“Colin?” His body jerked at her calling his name and his eyes cleared.
“Tell me about it,” he commanded, his voice now strangely husky.
“What?” she asked.
“The dream,” he persisted, rather annoyingly, Sibyl thought.
“I said it was nothing.”
“Tell me,” he urged.
“I’d rather not. I don’t want to think about it,” she demurred, beginning to get panicky.
And anyway, why, exactly, did he want to know so badly?
“Sibyl, tell me.” The huskiness had vanished and he was lapsing into his smooth, angry voice again and she decided he was not going to let it go.
So she gave in, in a way. “I’ve had it before. It’s just… not nice.”
“Yes?” he prompted.
“In it, I’m sleeping.” Her mind was racing, she was going to have to make something up and decided, in case it came up in the future, or she dreamed it again and kicked him or hurt him in some other way (which she hoped she never did, indeed, she hoped never to have the awful dream again), she would remember what she said. “Peacefully, alone… I mean, by myself, sleeping by myself… all alone…”
“Go on,” he prompted when she’d trailed off, his eyes assessing. “You were alone, by yourself, sleeping.”
Sibyl nodded. “Then someone, or it feels like more than one person, I never see them, they don’t have faces, drags me out of bed and they slit my throat. That’s it.”
“Christ,” he swore immediately after she finished speaking, dropping to his side and taking her with him. Once there, he pulled her deep into his body and repeated, “Christ.”
She tipped her head back to look at him, feeling guilty at her white lie and somewhat surprised (in a funny, happy way) at his reaction. He seemed so concerned, it was almost touching (well, it was actually very touching but she didn’t want to consider that).
He dipped his chin to look at her.
“Last night, you touched and kissed my throat. Why?”
Oh goddess, she’d forgotten she’d done that.
“I don’t know,” she fibbed for she bloody well did know. “Maybe just a spontaneous reaction. I was kind of out of it at the time.”
He was watching her closely, very closely and she was fairly certain he knew she was lying. It wouldn’t be hard to figure out, she was the worst liar.
“That’s all?” he asked, his voice showing his doubt.
She thought it best not to utter another word so she nodded.
He seemed to decide to let it go and tucked her head under his chin as his hands roamed her back. This she found soothing, even though she still felt guilty for lying to him.
“Do you want breakfast?” she asked against his throat, wishing to be on another subject.
“What?” he queried distractedly.
“Breakfast,” she forced her head back and he again dipped his chin to look at her. She noticed he looked lost in thought and she explained teasingly, “You know, the first meal of the day. The most important meal of the day. Breaking your fast. The French call it petit dejeuner. The Spanish call it desayuno.”
He awarded her one of his fabulous grins and, at the sight of it, Sibyl felt her entire body relax and warm.
“I know what breakfast is,” he told her, his voice low and effective.
“Would you like some?”