“That wasn’t the worst part.”
The pain in my rib fades enough to let go. I need both hands to pull Elise away from the wall and into my arms. She burrows her face into my shirt. “Tell me about the worst part.”
“It started out how—you know. How it did in real life. They came to get me when the plane landed. But when we got to those offices, it wasn’t the same.”
“Mmm. How was it?”
“They…took me to the same room, but when they opened the door, it was my dad’s office. He was—he was in there behind his desk.” Elise takes a deep breath. “With his cane.”
“Fuck. I’m sorry.”
“It was really bad. I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t scream, I couldn’t—I couldn’t run. And now I have this…”
Elise’s voice shakes, but she doesn’t sound afraid. Stressed, maybe. I rub her back. Breathe her in. She’s still warm from lying in my bed. I bought her three sets of pajamas, but she wanted to sleep in one of my T-shirts.
“Now it feels like I have a knot in my chest. Like the dream got caught in there, and I can’t get it out. I kind of wish I could cry, but—” She makes a frustrated noise. “I don’t want to cry over this.”
“Would you rather cry over something else?”
She takes her hands down from her face and slides her arms around my waist. “What?”
Now that the thought has crossed my mind, my body reacts. I can’tnotnotice the feeling of her softness against me. I can’tnotwant to hold her and fuck her and make her come.
“Once, when we were in your apartment…”
Her hands still on my lower back.
“When we were in bed, I made a deal with you. Do you remember it?”
“I don’t know.” Jesus, she’s cute when she lies. “What was it?”
“You were interested in playing a rough, dirty game with me. So I toldyouthat if you made yourself come with your fingers—” Elise’s hips press against mine now. She’s even warmer through the T-shirt. “Then I’d play a rough, dirty game with you and make you cry.” I drop a kiss to the top of her head. “I can’t be as rough as I’d like at the moment—”
“Right.” A little laugh. “You have broken ribs.”
“But I could make you cry.”
“That’s not all you’d do, is it?”
I tip her face up toward mine and take her in. The last tendrils of the nightmare are there in her eyes. Small flashes of fear. But there’s heat, too. I can work with that.
“No,” I promise. “That’s not all.”
Elise bites her lip. “It’s the middle of the night. Are you sure—” I tug her hips snug against mine, and Elise sucks in a breath. “Okay. You’re sure.”
I run all of my fingers through her hair, trying to ignore the insistent pulse of my cock between us. “Who do you want to be right now? Do you want me to soothe you to sleep with my tongue on your clit and pretend you’re made of glass? Or do you want—”
“The dirty game,” Elise blurts. “The rough one. Which—I understand you can’t—that you wouldn’t really—that it’s agame,not some kind of—”
I silence her with a hard, deep kiss. I’m not gentle about it. Not at all. Elise pants into my mouth, wanting, and I use the moment to grab the hem of her T-shirt and strip it over her head.
“Pretend my bed is a desk.”
Her eyes get huge. “What?”
“I can’t take you into my office and replace that ridiculous nightmare with something else. You’d probably scream and wake up Nate and Lydia. Pretend my bed is a desk and bend over it.”
Her cheeks flush. I can see it even in the dim glow from outside. “Okay.”