I roll those words around in my brain. My whole life, I’ve been the unseen middle child. The one not quite like the others. Even when I tried to fit in, I never quite did.
Or was that in my head? Maybe Griff’s right. Maybe I’m more integral than I thought.
He’s looking at me with heat in his eyes that has nothing to do with family dynamics. Like he sees something in me I’ve never seen before.
Like he wants to possess it.
I swallow hard, conscious of the crowd dwindling around us. The other bar is still open, so no one would notice if we slipped out. Just closed up this one, sprinted across the grounds under a starlit sky, and made our way to a cabin with a bed and curtains to shut out the rest of the world.
It would be so easy.
I know it isn’t. I know there are a million reasons I shouldn’t say what I’m about to say, but that doesn’t stop me from opening my mouth.
“Would you like to leave with me?” I ask. “Maybe go back to my place.”
The grin that lights his face brightens the whole bunker. There’s a phrase I never thought I’d use, but Griffin smiles like what’s happening here in this dim, earthy space is the most natural thing. Like the words I’ve just uttered aren’t the verbal equivalent of me splaying naked and exposed at his feet. Like I’m not holding my breath, waiting for his response.
“Yes.” He smiles so wide it transforms his whole body. “I’d love that more than anything.”
I’m nervous as I open my front door and usher Griffin inside. “I thoroughly cleaned and sanitized the dining table since last time.”
As foreplay goes, it’s not great.
Griffin quirks an eyebrow. “You’re wanting to do this on the table again?”
Heat floods my cheeks as I close the door behind us and pull my blinds closed. “No, I—I just didn’t want you to think I’m so incompetent in the kitchen that I had no concept of hygiene.”
He pulls me into his arms and kisses the side of my neck. “I question many things about you, but competence isn’t one of them.”
I draw back, pressing my palms against his chest. “What do you question about me?”
“Lots of things.” He’s calm and unassuming as he goes back to kissing my throat, but I feel the hardness in his jeans. “I’ve wondered why you did Shrink to the Stars in the first place. It was amazing, but it doesn’t seem like your thing.”
“It was a good career opportunity.” I bite my lip as he kisses the top of my collarbone. “I wanted to work within the scope of competency for a niche demographic I’d trained to serve.”
“Okay.” He threads his fingers into my hair. “I love your hair like this, by the way.”
He gives the softest tug at the nape of my neck, tipping my head back so he can kiss lower. I groan and clutch the front of his shirt. “Oh,” I gasp, gripping him tighter as his tongue glides along my collarbone and heads south. “Also, that might not be the only reason.”
“You don’t say.”
I squeeze my eyes closed, sucking in a breath as he eases my shirt off one shoulder and skims his lips over the top of my breast. “I tried to fit in,” I choke out, no longer sure what I’m talking about. “The clothes, the spotlight. But none of it made me a real Judson—not like the others. So I ran as hard as I could the other direction—”
I swallow the rest of my words as Griffin’s lips close around my nipple and he draws me into his mouth. I’ve never been more grateful to go braless if I want. The soft, wet suction is indescribable, and I forget what we were talking about.
Griffin releases my nipple and kisses his way to the other breast. “You thought bright lights and fancy clothes were key to fitting in with your family,” he says between kisses. “But really, it’s about letting them in. Letting them see the real Mari and get close to her.”
I groan as his tongue circles my other nipple. I know I should argue. I’m the one with the psych degree. Surely this would have occurred to me if it were true.
But haven’t I told dozens of patients how tough it is to recognize what’s obvious to others? How tricky to see the forest for the trees? Maybe I’ve been kidding myself about why I’m the odd woman out in my family. Maybe I owe it to them, to myself, to be more present.
That’s exactly what I owe Griffin now.
I slide my palms from his chest to his back, devouring the ripple of muscle as I nudge him toward the hallway. “Bedroom,” I breathe.
“Okay.”
I hesitate, wondering if I should turn this into a sexy striptease. I’m hopelessly out of practice and unsure if I should shed my shirt or something else. Something more revealing.
Griffin smiles like he’s reading my thoughts. “Want to tell me something else?”
I nod, surprised that I do. It’s not remotely sexy, but I blurt it out anyway. “The reason I don’t cook is because my mother warned me I’d be tethered to the stove forever if I turned out to be as competent in the kitchen as I was in academia.”
Griffin grabs the hem of my top, tugging it off over my head. “Sound advice, coming from a woman who probably had an army of personal chefs.”
“You’re not wrong there.” Shirleen Judson, sex siren of the seventies, was a household name since before Griff was born, so I’m not surprised he has ideas of what it was like to be raised by her. “But she wasn’t wrong, either.”
“Oh?” His mouth finds my breast again, and I’m not sure he’s interested in the answer. I’ve forgotten what I was saying anyway as I tug off his shirt and back him through my bedroom door.
He comes up for air and angles us toward the bed. “Tell me more.” He hoists me up and tosses me onto the mattress like I weigh nothing. “Why wasn’t your mother wrong?”
Easing down on top of me, he presses me back and kisses his way down my sternum. I clutch his head and pray Leonard isn’t eavesdropping in the next room. It’d be just my luck TMZ would run an exclusive interview with my parrot.
“No man has ever expected me to cook or clean or rub his feet,” I murmur as Griffin unfastens my jeans. “So maybe my mother had a point.”
“Could be.” He undoes the buttons and drags the jeans down my legs, making me grateful I kicked my shoes off at the door. A few quick tugs and he’s bared me from the waist down as I claw at his zipper. “Could be she set out to make you less self-sufficient so you’d rely on her.” He grins and kisses his way from one hipbone to the other, pausing to trail upward and dip his tongue in my belly button. “But you got the last laugh.”
“Wh—what?” He’s kissing lower now, and I’m losing track of this conversation.
“You figured out how to be self-sufficient in your own way.”
I’ve never felt this bared, this exposed. Could be that I’m naked, but I don’t think so. I’ve spent my career rifling around in other people’s psyches, but no one’s done it to me.
I’ve never had anyone who wanted to.
“Maybe you’re right,” I murmur, not sure I’m accepting that. “But there’s one area where I’d prefer not to be so self-sufficient.”