How Roth & Grayson met…

“Do you mind if I sit?”

Before she could answer, Grayson settled beside her and stretched his legs out. Distractedly, she noticed that he didn’t have one hair on his glossy, perfectly sculpted legs. Did he wax?

They sat in companionable silence for a minute, taking in the other beachgoers before she asked, “You know?”

“Yes.”

The moment she laid eyes on him, she suspected he’d been told. She stifled the urge to surge to her feet and walk away and instead lifted her face to the sun.

“Did Roth ever tell you how we met?”

She tipped her head toward him and saw he was watching her over the tops of his sunglasses. Curious despite herself, she said, “No, he hasn’t.”

He grinned and pushed his sunglasses up his nose before he looked out to sea. “The man is a vault,” he murmured. “I doubt he could be tortured for information. He’d just look them dead in the eye and tell them to keep going.”

She waited for a full minute, but when he said nothing, she prodded, “So, how did you two meet?”

“He stopped me from jumping off a bridge.”

She sat up quickly and examined his face for a sign that he was joking. He had a crooked smile on his mouth, but it more self deprecating than amused.

“You…?” She didn’t know how to frame her question.

“I inherited a…” He cocked his head and considered his words before he settled on, family legacy that took its toll. I was stuck in this role with no one to take my place. I couldn’t take it anymore, so I decided to take myself out of the equation and let the world sort it out.”

Two women frolicked in front of them while sending flirtatious looks Grayson’s way. He stared straight through them as his fingers absently sifted the fine sand.

“At first I wanted it to look like an accident. I tried every extreme sport you can imagine. Then I switched to drugs and alcohol.”

He leaned back, bracing his hands on the sand. His shirt parted, revealing a chiseled chest and abdomen so perfect, it looked airbrushed. He looked like a clean-cut Calvin Klein model rather than a man hellbent on destroying himself.

**This is a raw draft of Bitter Sins. Please do not share or distribute.

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