Play It Safe by Kristen Ashley Read Free Book Online Page B

comin’ home with me.”
    My body froze and I stared at him.
    Then I forced my mouth to whisper, “Sorry?”
    “You’re comin’ home with me.”
    “I –”
    He interrupted me. “First, I got a first aid kit. You can disinfect and put shit on the cut. Second, I got a grandma who lives with me, she’s not ancient, she’s not young but she could be three hundred years old and still she’d have the hearing of a German Shepherd. She goes to church every Sunday and she’d lose her mind if I brought a girl home with any intent other than to make her dinner or study the Bible.”
    I couldn’t help it. That was so funny, it made my mouth twitch.
    Gray watched my mouth move and flat out smiled.
    Then he started speaking again.
    “And last, got an extra bed. Manny takes pride in his place,” his arm moved, indicating the space around us that was clean and to my practiced eye I knew it had been renovated sometime in the last five years and although the cable was basic and I wouldn’t want to live the rest of my life there, it was pretty nice for what it was and a whole lot nicer than many places I’d laid my head, “but I bet the bed at my house is more comfortable and I can guarantee a thousand other people haven’t slept in it. So, what I’m sayin’ is, you’re safe, you’ll be comfortable and last, and most important, you’re safe. ”
    I read him and my eyes locked to his.
    “You think they’ll come back,” I said quietly.
    “No tellin’. Jim, Ted and Pete, no way. ‘Specially Pete. Buddy is an asshole and he was pissed. You were immune to his charms then you bested him then he got bested by me. That shit doesn’t lay well with him so…” he trailed off and shrugged.
    This wasn’t good.
    Another trickle of blood slid down his face. It wasn’t much but the cut was still bleeding.
    That wasn’t good either.
    Darn it all to heck.
    I closed my eyes.
    “Ivey, swear to God, you’ll be safe with me.” I heard him say softly.
    I opened my eyes mostly because him talking soft was nice and with my eyes closed it seemed a heck of a lot nicer.
    “Get what you need and write your brother a note. I’ll bring you back in the morning.”
    I wanted to bite my lip.
    I didn’t.
    I went to the bathroom, did my best to rinse his blood from the washcloth I had, I wet another one then took it out to him.
    Then, stopping as far away as I could, I held it to him and said quietly, “It’s still bleeding. Maybe I should drive.”
    He took the cloth from me but he did it grinning.
    Hells bells.
    * * * * *
    “Go on through to the kitchen, I’ll take this upstairs and get the first aid kit,” Gray ordered on a mutter, his fingers flipping a light switch which illuminated the hall.
    He’d already illuminated the entryway.
    At the end of the hall was a kitchen.
    He turned and went to the foot of the stairs and jogged up, carrying my bag.
    I stood in the hall and allowed myself to bite my lip.
    He didn’t live in town.
    He lived out of town and not close to anyone. I couldn’t tell in the dark if it was a ranch or an orchard. There were a lot of shadowy trees close to his house. There were also outbuildings and some fenced but empty pens. One of the outbuildings was a barn.
    But it was his house I liked.
    It was old. It wasn’t a ranch house, it was a farmhouse. Not big. Compact. Two stories. From what I could tell white outside but the woodwork was painted something else. A rectangular porch out front with a porch swing, the family room jutting out so the porch only had two open sides.
    Stained glass in the door.
    I didn’t have to peruse the rest of the house, the entryway said it all.
    People lived here, the same people for generations. When I say that I mean the same family. The furniture was old and pretty. The pictures on the wall faded and pretty. The décor the same. This house had been lived in, maybe stuff had been added but nothing had been taken away. Still, instead of full and suffocating, it seemed