“Damn, Weston,” she gasps. “We’re so good it’s dangerous.”
I laugh bitterly. This sweet, sweet girl doesn’t know how dangerous this could truly be.
For both of us.
“Seriously. I don’t have the energy to lift my arms,” she whispers.
Neither do I, but I find it, just enough to tuck her limbs around me and tangle us up.
We pass out like that, as if we’re two lovers with an honest future beyond apocalyptic sex.
Not a couple of liars desperate to risk everything for lust.
* * *
When I open my eyes, the room is silent except for Shelly’s soft breathing.
I roll over, look at her, and smile for three blissful seconds.
Then reality throat punches me again and my smile slips off my face.
What the hell are we doing? Playing with each other’s emotions like this?
Even the most satisfying horizontal rumba of my life can’t overturn the fact that we’re acting like we’ve got a future when everything screams impossible.
Fuck.
I should know better.
I should know a lot of things I’m blind, deaf, and dumb to when she’s in my bed.
I need to think, plus I’m waking up later than usual and Herc’s probably headbutting his pen from starvation.
Carefully, I climb off the bed, find my jeans, and exit the room. I also collect the clothes we left strewn across the living room.
I put hers in the bedroom and shut the door before pulling on my shirt. Then I pour a glass of well water from the pitcher in the fridge and step outside, sitting on the porch so I can collect my thoughts in the icy fall morning.
There are too many to collect, apparently. My head feels like somebody opened it up and dumped sharp gravel inside.
“Focus, dammit,” I whisper to myself.
How can I let her down easy?
How can we do this for weeks without ripping her beating heart out—and mine?
It’s guaranteed to hurt when it ends.
I’ll feel it, too, and likely walk away from her with a few more scars on my charred-to-a-crisp soul.
Nothing has changed.
I can’t have a real relationship with her, or anybody.
There’s always that nagging chance I could fall off the wagon and put my demons back in control. Collateral damage I’ll never shake off from the war.
No one deserves to live with a man like that.
I’m a functioning person, but not human.