11. Chapter Eleven
Chapter Eleven
Nate
I’d turned the lights off, thinking it would be another long, sleepless night. No way would I fall asleep in a strange room while sharing a mattress with Samantha. She’d slipped into sleep so easily I’d been in awe. I remembered listening to the steady sound of her breathing.
Then nothing.
Needless to say, when my eyes snapped open, I was disoriented by the faint sounds of birds chirping and the warm weight plastered to my side and chest.
I turned my head, met with streamers of blond hair fanning across Samantha’s face.
Her face was nestled on my shoulder, her body half on mine, one arm slung around my neck, her leg wedged between mine. In the hours after I’d lost consciousness, she’d managed to roll onto me and sprawl out like a blanket, and I’d kept sleeping.
Huh.
This was new. Getting more than a few hours of broken sleep didn’t happen often. And judging by the bright light spilling through the crack in the curtains and how clear my head was, I’d been knocked out for hours.
I must have moved. Samantha made a little disgruntled sound, nuzzling closer, and without much thought, I rested my hand between her shoulder blades and closed my eyes.
I’d only ever shared my bed with one woman for more than a night or two, and Rosalie and I had been broken up for years.
There were some things I missed about her, but I couldn’t say sleeping together was one of them.
It had always been an area of contention.
My insomnia didn’t mesh well with her need for utter stillness and quiet during the night.
More often than not, I’d end up leaving the bed to do work in the living room so my tossing and turning didn’t lead to another fight.
This…was surprisingly nice. Samantha’s long, lean body molded perfectly to mine. My cock had taken notice too. It was thick and hard against my thigh, but that was easy enough to ignore.
No doubt she’d be embarrassed by her position when she woke up, but I was in no hurry to push her off.
My head heavy on my pillow, I let myself settle into the mattress, enjoying the feeling.
I fell asleep again.
Holy shit, I’d fallen back to sleep.
My eyes shot open, and I found Samantha’s wide, startled gaze looking back at me.
“I’m sorry,” she rushed out. “I told you I was going to do it, but I’d hoped I was wrong.”
I grabbed her hand before she could roll off me. “I slept.”
She continued stammering out an apology, then my words registered and she cut herself off. “Wait. You did?”
I nodded. “Yeah. I woke up a couple hours ago. You were on me, and I thought it wasn’t half bad, then I fell back to sleep. I’ve—” I dragged my hand over my face, exhaling heavily. “I’ve never been able to fall back to sleep. Once I’m up, I’m up. But I did. I slept so damn much.”
The backs of my eyes burned. I would have blamed the dry mountain air, but that didn’t explain the knot in my throat or twitch in my nose.
God, I’d needed this more than I’d even thought.
The sleep…the human contact…
“Yay.” She dropped her forehead to my chest and gave me a squeeze. “I’m so happy for you. And for me. My snuggling habit finally did some good.”
I laughed away the thickness in my throat, giving the back of her hair a gentle tug. “I find it hard to believe you’ve had many complaints.”
“Mmm. A lot of guys don’t like being touched while they’re sleeping.” She raised her head again, her nose scrunched. “My last boyfriend would build a pillow wall between us.”
“I think we established you’ve been dating the wrong kind of men.”
“I seem to only attract ones who don’t really like me.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Now that’s impossible to believe.”
Samantha Blackwell was gorgeous. Her face was a master class of proportions.
A combination of girl-next-door beauty and sultry goddess, both accessible and unattainable at the same time.
Combined with her long legs and…well, the rest of her, she was a true knockout.
She had to attract most men. Good and bad.
I had a feeling there was a reason she was choosing the ones who ended up not liking her, but I wasn’t here to analyze her inner workings.
Not when my own were a tangled mess.
“You’re just being nice because you got a full night’s sleep with me as your blanket.” She patted my cheek. “It’s fun in the beginning, but aren’t most things? It never lasts.”
“Adrian doesn’t seem to mind you cuddling up to him.”
“Adrian is the exception to most rules. I inoculated him to all things me before he became the grumpy adult he is now. Most importantly, he’s not my boyfriend.
” She pushed herself up to sit on the side of the bed and looked at me over her shoulder.
“Trust me, Nate, I’ve been through the same song and dance enough times to know what I’m talking about. ”
I sat up too, my back to the headboard. “I believe you think you know what you’re talking about.”
She sputtered, tossing her pillow at me. “Okay, enough of that. We could go round and round all day, and that doesn’t sound like fun.”
“What shall we do instead? More alpine sliding?”
She pulled her leg up on the bed, twisting around to face me.
For a woman who’d just woken up, she was awfully bright eyed.
“Who knew Nate Wells would become addicted to sliding down a mountain?” She tucked her hair behind her ear.
“We’ll probably have time for that. But first, maybe we could try out the ropes course? ”
Maybe it was the sleep. Maybe it was Samantha’s influence.
Maybe it didn’t matter.
Without an ounce of hesitation, I said, “I’m in.”