Sawyer lay on his side, the blanket draped over his thigh as he traced the smooth curve of Julia’s hip. They’d come back to her room after the gym. He’d showered and changed, and she’d fed him cheese and toast and tinny red wine from a faded bottle of Mateus Rose that she’d pulled out from under the bed with a giggle. Finally, he’d fallen into an exhausted sleep, Julia in his arms and crumbs on the sheets.

His fingers slid into the soft swell where her legs met at a juncture of delectable darkness. Soft hair brushed under the tips of his fingers. She stirred, and her lids flickered, unseen dreams racing across her eyes. His hand continued further, stroking the satin warmth of her thigh. Her lips parted, and she muttered, her brow creasing as she continued to doze.

She’d allowed him to sleep with her only a handful of times and even then only for few hours, never for the entire night. Each time it had been the same; her sleep was restless and haunted, never peaceful. His hand slipped from her leg back to her face, where he swept her hair from her forehead. He kissed her brow, soothing her agitation. Her lids opened, and she was finally still, her eyes dark and silent.

The frown remained on her face. “You’re still here.” She raised her hand to his cheek, running her nail though the bristles on his chin.

He twisted his face and kissed the side of her palm. Her skin was musky-sweet, like sugar. “You were having a bad dream.”

She blinked. “Was I?”

“Uh huh.” He scanned her face, looking for clues, but she was already shutting down on him.

“Chittrix stuff,” she said with brisk shake of her head.

She sat up abruptly, hiding from him under a thick curtain of hair. The sheet dropped from her breasts, pooling in her lap. Julia was many things, but bashful was not one of them. He cupped one golden breast, running his finger across the dusky nipple. He liked that in a woman. Especially in this woman. The list of what he liked about Julia increased every day with little sign of abating.

“You were repeating a name. Maria.” He regarded her steadily, casting his mind back to her hesitance down in the basement. “Anything to do with what happened earlier?”

“I hate water. I hate having nothingness under my feet…” She waved her hand.

He waited, leaving space between them. There was more, balanced on the edge of her tongue, loosened by sleep and sex. He was a patient man.

She sighed and rolled her eyes at his patience.

“You don’t need to tell me if you don’t want to,” he said.

She flashed him a look, and he saw the effort of keeping it to herself was finally greater than that of release. She picked at a loose thread on the sheet. “There’s not much to tell. Maria was my sister. She died when I was nine. She was only seven and we were swimming in the lake together.” She hugged her legs and buried her face for a moment, resting her eyes against her knees. He stroked the smooth skin of her thigh, waiting for her to continue.

“She got caught in tall weeds near the bottom and it took a long time to find her because she was so little.”

She huffed softly. “The darkness and the water, not knowing what was going on in the basement. It was too much. I saw Maria floating, green weeds anchoring her to the riverbed. Every night in my dreams my father dives in and pulls her out, and there’s water and screaming. So much screaming.” She stopped suddenly and squeezed her eyes together, but the tears escaped and found their way to the swell of her cheek.

Sawyer remained silent, placing his hand on the small of her back, circling the dimples at the base of her spine.

“I’m sorry.”

She nodded, her head bumping against her knees. “My life was never the same after we lost Maria. My dad buried himself in his work, and my mother…my mother died that day. She was there, but hollow with nothing left inside, just a papery shell. She started drinking and at first, it was just a few glasses of wine while she was cooking. Then it escalated. I would find bottles of vodka hidden behind the curtains, and we had to check the oven and the washing machine before we switched them on, because she used to hide them there too. I quickly realized no one was going to do anything for me. I needed to do stuff myself.”

She stopped then, and he sensed her instinct to flee like she always did. Her voice steadied. “Did me no harm. Drove me to the top.”

He covered her small hand with his, wanting to hold her. She glanced at his fingers, concentration creasing the skin between her eyebrows. “I shouldn’t be telling you this. It’s not part of the deal, Sawyer.”

He bristled at her use of his surname and her steadfast refusal to call him by anything else.

“It can be,” he said simply. I want it to be part of the deal.

She shook her head, the fall of her hair shifting on her shoulder. “Don’t complicate things.”

He held his tongue. She was locking him out. Now was not the time.

She gave him a serious look, all business now. The vulnerable woman was secreted away again and, her voice was suddenly official and brusque. “You should go.” She tossed sheets aside. “Where’s my t-shirt?”

He sat up running a hand across his skull. Why did it always have to be like this afterwards?

Snagging it off the floor, he passed her the shirt. Julia pulled it on, tugging it over the swell of her breasts. She wasn’t wearing a bra, and it hugged the outline of her nipples, teasing his cock even now.

“We shouldn’t be doing this,” she said.

He considered the dark and silent room, trying to keep the sarcasm from coating his words. “Doing what, exactly?”

“This. Time afterward.”

He cleared his throat and climbed off the bed, yanking on his jeans. “Julia. We’re not. It’s just talking. What normal couples do. Or are we not normal?” He tugged his belt tight. Tighter than he intended. He loosened it off a notch so he could still breathe.

She ignored his question with narrowed eyes and stepped in front of him, wearing only her t-shirt and underwear. A flash of lilac lace below the hem made him pause. Her hair was a tumble of dark waves, begging him to run his fingers through it.

“Are you still able to do this?” She ran her fingernail across the line of his jaw.

“This?” He decided to be obtuse on purpose. Make her repeat it. He wanted to look into her eyes and see what was there.

Her shoulders twitched. The smallest gesture of frustration? Maybe she was just tired from lack of sleep.

“Use each other for sex whenever we feel like it. Day or night. But nothing else.”

He watched those beautiful eyes, daring to hope for hesitation or doubt, but they were steady and unrelenting.

“I don’t know if it’s going to work anymore,” he admitted.

Fear flitted across her face like a dark shadow, just like always.

No matter how much he wanted their relationship to be different, he didn’t know how to change it. Catching her hand, he raised it to his lips then turned it over and kissed the inside of her wrist. The heat of her blood burned against his lips as he muttered her name into the softness of her skin. Her scent wrapped round his brain, ensnaring him. “Because obviously, you’re going to fall in love with me.” The words came easily. It was a common game they played.

Julia ran her hands through her hair, and she cocked her head slowly, a smile finally playing at the edges of her mouth. “I’ve already told you, I don’t do love.”

“Whatever, Dr. Simmons.” His reply was quicker than he intended.

She didn’t notice his discomfort or perhaps she was ignoring it. An easy smile spread across her face now that she was on familiar ground. “I’m still working on reducing the size of the Sweeper’s components. Make the damn thing more portable and powerful. That’s what I have time for. Well, that and you in my bed at two a.m. if I want you.”

“So we keep doing this until one of us feels something more? Just remember I warned you.”

“Warned me?”

“You’ll be first. Eventually you are going to fall in love with me.” He was impressed at how neutral he sounded.

He moved away, bending to pick up his boots. Where were his damn socks? He spotted them tucked under the edge of the sheet that spilled across the floor.

“It’s not going to be me,” she retorted, not missing a beat. “There’s too much crap going on for us to waste time on relationships. I told you that from the beginning. I’ve always been up front with you.”

“You are so romantic.”

She shrugged, dismissive. “There’s no romance anymore. We both know that.”

Sawyer hesitated. Unquestioned assumptions were a thing of his past and cold fingers of doubt pressed against the bones of his chest.

Cracking the bedroom door open, Julia checked outside to make sure the corridor was clear. She stood back to let him pass.

“No one there.”

He stepped out into the corridor, willing her to ask him to stay but her door clicked shut behind him and he was alone, just as she’d promised.