To be better.
Fia was self-aware enough to know how her body worked. Five minutes after her last bite, she was slumped into my side, my arm slung over her shoulder, and she was fighting sleep.
I said goodbye to her new friends for her and guided her down the street back to our motel. She collapsed onto the bed, and I slid her shoes off, quickly noting their size. “Fia, did you pack pyjamas?”
She nodded into her pillow.
“Am I okay to put them on you? Or would you rather sleep in what you’re wearing?”
“Outdoor clothes not in bed.”
“Okay,” I chuckled, unwilling to tell her that was already happening. “So I can help you get changed?”
“Help me,” she said, sitting and lifting her arms.
I pulled her dress over her head and quickly searched in her suitcase for the silk pyjamas she’d packed, before pausing.
Did women sleep in bras?That didn’t seem comfortable, but I’d never slept in a bed with a woman unless we’d… well. I didn’t want to think about doing that with anyone else.
But if I took off her bra, that might be too far.
I pulled the top over her head and then the shorts up herlegs. She lay back down and lifted her hips to help me. Then she rolled over, grunted, and lifted her bra through her top.
“What witchcraft was that?”
She laughed through her exhaustion and chucked the bra across the room. “Get in bed. ‘S comfy.”
When I’d searched through the suitcase at the bottom of the bed, I’d seen it wasn’t actually a double bed, but two singles pressed together. Without disturbing her, I pushed the far bedside table to the ensuite wall and moved the empty bed to follow it.
She rolled over. “What doing?”
I can’t sleep in the same bed as you without pulling you close and cuddling you until you push me away.
“Just giving you some space.”
“You don’t have to do that,” she said. She wasn’t smiling, but she watched my every move.
“I know.”
I stripped to my boxers and got in, facing her. She had her palm under her cheek.
“You’re far away,”she mumbled.
“It’s probably for the best.”
Her eyes locked on mine for three beats before she asked softly, “Do you regret it?”
“Yes,” I said, and then remembered I had promised her the complete truth. No omissions. My hand reached out between our beds, halfway. I couldn’t bring myself to touch her. “And no. I regret hurting you. But I can never regret us. And without what I did… I don’t think we’d be the same.”
“We wouldn’t,”she agreed, but her hand slipped from the mattress in the dangerous space between us.
“I should have told you,”I said. “But I didn’t know howwithout losing you.”
Her fingers curled around mine. “You still might.”
“I know.”
But she didn’t let go. Instead, she closed her eyes and drifted into sleep.
