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“She don’t know nothin’,” Westley said, though he didn’t sound entirely convinced of it himself. He picked up his fork and stabbed at his mashed potatoes.

I watched him eat for a minute, the easy way his jaw worked, the way he didn’t seem the least bit bothered sitting there across from me after everything that had happened upstairs. It didn’t make a lick of sense to me. This morning he’d looked like a ghost of himself, pale and spooked and unable to meet my eyes, and now he was just sitting there, eating like everything was normal.

“You’re starin’,” he said without looking up.

“Sorry.” I dropped my eyes to my own plate, pushing a piece of chicken around without much interest in eating it. My stomach was still too tied up in knots to want food, no matter how good it smelled.

“Don’t be.” He glanced up at me then, and something in his expression softened. “I like it when you look at me.”

My whole chest went warm and tight at that, and I had to look back down at my plate before he could see whatever was written all over my face. This was so new, and such a fragile feeling. One wrong move felt like it would send it all toppling.

“West,” I said quietly, my voice barely carrying over the clatter of dishes and conversation around us. “What happens tomorrow?”

He was quiet for a second, chewing slower than he needed to, like he was buying himself time to think it through. “Well, tomorrow we’ll have breakfast together and then I’m gonna go to work for pastor Mike. You can get more rest or do whatever you want.” He paused, lifting his gaze to meet mine. “And when I get home, I wanna try some things with you, things that I can’t seem to get out of my head.”

That low tone in his voice went straight to my cock. I didn’t have to ask what he meant.

“You promise you won’t regret this?”

West sighed, putting down his fork. “Buttercup, I don’t regret nothin’. Not a damn thing. I need you to believe me on that.”

I nodded. “I’ll… try.”

“That’s all I can ask,” he said, giving me a nod. “And I might need your help too because I don’t know anythin’ about all… this.” He gestured vaguely to the pair of us. “I don’t know how it works.”

“I guess we’ll have to figure that out together,” I replied, feeling that knot in my stomach loosen just a little bit.

He smiled and my heart melted just a little bit. “Good. Now eat your dinner, Buttercup. You’re gonna need your strength.”

There was a tiny, sexy threat built into that sentence. The idea sent another shiver down my spine. And I couldn’t wait to find out how he meant to make good on it.

Chapter 14

Westley

The second time I woke up beside him, I didn’t panic. I just laid there in the dark, memorizing the weight of his arm slung heavy across my ribs, and let myself want him without feeling bad about it.

That was new. Yesterday morning I’d fled to the bathroom like the devil himself was chasing me. I thought my whole damn world was coming undone. This morning I felt something closer to greedy. Two days ago I might’ve been worried about that, about what people might say. But I didn’t really give a fuck what my daddy thought now, and the ranch hands could go fuck themselves as far as I was concerned. All I felt now was a fierce protectiveness that had multiplied tenfold followed by a lust to claim what I felt was mine.

Rhett was still asleep, breathing slow against his pillow, and I could feel every inch of him pressed up along my abdomen. He was all warm skin and hard angles against me. And yeah, I was rock hard pressed against the curve of his ass. I couldn’t help it. But it didn’t scare me now. Now I knew why it was happening, especially when I thought of his mouth on mine and his cock hot in my fist and the sound he’d made when he came for me pressed up against the apartment wall.

I rolled my hips into him, just slightly, testing.

Rhett made a soft, sleepy sound and pushed back against me, pulling a groan from my lips. He wasn’t even awake yet, not really. His body was just chasing warmth the way he always did in his sleep. But it lit me up anyway, that little unconscious want reaching for me even when his mind wasn’t in on it.

“Rhett,” I whispered, and when he didn’t stir, I said it again, a little louder, my hand covering his where it rested on my belly. “Buttercup. You awake?”

He groaned, low and rough, and pressed his face into the pillow. “Mmph. What time is it?”

“Don’t know. Early.”

“Then go back to sleep.” His voice was thick, slurred at the edges, but his ass pushed back against me again in a way that told me some part of him was plenty awake already.

I turned him in my arms until we were facing one another, close enough that our noses nearly touched, close enough to see the sleep still clinging heavy to his lashes. His bruised cheek had faded some overnight, the swelling in his lip gone down just enough that I could look at his mouth without flinching on his behalf.

I pressed my forehead against his. “You’re really cute when you’re sleepin’, you know that?”

Rhett cracked one eye open, squinting at me like I’d personally offended him. “Cute?” he muttered. “I look like I got hit by a truck.”