As slowly and carefully as I could, I lifted my head. Please let him be asleep.
My gaze slid over his chin, up to his nose, then higher, locking on heavy-lidded, golden eyes that were staring back at me.
I was definitely going to stab myself in the brain. There was no other option. “I’m not sure how I…” I looked around me. Urs and Gus were asleep on their own pallets, and I’d traveled a good distance in my sleep, to crawl all over Lothar. “…got here.”
“No?” he asked, his voice all sleep roughened.
I hated how much I liked that. “I mean, I occasionally sleepwalk.” I chewed my lip, and Loth’s gaze dipped to my mouth. “I must have…”
“I was on watch,” he said.
“Okay.”
“You stood up, eyes rolled back in your head like you were fucking possessed, strode over, shoved me to my back, and crawled on top of me.”
My face exploded into flames. “Right.” When was the last time I blushed? I had no idea, but I was now, so hot I had to squint from the heat waves coming off my own face. I gave him one of my bubbly giggles. “I must’ve been cold or something.”
“Or something,” he muttered.
Oh, sweet Lucifer, no. My fake smile froze on my face “What else did I do?”
I felt him more than saw him shrug beneath me, then he flashed me his fangs. “Let’s just say, I’m happy to be your scratching post any time, kitten.”
My world spun, my heart stopped, then my soul left my body and shattered into a million pieces. Kitten? There’s no way he’d know that name. No fucking way. Then the rest of what he’d said registered, hitting me like a six-ton elephant. “Your scratching post?”
His nostrils flared, and he nodded.
My swallow was audible. “Are you saying…” Oh my gods. Oh my gods. “Are you saying that I…that I…”
“Dry humped me?” He winked and lifted his hand, his thumb and finger a centimeter apart. “Little bit.”
“What?” I shrieked. “Why didn’t you shove me off?”
He chuckled. “You held a blade to my throat.”
“I did not,” I burst out.
He tilted his head to the side and there was a faint red mark. His grin broadened. “I didn’t dare move.”
“And you find that funny?” I yelled as I scrambled off his massive body. “I held you at knifepoint and dry humped all over you in my sleep, Lothar! That is not funny!”
“You did,” he said, still lying there as if the most humiliating thing ever to happen to me hadn’t just happened.
“I sexually assaulted you!”
He laughed then, that deep, rumbling laugh that made my toes curl. “If I really thought you’d take my head, I would have overpowered you.” He sat up, his stomach flexing as he did. “You obviously needed to let off some steam, and it wasn’t like I had to do anything. I was playing solitaire on my phone through most of it.”
I screamed in horror, and Ursula jumped to her feet, her knife already in her hand, searching for danger. Gus only a second behind her, jumping to his feet, fists clenched.
“Stand down,” Lothar said. “There’s no danger.” His gaze slid to me. “You good?”
“No.” I spun to Ursula. “I had a nightmare,” I said through clenched teeth, my eyes widening as if I could communicate the horrific thing I’d just done with one look. “I really wish you’d woken me before you went to sleep, like I asked you to.”
“You were out cold,” she said. “I thought you were good.”
“I wasn’t. I wasn’t good, Urs.”
“Shit,” she muttered.
