AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I can deal.
I always do.
I start to turn away.
“We’re sharing.”
Fourteen
Lake
She spins around,mouth dropping open. “Wh-what?”
I went from feeling generous and a little bit soft about this woman who’d clearly had a shit twenty-four hours to being annoyed.
In a second.
Or maybe defensive because I’m a dumb fuck who was feeling soft about a woman I didn’t know—and had been about to offer to sleep on the floor in another room while she took my bed. But then she’d gone ahead and proved she’s a woman who’s exactly like the other women in my life, present and past.
So, I’m a dumbass for that blip in the space-time continuum, for that moment of soft.
Now, I’m moving on.
Soft is gone. Asshole is back.
She’s going to hate me.
The thought is crystal clear and piercing through my brain.
Whatever.
It doesn’t matter if she likes me—or if her little dog does too.
In fact, it’s better if they both despise me.
Which is why I double down. “You can either share”—I wave an arm at the bed, an eastern king because I’d bought absolutely the biggest mattress I could get my hands on—“or you can find another flat surface in this house to sleep on.”
“I wasn’t trying to take your bed,” she says quietly.
I lift one shoulder, drop it. “Sure seems like it.”
She glowers at me. “I just thought you were going to offer and it’s—” Her teeth clamp together before she shakes her head and huffs out a breath. “Never mind.” A sigh, chin lifting. “Am I allowed to take one of those pillows and maybe a blanket?”
Asshole, that’s me.
I nod tersely, and she moves toward the top of the bed, taking one of the pillows—takingmypillow, as in the only one I’ve slept on to date, as in my expensive as shit pillow that I bring on road trips and don’t letanyoneuse. “Not that one,” I say before I can stop myself.
She turns, and if looks can kill, I would be dead before my big body hits the floor.
Then she sighs again, extending her hand toward the other pillow. “Is this one acceptable?”
I nod.
She slowly grabs it, eyes on me, as though waiting for me to protest again. When I don’t, she moves to the foot of the bed, places her hand on a blanket, lifts her brows at me. I keep my mouth shut, and she picks it up. “Come on, Steve,” she says softly.
I expect the tiny demon to ignore her, and though he makes a soft sound of protest, he still gets to his feet, jumps down, and follows her out of the room.
I watch her go, stare at the open door for long minutes, expecting her to come back in.
