He rolled over again. “Locke?”
The new lucidity in his deep voice spiked my pulse.
I refocused to find him on his back, staring at me, breathing hard, as if he’d just been catapulted into reality.
Without thought, I laid a hand on his bare chest. “I’m right here, man. She’s okay.”
Confusion furrowed Nash’s brow.
“You were worried about her,” I explained. “Sleepwalking, I think.”
Comprehension smoothed his frown. “Shit. Did I hurt you?”
“Of course not.”
Nash covered his face with one hand and reached for Orla with the other, finding a home in her dark waves. “She didn’t wake up?”
“Nope. Just Rubi, but he didn’t see you.”
“Fuck.” Nash’s jaw clenched. “Fuck.”
I rubbed his chest, trying to soothe his racing pulse. “Breathe slower.”
It came out like an order, one that Nash obeyed. He let his hand fall from his face and closed his eyes. I stayed where I was until I was sure he’d passed out, but as I rose, his calloused hand found mine in the dark.
“Stay. Please?”
7
LOCKE
I stayed. Of course I fuckin’ did. Nash was rattled. Upset. And it was so unlike him that I’d have slept with any brother under those terms. Folk. Ranger. Hell, even Cam.
At least, that was the reasoning I treated myself when I woke up the next morning pressed up against him, my hand splayed on top of his head, ignoring the multiple flaws in my thinking, including but not limited to this: would I have spooned Cam like a motherfucker and woken up carving a dick-shaped hole in his spine?
That was a solidno.
Fuckin’ hell.
I eased onto my back, careful not to wake Nash as I came to terms with the hardest wood I’d ever popped. And the fact that I’d somehow wound upinthe bed when I’d laid myself down with the strict intention of staying on top of the sheets. Witchcraft. Had to be. And Lordy Lord, why was this damn bed so fuckin’ comfortable?
“Locke?”
I blinked. Turned my head.
Orla loomed over me, hair piled on top of her head, wearing shiny leggings and a lace camisole. Or maybe it was her bra bringing the lace. Who the fuck knew?
I rooted a hand to the mattress and pushed myself upright.
Orla passed me a tea mug. “Rubi told me what happened.”
Awesome. So she hadsomeidea of why I was cuddled up in bed with her man. But still... “Rubi doesn’t know what happened. He went back to bed.”
“Rubi’s known Nash since this started. He doesn’t need to see it to figure it out.”
I sipped the tea like the caffeine fiend I was. “When did it start?”
My voice was a whisper.
