“It was a long time ago.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
I almost smiled because she looked genuinely annoyed by the concept of time as a mitigating factor.
Her gaze softened slightly as she studied the marks again. “Does it bother you when people touch them?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“Why?”
She pinned me with her gaze. “Because I’m not planning to stop.”
Her fingers resumed their slow path across my chest, the touch light and comforting. I tightened my arm around her slightly without thinking.
Zoey settled closer against me in response, her leg hooking over mine as if the movement had been expected.
A little while later, she sighed. “This might be my favorite part,” she admitted.
“Which part?”
She tapped one finger lightly against my chest.
“The part where you stop pretending you’re not soft.”
I looked down at her. “I never claimed not to be.”
“You absolutely have.”
“I’m very honest about my disposition.”
She snorted quietly. “Sure you are.”
Her hand slowed again, resting flat over my heart. “Whoever did this, they don’t get to hurt you anymore.”
The statement was simple. Certain. And for reasons I didn’t fully understand, it landed deeper than the threat that had come before it.
I brushed a strand of that gorgeous blue hair out of her face. “Noted.”
Zoey smiled faintly and dropped her head back against my chest, resuming the idle tracing of patterns along my skin.
And this time when the quiet settled around us again, neither of us tried to interrupt it.
Chapter 15
Zoey
Morning arrived slowly.
Awareness came back in layers. First the warmth, then the faint sound of Markie shifting somewhere in the apartment, then the quiet hum of the refrigerator down the hall.
Then the very immediate realization that I was not alone.
I opened my eyes.
For a moment, I didn’t move. I just stayed there, taking inventory.
