I spin around in the ergonomic leather chair and open his laptop, but of course it requires a password, so I close it again. Then I open his desk drawers, not really looking for anything in particular. It’s not like I’ll find a secret decoder for Royal Dolce’s screwed up psyche. Though his room is neat, his drawers are messy and chaotic, like he shoves all his random crap in there when his dad tells him to clean his room—papers, pens, mints, an old cellphone, Chapstick, gum wrappers, a yellowed paperback copy of The Great Gatsby.
I pick up the book and fan through the pages, but there’s no hidden note, no secret compartment inside. It’s just a book about some rich guy with champagne problems.
I hear the water shut off, and I slam the drawer, not wanting Royal to see me snooping.
He emerges in a cloud of steam wearing nothing but a towel around his hips. I gulp at the sight of him, but I’m not about to lose my head again, even if just looking at his body makes me wet. He glances from me to the bed, raising a brow. “I figured you’d be spreadeagle on the bed when I came out.”
“Sorry to disappoint,” I say with a shrug, my gaze following the path of a drop of water that slips out of his wet hair, tracing the graceful, strong line of his neck to his shoulder, settling on his collarbone. Thirsty bitch that I am, all I can think about is licking the water off his skin.
“Suit yourself,” he says, turning to the dresser. Even his back is glorious, with ridges of muscle flexing when he moves, and those back dimples that make smart girls stupid. He pulls out a pair of grey drawstring pants made of T-shirt material and pulls them on, every movement fluid and casual, endowed with the grace of a guy who owns every inch of his impressive body, who recognizes and enjoys its power.
God, it’s like he’s trying to torture me. Every line of his muscular ass shows right through the pants, and when he turns around, I can see his cock hanging against them, just enough of it to tantalize. The fabric barely hints at the ridge around the head of his cock, but it still makes my knees squeeze together involuntarily.
“Fucking tease,” I mutter.
He gives me a cocky grin and shuts off the light, plunging us into darkness. I tense, but a second later, I hear his body hit the bed. My eyes begin to adjust, and I get up and move to the closest recliner.
“What are you doing?” he asks.
“You expect me to sleep on the floor like a dog?”
“Don’t be stupid,” he snaps. “Get in the bed.”
“Yeah, not happening.”
He sighs. “We’ve already established that you’re the only one interested in your pussy. Just stay on your side and try to keep your hands off my dick for once, and we can both get some sleep.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It’s late, I took a beating tonight, and I’m too fucking tired to deal with your drama,” he says. “Get in the damn bed, Harper.”
I move warily to the bed and climb on, acutely aware that he can flip the script at any moment, that he can claim this is some kind of consent, since he told me to get in the bed if I wanted to get fucked.
His weight shifts on the bed as he rolls over, turning his back to me. I lie perfectly still, wide awake though it must be well after midnight. The room is filled with a silence as heavy as the darkness swallowing us. I blink up at the ceiling, considering whether to let myself fall asleep next to a guy who tried to kill me only a week ago. I can feel him breathing, can hear every rustle in the sheets when he adjusts his position. I wonder if he’s thinking about his sister, the pain fresh all over again. I think about how much that must hurt, that they never got closure, and any little comment can open the wound all over again.
This time, however inadvertently, I’m the one who broke the skin on it and made it bleed again.
At last, I roll over to face Royal’s back. “I’m sorry,” I say quietly.
He’s silent for a minute, and I think maybe he’s asleep after all.
Just in case, I add, “I know better than anyone that false hope is worse than no hope at all.”
“What, you waiting for your darling daddy to show up?”
“Maybe, when I was really little,” I admit. “But I never knew him. It was easy to let that hope die. It’s the ones that stick around that do the most damage.”
“Your mom?”
“Yeah,” I say, shifting my position to lie flat on my back. “It’s hard to let hope die when the person is still there, and you see the good moments along with the bad. When they do big things every now and then, like get you out of the trailer park and into a real house. You keep thinking maybe one day they’ll drop their crutches and make another giant leap forward, reaching for something better.”
“Harper?”
“Yeah?”
“That’s some poetic shit right there, but shut up and go to sleep.”
I laugh quietly, then roll over, scooting cautiously across the bed to wrap my arms around him. I curl my little body around his big one and press my lips to the center of his back. He doesn’t tense when I touch him, but after a minute, he rolls over, tucking me into the crook of his body. His arms are huge, and I feel both delicate and vulnerable with all that muscle wrapped around me. Then I feel his cock, stiff against my ass, and I’m the one who tenses up.