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I showered Greyson off me and climbed into bed.
It was only as I was falling into bed that I admitted to myself…I might not have said it.
But it didn’t make it not true.
A part of me may have started to belong to Jack, Sebastian, and Carter—but Greyson owned a part of me now, too.
16
It had been a long time since I had last dreamed I was trapped in the coma again.
But even though I knew I was dreaming, I couldn't pull myself up to the surface. I was stuck, trapped in the deep black. My arms and legs felt heavy, as if they were being drawn through the mattress underneath me. There was no escape.
I tried to move, but I was entombed. I could hear sounds around me, but I couldn't open my eyes, or maybe I did but I was in the deep and couldn't see anything. But the sounds, a low crackling, a sudden rushing sound, sent a jolt of panic through me. It was so warm in my room and my breathing felt shallow and rapid, like I couldn’t get enough breath. My skin felt flushed and hot, as if I were burning up.
In the distance, I heard the sound of someone slamming into a door. “Kennedy!”
I wanted to call back, “I'm here. Don't leave me alone.” But I couldn't speak, when I finally managed to get my lips to part, my voice came out so rusty and weak, the same way it had when I first surfaced from the coma.
“Kennedy!” That deep, husky, desperate voice was Sebastian. The fear threading through his voice sent a rush of adrenaline through me.
I was finally able to open my eyes.
The room was almost pitch black. But there was a slice of surreal light coming through the window, bright orange. The room was filling with smoke, and the scent choked me.
My room was on fire.
And I couldn't move.
Finally, I heard the sound of the door slamming into the floor. Seconds later, Sebastian was in my room, his eyes wide. Beyond him, I could hear smoke alarms going off, and the sound of sirens.
“What are you doing?” he demanded, right before he scooped me up and cradled me against his chest.
“Is this real?” I begged to know, my fingers digging into the thick muscle of his shoulder, trying to ground myself in something real. I pushed my face against his T-shirt and the hard planes of his chest, but I couldn't smell his aftershave. All I smelled was the smoke.
Was I still trapped in my bed? In my sleep? Had I dreamt of him to comfort myself as the smoke smothered me?
“This is real, Kennedy,” he told me, giving me a worried look as he carried me through the living room and over the broken down door.
Then we were out in the hallway. Everyone else seemed to be evacuating, or already outside. Firefighters were rushing in as he carried me out across the parking lot to his car.
He opened the back seat and slid me inside, then stood there with his hands braced on the door frame, studying my face. “What happened?”
“I couldn't move,” I whispered. “I felt like I was back in my...And part of me still wonders if maybe this is the dream, if I'm really still in the coma and this isn't real, but I'm about to die in a fire...”
“I am real,” he said, taking my hand and pressing it to his cheek. The day's scruff was bristly against my palm. “And you're alive, Princess. You're not dying in a fire. You're with me, period. Let me show you how alive you are.”
He got into the back seat with me. Then he closed the door, and through the windows, I could see the bright orange flames engulfing the building.
“Eyes on me, Princess,” he said quietly.
With effort, I turned away from the devastation outside and met his deep blue eyes.
“That’s better,” he murmured.
He wrapped his arm around me, kissing my forehead tenderly. “I just want to take care of you,” he whispered.
“Why?”
