Page 41 of Wicked Little Darling

I had no idea what the fuck was happening. Reese walked to the door and flung it open, and I raised my arm to cover my eyes when the light from the hallway practically blinded me.

“Jesus fuck, Reese, where are you going?”

Reese disappeared into the hall wearing nothing but his sleep pants. I could hear his bare feet slapping against the wood as he stomped away.

Shit.

“Hey!” I called, pushing myself to my feet and racing after him. “Reese!”

He was halfway down the hall and trying to open the door to someone else’s room.

“For fuck’s sake,” I muttered, jogging down to him. “That’s not your room. Let’s go, darling. Back to our room.”

I grabbed his arm to try and steer him back the other way, and when I got a good look at his face, I could tell instantly that he was sleepwalking. His eyes were open but entirely unseeing,his cheeks flushed, and there was an eerie emptiness in his expression. It was so unlike his usual self that it was unnerving to see him like this.

I slid my hand down his arm until I was able to grab ahold of his hand, then tugged gently. “Come on, let’s go back to our room.”

He turned around, slid his hand from mine, and started walking down the hall again. I sighed and went after him.

He was either going to make it to the stairwell and fall to his death, or keep trying other people’s doors and get a fist in his face, so I rounded in front of him, pushed my shoulder into his stomach, wrapped my arms around his legs, and hoisted him up. He grunted, then brushed his fingers against my bare back, trying to find a hold, and finally made it to the waistband of my sweatpants. He grabbed so hard that it pulled the material up into the crack of my ass, and I shouted in surprise, stumbling and bracing a hand against the wall as a sharp pain lanced through my balls.

“Jesus, dude, that fuckinghurt.”

He didn’t ease up his grip at all, just kept holding on, so I grumbled and walked us back to our room. He was pretty heavy for how small he was. His skin was really soft, too.

“No, you can’t put the potatoes in there,” he mumbled, giving my pants a tug and making me grip him harder. Fuck that did not feel good. “They go in the other shoe.”

I huffed a laugh. He was kinda funny like this—when he wasn’t breaking my heart with that other stuff. I wished, for his sake, that all his dreams could be about potatoes being put in the wrong shoe.

I shut our door, then dragged my desk chair over to it and stuck the back under the handle. Hopefully that would deter him.

Reese suddenly let go of my underwear and slapped the skin of my lower back with both hands, making me hiss in pain.

“Fuck, you really know how to do some damage, don’t you?” At least he’d let go of my underwear. My balls were throbbing.

I gently laid Reese in his bed and pulled the covers over him, tucking them under the mattress so he couldn’t easily get up again, then got back in my own bed. I faced him on my side, wide awake and still feeling the burn of his slap on my skin and the discomfort in my balls.

For a few minutes, he was actually quiet. And then he started crying again, making little frustrated sounds as he snatched at his covers.

I groaned as a weary sadness pulled at my bones. “Fuck, please don’t cry, Reese.”

He got the covers untucked and stood up again, standing in the middle of the room as he sobbed his heart out.

I got out of bed, grabbed him from behind, and dragged him down onto my bed with me, wrapping my arms and legs around him so he wouldn’t be able to move.

To my surprise, he didn’t fight my hold. He made a sleepy sound of contentment and rubbed his cheek into my bicep, then sighed and stopped moving altogether.

Well, fuck me.

I propped my chin on top of his head, his soft hair tickling my skin, and closed my eyes. “What the hell am I supposed to do with you?”

Reese started snoring quietly, and I sighed.

“How arethings with your new roommate, Dakota?”

Things were really wild. Reese had been sleepwalking practically every night, so I just kept pulling him into bed with me or getting in his bed.

I set down my fork and smiled vacantly at Albert. “Oh, peachy. He’s a peach. A juicy little peach.”