Chapter 14
Callie
I woke up feeling like I'd been reassembled by someone who knew what they were doing.
My hips ached in a way that was going to make sitting interesting. My inner thighs were tender from wrapping around him. There was a bite mark on my shoulder that I vaguely remembered being enthusiastic about at the time, and was now going to require a high-necked shirt for the next three days. I pressed my thighs together and felt the swollen, well-used tenderness between them, and a shiver rolled through me that had nothing to do with cold and everything to do with sense memory — his hands gripping my hips, his mouth on my neck, the sound he'd made when I —
Okay. I needed tea. Or a cold shower. something.
I hadn't opened my eyes yet. But I could feel him watching me.
The warmth of someone's attention on your face. The weight of being looked at by a man who, based on the evidence of thelast twelve hours, had made a detailed study of every inch of me and was apparently reviewing his notes.
"If you're watching me sleep," I said, eyes still closed, "that's either romantic or serial killer behavior, and I need to know which before I open my eyes."
His laugh. Low. Close. The rumble of it through the mattress.
"Romantic. Definitely romantic."
I opened my eyes.
He was on his side, head propped on one hand, the sheet pooled at his waist. Bare chest. Bare shoulders. The kind of upper body that had no business existing outside of a cologne advertisement — broad and sculpted and golden in the morning light, every line of muscle defined without trying because this man had spent his life throwing hay bales and holding onto two thousand pounds of fury. The stubble on his jaw. The green of his eyes. And the expression he was wearing — unhurried, warm, so openly adoring that it made my breath catch.
"Hi," he said. Like I was the best thing he'd seen all morning. Like I was the best thing he'd seen in his life.
"Hi." My voice was wrecked. I sounded like I'd spent the night either screaming or smoking, and we both knew which one it was. "How long have you been awake?"
"A while."
"And you've been... watching?"
"Couldn't help it. You do this thing in your sleep where your nose scrunches up, and you frown, like you're arguing with someone in a dream." He traced a line from my temple to my jaw with one finger. "I'm pretty sure you were dreaming about me."
"Oh, you'repretty sure."
"Positive. You said my name. Twice." The grin was insufferable. Cocky and warm and so stupidly handsome that I wanted to hit him and kiss him in equal measure. "And then you smiled."
I rolled into him, and he caught me — arms wrapping tight, pulling me flush against him until we were completely tangled, legs threaded together, my hands flat against his back. He buried his face in my neck and inhaled — slow, deep, like he was memorizing the scent of me — and the sound that came out of him was low and involuntary, a groan that vibrated against my throat and made my stomach flip.
"You smell incredible," he murmured into my skin. "How do you smell this good at seven in the morning?"
"I smell like you."
The groan again. Deeper this time. His arms tightened.
He pulled back just enough to find my eyes. And held them. The cocky grin was gone. What was underneath it — steady, unguarded, his whole heart right there on his face — made my breath catch.
We stayed like that. His hand on my jaw. My fingers on his chest. Neither of us speaking. Neither of us needing to.
"You are something else, Clay Blackwood," I said.
The smile that spread across his face was slow and warm and did things to my pulse that should have been illegal before breakfast.
I pushed him onto his back and climbed into his lap — knees on either side of his hips, my hands on his chest, looking down at him. His hands found my thighs. His thumbs drew slow circles on my skin. I leaned down and kissed him — soft, unhurried — and then folded against him, my cheek on his chest, his arms closing around me.
Neither of us moved for a long time. His fingers in my hair, drawing slow lines from my scalp to the ends. His heart beat steady and unhurried under my ear. The fridge hummed. A bird outside. The kind of morning where the world holds its breath and lets you have this.
"We need to get up," he said eventually.
