Chapter Seven
Waking up had never been Lilith’s strong suit, and even less so now that her internal clock was all messed up. That’s what happened when a girl went from working nights to suddenly…not.
She could’ve kept to her night owl schedule, but the truth was that she was tired all the time, wanted to sleep all the time. She hadn’t realized how worn out she was until she stopped. Sort of like the drop after a scare, except the bad shit had been going on for years now and the stress had worn her skin threadbare, feasted on her muscles until she was exhausted down to her bones.
She definitely wasn’t sorry about having used this cabin for a refuge. Honestly, what the fuck other options did she have? But in her heart of hearts, she really was a good girl, didn’t like breaking rules. It had made her uneasy to be taking something that wasn’t hers even if she wasn’t hurting anything and the person she’d been taking from had more than a single human could ever need. Having a conscience was a bitch.
Something about her sleep last night had been different though. She’d perched on the edge of the bed on her back, sheets and blanket held under her chin while Vance kept to himself on the other side of the massive bed, his big body a mound under the blanket he’d pulled from the couch.
It might be fun to sleep in the coziness and comfort of a coffin but there was nothing to actually contain her in the expanse of the huge mattress and that had been unsettling. She’d allowed herself to clutch Flaps but she’d left her binky in its case. Sure Vance had seen it and didn’t seem appalled but she didn’t want to invite any more awkward questions. All of that had made it more difficult to fall asleep, but now…
She was warm, and felt like she was wrapped in a cocoon, cozy and safe, maybe waiting to metamorphose into her final form. Leave this night manager at a shitty campground persona behind.
It’d be nice to stay in this purgatory between sleep and waking forever, just aware enough to appreciate how snug and secure she felt, but a pinprick of awareness exploded in her brain and made that impossible.
She wasn’t alone. She wasn’t alone and the person she was not alone with had wrapped her up in their limbs, resting the heavy weight of an arm around her ribcage while the bulk of a thigh slung over her hip meant she couldn’t simply roll away.
Vance. Vance the husky bearded blond lawyer was the one who was tangled around her, and, holy shit, she could absolutely feel his morning wood pressed to her belly.
There were layers of bed linens between them and he wasn’t moving—no, judging by the rattling purr that was emanating from somewhere above her head, the bear of a man was still very much asleep. So it wasn’t as though he was trying to assault her, they were just…cuddling. When was the last time she’d been cuddled?
Sure Carey hugged her and so did the kids, but she always felt as though she was the big spoon. Which was nice since she knew they adored her, looked up to her, but sometimes she just wanted to be the small one, the fragile one, the one who needed shelter instead of providing it.
And here this stranger was giving her exactly that. Her throat got thick and her eyes watered while she wondered how long she could enjoy this before Vance woke up. A minute? Maybe five? But if he woke up to find her snuggling into him, he was going to think this was okay, that this sort of intimacy and affection was fine. It was not fine.
Lilith snatched her arm out from where she’d curled it around his thickset ribcage, and managed to tug her leg out from between his substantial thighs.
Had she ever encountered a man whose body made her heart beat harder? So much of men’s goth fashion emphasized a skinny androgynous look, which she appreciated the aesthetic of, but nothing made her libido perk up like a guy who was built like a bear about to hibernate.
Vance’s blond brows crunched together, his nose wrinkling as he cracked open an eye and then sat bolt upright. They both scrambled back to their respective sides of the bed, Lilith clutching the sheet to her chest even though she was fully clothed, and Vance—oh shit.
The bed shook as he toppled over the far side and landed hard on the floor. That wasn’t what she’d meant to happen at all. Lilith scrambled across the disheveled bed to peer over the edge, make sure he wasn’t bleeding profusely from a head wound or anything.
“Are you okay?” she asked, scanning him for injuries. No awkwardly bent limbs, no blood, just a hefty dude on a braided runner with his hands over his face.
“Yep. Fine. Just, uh, pretty embarrassed and real awake,” he replied, scrubbing his palms over his cheeks and beard before looking up at her with a tight smile.
Lilith sat back on her heels so she wasn’t looming over him, and Vance got to his feet, shaking out his hands and rolling his shoulders. His erection was gone, maybe shocked out of him by the fall, and she was a little sad not to see the full extent of it in the pinstriped cotton pajama pants he had on along with a Yale Law School tee. Well that explained a lot.
“I…did not mean for that to happen. Like, the falling out of bed, obviously, but also the, uh, touching thing. I didn’t cuddle you on purpose, swear. I’m used to sleeping on the other side and I probably just rolled over, and—”
Lilith shook her head, feeling a blush creep up her neck and into her cheeks. “It’s fine. I mean, not fine, like I don’t want a repeat or anything.”
Liar. You would hibernate with that man in a cave at the drop of a hat.
“But I’m not mad. And who knows who cuddled who. It just happened. Hazard of only one bed and all that.”
Yes, this was fucking hazardous. She did not want to like this guy or sleep with this guy. She wanted Vance to leave so she could get her shit together in peace and then move on, hopefully before she had to see His Preppy Eminence ever again. He’d been fine so far—except for the incident with Flaps, which he’d apologized for and didn’t repeat—and that was how she wanted to think of him. Fine.
“So maybe you could leave now,” she suggested, holding Flaps to her chest like a talisman against catching feels for this spoiled overgrown frat bro.
Vance blinked at her, those lake-deep eyes wide and catching a ray of sunlight before he cracked a grin and shook his head again.
“You got it. I’ll just hit the head and be on my way.”