Page 51 of Combust (Everyday Heroes 2)
Just when I’m about to laugh and ask what he did, Grady looks my way, and the angry red mark on his right cheek says it all. “What happened? Are you okay?” I’m up and rounding the couch before the words finish passing over my lips.
“Just a little fight,” Grayson says and shakes his head.
I reach up to touch Grady’s face in reflex and then pull back. “That looks like it hurts like a bitch.”
“You should see the other guy,” Grady mutters and locks his eyes to mine. There’s an intensity to them I can’t decipher, making it hard to look away.
“You good, man?” Grant asks from the doorway.
“Yeah. I’m . . .” Grady lowers his eyes for a second before looking back at his brothers. “Thanks, guys.”
“Yep. Later, Grady.”
The door shuts behind them as I’m searching the freezer for a bag of frozen vegetables to put on his cheek. Sadly, I know from my experience with Jett that this is what works best. I finally find one, and when I turn around, Grady is still staring at me with that look.
“What happened?” I ask again as he hisses when I bring the bag to his cheek.
“It was nothing.” He takes the frozen vegetables from me and walks to the other side of the kitchen. I swear he says something under his breath, but I can’t make it out.
“It was nothing? That’s all you’re going to give me?”
“Yep.” He drops the makeshift icepack on the counter and heads to get a beer out of the refrigerator. I push down the irritation that bubbles up at how cavalier he’s being toward me when I’ve done nothing wrong.
“Seriously, Grady? You waltz in here with what looks like the start of an impressive black eye, bruised knuckles, and blood on your shirt, and all you’re going to tell me is it was nothing?”
“Blood?” he asks, disregarding everything else I said and pulling on his shirt to look at the back of it where the blood is smeared in a few spots. “Fucking Christ.” He mutters and grits his teeth for a moment before tilting up his beer and downing the entire bottle in long swallows.
There’s tension building between us, and I can’t help but feel like he’s mad at me for some reason. Although, I have no idea what it could be for other than Jett. But Jett isn’t here so . . .
Grady throws his empty bottle in the sink and then, in one swift move, pulls his T-shirt over his head. When he goes to toss it in the trash, I wince. Some of that blood is from him. I don’t get a good look because the shadows of the kitchen fall over him, but it looks like there are slight cuts in a few spots on his back.
How the hell did his back get cut?
“How’s Jett?” he asks with a bite as he turns around, and I mentally cringe when he catches me staring at his back. He doesn’t realize it’s because he’s bleeding and not because of his scars, but he doesn’t comment.
“I don’t know. He isn’t here.”
There’s a slight hitch in his movement as he leans his hips back against the counter and stares at me.
“Ah, the wonder boy decided to let you out of his sight for more than five minutes?”
“It doesn’t matter if he does or doesn’t,” I say, suddenly feeling like there is an unspoken and testosterone-laced competition being waged that I have no knowledge of. “I’m not interested.”
“Hmm.” He folds his arms across his chest, angles his head to the side and studies me as if he’s trying to figure out whether to believe me or not. “Where is he, then?”
“Napa.”
“Why?”
What is this, twenty questions?
“To see an old friend.”
“Huh.”
He continues to glare at me without saying anything else, and I’m more confused now than ever. What happened to the man who kissed me on the head this morning as if we were husband and wife? I want that guy back. Not this version who’s treating me as if we’re a married couple on the verge of splitting up.
“Grady? Why do you seem pissed at me?”
