He smiled. “Gute Hund!”
Bogart lifted his head then lowered it back to his paws, thanks accepted.
Finally James looked down at Shay. Her forehead was propped against his chest. Her shoulders were quivering and he thought he heard little sobs. He lifted her face up to his. Her cheeks gleamed with tears.
“Did I hurt you?”
“No. It was just so … intense.”
“Yeah.” He wiped the tears from her cheeks with his thumbs. “You’re sure you’re okay?”
“I never—” Shay shook her head. She wasn’t much of a sharer. And he didn’t seem the sort of man you admitted all your weaknesses to. “I’m okay.”
It took her a moment to rise up off him. When she did, it was to slip on her sweater, which he noticed only came to the top of her thighs and revealed the lower curves of her naked butt as she walked away.
“Where are you going?”
She turned back from the entrance to the kitchen, her expression unreadable as she avoided his direct gaze. “You look like you need time to recoup. Want a beer?”
He grinned. “Whatever you got, I want it.”
*
James lay awake in the darkness, staring at the LED lights on the clock radio across the room. It was 1:41 A.M. Shay lay curled against him on the bed they’d moved to sometime during their second session. So deeply asleep, she snored like a truck driver. Bogart, too, could be heard dream-woofing softly now and then as he slept on guard by the front door.
What the hell had happened tonight?
He’d had good sex and bad sex. And a lot more in between. He’d never had sex quite like this. It was like sex at the end of the world, all desperate need and raw hunger and … anger. Shay Appleton defined enigma: an intense defiant contradiction that attracted him while messing with his head.
She didn’t want to talk. She didn’t want to hear words of praise or tenderness. She wanted what he wanted, sex. Lots of it. Hot, eager, pulse-pounding, body-rocking sex. Until, exhausted, they could no longer remain awake.
He should have guessed. She did nothing halfway. Angry, hurt, scared, all her emotions were expressed straight up, in your face. Now he knew what it was like to have sex with her. And he wanted to be reminded again and again.
He closed his eyes. Tomorrow. Tomorrow they’d have to talk.
*
Shay gazed straight ahead. It was very dark, so dark that when she shut her eyes and opened them again she couldn’t tell the difference. A moment later, she realized the covers were over her head. She flung them aside.
She lay on her stomach, head turned toward a doorway. Pale moonlight came from beneath it. A finger of dread slid up her spine. Was the bathroom door blocked? She always blocked it at night.
Even as she stared at it, the shadow of a pair of feet appeared at the bottom, partially blocking the interior light.
A moan escaped her. No! This couldn’t be happening!
*
Still half asleep, James opened the bathroom door.
A scream split the dark, lifting every hair on his arms and along his spine. Instinct made him reach for his weapon. But he was naked. No gun. In the sofa cushions. Too far away.
“No! No! Stay away! Stay away from me!”
He heard Bogart’s bark, bright and sharp. An alarm that meant he was coming to help.
James reached back and flipped on the bathroom light, adrenaline gushing through him so quickly his heart seemed to expand in his chest.
The light angled sharply into the bedroom, in stark relief to the shadows. He looked first toward the bed, empty. He swept the room, looking simultaneously for Shay and a makeshift weapon.
She stood in the far corner, only her feet lit by the partial light.
Bogart streaked in, barking loudly as his big head swung from side to side, trying to detect an aggressor. After a second, he paused, black eyes gleaming as he stared at James.
James shared his confusion. What the fuck?
He groped along the bedroom wall until he found a light switch and flipped it.
Shay stood with her back to the windows. Her eyes were wide and both hands covered her mouth.
James took a few steps toward her. “Shay?”
Her gaze did not track to him. Instead, she stared at the bathroom door. That’s when he realized she was still asleep. In the midst of a nightmare he did not share.
Bogart barked again, running up to press against his partner’s leg in confusion. James bent to stroke him.
“Gute Hund.” He pointed. “Geh raus.”
Bogart turned away and after a quick glance at Shay left the room.
James’s attention was still on Shay. He moved into her line of vision and said in a sharp, commanding voice, “Shay Appleton!”
She jerked and blinked, then her hands slid away from her mouth as her gaze focused on him.
“That was you?” The words sounded forced out of her, almost airless.
“Yeah. I needed to take a leak. Sorry if I scared you.”
“It was you.” She shook her head tightly then pressed her palm to her forehead. “This was a very bad idea.”