Chapter 7
ASHLEY
Carter: Missed Call. Voicemail Left
Heath: Missed Call. Voicemail Left.
Royce: Missed Call. Voicemail Left.
Royce: Missed Call. Voicemail Left.
Royce: Missed Call. Voicemail Left.
Royce: Missed Call. Voicemail Left.
Royce: Missed Call. Voicemail Left.
Royce: Motherfucker, I will gut you and feed the scraps to raccoons. Answer your fucking phone.
Carter: Fucking coward. She better be okay or don’t bother coming home.
Heath: I’m trusting you, bro. Don’t fuck this up.
T he drugs I’d been shot up with were disgusting .
For what felt like an eternity, I was stuck in an awful, swirling, half-conscious state where I could barely even lift my head, let alone move my limbs.
Voices and faces faded in and out so fast, it made me seasick and question what was real or imaginary.
Out of all the wild hallucinations and dreams—or nightmares—the drugs seemed to conjure up, I never questioned the reality of Nate showing up to save me.
There was no faking the comforting sound of his voice, or the familiar smell of his truck, so it was easy to let myself sleep properly for what felt like the first time in forever.
At some stage, we stopped, and I tried to claw my way through the fog to wake up as Nate lifted me out of the truck.
“Just sleep, Duckling,” he murmured in that low, comforting voice. “I’ve got you.”
I believed him, sagging into his embrace and letting my heavy lids slide closed once more. Sleep would help to clear the drugs, surely. Nate wouldn’t let anything bad happen while I slept—of that I was confident.
“I’m sorry, Layne baby.” His whispered apology roused me some time later. “I’m not being a pervert, I swear, but I want to get you out of these hospital clothes.”
That seemed like a good idea, so when he sat me up, I tried my very best to stay upright while he tugged the hospital-issue shirt over my head.
Patients obviously weren’t permitted underwire bras, so I was wearing a thin cotton crop underneath, which was one step away from useless for support, and he removed that too.
Good. I didn’t want anything from the hospital left on my skin.
“Fuck,” he groaned when I collapsed back onto what felt like the softest bed on earth. “Maybe I am a pervert. A little bit anyway. Probably a good thing you’re so out of it, or you’d have punched me in the dick by now.”
A small laugh bubbled out of me, and I managed to peel my lids open to look at him scowling down at me with the most tortured look on his face. When I laughed, he shook his head swiftly and huffed a long sigh. Poor baby. Tortured was such a good look on him.
Ass doesn’t have a bad look , some irritated voice in the back of my head reminded me. It was true. Even when he was being a dick, he was delicious. So not fair. I was mad at him.
Right?
“Okay, Duckling, let’s get these ugly fucking pants off, then I’ll drop the whole cursed outfit down the trash chute.
” His fingers gripped the elastic waistband of the gray pants, and I weakly lifted my hips to help.
“I’m not looking. I’m not looking ,” he muttered, and I wondered if he was telling me or himself.
Either way, I was not in any state to give a fuck.
I was just glad to have those scratchy clothes off.
He hastily draped a blanket over me, telling me he’d be back in a minute. The door clicked, and I had to assume he was making good on that promise to toss my patient uniform down the trash chute.
Suddenly alone, panic flooded through me harder than the sedatives. Was he coming back? Was this all a fucked-up medication dream and I was still in the hospital?
Groggy and dazed, I struggled to push myself up to sitting so I could look around. It was dark, with just a bedside lamp illuminating the unfamiliar hotel room. Hotel. Not hospital. Relief hit me like a truck, and I flopped back into the soft sheets with a groan right as the door opened once more.
“Hey, are you okay?” Nate asked, rushing over to the bed. “Are you sick? I can take you to the bathroom or?—”
“Shut up,” I moaned. “I’m sleeping.”
“No, you’re not,” he accused, even as he tucked the blanket back around me like he was caring for a child. “You’re grumbling and pouty. I thought you’d rather sleep off the drugs here than in my truck, so maybe try thanks, Nate, you’re the best. ”
I huffed a sigh, wriggling a little and noting that I could wriggle, which was progress. “Eat a dick, Nate,” I replied. “How’s that?” I’d missed this—snarling at him.
His low chuckle brought a warmth to my chest that I thought I’d never feel again.
“I’ll take it,” he muttered, stroking my hair back from my face with the gentlest of touches.
Then he repeated the gesture, again and again, his fingertips stroking over my forehead and cheek, soothing me back into sleep.
I was safe.
No one would hurt me.
It was okay to rest.
“For what it’s worth, Layne,” he whispered, so softly I could barely make out the words, “I regret everything. I don’t know how to say how sorry I am or how badly I wish I’d made different choices. I didn’t just break your heart, Duckling. I destroyed mine.”
I was too deep into the grips of sleep to respond, but even if I had been able to…I’d have had nothing to say. What the fuck could I say to that? And shit, for all I knew, that’d been all in my head. What was reality anymore?
My dreams were troubled, full of Jocelyn’s face as she sneered at me, the sharp bite of a needle in my neck exaggerated by the power of my own twisted imagination.
As my limbs regained control, I dimly acknowledged the fact I was tossing and turning constantly, occasionally mumbling and shouting out.
Strong arms wrapped around me seemed to soothe me back into sleep each and every time, though, and it allowed me to truly rest.
When I eventually woke, my head was like a scrambled egg, but my entire being was incredibly relaxed. A warm body curved against my back, one big palm splayed across my belly, and a hard shaft crushed against my backside. I inhaled deeply, recognizing the unmistakable scent of Royce immediately.
I snuggled back into him, searching my brain for how we’d ended up here. Where even were we? When had Royce arrived? Not that I was complaining. I always slept well in his arms, especially now that we’d done away with the pillow-wall pretense.
His hand flexed against my stomach, holding me tighter as I sighed with contentment.
His breathing was still slow and steady with sleep even as his fingers stroked lazily across my skin.
When his thumb brushed the curve of my breast, I moaned and arched my back a little.
Just enough to make him fully aware that I’d really like him to slip his dick inside, please and thank you.
His breathing quickened as I ground my ass against his erection, and his palm slipped up to cup my breast more deliberately, his fingers tweaking my nipple. Fuck me, that felt good. Lazy mornings in bed with Royce were my favorites.
I moaned again, tilting my head to the side as his lips found my neck. His face was rough, like he hadn’t shaved in a few days, and it sent tingles through my whole body as he kissed the sensitive skin below my ear.
“Please,” I whimpered, damn near trembling with desire already. “I need you inside me.”
He stilled, sucking his breath in sharply as my husky voice broke the silence in the room.
He wasn’t doing what I wanted fast enough, though, so I hiked one leg up and over his hip to give him easy access.
His hot shaft rubbed against me through his boxers, so fucking close to where I needed it, but still he hesitated.
“Please,” I gasped again, my fingers digging into his hip. “Royce, please fuck me.”
His breath exhaled in a hiss, and his fingers flexed hard against my breast. “I’m not Royce,” he growled, voice full of frustration and annoyance. Or was that jealousy?
Jealousy? Why would Nate be jealous?
Why was Nate in my bed?
Hazy memories of leaving the hospital hit my brain hard, and I jerked out of Nate’s embrace as if he’d just electrocuted me. “Nate! What the fuck? Why do you smell like Royce?”
He glowered at me as I flipped over to glare daggers. “I don’t. You do. He’d left a T-shirt in my truck, and I figured you’d prefer that to sleeping naked.”
Confused, I glanced down at myself, and sure enough, I was wearing one of Royce’s Nevaeh University T-shirts. That…okay, yeah, that explained why the bed smelled so distinctively of Royce . Thank fuck I’d said his name, so Nate didn’t believe I wanted him to fuck me.
Right, mangled brain? We don’t want him to fuck us. My brain needed to get the rest of me on board with that narrative, because my cunt was clenching around emptiness.
“How’s your head?” Nate asked, acting like nothing had happened as he stretched one thickly muscled arm behind his head and gazed up at me. “You were pretty out of it.”
More memories flooded back, and my blood pressure spiked in a whole different way. “No shit,” I snarled. “You lying, sneaky, backstabbing piece of shit !”
His eyes widened, but before he could even open his mouth to defend his actions, I had slammed a pillow over his face and launched myself onto him to hold it down. He deserved it. He fucking deserved it for having me committed and tricking me into signing that fucking paperwork.
I wanted him dead.
“I trusted you! ” I screamed as I smothered him with the pillow, not letting up for even a moment. Maybe I’d failed to choke his mom to death, but there were no sedative-wielding orderlies here to save Nate. “I trusted you, and you fucking set me up, you son of a psychopath!”
Muffled sounds came from beneath the pillow, but instead of trying to pry it away, his hands clasped my hips where I straddled him. But again, not trying to push me away. If anything…