Page 69 of Too Hexed to Handle

‘I’ll clean myself in the washroom while you . . . yeah.’

He limps away, leaving me to undress in peace, only to discover it’s not just my clothes that are soaked through, but everything. My underwear is clammy and damp and uncomfortable. I hop from one foot to another. Do I? Should I?

Maybe I can build a pillow fort around myself, so he’ll never know.

I strip quickly, hang everything up as best I can, and dive under the blanket to discover there’s only one pillow. Total. Oh, hexes. We can’t share this without him realising how far I took his let’s get naked idea. I sit up, intending to rectify the situation before he knows anything about it, but the door opens before I get the chance, forcing me to scurry as deep beneath the blanket as I can.

Shit. Shit. Unless I want to admit to him what I’ve done and the fact I’ve already had reservations about it, which sounds like a wholly embarrassing conversation, I’m going to have to play this off as part of the plan.

In fact, I can blame him. He told me to get out of my wet things, so I did. Here I am. Wet-thing-free. Ready to sleep beside him, as promised.

The problem is, as he emerges from the washroom and I realise with sharp clarity he’s about to get in alongside me, sleep is the absolute last thing on my mind.

And from the aroma filling the room, like someone’s overturned a pepper pot, I think it’s the last thing on his mind too.

22

I squeeze my eyes shut. If I’m asleep by the time he climbs in, maybe we won’t have to address the nudity situation. Goose bumps prickle over my skin. I’m hyper-aware of Astin’s bare feet padding across the floor, followed by the rustling of his shirt, and then, finally, an exasperated sigh.

I suspect, knowing him, he’s gone to hang his clothes by the fire only to deem the way I’ve draped mine as untidy and decided to rearrange my efforts.

Which means he’ll have found my soaked underwear hidden beneath my blouse. Hexes. Can’t the man leave things alone for one night? The cabin isn’t going to implode because I folded something wrong. He pauses for an excruciatingly long beat during which I picture him holding my bra while pulling some sort of tortured face about how confused he feels.

That non-answer makes me almost annoyed enough not to care when he drops into bed beside me. Almost. I wouldn’t be human if I didn’t at least wonder whether he removed his own underwear.

‘Why’s there only one pillow?’ he asks.

‘I hid the other one so we have to share,’ I respond grumpily. My head is burrowed in said pillow, and the words come out muffled. ‘How am I supposed to know?’

Even with my back turned, I can sense the roll of his eyes, because I’ve seen it a hundred times before.

A moment later, he attempts to steal the pillow from me.

‘Hey!’ I exclaim.

‘Well, if you weren’t hogging the whole thing –’ The mattress jolts as he tries to get comfy. Our heads vie for space on the pillow, and I am forced to shift closer to the wall, not so much out of acquiescence to his demands, but out of fear he’s far too close to my body.

I wrap the blanket tighter around me, which earns me another huff.

His head presses lightly against the side of mine as we descend into silence, and this one’s more consuming than the last time we shared a bed, with the new memory of the maze playing on repeat, with the knowledge that maybe he’s battling the same urges as I am. I wriggle, kicking the blanket, unable to settle when my skin is rippling as though all the magic in the world has risen to its surface.

‘Are you cold?’

I jump at the sound of his voice. Sleeping shouldn’t be a talking activity. Talking means acknowledging the other is there, which seems dangerous given our current circumstances.

‘A little,’ I answer. Anything to explain my squirming around like a worm in a storm.

He somehow finds a way beneath my blanket barricade, and I tense as his hand rubs up and down my arm. It’s brisk at first, like I’m nothing more than a piece of wood that needs sanding, but somewhere along the way the movements soften, tracing patterns across my shoulder blades. I shiver, relaxing despite myself, shuffling backwards to lean against his chest – and hit something else instead. My pulse leaps.

Well, that answers the question of whether or not he kept his underwear on.

He jerks his hips away. ‘Sorry.’

‘No, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to . . .’ Mean to what? Ram myself against his . . . My cheeks heat, while my breaths grow unsteady. I throw a hand over my face. ‘I guess that part isn’t confused.’

He snorts before, tentatively, running a finger down my arm. ‘Guess not.’

Hexes. Every inch of me is tense, my legs clamped together, trying to ignore the deep want pooling between them. Smirking, I say the one thing that will annoy him enough to fix his situation. ‘It’s the curse of being in one bed.’