“It’s alright. We’ve spent the last few days pretending. It was bound to happen at some point.”
He glanced away and when he turned his face back to hers, his eyes had become more guarded. “Right.” He dropped onto his back at her side and took her hand again, holding it loosely.
For the first time all night, she was cold.
“Will you tell me why we’re still out here?” His voice was soft in the growing darkness. She didn’t answer, not sure what to say. He squeezed her hand. “Come on, Callie. I know it’s not because you wanted to find snowmen in the stars.”
“I’m not sure I can get up.” She hated the way the words called tears to her eyes. Hated that she even had to say the words at all.
“Alright. Will you be able to get up if we wait a while?” His voice was even, neutral, as though they were discussing the weather and not her inability to move properly.
“Maybe.”
He was quiet for a long time before he spoke again. “Would you like me to try to help you up, or would you rather we lay here a little longer?”
“You can go in if you want. You don’t need to wait for me.”
He shot her a look that said she was out of her mind if she thought that was seriously an option. And he was so damn beautiful it hurt to have him look at her like that, like he would take care of her. Because she didn’t need him to take care of her. She could take care of herself. She didn’t want to be someone else he needed to take care of. She just wanted him to wanther.
“I think I’d like to lay here a little longer.”
He gave a tight nod and shifted his focus back to the sky.
They lay there for at least another half hour, pointing out constellations that weren’t and holding hands like they weren’t running out of time.
∞∞∞
Slipping out of bed in the middle of the night was becoming a bad habit for Noah. After that kiss, the last thing he wanted to do was leave Callie’s side. Which is exactly why he knew he had to. If he could focus on work then maybe he could stop thinking about how soft her lips were, or the little noise she made when he’d slid his thigh between her legs. The problem, of course, was that he couldn’t focus on work. He’d been sitting at the baby grand in the hotel restaurant for nearly an hour playing the same four bars of music over and over again and getting nowhere.
“I’d recognize that cadence anywhere.”
Noah looked up from the piano to find his sister walking through the darkened room towards him. She wore one of those flimsy hotel bathrobes tied tightly at the waist over her pajamas, her hair piled in a messy bun on the top of her head. It was well after midnight and the rest of the hotel was quiet save for the distant sound of someone running a vacuum.
“I didn’t realize anyone could hear me,” he said.
“They can’t.” She sat on the piano bench beside him, nudging him with her shoulder. “The night manager ratted you out.”
“What are you doing up?”
She pressed her lips together in a way that made her cheeks puff out and shrugged. “Couldn’t sleep.”
Noah wrapped an arm around his sister’s shoulder and hugged her against him. “Nightmare?”
She nodded. “They don’t happen that often anymore. I didn’t want to wake Daemon.”
“I think I have one of those plastic army men in my suitcase,” he said.
He knew he had one. He had several, in fact. Ever since their father died, he’d been planting green plastic army men beside Liv’s bed to help her feel brave and keep the nightmares at bay. As they’d gotten older, he’d started giving them to her at other times, too, to remind her that she was unstoppable—like on the first day of rehearsals for her first major production, or when she had to fly to another continent for the first time.
“I’m about to be a married woman,” she laughed. “I can’t depend on my brother to give me a toy every time I have a bad dream.”
“You can if they help you feel better.”
“I think I need to learn how to feel better without leaning on you for support.”
He rested his head on top of hers. “I’ll always be here for you, Livi. Even after you’re a married woman.”
“I know. But—” She tensed in his arms, rolling her lips between her teeth to stop herself from speaking.
