Chapter 15
My head feels like it’s going to explode, my mouth feels like sandpaper, and why am I so sweaty? Why did I let Cassie convince me to drink last night? I always feel like I got run over by a bus the next morning.
I stretch to try to get the unexpected soreness out of my body. What the hell did we do last night?
That’s when I realize . . . I’m not in my bed; I’m in Liam’s bed—alone.
“Fuck,” I curse under my breath.
No. No. No. No. Shit. Fuck. No. I did not drunkenly get into Liam’s bed and sleep past sunrise.
Though, truthfully, I don’t remember anything after putting on the first High School Musical last night.
“I see you’re up,” Liam says, walking into his room, startling me. What pulls me from my thoughts, though—what makes my mind go blank—is the fact that he’s wet. Wet and shirtless with gray sweatpants hung low on his hips and a towel around his neck. Damn.
Now, instead of freaking out that I’m in his bed, I’m concentrating on not drooling at the sight of water droplets running down his right peck and onto his abs.
“Eyes are up here, Rosie,” he says with a rare smirk. “How did you sleep? You were too drunk to sleep alone so I made you sleep in my bed. Sorry.”
Oh, thank God. I really didn’t want to deal with him finding out I sleep here every night while feeling like death warmed over.
“Here,” he says, holding out his hand to me. “I brought you some more Tylenol. You had two before going to bed; you should be good to take a couple more. I think you still have water left in your bottle.” He lifts his chin toward the nightstand.
Grateful, I wordlessly take the pills he holds out and gulp down some water, still not saying a word.
“Thank you,” I say with a hoarse voice, clearing my throat and taking another sip of water. I sit up straighter, throw my legs over the edge of his bed, dreading what I’m about to ask. “Do I want to know how drunk I got last night?”
“Let’s just say I’m more than impressed that you can still perform all the moves to all three High School Musical movies . . . and at how high your vocal range is,” he says, actually trying to hold back a laugh. It’s a rare sight to see him laugh.
“Arggggh,” I say, throwing myself back on his bed with my hands over my face, trying to hide my embarrassment.
“It wasn’t that bad, Rosie,” he says in a soft tone I’ve barely ever heard come from him. And again with that damn nickname. It makes my insides melt. “I promise, it was nothing bad. If anything, it was cute,” he continues in the softest tone.
This time, it isn’t the nickname that makes my insides melt, it’s his fingers softly pushing my hair off my forehead. The sparks that run down my spine make it impossible not to shiver. If he notices, though, he doesn’t let on, just keeps softly running his fingers through my messy hair.
“I promise it wasn’t that bad,” he says. “I’ve seen both Ronan and Cassie way more drunk than that. If anything, it was entertaining. You kept me smiling all night.”
Who is this and what happened to Liam?
He’s never been one to be sweet or overly touchy, yet here he is, almost forgetting that I’m his best friend’s younger sister.
And here I am, forgetting that he’s shirtless.
Instead of taking in his shirtless form, I hide behind my hands like a little girl.
Unable to stop myself, I let out another huff.
“Sloane, I promise it wasn’t bad at all,” he reassures me again in that soft tone I don’t know what to do with. If he wasn’t playing with my hair exactly the way I like, I’d be put off by it. But like a cat in heat, I keep my eyes closed and tilt my head closer to him.
We don’t say anything for what feels like forever.
I don’t ever want to leave this bed; I can’t remember ever being this relaxed.
Between two cross country moves, an undergraduate degree, a master’s degree, and starting my PhD, I haven’t found the time to just relax.
I haven’t mentally stopped in the last seven years.
Even when I’m reading for fun, I’m still not relaxed—my shoulders always seem so tense.
Not right now though. I’m currently melting into a puddle at Liam’s touch.
Unfortunately, my bliss doesn’t last long as we’re interrupted by my brother, and very quickly, the soft sparks floating along my scalp and spine all meet in a volcano of embarrassment on my cheeks.
To my utter surprise, instead of freaking out that I’m in Liam’s bed—with a shirtless Liam standing rather close to me—he just casually says, “Oh, there you both are. Breakfast will be ready in about fifteen minutes.” Then, he leaves just as casually as he appeared.
What. The. Hell.
This has to be some kind of drunk dream.
There’s no way my brother would be cool with this, even with Liam and I living together—platonically, I might add.
But more importantly, there’s no way on God’s green Earth that Liam would ever be this nice and attentive with me.
Did we turn a corner in the last week? Yes.
Had he made more signs for my plants? Yes.
And okay, we have eaten super and watched a movie together every night this week, but this . . . sitting in bed together, running his fingers through my hair . . . is not normal Liam and Sloane behavior. Even before The incident this was not normal Sloane and Liam behavior.