Page 79 of Control Freak

A few more beers, and it would be easier to touch Shiloh. Add in some whiskey, and I might even manage more than that. But I didn’t want it to be that way with him. I wanted to be aware and clearheaded. I wanted torememberevery detail of what we did together.

By the time we called it a night, I was vibrating with an unnamable need inside me.

Shiloh was oblivious to my inner turmoil. As soon as the door closed, he pulled his hoodie over his head and tossed it in the hamper. His sweats followed. I watched him get naked without an ounce of modesty, but also no flirtation. School came early in the morning.

He climbed under the blankets with a yawn, then seemed to realize I was standing unmoving in the center of the room.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. Just zoning out.”

He smiled quizzically. “You did that a lot tonight. Something got you worried?”

“No. Just…thinking.”

I considered telling him everything, trying to explain how it felt to want something and be unable to take it. How lonely and isolating it could be. But that would only make him sad for me. I wanted Shiloh to feel a lot of things for me, but sympathy wasn’t one of them.

I unbuttoned my shirt and popped the button on my black jeans. I was half-naked before I realized Shiloh was watching me intently.

I paused. “Something on your mind?”

His lips quirked. “Just admiring the scenery.”

I shed my shirt, then reached for the lamp and turned it out, not in the right mindset to put on a show. Shiloh was the exhibitionist. I wasn’t used to being admired that way.

Shiloh didn’t comment on me hiding in the dark.

“I take it we aren’t practicing tonight?” he said, a question in his tone.

Practicing was our code for working on touch. I wanted to reach for him tonight, but my mood was off-kilter. I wasn’t sure I wouldn’t freeze up, and I hated doing that to him.

“Probably shouldn’t,” I admitted as I climbed into my sleeping bag.

“Okay, good night.”

“Night, Shy.”

The darkness pressed in, thick and heavy. I zipped into my sleeping bag but soon felt claustrophobic.

Shiloh’s breath evened out. Banshee wiggled into her spot at the foot of the bed. The house creaked and settled with a sigh. It seemed as if the whole world was going to sleep, and I was just now waking up.

I rolled onto my side, watching Shiloh’s face, so relaxed and calm in sleep that I almost envied him. Had I ever felt so at ease in my own skin?

The urge to touch him rose in me again. I unzipped my bag enough to slip out an arm. Gently, I brushed a lock of his hair back from his face.

My heart pounded as if I were about to steal a priceless artifact from a museum. But with Shiloh sleeping, my touch aversion shifted a little. The touching didn’t come naturally, exactly, but I felt more secure.

Shiloh’s hand was on the pillow beside his face. I curled my fingers around his, feeling the weight of him for thefirst time. Slowly, I slid my fingers between his, conscious of every millimeter where we touched, but also taking a kind of pleasure in it, like the way it felt to push on a bruise. It was uncomfortable, but also sweetly compelling.

I raised his hand in mine, driven by an impulse to kiss his knuckles.

Shiloh’s eyes opened.

“Holden?” he asked, voice slurred with sleep. “Are you…”

My hand tightened on his, then snapped open to release him. “Sorry. I just needed— But I shouldn’t have…”

“You can touch me,” he said, sliding his hand over the bed but stopping short of making contact. It was an invitation, not a demand. “Touch me anywhere you want.”