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“Okay,” I agreed, trying to be casual. Yeah, I’d eat. But not because I needed to, not because he made me. Just because I was bored of talking about it. “What time is it?”
He pulled his hand off my back and squinted at his watch. “About ten.”
“Seriously?” My pulse spiked at all the lost hours, like I was due somewhere when the truth was I had nowhere to go. I’d expected him to say like six, maybe. I’d lost all concept of time. And pretty much everything else, it seemed like.
“Yeah, you crashed pretty hard. How long since you had a decent night’s sleep?”
I shrugged again. “This guy…” I waved my hand vaguely in the direction of my street, my house, the place where eventually people were going to realize I was missing from and either care… or not. “It’s been… a situation,” I finally went with, picking a word that wasn’t even really close. A fucking disaster was what it was. A freak show. A joke.
He nodded. “You’re in a different situation now. You’re safe. You can take it easy. Get to bed early, catch up on your sleep.”
I snorted. “Those aren’t really things I do.”
“Oh, I believe it,” he told me, stroking my face, brushing my hair back. “But they’re gonna be. You’re gonna start letting me take care of you. It’s not a game.”
“Kinda feels like a game,” I admitted.
“Well, that’s okay. That’s how you learn best. If you hadn’t noticed, I’m pretty invested in this whole tutoring thing.”
“Yeah… I’ve noticed.”
He grinned and my stomach got fluttery again, a lot of empty space filling up with… I wasn’t sure what. Waking up in a panic sucked, but waking up next to somebody who didn’t freak out about it, getting some kissing and conversation and a choice little ass beating and some bossy owning in the middle of the night… that was why people got boyfriends, I guess. Or whatever this was.
He gave me one more solid smack on the ass and then tugged my sweats up and climbed over me out of bed, yawning and stretching his giant body, and I swear his arms and legs got even longer when he did. His tshirt lifted in the back, showing off some butt cleavage where his sweats were hanging low, and I had an urge to reach out and goose him since I hadn’t paid nearly enough attention to his ass yet. Maybe just yank them off entirely, spread his cheeks and get a taste. Might not have any experience there, but I felt like my instincts could be pretty good.
“You coming?” he asked, turning around, catching me checking him out.
“Not yet, but I could be.”
He snorted and rolled his eyes, reaching for my hand. “Come on, brat.”
CHAPTER SIX
I followed him down the short hallwayto the kitchen, quiet, like I was sneaking around. I just had a default setting trying not to wake anyone up, even if there was no one to wake up.
There was a light on over the sink, and a lamp in the living room beside the couch, but mostly it was dark. It wasn’t the kind of dark I was used to though, the kind that planted my heart in my throat, made me feel like my vision was blurry. It was a softer kind of dark, like all the corners were round instead of sharp, like nothing would reach out and grab me.
He pulled a chair out from the big table and pointed me to it, and I sat down as he opened the fridge. The seats were hard, and I shifted around trying to get comfortable until I decided I didn’t really want to. Ilikedthe way my weight pressed down, the way the wood kissed my sore ass without any give. Really was too bad he wasn’t a sports guy. He put up solid numbers in strength and stamina.
It was a tiny kitchen, really just a line of cabinets and appliances and a fridge on another short little wall next to a closet. There was hardly any counter space because of all thestuff—a coffeemaker and a blender and more gadgets than there were outlets for, all in bright colors which you knew cost extra for no reason. But it was really clean. No dishes in the sink, no splatters on the stove, no crumbs by the toaster. Hell, even the floor was shiny. Ugly weird brown vinyl shit, but shiny. The Beast could clean house.
“So what’s the deal with your parents?” I asked him, trying to get a grip on the scene, wrap my head around him actually living here alone. “They really just like… pay for you to live here?”
“It’s more like they pay for me to not live with them,” he finally said, putting a water pitcher down on the table and two giant pizza boxes down beside it, sliding a notebook and a legit bowl of fruit and a familiar stack of note cards down to the other end. “But yeah.”
Well, that pissed me the fuck off, and I scowled at the pizza boxes like it was their fault. “They sound like assholes.”
I thought I heard him laugh as he grabbed two plates from one of the skinny cabinets behind him and two glasses from another one, and I followed along with my eyes to see where things went, so I didn’t have to ask or go fumbling.
“Pretty much. Mostly to each other. I mean it could be a lot worse, I know I’m lucky. But they’re just way more interested in fighting than anything else. Here, pour these,” he told me, nudging the glasses and the pitcher my way as he flipped open the top box and the smell of meat and garlic sent my stomach through the roof.
I fiddled with the lid of the pitcher like a moron, trying to remember which direction meant open and which meant closed. Last thing I drank out of a pitcher had to be after-practice Kool-Aid at Ellis’s years ago, and even then I could never remember which way to twist. Who the hell used a pitcher anyway?
I finally figured it out and concentrated on not overfilling or knocking things over or breaking anything while I watched him load up one of the plates with three massive pieces, stacking them on top of each other.
“Pepperoni good?” he asked me. “There’s vegetable too.”
“It’s great.” I stared at the slices piled up like pancakes, almost laughing when he slid the plate over to me. “You want me to eat all this?”
