SLEEP

Veronica
I gasped, but he swallowed the sound, his hand at the back of my skull holding me in place as his lips moved over mine, slow and soft, tasting me. When his tongue probed, I opened, and he slid inside. I tilted my head, and he pressed against me. When he did, I felt him, his hardness, at my belly.
I would have stopped the kiss.
I did.
But he held me and reclaimed my mouth, and this time, urgency replaced the gentler exploration of moments ago. His kiss was hungry, ravenous almost, and his desire only seemed to wake the same inside me. I raised my hand and laid it against his arm, liking the feel of hard muscle there. Feeling somehow safe for it. My body eased, relaxing into him, and my eyelids fluttered closed.
But then he broke the kiss and leaned his forehead against mine.
His breath came heavy. His hands moved to my hips, holding me.
“I’m fucked up right now,” he said. “You need to go upstairs.”
I raised my head to look at his face, into his eyes. They told so much he didn’t say, and it felt strange that I’d only known this man for days. I should hate him. Fear him. And I did fear him, but there was something else, a pull too powerful to ignore.
As dominant as he could be, as much as he commanded me, Stefan’s vulnerability seemed to touch the edges of his hardness, to soften it, even if he tried to hide it, to bury it, and all I could think was that he was lost.
With trembling fingers, I touched his face.
One of his hands moved lower, then rose upward, sliding over my stomach, his skin burning through the thin cotton of the dress as he caressed belly then breast, and when his knuckle brushed against my hardened nipple, I felt it at my core, as if he touched me between my legs.
“I want you, Veronica. But I’m drunk, and I need you to go upstairs to your room and lock your door, understand?” His warm whiskey breath tickled my face.
“You won’t hurt me.” Was I so sure?
“I will. You don’t know me.”
“You keep telling me that.”
“Maybe you should start believing it.”
He cupped my breast over my dress, and I gasped, watching his hand move, fingers playing with my nipple, neither the dress nor the bra offering protection.
“You could have hurt me the other day, but you didn’t,” I said.
Eyes locked on mine, he tweaked my nipple, as if to prove his point. When I made a sound, he released it and stepped back to pull his T-shirt off with one hand.
“Touch me.”
I looked at him, swallowing, something inside my belly fluttering. We both watched as my hands shook, as my fingertips touched his skin damp with rain. I caressed him lightly, softly. I wondered if he’d laugh at me, at my inexperience, but he didn’t. He stood letting me touch him, letting me feel his heart beat beneath his skin. But when my exploration emboldened and my fingers trailed downward over ripped muscle to the trail of dark hair that disappeared inside his jeans, he grabbed my wrist roughly.
I gasped, my head snapping up.
“I told you to go upstairs to your room and lock your door. I’m drunk. I’ll hurt you.”
“You also told me to touch you.”
He squeezed my wrist.
“You were right the other day. I want it. I want you.” I swallowed, not sure what the hell I was doing, where this was going. “Kiss me again, Stefan.”
A fire burned behind his eyes. My lips parted, and I licked them. Stefan pushed me against the wall, his mouth crushing mine in a kiss so intense, so full of everything, it hurt, it seared. It was as if he were leaving his mark. Claiming me. He pressed the flat of one hand against my belly, the back of my head against the cold, painful jagged stone.
“If you weren’t a virgin, I’d fuck you here and now, against the wall.”
The words came out in a ragged, hoarse voice. He didn’t give me a chance to answer. To tell him to do it. Because some part of me, it liked this side of him. This damaged, dark, broken soul. It longed to touch him. To touch that fractured part of him. The one that left him open and lost and dangerous.
Instead, he smashed his mouth over mine again. I made a sound, not a protest, but also not a yielding. I knew he was drunk. I could taste it on his tongue. I liked it, I wanted it. I wanted him. But not like this. Not the first time.
Stefan drew back, his breathing hard. He gave me one hard glare then stepped away, turning his back to me. Even from behind him, I knew his gaze locked on that pillar.
“Your back, Stefan,” I said, stepping closer, touching the bumpy, uneven skin. Scar tissue.
He whirled around and grabbed my wrist so hard I stumbled.
“Don’t. Touch. Me.” He squeezed. “Not my back.”
“You’re hurting me now,” I squeaked after a moment.
It was as if it took him time to process my words, because it took him time to release me and step away. He dropped his gaze and ran a hand through his hair.
“I told you I would,” he mumbled, then straightened and pulled the flask out of his back pocket. “Whiskey?”
He wasn’t really offering it, but I shook my head anyway. He swallowed a large gulp. Hardness was slowly returning, laying concrete over broken ground. I watched it happening before my eyes.
“You shouldn’t be down here, Veronica. This place,” he looked around, shaking his head. “It’s haunted.”
“Haunted?” I wanted him back, the man I’d just seen, the one I’d glimpsed for mere moments. He wasn’t making sense, and he wouldn’t look at me. Something told me I needed to get him upstairs. Get him out this cellar.
“Too much pain and suffering and hate.” He spat the last word.
“Come upstairs with me, Stefan.”
He shook his head. The light glistened against his too bright eyes. “Go.”
“Not without you.”
“I belong here.”
He drank.
I went to him again, tentative this time as I raised my hand to touch his arm, the back of his hand. He watched it, watched the progress of my touch.
“You don’t belong down here. No one does,” I said.
He only looked at me.
“Come upstairs with me. Please.”
“You don’t know me. You don’t know anything about me. You don’t have the first fucking clue of what I’m capable of.”
“I think I may know you better than you think. And you’re right. There’s too much hurt here. You need to come upstairs with me.”
“Why? Why do you care? I mean, look what I’m doing to you.”
I didn’t answer that. I couldn’t when I didn’t know the answer myself. All I knew was that I couldn’t leave him down there alone. Not now. Not ever.
“It’s cold.” I took his hand and dragged him, or tried to, toward the stairs, but it was like trying to move that pillar. “I’m cold. Take me upstairs.”
He didn’t answer, just watched me. I wasn’t sure how much of the whiskey he’d already had. He didn’t seem drunk, but he wasn’t himself.
“Come on, I’m cold.”
Just then, Charlie’s yappy bark came from the top of the stairs. I looked up at him. He stood at the edge of the stairs still too small and maybe too frightened to take that first leap down. When I turned back to Stefan, I found him watching me with the strangest look in his eyes. I couldn’t name it. Couldn’t put my finger on what it was.
“Come with me, Stefan.” This time, he let me lead him up. “Charlie will get hurt if he tries to come down.” Slowly we went up, and Charlie circled our ankles when we got to the top. I turned out the light and closed the door behind us. He let me lead him through the house and up to the second floor. “You’re freezing,” I said when we got to my bedroom.
He just stood watching me.
I opened the door and pulled him in with me, not sure it was the best idea, not with that strange look in his eye. From the bathroom, I grabbed a towel and dried his hair, shoulders, and chest and set the towel on the bed. Unsure what I was doing, uncertain I should do it at all, I began to undo his jeans, first the button, then the zipper. He stood still, and I knelt to take off his shoes and socks so he stood barefoot, bare-chested, his jeans open, the dark gray of his briefs visible.
I pushed the jeans down off his hips, the wet denim sticking to his thighs. Swallowing, I bent again, and he stepped out of them.
“Veronica,” he said once I straightened.
“Shh.” I pulled the covers back. “We’re just going to sleep.” I meant it. Nothing would happen. Not yet.
His forehead had furrowed, and his eyes had lost some of their strange brightness. He nodded, and when I pushed on his chest, he got into bed. I drew the covers over him, watching how the thick muscle of his arms and shoulders bunched when he turned to his side.
Charlie tried three times to jump on the bed. I picked him up and lay him at Stefan’s feet before grabbing my tank top and shorts and changing in the bathroom. Stefan lay watching me when I returned. I drew the covers back and climbed into bed, turning my back to him, taking care not to touch him. But then his heavy arm draped over my waist and pulled me to him. My heart raced and my breath hitched as he tucked himself around me, his big body wrapping around mine, his arm settling, his hand splayed open at my belly, holding me tight to him.
Neither of us spoke, but I knew he didn’t sleep for a long time.
Eventually, his breath evened out, and I closed my eyes, my body too tired to fight the fatigue any longer, his body too warm for me to not curl into, to soften against.
“I haven’t slept holding a woman like this. Ever.”
I blinked my eyes open but didn’t speak.
“I never wanted them to stay,” he finished. He pulled me in tighter.
“Stefan-”
“Sleep, Veronica. Nothing’s going to happen.”
I reached my hand down and touched the back of his and closed my eyes and slept, and when I woke in the morning to sunlight coming through the curtains, he was gone, his side of the bed cold.