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He presses his lips to my forehead, like it’s the most natural thing in the world. “You don’t have to go home.”
“Sawyer Kingston,” I gasp, going for dramatic but coming off more like mid-yawn. “What if our parents found out?”
“Oh, the scandal.” He scoops me into his arms, like a groom carrying his bride across the threshold, and stands up. “I guess I’d have to marry you then.”
“Umm.No. Put me down, goofball.” But instead of listening to me,not like he ever does, his grip tightens, and I’m carried up the stairs, laughing. “Sawyer, my house is a thirty-second walk from here. Literally thirty seconds. I can brave the snow. I have to go home. I have to work tomorrow.”
He places me gently on his big bed, then grabs a t-shirt from his dresser and hands it to me. “Are you on-call?”
“No. Not tonight. But I am on-call tomorrow.” My heart skips a beat when he smiles.Damn it.
“Well then, I guess it’s a good thing it’ll only be a thirty-second walk in the morning when you go home to get ready for work, now isn’t it?”
I run my hands over the soft cotton tee sitting in my lap, thinking about how cold it is outside and how warm I am right now. It would only need to be one night. “If I stay, I need my bag from downstairs.”
“I’ve got to lock up and turn off the lights anyway. I’ll grab it and be right back.” Then as if the discussion has been settled—because according to Sawyer,it has—he disappears down the hall, and I realize something that rocks me to my core.
I like when he takes control.
I like when I don’t have to make the decisions.
I spend all day, every day, with someone else’s life in my hands.
I like it when I don’t have to think.
Does that make me less of a feminist?
Maybe I’ve had a little too much merlot tonight to contemplate the mysteries of the world and its effects on my life. Let’smaybestart with something a little less stressful. I slip off the platform bed and out of my dress and pantyhose, then debate what to do with my bra. On or off? Any woman will tell you sleeping with your bra on is an experience in torture the CIA should employ if they want to get results quickly. But those same women, me included, also know that as you approach thirty, the girls start to droop, and the boost a good push-up bra gives you definitely helps.
The only light filtering in the room is from the glass doors leading to his balcony and overlooking the same view of the lake as the family room below. So I take my chances and add my bra to the pile of clothes I’ll be doing the walk of shame in tomorrow.
Problems to be worried about in the morning—check.
I run my palm over Sawyer’s soft bedding before crawling under the covers and laying my head on the pillow.
Am I supposed to look sexy?
I fix my hair so it’s lying flat around my shoulders and call it a day.
A very long day.
At the end of what was quite possibly the longest week of my life.
I close my eyes and yawn again, thinking I’ll just rest them for a few minutes until Sawyer comes back. Sleep pulls at me, and I feel myself drifting off, thinking about piercing blue eyes that belonged to my childhood tormentor. Eyes I hated for years... that now belong to the man I think I may be falling for.
* * *
Aboom of thunder shakes the house, and when a loud beeping follows, I nearly jump out of my skin. But when I jump, I remember I’m not in my own bed.
Sawyer might have been better off if I remembered that before I shoved him away and possibly kneed him in the dick.Son of a bitch.
“Breathe, Red. The beep is just the generator kicking in. We probably lost power from the storm.” He pulls me back down and wraps his arm around me. “Stop thinking so hard and go back to sleep before I give you something else to think about.”
My sleepy body perks up as the beeping stops and my nerves calm. I drape my arm over Sawyer’s bare chest and trace my fingertips along the dips and lines of his abs while I watch the snow fall through the windows. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it? I almost forgot how pretty it can be.”
Sawyer presses his lips to the top of my hair and whispers, “I never forgot, Red”—just before he rolls me over him. My legs straddle his waist, and his hands slide under the gray t-shirt and grip my hips as he moves me against the erection straining the limits of his boxer briefs. “You’ve been the most gorgeous woman in any room for as long as I’ve known you, Wren.”
“Sawyer...” I press my palms flat against his chest and roll my hips again, loving the feel of this man under me.
