Caymans because it was too beautiful to be boxed up.”

“It was the centerpiece of the first room I designed when I built this house. It took me five years to do the room justice, but your piece was in every apartment and house I’ve lived in since I bought it.”

I staggered back a few steps, and my hip bumped into a table. A very familiar table. I frowned down at it. My box of tools.

“What is this room? And why is it hidden away?”

“It’s for me. It’s always been for me. When I need space to think, this is where I go. Except lately.”

“What?” I dragged my focus away from my worktable from the beach house. The boxes of glass that had been packed in the corners of my workshop had been meticulously packed up.

He’d taken it all.

“It’s been hard to be in this place. Facing all the feelings I’ve put aside for years is not something I’m comfortable with. Especially when I’ve made so many mistakes when it comes to us.”

He crossed to me, and I rounded the table to put space between us. I couldn’t even pinpoint a single emotion right now. They were stacking up on each other until it was a jumbled mosaic of glass that couldn’t quite come clear in my head.

Love kicked hard, followed directly with confusion and rage. He’d kept me in a secret room all this time.

Well, notme, but this version of me he had. I was laid bare in that glass behind my angel.

Hisangel now.

“Grace. I wanted you to be a part of this room. This place. A part of me.” He swallowed hard enough that his Adam’s apple bobbed. His eyes were bleak in this nightscape of silvery light and shadow. “I’m tired of the secrets.”

“Me too,” I whispered.

Was he actually asking me to be part of his world? I wanted to believe him. Enough that my heels clicked over the tiled floor before I realized I was walking toward him.

He met me halfway. Shadows had lengthened and the clouds had dampened some of the moonlight. It didn’t stop me from climbing up onto him, wrapping my legs around him instinctively. I loved how big he was. Especially in these moments where he made me feel strong and fragile at the same time.

When his huge hands clasped me so firmly and yet gently. These were the nights that I craved to push him past the gentle and into the crazed.

Sometimes, he allowed it. Most of the time, he held part of himself back.

Here in the clarity of moonlight and glass, I hoped for the wildness. There was no reason to hold back here. Not now. Not if he truly wanted to share every part of himself with me.

It was a gamble I was willing to take.

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