Chapter Thirty #2
The rational side of my brain reminded me that he was worried about tangible things.
Like having enough gas to keep the generator going.
Like food running low. Like something happening to one of us that would require medical intervention that we couldn't get to.
That was why he was so desperate to get into contact with someone.
But the silly, irrational, insecure part of me couldn't help but wonder if he was sick of being cooped up with me already, if he was dying to get away from me.
"Hey, everything alright?" he asked, tossing his phone onto the nightstand, looking over at me.
"Yeah."
"You've been quiet."
"I'm always quiet." I didn't miss the sharpness in my voice. And, it seemed, neither did Rush.
His hand shot out, grabbing my wrist, stopping my attempt to get to the other side of the bed, pulling me instead in front of him, between his spread legs, his head angled up, brows raised.
"Wanna try that again?" he asked, lips twitching. "That wasn’t even halfway believable."
"I'm tired," I told him, and the answer was two-fold.
Yes, I was tired. In the physical sense.
Even though my days, by and large, had been much less busy than back in my usual life.
But also, in a soul-deep kind of way. I was just...
tired. Tired of feeling like crap about myself, tired of second-guessing all my interactions, tired of feeling like crap.
Just freaking tired.
"That seems halfway believable," he relented, his thumb starting to trace across the sensitive inside of my wrist.
"I don't want to talk about it," I told him, gaze falling from his face.
This was the point where my ex would have started an argument with me, not believing I had a right to take some time to sort through my thoughts before I talked about them.
He wanted to know what I was "pissy" about immediately.
And if I didn't want to talk about it before I got a chance to think it through, the yelling would start.
"Alright," Rush said, nodding. "But if you do want to talk about it, I'm right here."
Him being right there was part of the problem, wasn't it?
Maybe it would be good to get back to Navesink Bank, away from this fantasy. Then I would stop calling his line at work. I would put some distance between the two of us, maybe move onto something healthier.
"I appreciate it," I told him, meaning it, waiting for his thumb to finish one last swipe before pulling my wrist away, and going around the bed.
I settled in on my side, facing away from him, telling myself it was the surefire way to ensure that I didn't end up plastered to him by the morning.
I underestimated my subconscious's desire to be as close to him as possible.
Because I woke up to a grumbling sound in my ear, making my eyes snap open, my brain scrambling to understand the origin, the reason for that noise.
It was then I felt the warmth on my back from the top of my head to my thigh, the arm casually draped over my hip.
Rush.
I had shimmied back into him while I was asleep.
In fact, my butt was rammed back into his pelvis. Where I found the origin of the groan.
His erection pressed into my ass. Which I must have wiggled against in my sleep.
"You're killing me," he murmured into my ear, breath hot, making a shiver move through my insides.
"I'm sorry. I, ah, I don't know why I can't, you know, stay on my own side of the bed. I guess I just... it's been a while since I shared one, I guess. My boundaries are, um, off. I will scoot," I told him, my body trying to lurch forward to do just that.
The arm around my hip stopped me, sinking into my hip bone, jerking my back into him.
"Don't you dare," he told me, voice low, sexy, turning my insides to liquid.
This was how he sounded on the phone.
Husky.
Commanding.
Voice full of promise.
If there had been anything resembling resistance in me, it evaporated in an instant. Though, truly, I didn't think it had ever been there. Not with regard to him.
"Rush..." I had no idea what I was trying to say when his name left my mouth.
Was it some attempt to de-escalate the situation, to remind him that we worked together, that it would get messy?
Or to beg him to push me down, to whisper those dirty things he said to me over the phone, to slip inside me, to erase the months and months of longing, but not having?
I had no idea.
Because Rush scooted back, making me go somewhat flat, looking up at him, finding hungry eyes I was having trouble believing were meant for me.
Yet there they were.
Looking down at me.
Heavy-lidded.
Smoldering.
"I..." I started, again, having no idea what I was going to say.
But just this once, that was okay.
Because Rush leaned down and silenced me, his lips pressing to mine.
Not hard and hungry, the way I had imagined them over the phone. But soft, sweet, almost a little tentative.
I felt like my entire body went boneless at the contact. A small sighing sound escaped me as my hand rose, sliding across his jaw and to the back of his head as his lips pressed deeper, harder, got more demanding as his body shifted over me, his welcomed weight pressing me deeper into the mattress.
His tongue traced the crease of my lips, moving inside when they opened on a whimper, claiming mine as my arms went around him, pulled him tighter to me.
No thoughts could penetrate my mind in that moment.
Until it happened.
Until we heard it.
Ringing.
A phone.
Somewhere in the house, a phone was ringing, a lifeline to the outside world that seemed to have forgotten all about us.
Rush's lips ripped from mine, his body pressing up, looking down at me with drawn-together brows for a long second, like a part of him was struggling to comprehend what the sound meant.