Chapter 29
“Don’t make me break this door down!”
“You do what you have to do!” she snapped back, too freaking exhausted to do this today.
She didn’t care that she was supposed to be packed and leaving right now, not when she was this exhausted. She’d tried. God, knew that she’d tried to do the right thing and pack her bag so that she could clear out, but the moment that she sat down on her bed to apply lotion to her skin she’d lost the battle. Before she knew what was happening, she had her eyes closed and was curled up in her bed, already falling asleep.
That’s when the pounding started.
Well, to be fair, he’d probably started off with a soft knock, but by the time she’d heard him, he was pounding on the door and demanding that she move her butt before he broke the door down. Let him break the door down, she thought, really not caring at the moment, not when she was finally on the verge of falling into a deep, peaceful, restful sleep for the first time in weeks.
She didn’t care what he did right now as long as he let her sleep. He could drag her out of here, throw her into his truck, and drop her on Sara’s doorstep for all she cared, just as long as he did it without waking her up.
God, she was just so freaking tired…
“What the hell are you doing?” Reese asked, not sounding mad as she felt the bed dip.
“Sleeping,” she mumbled, wondering if he’d be willing to grab her pillow and comforter for her before he left.
“I can see that,” he said, sighing as the bed jostled a bit and she felt him lying down next to her. “You know that you’re only wearing a towel, right?”
“And you realize that you’re still talking, right?” she shot back, curling up and even more determined than ever to fall asleep.
“And you’re hogging the bed,” he grumbled, shifting again.
“It’s my bed.”
“You can share.”
“I really can’t,” she muttered, absently reaching back to push him away so that he would stop jostling her.
“You really can,” he said, ignoring her demands that he move over and somehow ended up taking up more space.
“Don’t you have work to do?” she reminded him, forced to shift over even more, not even caring at this point if she lost her towel in the process.
“I do, but some pain in the ass won’t get the hell out so that I can get started,” he said, already sounding like he was half-asleep.
“Jerk,” she mumbled, enjoying his chuckle even as he shifted, once again jostling her.
“Brat.”
“Would you stop moving?” she asked, too tired to open her eyes so that she could glare at him.
So, instead she settled for lying there, getting jostled as the man that was clearly too big for her bed continued to move, slowly destroying her will to live. Whimpering, she grabbed hold of her towel, shifted to the edge, and released a long-suffering sigh only to end with a small grunt of surprise when she suddenly found herself dragged back into the middle of the bed and pulled up tightly against a warm chest.
“What are-”
“Shhhh, sleeping,” the manhandling bastard muttered as his arm tightened around her and god help her, but she was too tired to argue with him.
That, and he was so warm and comfortable and she was so freaking tired.
So. Freaking. Tired.
“Are you going to grab the pillow and comforter?” he mumbled, tightening his hold on her and making it impossible for her to do just that.
Not that she was actually going to do that when she was barely capable of doing anything more than mumble at the moment. Instead, she shifted back against him, put her arm over his, and slowly exhaled as she started to drift off when she realized that this was the first time that she’d fallen asleep in someone’s arms since Michael died and couldn’t help but smile when she realized that it wasn’t as terrifying as she thought it would be.
*-*-*-*
“What time is it?” the woman tangled up in his arms mumbled into his chest.
“No clue,” he said, refusing to open his eyes and find out that this whole thing had been nothing more than a dream.
A refreshing, soul-mending, blissful dream where he got to hold the woman that he wanted more than his next breath in his arms and-
“Oh, hell,” he groaned when she suddenly turned in his arms and pressed her wiggling bottom against him, drawing a surprised hiss from him as his arm tightened around her, praying that she stopped all that wiggling that had him grinding his jaw as she settled in to get more comfortable.
“Are you done yet?” he asked through a clenched jaw as he struggled to ignore just how good she felt in his arms.
“Maybe,” she said with a little wiggle that had him slowing exhaling and going over in his head everything that he was going to need in order to finish the kitchen and living room to keep from enjoying that wiggle, because he knew better than to let himself enjoy her touch when it wouldn’t end well for him.
“God, you’re mean,” he said with a pained chuckle, once against tightening his hold around her to get her to stop wiggling before he lost his fucking mind.
“Mmmhmmm,” she murmured sleepily, already starting to doze off in his arms again.
Opening his eyes, he looked down at the beautiful woman in his arms and couldn’t help but smile. She was just so beautiful and pixie cute, he thought with a chuckle as he gave into the urge and released his hold on her so that he could run his fingers through her short, silky hair.
“What are you doing?” she asked with a twitch of her lips as she reached up and blindly swatted his hand away with a laugh and a, “Stop!”
“You know you snore, right?” he asked, chuckling when she cracked an eye open to glare up at him.
“I do not!”
“You really do,” he said, smiling down at the beautiful woman glaring up at him as she rolled over onto her back to glare more effectively at him, making sure to keep a good hold on that towel that refused to budge.
“You know it’s wrong to lie, don’t you, Officer Bradford?” she asked, blinking up at him.
“Oh, if only I was lying,” he said with a forlorn sigh and a sad shake of his head that had her narrowing her eyes on him.
“Lies, Yummy. All lies,” she said with a tsk as she reached up and ran her fingers through his hair before smoothing it down as she smiled up at him.
“Are you sure?” he murmured, looking into her beautiful blue eyes as he felt the air around them suddenly shift.
“Yes,” she said, slowly losing that beautiful smile as she returned his gaze, looking a little lost as her hand fell away and he found himself looking at her beautiful plump lips, wondering how they would feel against his.
“I-I should probably pack,” she whispered softly as she tightened her hold on her towel even as her gaze dropped to his lips and all he wanted to do was to lean down and find out if her lips were really as soft as they looked.
“Probably,” he said, unable to take his gaze away from those lips that he thought about damn near every minute of the day.
Unable to stop himself, he leaned down and found himself pushed back as Kasey shoved him away with a panicked, “I should get going!” as she raced from the bed, threw open the door and slammed it shut behind her, leaving him lying there, staring at the wall and wondering if she had any idea that she’d just escaped into the closet.
Rubbing his hands roughly down his face, he sat up and shook his head in disgust at himself, because he was about to seriously fuck this up again.