Maybe that’s how Hunter had always felt—like a guest, even in his own apartment.
I hopped down, pressing my hands to his chest. My whole body was sore. From the waist down, I felt like I’d been wrecked. From the waist up, every inch of my skin was covered with a red rash from his unforgiving stubble.
“Thanks.” I kissed the corner of his mouth.
“For what?”
“For being real. I know it’s hard.”
I started to my room, resisting the urge to invite him to my bed, seeing as his was broken. Never mind that we broke it together. I decided to be very careful with Hunter when it came to things that could be viewed as clingy or too relationship-y. Not just for his sake, but for mine, too.
The minute I stepped over his bathroom’s threshold, though, his hand snaked and caught me by the waist.
“Where do you think you’re going, aingeal dian? If you can still walk, that means we’re not finished yet.”
He carried me to my own bed and did unspeakable things to my body three more times that night.
Then fell asleep on top of me, our limbs tangled together.
And when we woke up the next morning, true to his promise, it was almost impossible to walk with the soreness between my legs. It felt like I was peeing fire, and I actually feared to do a number two.
But what I worried about most was my heart, which felt ten pounds heavier, and so swollen I almost tripped over my own feet.
The next six weeks passed quickly.
I was drowning in work and essays, but never missed a chance to fuck my roommate, who—it was safe to admit now—had turned out to be the best roommate in the history of roommates.
Just to be on the safe side, I didn’t get my bed replaced. It made slipping into her bed every night seem more practical and less…whatever. Even after Sailor got back to training full-time and started waking up early again, I still found time to fit in a morning quickie, even if it meant waking up with her.
It really took the edge off the rest of the day.
Bonus points: Da didn’t seem to be pissed at Sailor after that bullshit dinner, so there was no immediate threat to my inheritance. While he was careful not to talk to me, and limited our already-restricted communication, Sailor told me he’d been emailing her more frequently and had even used the term of endearment “sweetheart” (insert throwing up emoji here).
“He said he respected the way I stood up for you and gave him a piece of my mind, but at the same time, he knew I was smart enough not to get involved with you,” she told me the day after that dinner, ironically minutes after I’d used her thighs as ear-warmers and eaten her out for twenty minutes.
My lips were still glistening with her juices when I laughed, throwing one arm behind my head.
“Maybe I’m not that smart.” She nuzzled her head in the crook of my arm as her fingers played with my chest hair. I fucking loved when she did that. I didn’t even know why. Sometimes she tugged at them real hard, but it was an intimate gesture no fling had ever done.
“Maybe he’s not that sharp,” I replied.
“The answer probably lies somewhere in the middle,” she mused.
I took her face in both my hands and kissed her hard. “There’s no way you are less than a genius. Takes one to know one.”
Though I didn’t feel like a genius, no matter what my IQ test indicated.
After that stupid-ass dinner, we went to visit my family or hers almost every weekend. Dinner with the Brennans was the tits.
Sparrow Brennan was a world-class cook (literally), and it was fun watching the infamous Troy Brennan getting the third degree from his spitfire wife and hell-raising daughter. I even learned how to get along with Sam. Sort of, anyway. He was a scary motherfucker.
We talked about every subject under the sun—politics and TV shows and new things to do in the city and the future, but never about money, which felt fresh. Da and Cillian only talked about money. Sometimes Aisling tagged along, which I liked, too, because she was pretty much the only family member I had that I was sure didn’t want to maim me to death with a dildo. But also didn’t like it, because she looked at Sam like he had the world clenched in his dirty-ass, violent palm. Aisling and Sam were a bad idea.
She was the princess in the ivory tower, and he was the punk who was going to steal and corrupt her on his lunch break from setting the world on fire.
He was too everything—old, experienced, and dangerous—for my baby sister.
Sometimes the Penrose sisters were there, too. I didn’t mind them all that much. I told myself they probably had no idea Sailor and I were fucking. They no doubt thought I didn’t deserve her, or worse—that I had no chance with her in the first place. Both were true, by the way.