This one was done in greens and was smaller than his. No window. The bed wasn’t much bigger than my college dorm bed, but as it was unoccupied and I was still exhausted, it looked great. I pulled on a pair of shorts and a shirt, because I’d lied to Dominic the other day. I didn’t sleep in the nude unless I had to.
I curled up under the covers and passed out.
Only to wake with his arm around me, making me the little spoon once again. What the fuck? My bleary eyes surveyed the room. Purple, not green. Big bed, not little. His room. “How the hell did I get here?”
“Plane,” he rumbled, half-asleep.
“No, asshole. How’d I get in this bed?”
There was a hand attached to the arm thrown over me, and that hand was beneath my shirt, his palm warm against my belly. “I got lonely and dragged your ass back here. Now stop talking so I can sleep. I have to work tomorrow.”
I tried to get up, but the hand went firm.
“Don’t even think about it.”
Fire flooded into me. “I told you. I. Don’t. Do. This.”
The bed rocked subtly as he rose up on an arm and loomed over me. Only the faint blue light from his alarm clock lit the room, but I could see his face clearly enough. It was set and determined.
“I. Don’t. Care.” Annoyance coated his voice. “My bed’s been empty for a year and you think I’m going to let the most beautiful woman I’ve seen sleep in the other room?”
I stared up at him and tried to assemble my words, but apparently he wasn’t finished.
“I brought you ten thousand miles to be here with me. Not on the other side of my apartment. What’s the big deal? You get night-terrors or something?”
“No,” I scoffed. “But it’s . . .” God, I didn’t want to have this conversation, now or ever.
“But it’s what?”
I sighed. “It’s too intimate.”
Of course he began to laugh. If I wasn’t pissed that he was laughing at me, I might have thought his laugh sounded nice. Deep, yet warm and infectious. Instead, I flung his hand off of me.
He scrambled to regain control. “Hey, stop that. Come on, this is stupid. We’ve had sex how many times already? We’re way past intimate.”
That’s not how I viewed it at all. Seeing him naked, sleeping with him . . . that wasn’t intimacy. The day-to-day, real life was what I didn’t want. I wouldn’t mind a peek behind the curtain of Dominic, but he sure as shit wasn’t going to get one behind mine.
I flopped down, turning over in a huff, and heard him settle back down.
I knew this was stupid, and if I ever wanted to belong to someone else, I was going to have to let them in. Yet I’d only done that once in my life and been burned so spectacularly, I couldn’t stomach the thought of trying again. I’d held Joel at a safe distance and hidden behind the sex, but my strategy had only worked for so long.
The bedroom was silent other than Dominic’s breathing which deepened as he fell asleep. Now I was wide-awake, staring at the ceiling of his Japanese apartment. How much longer should I stay here? I had to be firm about this sleeping arrangement. I’d let him have the kissing, but no more blowing past my rules.
I waited.
Gently extracted myself from his embrace.
And waited again. Then, I escaped from his bed the second time, channeling my inner ninja. I was relieved to stand my ground as I crossed the living area for the guest bedroom, but worried what action he was going to take when he figured out he was alone again. Would he storm into the bedroom, flip the lights on, and demand I get back into bed with him?
No, it was worse.
His heavy arm was around me again, crushi
ng me against his body that was like a fucking furnace.
“Morning,” he murmured when I stirred.
“Seriously?” I was disoriented with sleep, wanting to fall back into it. Too tired to argue right at that moment. “Can you at least get on your side?”