Free Bittersweet Deceit by Blakely Bennett Page A

looks department. Even at his age, he’s genetically gifted. So instead of dazzling you with my good looks, I’ll have to win you over with my incredible wit and intelligence. If that fails, I’ll have to pull out my tantric tricks.”
    “And if I said I wasn’t interested?”
    “I would know you’re lying. You’re just distracted at the moment. I’m a patient man.”
    “ I love him,” I said and sighed.
    “I believe you, but you’re not happy.”
    “That’s a bit presumptuous.”
    He shrugged. “Maybe it is, but it’s still true.”
    “Are you always this way?”
    “What way?” Stay took the washcloth off my forehead and shook it out, letting it get cool.
    “So confident of your own ideas?”
    “Not ideas, perceptions and yes.” He refolded the cloth.
    “Well add this to your perceptions then, I’m open for friendship and nothing more. I know my relationship with Mason won’t last forever , but I’m monogamous.”
    “Even if he’s not?”
    “Even.”
    He slanted his head and raised an eyebrow.
    “ Well that’s not exactly true. If I found out he was sleeping with his wife or anyone else, I’d be livid.”
    “Well then, I hope you don’t find out.” He replaced the washcloth on my forehead.
    “Are you saying—never mind.” I didn’t want to know. “Why do you carry a handkerchief?”
    “My grandmother said that all gentlemen used to carry them , and it’s a shame that my generation didn’t. I started keeping one in my back pocket when I was eleven years old to please her. I found it very useful and never stopped. How often do you use a restroom that’s out of paper towels? Or have a flat tire that needs to be fixed but have nothing to wipe your hands on. Or to give to a damsel in distress, like yourself. I could go on listing examples, but I’ll spare you. I’m a handkerchief zealot.”
    “That’s funny.” When I fished out an ice chip from the water, the washcloth fell off in the process.
    Stay shook it out again and said, “It feels really good on the back of the neck too.” I leaned forward and he wrapped it around the nape of my neck.
    “Thank you,” I said, making e ye contact. I felt the positive, sexual energy he projected my way, but I dismissed it, convinced that being sick had made me unusually vulnerable. “Did your grandmother raise you?”
    “Yes, from eleven on. My folks weren’t the reliable sort. Alcohol was their poison, still is from what I’ve heard. Even before I lived with Granny permanently, I spent a lot of my time at her house.”
    “Jacqs told me that you don’t drink alcohol. Is that because of your parents?”
    “Yes and no. It was poison for me too. I didn’t like the person I was when I drank and neither would’ve you. Bond and Red stuck by me. Especially Bond. He picked me up off the ground many a time and tried to talk sense into me, still loving me even when I was a flaming dick. Red stopped me from getting my ass kicked on several occasions.”
    “What made you stop?”
    “My grandmother. She had really sacrificed a lot to raise me, even her marriage with my grandfather. That’s a long story for another time. I was a real handful in my teens and early twenties. One night she needed me and I told her I would come and I didn’t show. I got shitfaced and passed out at Bond’s old apartment. It’s not like I hadn’t disappointed my grandmother before but that last time, I could literally feel her pain. She thought she’d failed again and that I had become another lost cause. She didn’t say those things, she didn’t need to. She was my only family and she loved me unconditionally for years. That night broke me, and I thank the universe every day for it. I never had a drink again.”
    “I’m sorry.”
    “Don’t be. I believe that everything in life shapes us into the people we are and I’m happy with myself. My grandmother is a truly wonderful woman and my parents are just people. They have a harder time coping with life