Page 82 of All In

Everything passes in a blur. The plates leave the table. María yawns. Gray’s hand tugs on mine. “You ready to head home, baby?”

I feel myself nodding, but my tongue feels too heavy to speak.

We say our goodbyes, and then we’re in the car, Gray’s hand still tucked in mine as the headlights illuminate the road in front of us.

“Are you okay? You’ve been really quiet.”

I bite at my lower lip, nerves rattling in my stomach. “Do you think I was rude?”

He turns his head, glancing at me. “No. Not at all. I don’t think they noticed.”

The “but I did” goes unsaid. Gray notices everything about me. He always has. That’s not a surprise.

“That story you told.”

His nose scrunches. “What story?”

“Of how we fell in love.”

His fingers twitch against mine, almost imperceptibly. “What about it?”

“Was it… the truth? Did you really want to marry me?”

Silence falls over the car, and Gray’s jaw clenches and then releases. “The easiest way to tell a lie is to keep it close to the truth.”

“What does that mean?”

He sighs. “They asked how we fell in love. I didn’t have a great answer, so I told them all that. It’s close to the truth. I mean, those things did happen.”

I sit on that for a second, my mind reeling. “So it wasn’t true? You didn’t mean it?”

Grayson glances at me again. “It was just a story, Harlow.”

“But it wasn’t the truth. You didn’t want to actually marry me?”

Biting the inside of my cheek, I wait for his answer. I’m not sure what to say, if anything. He’s quiet for so long that I’m sure he’s not going to say anything at all.

Finally, he shakes his head. “No. It wasn’t the truth. It was just a story. You were right.”

“Right about what?” I ask, my throat dry and a pit opening up in my stomach.

“Before the wedding.” The steering wheel creaks under his knuckles as he grips the leather. “You said that shit wasn’t real. You were right. It wasn’t. I was just a dumb kid who wanted to hang out with my best friend all the time.”

The pit grows, getting bigger and bigger until I’m sure it’s going to swallow me whole.

I carefully untangle my fingers from Grayson’s, letting my hand fall from his.

Not because I don’t want to hold his hand. But because for some reason I can’t explain, I’m almost sure that’s the first lie that Gray has told all night.

Chapter 25

Grayson

Harlow’s fingers untangle from mine, and he pulls his hand out of my grasp.

I swallow hard, my stomach twisting. For a second, I leave my hand resting on his thigh, but given how stiff his posture is, I can tell he doesn’t really want me to touch him, so after a few tense seconds, I pull it away.

This has been my fear since the start. Having sex is one thing, but it’s something entirely different to actually act like a couple in public. Pretending in the real world is hard. Especially when I’m not pretending.