Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
I open my eyes with a jolt, the nape of my neck slick with sweat.
I’m surrounded by darkness, and it feels like the weight of the blanket is suffocating me.
Kicking at the blanket does nothing to remove it, so I throw my hands at it, pawing it like I’m trapped in a nutshell.
I finally manage to find sweet freedom as the blanket balls up discarded to one side of the bed.
Sitting up, I realize my neck isn’t the only thing sweating. I’m drenched. I reach for my top, ready to remove it for some sweet relief until I hear a familiar voice remind me that I’m not in bed alone. Reason number take-your-pick as to why sleeping over is never a good idea.
“You okay?” Xander says. His soft voice floats across the blanket fort that I’d made in my desperate escape. My hands pause at the hem of the flannel I’m wearing. And the worst summer sleepwear award goes to …
The mattress moves under Xander’s body and then the lamp on his bedside table is on.
In the glowing light, I notice Xander’s curls have gone even more rogue than normal, which I didn’t think possible.
Just pure mussed. There’s stubble that’s clearly been growing since five o’clock.
He looks so relaxed it’d be easy to mistake him for someone who just woke up.
My body flushes hot again. And not because I woke up wearing flannel. I start moving the hem of the flannel back and forth, trying to create a makeshift fan. It’s not working.
“The air conditioner conked out an hour ago,” Xander says as his eyes land on my cheek where I feel a clump of damp hair sticking to it.
He lifts his hand up, like he’s about to move the hair off my face himself, like it’s instinct.
I bet he does it with all the girls. I freeze.
Definitely instinct. He must think twice about it because he redirects his hand to his own hair.
Running it through the curls. Somehow, it’s even hotter than if he touched me.
We stare at each other for a moment before Xander gets up and reaches into his bag. That’s when I notice he’s replaced his sweatpants and hoodie for boxers and a T-shirt. He’s wearing sleepwear. In front of me. A total stranger.
I start to feel lightheaded. This is exactly the kind of intimacy I avoid.
This is exactly why I bail afterward. This is exactly why I don’t stick around and snooze.
Wearing your … Captain America—really? I blink twice just to make sure.
Yep. Really—boxers breed the kind of closeness I save for Christmas with my mom.
Not old friends-turned-flames. Fucking labels.
He rummages around and then pulls out a white T-shirt and boxers, which he holds out to me. “Here,” he says, his eyes searching mine.
I narrow my eyes.
“They’re clean,” he says. He shoves them toward me and tilts his head to the side as if to say, Come on, take them.
I study the clothes. They are so inviting.
So cooling. So comfortable. So weather appropriate.
Even if they are part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
I imagine the cotton, oh, sweet cotton, how I miss thee, soft against my skin.
I want to get out of this fucking flannel so bad and wear them.
More than I’ve wanted anything in my entire life. I want them so bad I could cry.
I reach out as he hands me his clothes.
I don’t even have to ask him to turn around.
He faces the wall. I can’t help but notice his thighs are decorated with a smattering of tiny tattoos that weren’t there the last time I saw this much of his skin.
I see a wave. And scales of justice. And there’s a molecular tattoo that wraps around his thigh.
I can’t make it out. Unless I plan on getting up close and personal.
Which I do not. And so, I remove the flannel and replace it with his T-shirt.
And boxers. They smell like Juicy Fruit.
I breathe it in a little too deeply. The long slow steady breath grounds me.
The T-shirt is soft. It might even be organic.
I’m so relieved. It comes out as a sigh.
“Have you officially changed?” he says, repeating the same way I spoke to him yesterday after what I will forever refer to as The Peep Show. I look over at him and give myself a few seconds to remember just how strong I know his thighs are.
“I am officially changed,” I say with the enunciation of proper British nobility and the mind of a filthy chimney sweep.
He turns around and his eyes flicker all over my body, not sure where to settle. A shiver follows behind his eyes, like he’s physically touched me. “Better?”
“Yes,” I say, letting the cotton do its thing and moisture wick, cooling my skin down.
He rolls his eyes at me. “You’re welcome,” he says, taking a dig, because I didn’t actually thank him.
“Thank you,” I concede as he settles himself, though not before turning off the lamp and plunging us back into darkness.
Now that my body temperature has lowered to within normal range, you’d think I’d be able to drift back to la la land.
I can’t. The chasm that was between Xander and me when I fell asleep feels like it’s vanished into thin air.
Without my ability to see him, my other senses are in overdrive.
It’s like every surface possible from my ankle to shoulder is touching him.
“Do you know what the time is?” I say to distract myself from my skin singing at the physical closeness.
“Quarter past one,” he replies without having to check, which tells me he’s been awake this whole time, aware of the seconds that’ve ticked by to get us to this moment.
“You haven’t slept at all?” I ask, already knowing the answer, but if we’re going to be awake for a while, I may as well attempt to make friendly conversation. Maybe we can be civil. For the sake of the sleep study, I’m willing to try.
“Nope. I’ll usually get an hour or two around three, if I’m lucky,” he says with a lighthearted tone that tells me he’s taking it better than I would.
“How do you function?”
“Barely?” he says, his voice raised at the end in a question mark.
I’m not sure if it’s a confession or if he’s being self-deprecating.
My mind flashes back to when Xander answered his phone at the café while dealing with my shenanigans without missing a beat.
I can just imagine the jury needing to break for recess due to new evidence.
Open the envelope and you’ll see that it was Miss Scarlett in the photocopy room with the candlestick.
The man is functioning just fine. Definitely self-deprecating.
“And you have no idea why you can’t sleep?” The darkness makes me bold enough to ask, even if my eyes are slowly adjusting.
“That’s why I’m here,” he says like he’s admitting defeat. I wonder how long he’s had insomnia. And what his breaking point was to make him walk into this sleep study and not only ask for help but ask me to help him.
“Without sleep, I would be a pathetic mess,” I say, the mattress shifting next to me as Xander rearranges himself. Into what position, I have no idea. I don’t dare look.
“Er, thanks,” he says, like I was calling him pathetic. I scold myself in the dark.
“That’s not what I mean. You look good,” I say, exaggerating the good so much that I may as well have said, “You’re fucking hot” to his face.
“Thanks. You too,” Xander says right back to me. Like his filter might be malfunctioning in the dark.
“Because I sleep,” I say, trying to redirect the conversation away from the fact that Xander visually stimulates my senses. And not just visually.
“From what I remember, you look good especially when you haven’t slept,” he says, his voice lowering an octave on the last two words.
Woah.
My blood rushes from my extremities and pulses between my thighs. I can’t help but wonder what memory he’s in right now.
“Shut up,” I say, trying to deny myself the chance to ask. Unfortunately for me, this time, it comes out like I’m begging him.
“Make me,” he says.
I finally dare myself to look over at Xander. The streetlights outside slice through the blinds, illuminating his mouth.
That fucking mouth.
My eyes crawl up his face to find his locked on mine for a moment before they flicker to my mouth.
And something in me snaps.
I lean forward and kiss him.
On contact, I lose all self-control.
Xander slides his tongue over mine and my entire body leans into his, making full frontal contact. I tilt my head back, giving him access. I feel the hard lines of his chest, the detail of his waistband on my lower stomach, his thighs. He is all over me, and I still can’t get enough.
My hands are in his hair, twirling first, then tugging him closer.
His hands roam from my jaw down my back, and he squeezes my ass. I groan into his mouth before he slides them underneath my T-shirt—his T-shirt—and makes his way up my stomach, his fingers putting on a show as they dance over my ribcage.
Then he abandons my ribs and slides his hands around my back, pulling me flush to him. Our bodies meld together. His warm hands splay across my back, like they’re trying to cover as much surface area as possible. My skin heats up to the flame that is his touch.
Kissing Xander is like muscle memory. I don’t have to think. I just feel, my body remembering exactly where to burn for him.
And when our kiss deepens, I know it’s reciprocal.
My spine bends in a perfect arc as we create seamless contact and I feel him growing hard against me, the pressure intoxicating.
He scrapes one hand down my side to hold my hip, his thumb circling there. A request. But then his thumb digs into me. Frantic. Begging me. I open my legs ever so slightly and he fills the space with this thigh.
The friction.
I sweep my hands down his back and trail them gently along the edge of his boxers. Xander shudders at the light touch of my fingertips that dip below the waistband, teasing him.
“Ash …” Xander moans my name in my mouth, but he can’t finish the sentence as his warm tongue finds its way back to mine.
The hand he had on my back has moved to my side. He’s applying enough pressure to my ribcage to keep me from moving. His thumb starts tracing along the soft curve of my breast.
I ache everywhere for him.
BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.
I pull back from Xander. What the fuck was that?
The horny haze lifts at the sound of one of the monitors going off next to me. And I remember where I am. And who I’m with.
BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.
I snatch my hands away. Xander follows.
There’s a knock on the door before Ben enters. He rounds the bed quickly and pokes a few buttons on the machine next to me.
The beeping finally stops.
And then we descend into awkward silence.
I refuse to look at Xander, so I watch Ben as he studies the machine, watching my heart rate.
I feel so exposed.
I will my heart rate to slow down. But as it turns out, embarrassment is a hell of a stimulant.
I don’t dare look at Ben. I don’t dare look at Xander. So I keep my eyes forward.
“Another nightmare?” Ben says, finally cutting the excruciating silence.
“Yep.” That’s all I say.
“Have a read of those papers I shared in the morning,” Ben says before turning back toward the door. “Goodnight.”
When the door clicks behind Ben, I count to three before turning to face Xander.
He’s wearing the most self-satisfied smile I’ve ever seen.
“Not a word out of you,” I say, warning him. It looks like the lawyer learns quick because this time he doesn’t ask me to make him.