Playing For Her Heart - Megan Erickson Page 0,35

that mean, the real you?”

That was all she had in her. “You wouldn’t understand.”

She raised her hand and blew him a flirty kiss, even though she felt anything but flirty, then dashed downstairs, pulling on her crumpled trench coat as she wrenched open the door, getting the hell out as fast as she could, leaving behind a confused Grant sitting naked in his bed.

But she couldn’t imagine anything beyond failing him in some way or another. She wasn’t this fantasy girl come to life. She was Chloe.

And Chloe would never be enough for a man like Grant.

Chapter Nine

What the hell was that?

Grant stared at his bedroom door, blinking. Seriously, what the hell?

He’d gone from having an amazing orgasm to wanting some damn burritos to Chloe disappearing on him before he could figure out what the hell had happened.

He hadn’t even really thought too much about it, asking her out to get a bite to eat with him. It’d just felt…right. That had been some amazing sex and all he wanted to do was eat and stare into Chloe’s eyes.

Was that wrong? And why the hell had she looked at him like he’d just asked her to make some lifelong commitment? It was just burritos for fuck’s sake.

You wouldn’t want the real me. What did that even mean? Chloe had a lot of sides to her, he saw now. Why couldn’t he want more than one?

Grant ran a hand through his hair and tugged, wishing Chloe was back in his bed, because he wasn’t hungry anymore.

After he’d slept with her the first time, he’d been mostly glad he didn’t have to deal with the complication of a committed relationship in his life. He was committed to Sydney and his friends and that was all he had time for. That was all he wanted.

He couldn’t want more with Chloe, could he? The idea of wanting to spend more time with her after sex had sounded damn good. But nah, this was probably better, right? No strings. She hadn’t wanted him and so he could live with that. His ego was still intact.

Except, his stomach hurt. It seemed like the roles were all that Chloe planned to give him. And for the first time since they started this charade, he thought that maybe it wasn’t enough.

The next morning, Grant sipped his coffee and watched as Sydney stuffed her mythology textbook she’d been studying at breakfast into her book bag.

He’d slept like shit last night because his whole house smelled like stupid flowers from the candle and strawberries from Chloe’s hair and fuck it all, he wanted to rip his nose off his face.

To top it off, he missed his daughter. They’d both been so busy lately, he hadn’t had a chance to sit down and talk to her like he usually did. He felt like a crappy parent. He needed to get his head out of the clouds and focus on his daughter. “Hey, we never got talk about career day. Did you like the professional you spoke to?”

Sydney brushed her hair over her shoulder and glanced at the clock. “It was awesome, I had the best mentor.”

“Really?” He had been pleased with her school. He imagined it was a lot of work to ask community professionals to take time to talk to students, but it was invaluable in his opinion.

“Yeah, she was really nice and we got along really well. I learned a lot about the field and she made me super-excited about it.”

“That’s great. What does she do?”

Sydney dug in her book bag. “She finds problems in software and fixes it.” She pulled out a business card and handed it to him. “And I told her I’d like to meet up sometime to talk more. She said sure but that she’d want a parent present. I guess so she didn’t get in trouble.”

Grant couldn’t speak, because his tongue froze to the roof of his mouth as he stared at the business card of one Chloe Talley.

He’d never in a million years thought she’d be at the career fair, so that must have been Ethan’s doing.

He looked up at his daughter. “Chloe Talley?”

“Yeah, do you know her?”

“Sweetheart, Talley is Ethan’s last name.”

Sydney frowned. “But he’s not married.”

“No, he’s not. This is his sister.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really. Did she say anything about your last name?”

Sydney pursed her lips. “I’m not sure I ever said my last name. I told her I was Sydney.”

The coincidence really wasn’t that great. The community wasn’t that big and the