her hips, and I lick my lips as my eyes trail down the front of her body and the smooth skin of her legs as I watch them walk towards the bed.
She hesitates shyly at the edge of the bed, and I can see that she’s not sure if she’s doing the right thing. I don’t want her to leave, but I can’t find my voice to tell her that, so I reach over and pull the covers back, holding them up above the bed for her.
She looks at my face and smiles before climbing under the covers and sliding over to me, pressing the front of her body flush against my side, draping her arm over my bare stomach, and pressing her cheek to my chest. I tuck the sheet and blanket over the top of her and wrap my arms around her, pulling her closer and kissing the top of her head before finally speaking.
“Can’t sleep?”
She shakes her head no against my chest, and I reach my hand up to press my fingers under her chin and turn her face up to me.
“Your mother is a crabby bitch. Don’t let her get to you.”
She laughs softly at my words, and it makes me smile.
“That’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said about her,” she says with another easy smile. “I should be used to it by now. Everything I do pisses her off. I’m just thankful she wasn’t calling to tell me she saw what we did in your truck. That would have been awkward.”
Her dry humor is something I’m quickly growing to love about her, and it frustrates me that I don’t hear enough of it.
I heard most of the conversation she had with Eve earlier. Layla was sitting close enough and her mother was screaming loud enough for me to make out the gist of it. Eve found out from God knows who that Layla went off on her own and sang a few songs and played music on a guitar at a hole-in-the-wall bar. Songs that weren’t “Layla Carlysle” songs and a bar that wasn’t “Layla Carlysle” appropriate. Eve criticized and shouted all sorts of venom at Layla about how she was going to ruin her reputation and that she should be ashamed of herself for her behavior.
When Eve said that, Layla looked up at me with the phone pressed to her ear, and we shared a secret smile knowing that out of all of the things that happened that night, her behavior in the bar wasn’t even close to being as shameful as what we did in the truck.
I wanted to grab the phone from Layla’s hand and tell Eve to fuck off before she made Layla feel worse and took away the spark that was still in her eyes, but Layla beat me to the punch.
“I’m sorry, you’re breaking up. Must be a bad connection. We’ll talk soon.”
Layla hung up the phone mid-shout from her mother and tossed it onto the dashboard with a bubbling laugh. I started up the truck and headed towards her house, thankful she hadn’t let Eve’s words get to her.
Unfortunately, the twenty-minute drive gave her too much time to think, and by the time we pulled into the driveway, her mood had dropped considerably. She jumped down out of the truck without a word, and after I cleared the house and made sure it was safe, she excused herself to take a shower, never coming back out of her room.
“You should tell your mother off more often. I think she needs a healthy dose of reality,” I tell Layla softly in the dark, quiet of the bedroom.
“I shouldn’t have done that. She’s going to make me regret it, just like she always does.”
The admission from Layla shocks me, and I don’t speak for a minute. Just like June said, Layla isn’t very forthcoming when it comes to her life. I found a book of songs she wrote that have never seen the light of day, and I had hoped she would tell me all about them when I discovered it. She’s best friends with a man who at times seems like he resents her more than supports her, and she lets a woman who obviously hates her control her life. She sings like an angel and plays the guitar like a rock goddess in bar where no one knows who she is. I want her to trust me, and I want her to tell me why she’s made