Page 48 of Brave
She was his.
* * *
“It doesn’t look it,” Carlson said, as he spread a blanket for her over the living room sofa, “but this couch is almost more comfortable than the bed. I usually end up sleeping on it at least once a week.”
The couch was a dark green, with flecks of brown woven through the material. It looked comfortable. Still neat, not quite new, but far from ratty. It was also huge. When he held up the blanket for her, she crawled in with more than enough room to stretch out. Neither her head nor her toes touched the opposite arms. Her bottom, however, couldn’t help but touch the cushions. Lying on her back, she stretched out so it wouldn’t have to bear her weight, but sitting or sprawled, she was swollen and throbbing, and even the minor brush of her flesh against the cushions as she scooted down, made her ache and burn all over again.
While he roamed through the lower floor, lighting the gas insert fireplace via the remote on the mantle and turning off all the lights, she curled onto her side so the ache would calm back down again. The blanket was soft. The army green t-shirt he’d given her to sleep in was even softer. She tried to find his scent in it, but all she could smell was clean laundry detergent.
“Warm, cold?” he asked, once all the lights were out except for one down the hall that led, presumably, to his bedroom and the flames dancing in the hearth.
“Comfortable,” she answered.
“You know where the fridge is if you get hungry or thirsty. Is there anything else you can think of that you might need?”
Was he looking for reasons to stay out here with her? As much as it tickled her to think that, she shook her head.
Leaning over the back of the couch, he braced his forearms on the plush cushions, making himself comfortable as he looked down at her. “Questions, comments, concerns?”
It made her bottom ache all over again, but she rolled onto her back anyway, so she could see him easier. “The things you had me repeat…”
He nodded. “I remember them.”
“Are those my next lines?”
“You haven’t finished the lines I’ve already given you.”
Although she couldn’t hear a hint of blame in his tone, it was hard not to take that as censuring. “I’d have been done with the first one, but I had to redo a page.”
He blinked. “Why would you do that?”
“Because it got torn.”
“All right.” He inclined his head. “So, in future, the procedure for that is that you will tell me a page got torn, so that I may have the chance to say, ‘That’s fine. You still wrote them, and that’s what counts.’”
It was hard not to read that as scolding, too, even though he ended on a small smile.
Her line was ‘Yes, Sir.’ Never would she have answered Ethen with anything else, but like his fork at the supper table, she couldn’t quite stop herself from poking. “It wasn’t perfect.”
“Did I ask for perfect?” he countered.
Fidgeting with the folds of her blanket, she shook her head. She half-expected him to complete the ritual by asking her to differentiate between himself and Ethen, but he didn’t.
“How do you feel about the lines?” he asked instead.
The burning pulse in her caned flesh flowed a salacious path directly between her legs. Her thighs clenched, but it didn’t keep the wanton throb from finding a new place now from which to torment her.
“I like it,” she admitted.
He arched an eyebrow, the corners of his mouth curling.
“I know I’m not supposed to, but I do. It comforts me when I get nervous or scared, and…” She hesitated, knowing better than to say what would ultimately make her even more vulnerable than she already was. But he looked so good, leaning over her. He always looked good, but it was even better right now with the illumination from the hallway and the glow of the fireplace casting him part in light and part in shadow. He was close enough for her to touch, if only she were brave enough. All she had to do was stretch out her hand and she could easily have cupped his face. “It makes me feel close to you,” she finished helplessly.
Unfolding his hands, he trailed the tip of one finger across her forehead, swiping a lock of brown hair from her eyes. “I guess I should always keep you in lines then, shouldn’t I?”
She saw it when his gaze dipped to her mouth. The heated pulse leapt inside her. Her thighs tensed. The soft cotton of the t-shirt he’d given her might as well have been burlap for how fiercely she felt the abrasion against her budding nipples. The small of her back lifted, subconsciously grinding her sore bottom into the sofa cushions in her ache to feel the wandering caress of his finger, not just following the curve of her cheek to her lips, but all the way down to her breasts.
He stopped just shy of caressing her lips.
