“Here’s the thing, though,” I say, and finally quit pretending to read. “I’m on the couch already, so you may as well go sleep in a bed, particularly because your ankle is still healing and I need you to drive me into town tomorrow.”
“I can’t let you sleep on the couch.”
“I bet you can.”
Gideon gives a resigned sigh, then turns and drops his sleeping bag and pillow on the floor behind himself. Then he pulls his sweater over his head—I’m still wearing the blue one I borrowed—and unbuttons and pulls off the flannel shirt he’s got on underneath.
All he’s got on now is a dark gray long-sleeved thermal shirt—the kind with the waffle weave—that he’s wearing a base layer, and the thing about base layers is that they’re close-fitting. That’s, like, the point of base layers. They’re tight so you can put more clothes over them.
Which is to say: now I’m staring at Gideon’s back in this tight shirt as he rubs his hands over his face, which makes all the muscles in his back and shoulders bunch and flex in the dramatic, flickering lights.
I stare. My brain momentarily clears into light static and a distinct feeling of dismay at my reaction. It’s not—I shouldn’t. I really shouldn’t.
“Andi,” he groans, all low and rough, into his hands, and I can feel my eyes go wide. What thefuck. “C’mon.”
I almost sayyes, but come to my senses.
“I live on this couch now,” I announce, burrowing as far as I can into the cushions.
“Don’t make me do this.”
“Go sleep in a bed like a regular person,” I tell him, the sleeping bag all the way up to my chin. “Isn’t the whole point of this that you can’t sleep in the same room as me anyway? Shoo.”
He heaves another deep sigh, and it moves his shoulders and back a little, and it’s alarmingly appealing, is what it is.
“Don’tshoome,” he mutters, and turns, and shirt is actually quite tight and he’s so pretty and stern and hepushes the sleeves up to his elbows, and who the fuck gave him permission? Wasn’t me.
“If you don’t want me toshooyou, then—HEY WHAT THE FUCK?!”
Gideon crouches, shoves his hands under me, and lifts me off the couch like I’m a pile of laundry in need of folding, and it’s unfair and undignified and also very hot and that’s a hell of a combination.
“Warned you,” he says, turning for the bedroom.
“Okay,no,” I say, squirming against him. I succeed in knocking my sleeping bag off, but not much else. “You can’t just—”
“Try not to struggle too much, I don’t want to hurt my ankle again,” he says calmly.
“Then put medown.”
“I will.”
“Now, asshole.”
“The less you struggle, the sooner I’ll put you down,” he says, turning sideways to go through the bedroom doorway, his arms tightening around me, and he’s very solid and very warm and wow, his face is close right now. And he’s touching my butt, technically, and his fingers are splayed along my ribcage in a spot that’s kinda grazing my underboob, and I’m glad for the low light because I’m ten thousand shades of red right now.
“Why won’t you let me help you?” I shout, and grab the door frame. Gideon grimaces, hissing through his teeth, and I let go instantly. “Sorry,” I gasp. “Are you—”
The fucker just gives me a smug smile, walks two more steps, and dumps me onto a twin bed so hard the frame creaks.
“Ow,” I say, and instantly, he looks worried.
“Sorry, are you—”
I grab his wrist and pull. Gideon stumbles toward the bed and catches himself with his other hand so he’s leaning over me, and before I can think about it I knock that arm from under him and shove.
Gideon is heavy. He’s also full of complaints, but he’s off-balance for a few seconds so I take advantage of it and push him as hard as I can to the other side of the narrow, tiny bed, wriggling out from underneath him so I can get back to the couch.
I’ve almost made it—just one foot stuck under his thighs—when he lurches forward, hooks and arm around my waist, and slams me back onto the bed.
