I flattened my hand on the door at her back. "Are you sure? It's been a day."
"It's beena day," she repeated, lifting her gaze to mine.
We stared at each other for a full minute. Sixty whole seconds passed, I was certain of it.
At the exact moment I asked, "Do you want to hang out?" Zelda pointed down the hall, the one leading to the guest room, saying, "I'm kind of tired. I should get some sleep."
"Oh, yeah. Of course," I replied.
"But I could stay," she said.
"No, no," I argued, stepping back. "You're right. It's late and—"
"And we're visiting your family tomorrow," she added.
I dragged my hand down my face, groaning. "Oh my god, you're right. I can't believe I agreed to drive out there on a summer weekend."
"In that case," she said, moving toward the guest room hallway, "we should both get some rest. It sounds like tomorrow will be a busy one."
"It will be something," I muttered, staring after her as she walked away from me. "Good night."
She raised her hand in a wave and called, "Good night" as she stepped into the bedroom.
I stood there, barefoot and lost, longer than I should've. But as the minutes passed and her absence shifted from a cold snap to a dull ache, I forced myself into my bedroom. I did my best to get out of my clothes without fouling up the shoulder brace contraption too much, and once again I marched into the bathroom with the singular objective of jerking my want for Zelda right out.
I required that quick release to satisfy some of the hunger inside me. I needed it to make a dent in the overwhelming desire to consume Zelda, body and spirit. And I needed it to provide me enough momentary relaxation to get some sleep without resting my head on that gorgeous woman's body.
It didn't.
All I got was another streak on the shower wall and a buzz in my body that seemed to say, "Great warm-up. When's the real game starting?"
I tossed and turned in bed as much as I could, considering the busted shoulder situation. I slept for minutes here and there. My dick was hard the entire time.
After three hours of nocturnal torture, I heaved myself out of bed and went in search of some pain medication. Instead of the pills, I found Zelda curled up on the sofa wearing what I could only describe as nothing.
"Oh," she yelped, scrambling to the corner and tucking her legs under her. "I didn't mean to wake you up."
"You didn't," I said, my voice only slightly gentler than a bark. "I've been up."
Her gaze dropped to my boxers. "I can see that."
13
Zelda
There weretwo things you should know about me. Probably twenty things, but for the present situation two were most important.
One, I didn't sleep well. I'd never been able to rest my head on a pillow, shut my eyes, and drift off to dreamland. I had to wiggle around in bed and make unrealistic plans for the next day and reevaluate every time I'd ever said supremely cringey things in otherwise ordinary moments. I couldn't wind down until my head completed its Rockette-style high kicks for the night. Most of the time, I avoided the mental spinout with reruns ofThe Golden GirlsorThe Office, melting into the comfortable predictability like chocolate bars in the microwave. Even then, I drifted for hours in a groggy state that was neither asleep nor awake.
And two, I didn't own any pajamas. No one believed this but it was the damn truth. I slept in underwear and t-shirts, and not baggy sleep shirt-ish ones from Homecoming 2008 but actual t-shirts. The same ones I wore most days with jeans. They weren't big or holey, or otherwise pajama-y. Sometimes, I opted for a tank top. When it suited me, I skipped the shirt altogether and stuck with undies—or nothing at all. I couldn't justify buying clothes to sleep in when I was perfectly cozy without. The only exception was a pair of boxer shorts I'd owned since high school, back when it was "fashionable" for girls to wear boxers as clothing. Now, nearly twelve years later, those boxers were faded beyond recognition and washed so soft, they were threadbare. Any sudden movements and those things were bound to fall apart.
Like I said, you should know this. It made the wholelounging on Ash's sofa in the middle of the night wearing men's underwear and a tank topthing a lot less unusual.
There was no explanation for my inability to stop staring at the erection trapped behind his boxer briefs. I mean, nothing beyond the knowledge of what that thing looked like when wet and what it felt like pressed against my thigh.
Ash glanced to the television—Parks and Rec, tonight's elixir—and then back at me. Brows furrowed, he asked, "Why are you awake?"
Blinking at him, I jerked my shoulders up. "Why are you?"
