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And absolutely fucked.
In more ways than one.
Chapter twelve
Viktor
Morning comes with Heidi’s hair across my face and no pillow barrier between us.
I wake before her, listening to the soft shift of her breathing. The pink lamp throws little flecks of morning light against the wall, and somewhere on her nightstand, her phone buzzes then goes quiet.
My shoulder aches from last night’s game, my ribs carry the dull bruise from a blocked shot, and there is a faint red mark low on my chest, in between the tree branches, where her nails scraped against my skin in the shower last night.
Fuck, the shower.
Sex has never made me sentimental. It is a thing bodies do and a thing bodies want, a place to quench a thirst when everyone understands the terms. Last night should have eased something, or been a way for us to both get whatever this is out of our systems.
But it did not, at least not for me. It’s only made me want her again and more severely than before, because now I know what her breath does when she tries not to beg, and how her hand feels wrapped around me, how she sounds when it’s me making her come.
And now she’s asleep beside me with a knee hooked over the sheet and her cheek tucked into my shoulder. She stirs and stretches, her head lolling away from me, and I watch because I can’t not. Her blue eyes open slowly, hazy at first, but then home in on me when she finds me already awake.
“Are you doing your silent staring thing?”
“Yes.”
“Terrific.” Her voice is rough from sleep, and my body responds to the sound of it before my brain can tell it not to. “Any particular reason?”
I let my gaze move over her face. “Many.”
Color warms her cheeks, but she doesn’t look away. That is new, and it makes my chest pull.
She rolls onto her back and reaches for her phone. “Okay. Before we accidentally become weird about this, I think we need an amendment.”
“To the contract?”
“Yeah. Best to handle these updates while everyone’s freshly conscious and hydrated, right?”
She unlocks her phone, squinting at the screen. “Clause whatever… Mutually agreed sexual activity between spouses may occur as and where needed for physical relief, morale support, and general household stability.”
“Household stability,” I repeat.
“Have you seen the pillow wall lately? This household is in crisis.”
I turn onto my side, propping my head on my hand. “You are calling last night household stability?”
She shifts higher against the pillows, hair messy around her face. “I’m calling last night a successful pilot program.”
The corner of my mouth curls, and her eyes drop to it. The room goes quiet for a moment, neither of us ready to admit what this might be between us.
“Do you agree with the updated terms?” she asks.
“Yes.”
The answer comes easily. Maybe too easily, because her thumb stills against her phone and she studies me. She’s usually quick with her mouth when something feels too honest, but this time, she lets the silence sit. Then she swallows, nodding slowly.
“Okay,” she says. “So we agree to being mutually monogamous fuck buddies for the duration of this temporary marriage.”
“Very romantic.”
