And with that last thought, I closed my eyes and fell asleep faster than I had done since I was a baby.Chapter SixteenRaoulThe next morning, at roughly 7.05am, after a night of broken sleep thanks to the sleep Olympian I’d fallen in love with…
Breakfast was a slightly awkward affair that morning. After being woken up with an elbow to the gut again, I’d finally managed to get Rose to settle down by making love to her again. This time it had been slow and silent, but it had worked and she’d stayed still in her sleep for two hours, so that was something. With that knowledge, it was now a trick I wasn’t above using every night if I needed to.
I’d thought about the spooning issue as I’d walked through to the kitchen after showering and waking her up. It was true – I hated spooning. It made me feel claustrophobic, and a couple of my ex’s hadn’t been able to cope with the fact I wouldn’t do it with them in the past and it had led to us breaking up. Yeah, that’s how shit at relationships I was – I had breakups based on frigging spooning, don’t even get me started on that. But with Rose, I needed to feel her against me in my sleep, it settled me enough to make me fall asleep almost immediately. I don’t know why and how it worked, but it did.
That wasn’t the reason why breakfast was awkward, though. The reason for that was because of the papa bear who was currently sitting at the table, glaring holes into my back while I got my coffee. We’d been as quiet as we could be, and with the shower running the first time and my hand over Rose’s mouth, I was sure he hadn’t been able to hear anything. His glares said otherwise.
“Morning,” Rissa called as she joined us. “Did you sleep well?”
“Your daughter sleeps like a psycho,” I muttered, adding creamer to the cup.
I swear to God, I heard Hogan grinding his teeth before he snapped, “Well maybe you should sleep on the porch?”
Leaning against the counter, I looked at him over the rim of my cup as Rissa joined me. “Oh, shut it,” she snickered, hitting the button and looking over at me. “You know, my dad found out we were together when Hogan climbed in through my window and spent the night one time,” she told me, making the mouthful of coffee I had taste bitter - oh so freaking bitter - as I tried to guesstimate how much therapy cost these days. “He sleeps just like Rose does, and when he heard the creaking of the bed my daddy came running in…”
“Jesus, Rissa,” Hogan hissed at the same that I pinched the bridge of my nose.
“Just saying, dear,” she sang, reaching for her cup now that the machine was done. “Your daughter takes after you.”
Rubbing his face with both hands, he took a second to shake off the embarrassment. When he’d managed it, he looked up at me, except this time it was with concern. “What did she say about the note?”
Before I could tell him that I hadn’t had the chance to tell her about it yet, a voice came from the doorway, “What note?”
See? Awkward, right?
Picking up the cup of coffee that I’d made for her, I gestured toward the living room. “We need to talk.”“So, let me get this right, he somehow managed to get something to write with on a scrap of paper, left it with the guy he was in with, disappeared, and then the guy suddenly comes forward with the note?”
When she put it like that, it sounded like the plot of a movie but it pretty much summed what had happened up. “The guy told us he used a small piece of plaster he’d found to do it, and it looks about right given that the words were scratched on the paper instead of written.”
After I’d explained it all, I’d expected her to be pissed at me for not telling her sooner, but the truth was I hadn’t had the chance to. Telling her in front of everyone else might have made her feel vulnerable or uncomfortable, and I’d wanted to be able to give her my full attention and to answer any questions she had without interruptions. That’s what we were doing now, and so far she hadn’t threatened my balls.
“What the hell is it with this asshole?” she asked angrily. “Why can’t he just accept he’s lost and move the fuck on like a normal person?”
There was one simple answer to that question. “Control. People who are abusive or who bully others love the control. It empowers them and makes them feel bigger and better than they are.”
“So get social media,” she growled, flinging a hand up in the air. “That’s what people normally do. Or sell something online and tell the buyers to leave a review, it works for them. Have you seen the reviews on those online sites for things they’ve bought?”