Where am I? What happened? Why can’t I move?
My teeth are grinding together, and I’m wrapped around something warm and soft. I blink crummy eyes and wait for my blurry vision to sharpen. I hope I haven’t done anything stupid while dreaming, because last night…
Last night I was with Dakota. And she’s right here, curled in my arms. She has her back to me, the deathmoth tattoo barely visible in the gray light of dawn seeping through the window. I study the sweet curve of her shoulder, the pale expanse of her neck.
Then she tenses, curls up tighter. A whimper escapes her.
So this is what woke me up. Bad dream? I frown in the half-light, not sure what to do on this end of it, not being the one having the nightmare.
Sometimes, back when I lived with Emma and had bad dreams, she’d wake me up and stroke my arm until I could breathe again.
Uncharted territory.
I reach up and cup Dakota’s shoulder, then stroke her arm. “Shh, it’s okay,” I whisper. “You’re okay. I promise.”
She whimpers again, then jerks and twists around. Before I realize what’s going on, she’s turning in my arms, clutching me around the neck, nestling close.
Shocked into stillness, I don’t move as she rests her head on my chest, her soft hair tickling. After a small eternity, she settles, and I wrap my arms around her again.
Cuddling. On my bed. With a chick.
Must be the end of the world. I wait for darkness to set in. For an earthquake to hit or a bomb to go off, calamity to strike, and take us both down.
Nothing happens.
I relax a little, and thread my fingers through her hair. “Are you okay?”
She nods. “Nightmare.”
“What about?”
She swallows hard. I can feel her throat move. “Falling.”
I tense. “Why are you so afraid of falling?”
She says nothing.
“Go back to sleep,” I whisper.
“Don’t want to.” She sounds like a petulant child, and I smile in spite of myself. “Tell me about you.”
“My life’s not a fairytale.”
“Never said it was. I’m also building my folder on you, you know.”
“You are?” There’s a pleasant catch in my chest, like a kiss at my very center. Oh, fuck. And the worst part is that I want to tell her. The whole sad story of my past. All that fucks up with my head. All I’ve lost and may still lose. “What do you wanna know?”
“Why your cock is pierced,” she says.
I choke on laughter. I sure as hell wasn’t expecting this. “Seriously?”
“Seriously.” She nods gravely and looks down at my crotch. I’m naked, and, oh shit, I’m getting hard under her gaze. Her hand moves to the stud in my nipple, toying with it, and sensation tears through me, shooting straight into my dick, so that it tightens and rises against my stomach. “Tell me,” she says.
No clue what she’s talking about. Fuck.
“About the Jacob’s Ladder,” she goes on, still toying with the damn piercing. “Why did you put it in? Does it feel good when you have sex?”
“I, uh…” Her hand trails down my chest to my cock, and how the hell am I supposed to think like this? “Yeah.”