Yeah, see, this woman was hitting the spot every goddamned which way. All it would have taken was one lunge, and I could have shown her exactly what she was doing to me. But I didn’t. My birth certificate didn’t say Prince of Lower Moravia for nothing. “Have a good rest. Come get me if you need me.”
“Okay,” Lisa said and let my hand go, smiling. With soft footsteps on the thick carpet, she made her way over to the bed and flopped down on the thick, down comforter. The comforter, the feather bed, the sheets, and the duvet almost swallowed her up, but not completely. I could still see the line of her breasts through my hoodie, and her adorable feet dangling off the side, with my socks—far too big for her—hanging off her, too. “This is amazing. I feel like I’m on a cloud.” She kicked her legs and then raised her arms, flopping them back behind her like a snow angel. She reached for the controller and then elevated the top half of the bed so she could see me. “I love this!” she said as she lowered herself back down flat again.
“That’s the idea,” I told her as I switched off the main light and stepped out into the hallway.
“Dave,” she said, poking her head up from the pillows.
Holy fuck. Yes. This. Goddamn it, yes. “Yeah?”
“Thank you again.”
It wasn’t what I wanted, but it’d have to do. “Sweet dreams.”
*
This time, it wasn’t a thumping that woke me up but a raging goddamned hard-on. The sexiest women I’d ever seen in my life was less than fifty yards from me, in my house, probably half naked now because I’d kicked up the heat and because she was underneath a whole stack of feather duvets. I turned over in my bed and listened to the wind howl, and listened too for any sound from down the hallway. Her punching her pillow, her adjusting her comfort zones, her adjusting the lumbar support so that her hips would be at exactly the right angle to… Fuck.
I sat up, drained my glass of water and then headed into the master bathroom to take a piss. The storm was still raging, even worse than before. I grabbed my phone and looked at the weather alerts, all of them stacked on top of one another, just minutes apart. I even saw a news alert that said the National Guard would be arriving in the morning, to help “extricate the citizens of Essex County.” But that wasn’t really what worried me at all. Thanks to my grandma’s Depression-era habit of hoarding all the essentials for some always-looming catastrophe, I’d had a huge generator installed. My basement had not two but three chest freezers and enough gallons of water to see us through an actual nuclear winter. We’d be fine. But what I was less sure about was Lisa. And that head wound. I’d gotten lost in her eyes before, and I hadn’t even really checked her pupils. Which was, technically, her fault. But I couldn’t really blame her for having eyes that made a guy forget everything he was doing.
So I looked it up on my phone, Symptoms of concussion. The usual array of super serious shit topped the list—vomiting, hallucinations, bleeding from the ears—Christ almighty. But then some less common but still scary-as-hell possibilities: Recurring unconsciousness. Irregular breathing. Seizures. And WebMD was clear about it, Those suffering from suspected concussion should be woken every three hours. Looking at the time, I realized it was almost exactly three hours at that moment. I’d left her at 11:30. Now, it was just about half past two. I raked my hand through my hair and thought about it for about one millisecond. I should check on her—I should definitely check on her.
Forcing my hard-on to relent and adjusting my package so I wasn’t coming at her with the flagpole at full staff, I walked down the hallway and listened outside her door. I had left it cracked, and she hadn’t shut it all the way. I pushed it open an inch and listened for her breathing or for the sounds of her shifting on the sheets. I didn’t hear anything, so I opened it a bit wider. And there she was, like Sleeping Beauty herself, surrounded by fluffy pillows and the down comforters, with the eerie storm glow from outside lighting up her profile.
I watched her breathing to see if it was regular and normal, but I just couldn’t tell from where I was standing. Advancing with careful steps farther into her room, I found myself beside her bed looking down at her. Much to my relief, her breathing was regular. And fuck me, she was even smiling a little. Like my hand wasn’t even attached to my body, like I was fucking dreaming, I moved a lock of her hair away from her forehead. She moaned and turned toward my hand, nudging me with her cheek and nestling farther into the covers.
“Lisa,” I whispered.
She stirred but didn’t open her eyes. Her pretty eyebrows furrowed together, though, like I was interrupting a dream and she was annoyed about it.
“Lisa, wake up,” I whispered again.
This time, she made this cute little whine, like I’d imagine she would when her alarm clock woke her. She rolled over in a huff and stuffed her face into the pillows. She was probably thirty or thirty-five, but right then, she was every bit as spoiled as a sleepy teenager, and I fucking loved it. But still, she slept.
I placed one hand on her shoulder and shifted her onto her back. I leaned in closer to get a look at the wound, to make sure it wasn’t bleeding again. It wasn’t, but her face was so damned beautiful, so peaceful, so sweet, that suddenly I just found myself bending over her. I was drawn to her like that; she was just so irresistible. As I got closer, I could smell a faint scent, something like strawberries, possibly. Or flowers. Or strawberries and flowers together. I couldn’t put my finger on it exactly, but whatever it was, it was seriously crazy-making. And before I knew what I was doing, I brought my face down to hers, and I was pressing my lips to her forehead.
Which was, of course, exactly the moment when she woke up. “Oh, fuck, what is going on?” she gasped, jerking away from me and giving me a startled shove like any normal human being would when they found a guy hovering over them in the middle of the night.
Smooth, you weirdo. Smooth. “Sorry. I was checking for a concussion. I had a bad feeling and… Sorry.” Just keep on digging, asshat. I stepped back like I’d been tased. What an idiot. Kissing some total stranger on the forehead while she slept? Telling her I was checking for a concussion? I’d be lucky if I got out of this thing with only a restraining order to show for it. I rubbed my stubble with my hand and looked away. “Jesus, I really am sorry. That was totally out of line. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
Such total bullshit. I knew exactly what I was thinking. About her. And me. And how badly I wanted her. About how her body felt against mine when we were curled up on the couch, about how relieved I felt when the violent shivers shifted to regular, calm breathing. About how good she felt there tucked up against me. With me. I wanted her then, and I wanted her even more now. It was really that simple.
Lisa sat up in bed, her hair in a loose ponytail. “It’s okay.”