Page 85 of Hard Pass

Okay. It was the best sex of my life.

Move. Get up. Leave.

The sheet slips as I swing my legs over the side of the bed and the room around me comes into focus. My leggings on the floor. His shorts wet and bunched up in the doorway. One of my shoes by his dresser. A trail of belongings and discarded restraint leading all the way back into the hallway.

I can even see puddles of water that still haven’t dried on the tile of the bedroom floor. A storm tracked all the way through the house because neither of us had the sense, or control, to stop long enough to care.

Yeah, like I’m supposed to forget about this when we didn’t care like that.

I stand slowly, pushing my tangled mess of hair out of my face, and begin gathering my clothes piece by piece, but it becomes apparent rather quickly that it’s all still wet. My bra is in a small puddle of water. My leggings are inside out and damp. My underwear . . . well, who needs those to drive home, anyway.

There has to be something else I can wear home. A quick glance at the bed tells me he’s still peacefully asleep.

I spot a stacked of folded shirts on a chair near the dresser and hesitate a beat before moving to them.

Just borrow one. Leave. Then deal with the rest later. That’s the plan.

I reach for the first one on top.

“Not that one.” His sleep-drugged voice slices through the quiet.

I jump so hard, I nearly drop the shirt. Spinning, I clutch it to my chest and find him watching me. He’s on his back now, one arm thrown behind his head, eyes heavy with sleep, and other parts of him very much awake.

My gaze flicks at the sheet and the unmistakable pitch in it. Of course he notices, and if his eyes didn’t give it away, the slow corner of his mouth lifting does.

“Take the red one,” he says. “It’ll look better on you. The white one is a bit see-through and while I sure as hell don’t mind, I’m sure you will on your drive home.”

I stare at him because there are a hundred possible things he could have said—somehow that was worse than all of them. Considerate. Intimate. Normal. As though women waking up in his bed and stealing his shirts is a thing that just . . . happens. Almost like last night was just another in a long string of last nights for him.

The thought unsettles me. Especially because I’m in the process of trying to convince myself that none of this mattered.

“Dublin?” He lifts a lone brow.

“I have to go.”

His expression changes slowly. The easy edge dissipates. Then the humor in his eyes. What’s left is unreadable.

“Okay,” he says with a slow nod.

Okay.

That’s it.

No protest.

No question.

No wait.

A cold chill slips into the space between my ribs, and I pick up the red shirt just to have something to do with my hands.

You can’t have it both ways, Dub. You can’t tell yourself and him this is nothing, meant nothing, but then get upset when he implies the same thing.

“I mean it,” I say, more to save face. “I need to leave. Get home. Get to work. And figure out—” I stop myself before I say too much. Before my ramble sounds as panicked as I feel.

When I turn back around, he’s pushed himself up against the headboard, the sheet sliding lower and exposing skin I refuse to look at.

Well, mostly refuse.