Fallen from Grace (18 page)

His face twisted into the same sad expression he wore in her hall and the alleyway of the Plaza. “Of course.”

“Goodnight.”

He reluctantly acquiesced and sighed, diverting his crushed gaze to the floor. “Goodnight, Grace.”

She walked out of her bedroom and shut the door; it felt as if she’d entered a parallel universe. Her thoughts were a mess, and she was mentally and physically exhausted. She laid on the couch and stared at the ceiling, blowing out a long breath.

The lights in the kitchen were dimmed, and she could hear the traffic outside through the open windows.
The city that never sleeps
. That statement was 100% true.

Grace got up and fixed a glass of ice water. After standing in her kitchen, going through the reasons she couldn’t go back into her bedroom, she eventually lost the battle. Pouring him a glass of water, she knocked at the door.

“Come in.”

She walked in and saw him sitting on the edge of the bed. His feet were propped up on the running boards of her sleigh style bed, and he had the baggy sweat pants on, but was shirtless.
Stop drooling, Grace.

“I thought you might like some water.”

He nodded. The lamp next to her bed was still on, and Judas looked as lost as she felt. She walked to him and handed him the glass. He took a drink, then lowered it down between his legs and stared at it.

She took the glass out of his hands. “Lay down,” she demanded.

He looked at her.

“You heard me. Lay down.”

Grace turned the lamp off and opened all three windows in the room. Light from the moon spilled across her bed, across a shirtless Judas, and it sent the same jolt of
excitement
barreling through her body. He was looking at her as though she were the only person who mattered, like no one else existed, and Grace could see a longing in his eyes that scared the hell out of her.

She laid down next to him, but Judas didn’t move or say anything.

“Do you know who drugged you?”

He released a burdened sigh and relaxed. “I do.”

“Why did they do it?”

“I don’t really know for sure, but I think it has something to do with what Rebecca said about me. But I don’t know what it was.”

Grace could feel an invisible pull stressing between them, and all she wanted to do was roll over and touch his bare chest. Run her finger down his abdomen, across those perfect muscles, and trace the lines that trailed below his pants. She wondered if he were wearing underwear. Dammit, he lied to her. Was this a part of his plan? To manipulate her and make her feel sorry for him?

His voice was thick and unsteady. “Thank you for letting me stay.”

She shook her head, hoping to shake away the sinful thoughts and doubts she had in him. “Like I said, I didn’t have any other choice.” A car alarm went off outside, and it made Grace jump.

“Who do you need protection from?”

She shrugged in the dark. “You know.”

“No, I don’t.”

“I don’t know…people against Ellis.”

Grace knew what he was thinking, it was the same thing on her mind, but she didn’t want to have this discussion with him.

“If he weren’t outside, would you have made me leave?”

Several beats passed. “I don’t know. I know I wouldn’t have let you drive.” She started to sit up. “I don’t want to talk about this.”

“Okay,” he blurted. “I won’t ask you any more questions. I promise.”

The desperation in his voice bruised her heart, and she didn’t know how much more of this she could take. Laying her head back against the pillow, she thought about how messed up everything was. For an unaccounted amount of time, they laid beside one another in the dark, listening to the traffic, sirens and nightlife humming outside.

“You said you were drugged. With what?”

“Ecstasy.”

Grace hated being right, the idea Judas was under the influence of ecstasy had crossed her mind. She’d recognized the signs from Cade’s drug use. “How long ago?”

He was silent. “It’s been a little over two hours.”

“How much did they give you?”

“Two hits, I guess.”

She shot straight up and looked at him. “You’ve taken two hits of ecstasy?”

Judas remained quiet and unmoving.

Grace laid down and tried to wrap her head around the information. “How do you feel?”

“Not so great.”

Cade always told her how great sex was on X. She pushed it from her mind; that was
not
happening tonight.

“Must’ve been an
interesting
shower.” He didn’t say anything. “My brother, Cade always said showering on X was the most amazing feeling in the world.”

Judas was laying on his back with his eyes open. He kept rubbing his chest and didn’t stop. Grace rolled onto her side and put her hand on top of his. He closed his eyes and stopped moving.

“You really haven’t ever done any drugs?” Judas shook his head. She could tell his high had suddenly gotten worse.

Grace went back inside her closet and took Cade’s box down, removing a worn CD case. When she shut the box, she left her emotions inside and walked away. If she started crying and broke down with Judas in his current state of mind, she could end up throwing him into a bad trip.

Grace inserted the disc into the stereo, then adjusted the volume to a low, mellow level.

“Music helps,” she said, turning around. He was staring at her; his hand was still on his bare chest and his heated gaze excited her. She attempted to remain calm and struggled to appear composed.

Grace laughed. “Don’t look at me like that.”

“I can’t help it. You’re so beautiful.”

Heat bloomed in her cheeks. “Thank you,” Grace murmured. She walked to the bed and sat down in an upholstered chair on the opposite side he was lying.

Distance was good.

The Doors played in the background. “This music is perfect,” Judas said.

“I’m glad you like the band. Music has a calming effect in this situation.”

“I know I said I wouldn’t ask you any questions, but how do you know so much about this?”

“I wrote a thesis paper on the long term effects ecstasy has on the brain. However, most of my experience comes from Cade. He was heavy into it at one point.”

“I’m sorry. Dammit, Grace, I just keep hurting you.” He sat up, but had to brace his hand against the mattress. “I can call a taxi. I’ll take the back entrance. It’s how I got in.”

She moved out of the chair and sat on the side of the bed, one leg crossed and the other hanging off the side.

“You are in no condition to travel, or to be alone.” A jealousy flared inside of her. “Unless you want to leave so you can find little Miss Red Lipstick.”

His eyes locked with hers. “There is no other place in the world I’d rather be than right here with you.” He looked down and pulled a loose thread from the bottom of Cade’s sweats. “I just wish it was under different circumstances.

“Judas, I told you, I’m with Ellis.”

“Then why did you sleep with me?”

Grace looked at the piece of thread he twirled between his fingers. “I don’t know. I guess I thought you were different.”

“I
am
different.”

She turned away from Judas and looked out the window. Images of him with random women made the heat of lust turn to anger. “You aren’t different, Judas. You’re just like every other man out there. Dishonest and incapable of truly loving anyone but yourself.”

Grace felt the bed move, and she stood up. “Don’t touch me, Judas.”

“What happened after you left?” he pushed.

She shook her head. “We shouldn’t talk about this right now. Wait until you’re sober.” She heard Judas’s bare feet step across the wood floor and stop behind her.

“I deserve an explanation, Grace.”

She spun around. “What about me? I want the truth, Judas, about your past.
I
deserve
an explanation.”

“I know,” he murmured. He was silent for a moment, and when he spoke his voice was distant. “My mom…she was the greatest woman I’d ever known. She was loving and kind, to me, to everyone. I loved her more than anything. She died when I was eighteen on a rafting trip. I’d begged her to go with me for my birthday.” He snorted as his eyes became wet with tears. “Three full days drifting down Six-Mile Creek off the Kenai Peninsula of Alaska. The first two days, everything had been perfect. I’d gone on a few trips with my school a few years before, so I was confident I could take her out alone to a spot where the water was calm and the view incredible.” His voice broke, and he swallowed. “I was so excited to show her this special place, and riding out without the group wasn’t allowed, but she didn’t question my ability. She snuck away from the camp with me.

“No one knew we were leaving or where we were going. God, Grace, it was beautiful. The look on her face…” He shook his head. “On the way back, the wind picked up, and it was difficult to paddle. A gust of wind tipped our raft over, and when I swam out from under it, I didn’t see her anywhere.” Judas broke for several moments to compose himself. “The river was pulling me downstream fast, and I was helpless. Panicked to find her, I swam under the boat and found her, but she was trapped. She was trying to free her leg from a rope, but it wouldn’t budge. I tried to get it off of her…I knew she was running out of air, and I couldn’t breathe. She started pushing me away. My mother was drowning, and all she could do was worry about me.”

Grace wiped the tears from her face. Judas looked as if he was about to break, and she’d wager a substantial bet he had ground a layer off of his teeth. She remembered when Cade was under the influence of drugs, he always had something in his mouth—gum, a piece of candy, or a sucker. She reached into the drawer next to the bed and handed Judas a piece of gum.

“Thanks,” he said, unraveling it and folding it into his mouth. He sat on the edge of the bed and leaned forward, bracing his elbows against his thighs and intertwined his fingers. The moonlight spilled across his dark hair and tan skin, the pectoral indentations on his left side were shaded peaks, and his eyelashes shadowed over the dark circles beneath his eyes.

Grace hated that all the anger she felt melted away as she listened to him talk about growing up under Jack Woods and how unhappy his mother had been. About wanting to take her on the rafting trip because she had needed to get away and see God’s fingerprint. He told Grace the only reason he’d gone to law school was because Jack had made him but that he’d found himself there and now loved fighting in court for his clients.

The downfall had been Jack’s terms. Judas would have to get dirt on people, mostly young women, then give the information to him, or he’d be disinherited. Jack would also make sure Judas never stepped foot in another courtroom, and that his life and career would be over.

After everything Grace heard, she wanted to comfort him, so she had slowly moved closer until she was sitting in the chair, and then right next to him. When he became dizzy, a common side effect of ecstasy, he laid down and asked her to lie beside him. He laid back on the pillows on the bed and closed his eyes. When he opened them, they locked with hers, and the intensity pulled her to his side. She nestled next to him and laid her head on his chest.

A barely audible moan vibrated his chest, and it was the perfect mixture of masculinity and serenity. Grace hated to lead him on like this, but she had a feeling he wouldn’t remember anything. Even though Judas was miraculously functioning, he was still under the influence of a potent cocktail.

“Why the tattoos, Judas?” she asked.

He was quiet for several breaths. “At first it was a joke. I brought the idea up at one of Jack’s dinner parties, and he got serious and told me I could never get a tattoo.”

“Ah, the defiant path.”

She felt him shrug. “He said I couldn’t, and I had a different opinion.”

“Well they have to mean something, or did you just randomly pick each one?”

“No.” She shifted her face to see him. He looked serious as he raised her right hand and rested his palm flush with hers. “I drew them.”

She smiled. “You are just a man of many mysteries, Judas.”

“I’ll tell you anything you want to know. I will never keep anything from you again, Grace.”

“Jack blames me for her death.” Grace heard the pain in Judas’s voice. “I blame
myself
for her death.”

She propped herself up on her elbow and forced him to look at her. His eyes were filled with tears, and added yet another bruise to her heart. “It wasn’t your fault, Judas.”

He closed his eyes, and she wiped away the tear that fell across his cheek. She wanted to kiss him and take away all his pain, then replace it with her love and spend the rest of her life guaranteeing he never felt alone or lost again. “Your father should never have blamed you for her death. It takes an evil person to hold something like that against someone.”

Grace had never wanted to wipe someone off this earth, but she felt a passionate hate toward Jack Woods. “You’ve never been able to hear this Judas, but I want you to hear it over and over again.” His gaze met hers. “Her death was not your fault. When someone’s time is up, it’s just time. I believe God has his plan for everyone, and your present circumstances are the result of
his
past decisions. You are where you are right now because it’s where God wants you to be.”

“How can that be if my mother is gone and the only other woman I’ve ever loved is marrying another man? Why would God do that? Why would he bring you into my life, only to take you away?” He looked away. “She used to always say, ‘Faith through Grace.” But I don’t believe in God anymore.”

“Don’t say that, Judas.”

“I’m sorry, Grace. You’re a good woman, too good for me, and I hate myself for what I’ve done. I should have said no and just went out on my own. I could have done something else. I’ve always loved to write,” Judas continued.

It was the perfect opportunity to derail this conversation before the disaster that was inevitably approaching occurred. “What do you like to write about?” she asked, praying he’d accept the bait.

He pinched his eyes with his thumb and forefinger, then let out a shaky breath. “History. I’ve always wanted to travel to Greece and follow in the footsteps of Plato and Aristotle. I’d love to
really
get into their heads and see what inspired their philosophies. I catch myself fantasizing the freedom in traveling the world.”