Ten #3
‘You have the worst case of selective hearing in the history of mankind, you know that?’ He pinches my chin. Gives my head a shake. ‘You’re all frowny again.’
‘Default setting,’ I claim – I lie, and he sees right through it. ‘It’s nothing. I’m just tired.’
‘You wanna sleep over?’
‘You can take me home.’ If you want, I don’t verbally add, but, somehow, he hears it anyway – he sighs like the unspoken words piss him off.
He repeats the question, annunciating the want of it all, and as bright eyes bore into me, the part of me that’s preconditioned to detest being an inconvenience, to assume that I always am one, shuts down. I shut down; I slump again, my forehead hitting his collarbone. ‘Can I stay here, please?’
‘Well, since you’re being so polite about it . . .’ Fingers skim the ridges of my spine, splay at the base of my back between two dimples. ‘Of course you can. You always can.’
Oh, what relief I find from words I didn’t even know I needed to hear.
Words I believe, even though I probably shouldn’t, because it’s unhinged, really, to think that I could turn up here, at this house that I’ve only been to once before, at any time, in any situation, no matter what, and a man I’ve only really known for less than a month would just . . . let me in.
To know that is borderline clinically insane, but I do.
‘C’mon.’ Guiding me to the edge of the countertop, he eases me off of it, steers me out of the kitchen and down the hallway until he’s pushing open the door of a familiar bedroom, and, suddenly, the bed aspect of this arrangement registers.
One bed that seems to shrink more and more before my very eyes the longer I scrutinize it from where I hover in the doorway.
‘I’ll sleep on the floor.’
My scrutiny shifts to Heath, hunched at the waist and rifling through the neatly folded laundry stacked at the foot of his bed. It intensifies, and grows a vaguely offended sharp edge. ‘That’s idiotic.’
‘Again with the sweet nothings.’
‘Scared to share a bed with me now?’
‘Scared isn’t the word, honey.’
I don’t huff so much as just . . . exhale. Loudly. Not breathy or frustrated or irritated at all. Because that would be dramatic. ‘You sleep on the floor when other girls stay over?’
‘Funnily enough—’ Slinging what looks like a t-shirt and a pair of boxer-briefs over one shoulder, Heath turns to me again.
Starts toward me again. Crowds me as I flatten my spine against the doorjamb, forces a crick into my damn neck as I strain to meet his towering gaze.
‘—I don’t make a habit of bringing hook-ups back to the house I share with my sister and her five-year-old. ’
‘Dark hallways are your specialty?’
‘No.’ The curve of his mouth is dangerous. Almost as bad as that low, teasing rumble. ‘Dark hallways are your specialty.’
‘I—’ My cheeks flush. I have zero defense. It was me, technically, wasn’t it?
‘Hey.’ The curve of a knuckle lifts my chin before dragging along the line of my shoulder, down my arm, until Heath is holding my hand again, squeezing it. ‘I wasn’t complaining.’
Just what every girl wants to hear. You kissed me, and I didn’t complain. ‘High praise.’
‘You want highly inappropriate instead?’
I almost say yes – I’m sure he sees the consideration bounce around in my brain, sure that’s why he smirks, sure he opens his mouth to tease me only to reconsider and cluck his tongue instead. ‘C’mon,’ he says again, jerking his head toward the ajar en-suite door. ‘You wanna shower?’
I shake my head, but he leads me into the bathroom anyway.
He tosses me the clothes I guess I’m borrowing, and I laugh quietly when I unfurl the t-shirt and find The Darkness stamped in faded white letters.
Briefly, I consider revisiting that stalking conversation – quickly, I forget all about it when he drops to a crouch, rummages around beneath the sink, and retrieves what looks like a Tupperware container, neatly packed with . . .
I frown. Snatch the container so I can get a closer look. Confirm that I am, in fact, staring at a secret stash of familiar products. The mini counterparts of the brands I use habitually. Unopened, unused.
‘Didn’t get everything,’ Heath grumbles – defends, almost. ‘But it’s fine, right?’
‘Fine,’ I repeat in a croak, and it sounds wrong. Like a lie, because this is so beyond fine. ‘Why did you get all this?’
‘Just in case.’
Just in case. I pluck the mini version of the serum I slather on every night, that eats up more of my budget than is sensible, and I almost laugh.
Ben never even bought me a toothbrush.
Heath dropped fifty dollars on a fucking serum just in case.
‘Thanks’ doesn’t come out right either. Too pallid, too insignificant. Clutching the container to my chest like it’s a rare freaking gem, not a plastic tub of skincare, I clear my throat and try again. ‘You don’t have to sleep on the floor.’
It’s a horrendous display of gratitude. Truly abysmal, even for me.
And yet, Heath grins like I’ve him offered him a golden medal.
Like the offer is a bit of a rare freaking gem too.