Post by CLEA GIVENS on Jan 14, 2021 19:41:27 GMT
By now she should’ve been used to this sense of dislocation. Waking up, not having a clue where she was, what had happened. The dreams had been drowning her for years, sinking her into other people’s lives and futures she was powerless to prevent half the time. Usually when the mist cleared and her heart beat was back under control she was in her own bed though. Lately with the sounds of Craig and Cassie in the house, a soothing balm on raw nerves.
Glancing around the room as she’d started to come to she’d known instantly this wasn’t home. The panic hadn’t clawed at her throat though and sent her running for the door. Maybe it was that mental fog that still hid whatever had gone on last night. Maybe it was the warmth and solidity of him beneath her or the soft drawl of his voice. Something, Clea thought, was keeping that panic at bay leaving just those doubts behind that had her wondering how in the hell she’d ended up here with him last night. With that face, it could’ve been a Pied Piper situation pretty damn easily.
A quirk of his lips into a smile and she already felt the tug. A single comment ringing a laugh out of her, an instant flirtation that had always come naturally to her but was probably bordering on the dangerous given that she still didn’t have much of a clue who he was or how she’d gotten her, all wrapped around him on the couch. Squinting faintly, she turned her head, studied the window he was looking at. Shit, probably late enough to worry both Craig and Cassie that she wasn’t home. ”What time was it before I we … slept?” There was a eight on that word as his hum seemed to vibrate through his chest and straight into her fingertips. Damn. She felt the answering vibration in her own bones. Her fingers twitched. She should move, head home.
And do what? Try and just forget that she’d woken up plastered up against this heartthrob’s side after … whatever the two of them had done last night.
She swallowed hard at his chuckle, feeling that going places it shouldn’t have done either. Clea sank her teeth into her lower lip as she tried to extract herself over him. His comment had her freezing though, perched over him with everything getting still and hot. Except for her heart, suddenly that was a freight train thunder in her chest. One brow rose slowly. ”I’m glad to hear it,” she managed slowly. ”I would’ve hated to miss that.” The truth. The way he was speaking her had worried about what had happened last night though. A temptress with total amnesia when it came to both the temptation and what had put him in her path.
His eyes came back up to hers, dragged up from her mouth. Her breathlessness got more acute, her chest brushing his abdomen with each inhalation. If he kept looking at her like that she wasn’t going to hear what happened, some part of her would lose its permanently slick grip on self-control and the devil on her shoulder would assure her she could hear the entire story later. Clea stared, her mouth hanging slightly before she groaned and dropped her head against his chest. ”Your sister’s a vampire?” she asked, sucking in a breath that smelled of him, man and aftershave maybe, something just a little spicy enough under it that heat was rushing to her face as he settled his hands on her thighs. Slowly she lifted her head. ”I know about vervain, just haven’t had to use it before. Do I … are you a vampire too?” If it was she’d walked right into the viper’s nest so to speak. Had practically cuddled up to one.
They were usually just the wrong side of cool though, that veneer of human only there because they had ways around it. She wasn’t getting the vibe off of him, just that heat that sizzled under her skin where his palms settled against her thighs, anchoring her in place on top of him. ”Uh huh,” Clea whispered. ”Not even in the game lately.” Bracing her hands she made to move, shifting in his lap but then that pet name was slipping out of him again. She paused, her hands still resting on his chest. ”Why do you call me that? Little one.” The wise thing would’ve been to slip off of him, to excuse herself and splash cold water on her face, or slip into a damn bath of it but the curiosity that burned deep in her wouldn’t let her move. She’d always had a streak of it a mile wide, a way of challenging people and getting herself in so far over her head that she should’ve been drowning but somehow she never did.