Chapter Forty-six
“C lose your eyes,” Killian sighs.
“I can’t.”
“What do you need, Savannah?” He turns his face toward me again for what feels like the hundredth time. We’ve been led here, him leaning on the headboard while I lay on my side facing him for an hour. I am exhausted and yet terrified to close my eyes, even though sleep is right there, and I know I’ll sleep.
“I don’t know.”
His eyes flick around my face and then he takes a deep breath and shuffles down the bed until he is laying on his back, “ Come here.”
I stare at where he has lifted his arm, inviting me in to curl against his side, “You want to snuggle?”
“I want you to sleep.”
Hesitating for only a moment, I shift closer until the front of my body bumps against his side and then I lift and rest my head in the soft spot between his neck and his shoulder. His arm curls around me tightly, his palm cupping my ribs as his fingers curl into me a touch, adding a pressure that I feel right through to my soul. The air rushes from my lungs and I rapidly blink my eyes to fight the sting of exhaustion weighing them down.
He breathes deeply and evenly, his skin warm but littered in scars. I lift my arm and place it on his abdomen, his muscles jumping under my touch and his fingers flexing harder against my body. Something rumbles in his chest, a sound that vibrates down my spine and makes my thighs ache.
The sweats on his body are sitting low, showing off the carved V of his hips and a dark trail of hair that leads from his naval to beneath the band of his pants. He is built like a statue, carved with precision and expertise, honed to perfection with each line and ridge and valley. Unable to stop myself, I allow the tip of my finger to trace the line dissecting his abdominal muscles and a rush of air expels from his lungs.
“Savannah,” He rasps before capturing my wrist, “Stop.”
“I’m sorry,” I tilt my face to his, following the sharp line of his jaw hidden beneath his groomed beard .
“Please,” His throat works on a swallow and his eyes take on this pleading nature that hits me straight in the chest.
“What?” I push up onto my elbow.
I swear, right before he closes his eyes, I see them fill with water but when he opens them again, they’re as hard as the muscles under my hand. “Go to sleep.”
I deflate.
Waiting another second, I watch to see if I’ll see it again, the secrets hidden in his dark eyes, but he keeps the wall up, his expression a hard, impenetrable fortress that no one will ever be able to breach so I lower myself back down and when I place my hand back on his body, I curl my fingers into my palm, holding them there. His hand remains on my body tightly and instead of fighting it like I have been, I give into the claws dragging me toward my dreams. It takes me effortlessly, so quickly I don’t even remember closing my eyes.
I wake still laying on Killian, his arm still banded around me, holding me close to him except now I have one leg thrown over both of his and my hand is no longer curled in a ball, in fact I have my fucking fingers tucked into the waist band of his pants.
And he’s hard.
His cock pushes out the front of his sweats, creating a perfect outline of his length .
“Oh god!” I whip my hand away as my cheeks burn and sit up, wide eyes turning to him.
He releases a shaky breath, “Good morning.”
“I – shit – I didn’t mean to do that!”
“I know.” He swallows thickly and then sits up, “I’ll be back in a minute.”
I watch his back muscles work as he crosses the room to the bathroom and shuts the door behind him before the shower turns on a second later.
My cheeks are hot with embarrassment. I mean I practically groped the man in my sleep, and he just led there. Why didn’t he wake me!? Why didn’t he move my hand!?
Fuck.
I should leave.
I should absolutely leave, right now. Scrambling to get off the bed, I rush toward the clothes folded on the chair in the corner of the room but a sound coming from the bathroom freezes me to the spot. A groan. A loud, rasping moan that sounds an awful lot like…
“Fuck,” He grunts, the gravel in his tone shooting awareness right through me. Heat pools in my core as I realize what he’s doing in that shower right now.
My hands curl tighter on my clothes as I press my thighs together, heart pounding behind my rib cage as my cheeks burn for a whole new reason now .
I can imagine his hand wrapped around his shaft; imagine the way the water is hitting the back of his head as he watches himself work his cock beneath the spray. Has he got one hand resting on the tiles? Are his muscles pulled taut as he pleasures himself?
What does he look like when he comes?
My teeth sink into my bottom lip as I edge closer to the door, wanting to hear more.
“ Savannah ,” My name is both a curse and plea.
A memory hits me hard, stealing my breath and my mind. My back pressed to a wall, my dress shoved up around my waist as my legs are around his hips. He fucks me hard and desperately, relentlessly. There’s anger and yearning and frustration but it feels so good, and I want it so badly.
Lips crash against mine, tongue and teeth, a claiming and when I finally get a breath in, I pull back and stare down at him.
Killian watches me with a feral kind of possession, it’s wild and it’s raw. He looks at me like he’s a starved man and I am his first meal.
Killian.
The door ahead of me suddenly opens and I stumble forward only to fall right into his hard, wet chest. His hands catch me at the tops of my arms, a towel slung low on his hips and drops of water clinging to his skin.
That was real .
That was a memory.
“You…” I breathe, a thick, heavy lump clogging my throat.
“What did you hear?” He demands.
My head shakes violently, “You lied. ”
His eyes widen before he schools his expression, “What are you talking about?”
“You lied!” I scream.
I know the moment he figures it out because his face crumbles.
I snatch out of his hold only to slam my fists into his chest, over and over, “You lied, Killian!”
He stands there and he lets it happen and that’s all the confirmation I need. Was it just once? Were the other flashes of memory I’ve had all him? Is this why I am so desperate to be near him!?
“Why!?” I yell, my hits turning softer as my anger dissipates, “Why did you lie?”
He circles his fingers around my wrists gently before he tugs me against him, holding me so my chest rests against his.
His eyes follow the tears on my cheeks, tears I hadn’t realized had started to fall.
“Savannah,” He whispers my name.
“Why would you lie?” I croak .
He slowly releases one of my wrists only to lift that same hand and wipe away one of my tears, “Because I am not worth remembering.”
I snatch away from him, “That is not your choice to make.”
“What do you remember?” He steps closer but I step back.
“Nothing!” I scream. “Fuck! I feel like I am going crazy! It’s right there! The memory, it’s right there but I can’t make sense of it!”
“Savannah,” He reaches for me again.
“No!” I swat him away, “I asked you! I asked you and you lied right to my face! What else are you lying about? Do they all know too? Was it once? More than once!?”
“They don’t know,” He only chooses to answer one of my questions.
“You’re not going to tell me, are you?” I laugh humorlessly.
His silence is all the answer I need.
“How fucking dare you,” I snap at him, “I fucking hope whatever it was we had, whatever it was that happened, ended quickly! I hope I was fucking drunk and stupid and realized how much of a mistake it was the moment it was over!”
His eyes close as pain flashes across his face and inside my own chest, something cracks but I don’t stop. No, the anger is too fierce, too powerful. I hurt. He hurt me.
“You’re fucking right, Killian,” I grab my clothes, and shove passed him into the bathroom, grabbing the door, “You’re not worth remembering.”