Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 84763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 424(@200wpm)___ 339(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 424(@200wpm)___ 339(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
Walking in, I close the door behind me. She may be a little thing, but she’s spread herself out, one arm splayed across my side of the bed, her cheek resting half on my pillow. I draw the duvet back and see she’s wearing one of my shirts. It’s huge on her and I smile because I like the thought of it on her. Carefully, I lift her arm to slip into the bed.
Her face is close to mine, her expression sweet when she’s asleep. She showered. Her hair is a damp, unraveling braid.
I turn my face up to the ceiling, set her hand on my stomach and close my eyes, glad I’m exhausted because I’m wrong. It’s not easy to be this close to her, to feel her warmth and not touch her, but I don’t. I won’t.
I close my eyes.
Sleep is ever-elusive. It comes in fragments throughout the night. Exhaustion is my constant companion. I’ve learned to thrive on it. But tonight, sleep comes. It is a soft wave washing over me, no tugging undertow no riptide carrying me out to sea, drowning me.
Tonight, here, with her tucked warmly into my side, I sleep, a dreamless sleep.
7
ALLEGRA
An amber glow warms my face, makes the darkness a little less complete. It’s quiet, not a single bird to be heard, not Daniel in the next room playing with his toy train set. Not the sound of a vacuum cleaner running. I’m snug under a mountain of soft blankets and there’s something smooth, solid and warm beneath my hand.
I lay in a satisfied half-sleep until the light shifts, hitting my closed eyelids.
I stir.
Someone moves beside me.
Someone. Moves. Beside. Me.
Like a tsunami, memory comes crashing back knocking the sleep right out of me. My eyelids fly open, and I’m horrified to find a pair of eyes the color of a Mediterranean sea just inches from mine, watching me, a gleam of amusement inside them.
“What the hell?” I pull away, noting what was warm and smooth and fucking solid beneath my hand.
Cassian smiles wide, sets his hands behind his head and turns his face into the amber light. He gives a satisfied sigh. That light is the sun filtered by the stained glass of the window across the room.
He closes his eyes momentarily.
“I’ll never tire of this,” he says.
“Of what? Kidnapping women, beating them then sneaking into bed with them?”
He chuckles. “The light,” he clarifies.
“What are you doing here?”
I tug a greedy chunk of the duvet to myself. Without opening his eyes, he catches a corner and pulls it back over his naked body.
Shit. Is he naked? Am I?
No. I’m still wearing his shirt, but I’m naked apart from that.
“It’s my bed. And for the record, I did not kidnap you, you’re being held as collateral. Like I explained last night, your family knows exactly where you are, and they are welcome to collect you as soon as they’ve paid me back the money they owe me.”
“The money you’re extorting—”
“The money they cost me plus a little extra for my trouble. As for beating you, a spanking is hardly a beating, especially when you’re wet at the end.”
“I wasn’t wet!”
“Then you have a very selective memory. And this is my bedroom and my bed. I wasn’t sneaking. Where do you expect me to sleep?”
“The other room. There’s a perfectly good bed in there,” I say, pointing to the door of the adjoining room.
“I don’t think so, Moth,” he pushes the blanket back and sits up. I’m glad to see he’s not completely naked. I take in the part of the Grim Reaper that spans his back. It’s mostly his cloak and a graveyard littered with clocks. It’s weird. “I’m going to shower, then I’ll make you breakfast,” he says, reading a message on his cell phone.
“You were touching me,” I tell him.
He turns to me. “I slept on one third of the bed. If you’ll notice, you took up the other two-thirds even though you’re half my size. Maybe thank me for not shoving you aside and waking you.”
“Right. You’re very generous.”
“And just to be clear, if anyone was molesting anyone, it was your hand on my dick.” He stands, faces me and my gaze goes to that part of his anatomy which is currently a steel rod in his briefs.
“I wasn’t touching your dick,” I say quickly, averting my gaze, sure I’m beet red.
“Close enough. But don’t flatter yourself. This is just how I wake up. Although, I am amenable if you need—”
“No! I do not need that!” I snap, pointing. “And if I did it wouldn’t be your… that!”
He laughs outright as he walks toward the bathroom. I’m furious at myself because he was taunting me, and I walked right into his trap. He closes the door, and a moment later, the shower goes on.