It had taken Niko another half an hour to get to sleep.
Hollywood could have told you the exact millisecond she let go of consciousness by the way her muscles finally relaxed, her head slumping against his bicep.
His arms tightened around her instinctively, as though they were responding to her increased state of vulnerability.
Hollywood was still wrapped around Niko’s slender frame, his forearms brushing against her breasts, his cock no less hard than he’d been when they’d heard Roman’s giggle.
“I would.” Niko’s words kept repeating over and over in his brain, testing his resolve, tempting him to wake her up and make love to her.
He couldn’t do it.
As much as his shaft was still trying to convince him it would be Ok, he knew that he couldn’t take it to the next level, not here like this, when so much was up in the air.
He closed his eyes and breathed in the fragrance of her skin.
Ah, God, but he wanted to sink inside her wet heat, and drown in the feel of her orgasming inner flesh, wrapped tightly around his cock, milking his seed from him.
As if she could read his thoughts, Niko wriggled against him, the beautifully rounded cheeks of her ass pushing into his groin and bringing him more arousal and frustration.
He couldn’t remember a time in his adult life when he’d been more attracted to a woman, more aroused by a woman, and yet completely powerless to do anything about it.
And he was certain of that one thing… he would do nothing about it.
If they’d have met any other way, at any other time, he wouldn’t have hesitated to chase after her. Not being with a woman like Niko would never have been a consideration, not as long as there was breath in his body, and so long as she showed an interest.
“I would.” Those words would be permanently etched in his brain.
Niko wriggled again.
“No!” She mumbled, still fast asleep. “Don’t hurt him.”
Shit! She was having a bad dream.
Hollywood tightened his arms around her.
“Shh…” He whispered. “It’s all Ok.”
She continued to fret as her slim body jerked in his arms.
“Stop!” She moaned. “Please! Don’t hurt him.”
She must be dreaming of Roman, he thought.
“Baby, Roman is fine.” He soothed into her ear. “Everything is fine.”
Niko shook her head, causing her hair to fall into her eyes.
“No, they’re hurting him.” She whispered urgently. “They’re not going to stop until he tells them where I am. But it wasn’t him. He didn’t help me.”
Hollywood tensed. She obviously wasn’t talking about Roman now.
“Who are they hurting, baby?” He whispered into her hair. “Who didn’t help you?”
“Hollywood!” She hissed. “Hollywood!”
What?
He couldn’t for the life of him work out what she meant.
He hadn’t helped her?
Of course, he would help her, and Niko should know that.
So, why was she worrying about him anyway? Didn’t she realise he could take care of himself?
Niko fussed for a little while longer, but he couldn’t make out anything in her mumblings except fear and anxiety.
Running through her words just left him more confused.
In her dream, someone must have helped her get away, presumably from Ilya. But for whatever reason it wasn’t Hollywood that had helped her.
Well, that didn’t make sense at all.
Who had rescued her?
Kellen? Possibly. The other Guardians? Not likely. She was barely on nodding terms with them. Drago? He was Ilya’s man. She’d made that quite clear.
Hollywood tried to relax his muscles and realised that at least his cock had started to soften. That was some relief, anyway.
Maybe she was the informant after all, and she was expecting the rescuers to be strangers to her. That would explain why she wasn’t expecting Hollywood to be her white knight.
Hollywood tried to settle his breathing into a regular pattern.
Niko was dreaming. That was all.
He shouldn’t be trying to figure out the meaning behind anything, because everyone with an ounce of sense knew that dreams were ten percent grounded in reality and ninety percent grounded in fairyland. You couldn’t rely on them, and definitely shouldn’t try and make sense of them. That wasn’t their purpose.
Niko had probably eaten something that had disagreed with her.
Hollywood smiled.
Kellen had stopped eating cheese years ago, as it made him restless in his sleep.
That was it! Niko had eaten something that had sparked off a chemical reaction. That was all a dream was.
Hollywood closed his eyes again and tried to relax.
If only he could figure out which part of her dream contained the ten percent of reality.