Page 47

My night had become purgatory, I was sure I’d wind up lying stiff as a board next to her, contemplating my sins for hours, and she looked thirty seconds from snoring.

Life wasn’t fair.

I brushed my teeth slowly, trying to draw out every second before I slipped into bed next to Andi. After I hit the mattress, there’d be no avoiding her scent, warm like sunshine, next to me in bed.

How long had it been since I just slept beside someone? I gulped as I realized it’d been years. The last woman had been Jess. Any heat I’d been harboring cooled at the reminder of her duplicity. Jess had no problem sleeping next to me, lying about her relationship with Dean. Until it became more convenient to come clean. I pushed away memories of our breakup. Andi wasn’t Jess.

But channeling thoughts of relationships gone wrong might help me win our challenge.

I turned off my bedside lamp and slid between the sheets, listening for Andi’s soft breathing beside me. So, not snoring. Not yet, anyway.

There was at least a foot between us in the bed. If I slept still, there’d be no danger of encroaching on her space. Focusing on my breath, I willed myself to sleep.

Minutes ticked by, and Andi’s soft breathing turned into a gentle snore.

So, not faking it.

Sighing, I turned on my side in the dark, searching out her shape beneath the covers. Jealousy over her sleeping superpower washed over me. I flipped to my back again, staring up at the ceiling. If Andi could sleep soundly with me beside her, then I could too.

Thoughts of the trial intruded, and I welcomed them. It was better than obsessing about Andi beside me. Her warmth. The soft skin begging for a stroke, and her curves demanding a cuddle.

Not. Going. To. Happen.

Not without her consent, and not with trivia abandonment on the line. I could resist. Ihadto resist.

Briefly I debated getting up to knit, but turning on the light might disturb her, and I couldn’t bring myself to interrupt Andi’s sleep. One of us should be well rested tomorrow.

I ran through the evidence presented at trial before thoughts of Andi intruded again. Spending time with her had been the best thing about my court experience. It’d given me the courage to try again. Put myself out there with someone I cared about. Julie’s admonitions that I’d stopped trying after Jess had hit too close to home.

Thinking of Andi as off-limits had become a habit in high school, and she took me by surprise when she approached me after trivia. Going home with her was more tempting than it should have been, but I’d never be able to look myself in the eye, or Jimmy either, if I hooked up with Andi when she was anything less than stone-cold sober. Admittedly, fleeting thoughts of whether she truly wanted to sleep with a washed-up soccer player also intruded. When she knew me last, I was a Big Deal. I snorted softly. Maybe only in my own head, but still. It took a while to remember she’d never been interested in the sports star. To her, we’d just been her brother’s friends. And somehow, that made it worse. I couldn’t blame her deserting me later on anything but myself, my own flaws, if she’d never been entranced with Ty the Soccer Stud.

Rejecting her had been the right move at the time, though I’d tried to do it gently. Clearly, she remembered it differently. But it was yet another sign that I’d made the right decision.

If, no,whenAndi and I slept together, I wanted it to be good for both of us. No regrets, no hasty decision-making or alcohol clouding things. No siblings or ghosts of girlfriends past, only us.

I smiled into the dark, liking how “us” sounded in my head.

Just us.

***

My alarm blared, and I cracked an eyelid open, feeling for the clock beside me on the table to shut it off. Limbs heavy with sleep, I enjoyed the lassitude, unable to remember the last time I’d slept so well.

The feminine moan and soft puff of breath gusting on my neck brought me back to myself. Andi had wrapped around me like a vine in the night, but before I could declare victory in our little war, I realized my leg was thrust between her thighs, my left hand gripping one firm butt cheek. No wonder I’d had sweet dreams.

I unhanded her quickly, but probably too late to claim total innocence.

Andi disentangled herself from me, and I immediately missed her warmth snuggled against my chest.

“Morning,” she yawned, eyeing me sheepishly from beneath heavy-lidded eyes.

“Morning,” I rumbled back, my voice rough from disuse and tight with desire.

I wanted nothing more than to tumble her back into the covers and forget the world for a while.

“So …” She gestured between us with her pointer finger.

I yawned, trying to act casual, like I wasn’t hard, seeing her rosy cheeks and sleep-mussed hair.