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He remains in a deep sleep. He doesn’t seem to react at all.
Until I straighten up and turn to walk away.
A hand shoots from the bed, colliding with my wrist. I whirl around, heart pumping in surprise. Elio’s eyes are still closed, his whole face set in a furious, sleepy sort of frown as he tries to ineffectually close his splinted hand around my arm. With a sleep-gruff sound, he shoves the pillow he was hugging away, snakes his other arm out of the bed, and drags me down into it with him.
“Hey!” I gasp, tamping down the urge to fight my way out of his hold. I don’t want a stray elbow hitting one of his injuries. “Elio!” I hiss. “Let me go!”
I was planning on sleeping in the other bed. Elio needs rest, not to have somebody else rolling around and bugging him all night. But he doesn’t seem to care about what I have to say. I doubt he even hears me, to be honest. He throws a heavy arm over top of me, buries his face in my air, and promptly lets out a soft, rasping snore.
I stay still, chewing on my lip and trying to figure out what my plan is. I don’t know what to do with this sort of closeness. Because it doesn’t seem to want anything. There’s nothing angry, nothing sexual, nothing violent in his hold on me. It’s proximity, apparently, for comfort’s sake.
You’re the wound and the treatment all at the same time.
I’m a pain point for him. That’s what he told me.
But even in sleep he can’t stay away.
I breathe in and out until I reach a calming tempo, a rhythm that seems to soothe me. It takes me a moment to realize that this isn’t a placid sense of timing I’ve discovered on my own. I’ve simply matched up my breathing to Elio’s.
Even once I’m aware of it, I can’t escape from how I’ve paired my inhales and exhales to his. His broad chest plastered to my back, we breathe in perfect harmony, as if we share one heart and set of lungs between us. More than once, I try to speed up or slow down my respiration, just to see if I can break away from that connection, but it feels so wrong, so unnatural, that I almost get lightheaded. I relax, sink into it, close my eyes, and breathe with him.
Just for a little while, I tell myself. I’ll be gone soon. I know I will.
But not yet.
Not… quite… yet…
Chapter 19
Elio
This is the second morning I’ve woken up with my fiancée in my arms and it’s just as fucking perfect as the first time. There may be a hot poker of death shoved between my ribs that makes every breath an agony, but Deirdre’s here with me and that’s all that really matters.
A glance at the clock on the bedside table tells me she can’t stay here for long, though. Not if she doesn’t want to be late for class. Which if she knows what’s good for her, she won’t.
“Deirdre,” I whisper against the thick, sweetly fragrant explosion of hair beneath my chin. “It’s time to wake up for class, sweet little Songbird.”
Fuck, seeing her all slow and sleepy does something to my insides. And considering the fact that my insides are pretty fucking wrecked right now, that’s saying something. She’s so pretty, shifting in my arms, rubbing at those big blue eyes of hers.
“I told you I’m not going,” she croaks. I’ve never heard her voice first thing in the morning. There’s a grouchy smokiness to it that shouldn’t be charming.
But I’m charmed anyway. Go figure.
“And I told you that you are,” I remind her firmly. “Enzo’s probably already waiting for you downstairs.”
Deirdre sighs and scrubs at her face.
“Well, at least you’re not insisting on coming with me in your current state,” she mutters.
“If you don’t get your ass ready quick enough then that could change,” I warn her. “You are going to class and you are not going to be late today. And if that means I have to escort you myself to make sure you behave, I will.”
Deirdre wriggles free of my hold. I let her go even though I don’t really want to. But I can’t exactly tell her she’s not allowed to be late if me holding her hostage in my bed is what prevents her from being on time in the first place.
I can be reasonable with her.
Sometimes.
If I try real fucking hard.
