Page 10 of Clever Deceit

I closed mine as well, loving the feeling of his chest underneath my cheek and his arms around me. “Tired?” I asked.

“Exhausted. I haven't been sleeping well either.”

“Why not?”

His arms tightened. “Because I didn't have you with me, and I like to have my things where I can reach them. You don't think I moved in just for your sake, did you?”

I grinned. “I did, actually. Are you saying you're actually here for selfish reasons?”

“The most selfish reasons in the world.”

And we didn't say anything else. Because although my skin was burning with excitement at how close he was, and my body was aching with the need to feel him inside me, right now, in this moment, I was content to settle for the warmth and safety of having him with me.

Besides, it had been an awfully long time since I'd slept well. And as I felt myself drifting off, the world around us getting hazy and distant.

And there was something important in that fact.

But I wasn't going to think about it right now. I was busy letting sleep come for me, tucked up against the man I loved and knowing that no matter what happened, we'd keep each other safe.

CHAPTER 6

WARREN

––––––––

I WOKE TO THE GOLDEN hour, and I don't only mean because the sunshine was shining through the window, deeply golden and beautiful in the late afternoon.

I mean it was. Golden and beautiful and late in the afternoon. So technically, yes.

But it was also the fact that I was waking up with Lily in my arms, her face turned into my chest and her breathing slow and relaxed. She moved a bit, trying to get even closer to me, and I wondered if she'd somehow sensed that I was awake and starting to think about getting up. She nuzzled into my skin as if she could keep me there forever, and I closed my eyes and drank it in. Lily in my arms, safe and sound and happy. The two of us together and stronger than we had been before.

Both of us standing shoulder to shoulder against whatever—or whoever—might come our way.

It was something I'd never really experienced before. Sure, I'd been in the military with the men in my company, and we'd been as loyal to each other as any human beings could be. We'd fought tooth and nail to keep each other safe and out of trouble, and I'd never questioned their commitment to me getting to keep my life.

But the deep, abiding affection I got from Lily and the driving need—almost an obsession—that I felt to keep her safe and warm?

Yeah, those were totally new to me.

Because a kid who grew up without a family—or with a family who flat-out couldn't be bothered with him and took every opportunity to tell him so—didn't get to have that connection with the people who should have been taking care of him. He didn't get to know that his mother would always be around if he needed her or that he had siblings who would have his back when the bullies at school took exception to him. He didn't have a dad who would sit down with his family at the end of the day and teach them how to go out there into the world and succeed.

He didn't have grandparents who hugged him and snuck him candy behind his parents' backs.

He didn't have anyone hugging him at all.

He had fists and blood and pain until he got old enough to know how to hide from it, and then until he got big enough to fight back. And then he had that countdown until he was eighteen, when he knew he was going to be able to get away from it all and never, ever look back.

I hugged Lily even closer to me, trying to memorize the feel of her in my arms. The warmth of her skin, the faint smell of flowers coming off of her. The sensation of being allowed to hold someone so close and try to take care of them—and the realization that she'd take care of me too, if I let her.

If I let her.

That was the sticking point. I'd grown up with a family who didn't understand affection or commitment, and though I'd known enough to realize that was the wrong way to be, I also knew enough to know that it had affected the way I learned to interact with other people. I'd never learned true affection or love, and no matter how much I wanted to be able to experience those things, I was smart enough to realize that I might not have the right pieces in place to do it.

I might literally not have the training for love.

For either giving or receiving it.

So when someone like Lily was lying here, all vulnerable softness and open affection, I wanted to take it all in. Wanted to drink her up like the best cup of cocoa I'd ever had, take her in my hands and put her in my pocket to keep her with me for the rest of my life.