dreams ever since Tuesday night, the vivid, intense dreams that made sleep not very restful. They weren’t nightmares, though, and it wasn’t fear making me wake up sweaty and with a pounding heart. And it wasn’t being scared that had made me come more than once while I’d been sleeping.
Just thinking about them made my pussy throb.
“Dammit.” My head thudded against the back of my chair. “I don’t need to fuck him again.”
My body disagreed.
Hell, every part of me disagreed. As much as I was tempted to write things off as purely physical, I couldn’t do it without lying. Sure, there’d been stuff we hadn’t talked about, but it wasn’t as if we’d only ever spent time having sex.
When it got down to it, that was what bothered me the most. It’d hurt when he’d made those accusations. It’d be worse if I chose to get to know him better, and then things imploded.
That was the same reason I’d tried to keep Kaimi at arm’s length back when we first met, but I’d barely been a teenager, and I’d needed someone to watch my back. That had pushed me into trusting her much faster than I would have under other circumstances.
I needed a drink.
I got up and discovered that I’d apparently had my last beer at lunch, which left me with water or apple juice. At least Shadae had remembered that I didn’t drink sweet tea, and I hadn’t even needed to explain why.
I pushed the thought away as soon as it came. No good would come from falling down that particular rabbit hole.
Juice it was.
Except I didn’t really want the juice. And, honestly, I didn’t actually want a beer. I wanted to keep pretending that if I just ignored everything, my life could keep moving on the way it always had. Then again, my “always had” had never included being in Savannah and trying to figure out what I wanted with the smoking hot cowboy next door.
I closed my eyes and rested my forehead on the freezer door. I knew what I wanted to do with Bradyn. That was the problem. I knew it but was too chickenshit to do anything about it.
Rose’s text tone pulled me out of my thoughts before they could get too X-rated. I went back to the desk and opened her message.
I got asked to the Halloween dance!!!
Half a dozen gifs followed, all of them showing one form of excitement or another, and each one made me smile.
I thought you and your friends were going as a group?
We are, but they still asked! They’re going to come with all of us, but they really wanted it to just be them and me.
I tapped out my reply and added a few gifs of my own. Who is it?
Ty Gilmore.
I knew that name. Ty was a year older than Rose and had moved into Rose’s neighborhood around Christmas last year. A few months after they’d met, Ty had told Rose that they identified as non-binary, and that was why they’d had to move. Ty’s dad had beaten them when he’d found them trying on eyeliner. He was in jail now, and Ty’s mom had moved the two of them to New York City, hoping Ty would be able to find a place here. It’d been no surprise to any of us that Rose had immediately declared herself their protector.
I’m happy for you. I smiled as I wrote the message. Rose wasn’t one to go all weird around someone she liked, but the last couple months, I’d suspected she’d had a crush on Ty.
All of us decided we want to go as Guardians of the Galaxy now that we have enough people. I know you already bought me that zombie costume, but I really want all of us to match. Is it okay if I get something else? I won’t be mad if you say no.
Leave it to Rose to make her good news into her worrying about my feelings. I loved that kid so damn much it scared me sometimes. I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to handle being a mother.
Not that motherhood was really an option for me at this point. Hell, I didn’t even know if I’d ever want to have kids. I needed to get my own shit together before I started worrying about anyone else.
That was a thought for another time, though.
Of course it’s okay. I’ll bet Sitara can use the zombie one at the shop for decoration.