Page 28 of Embers

Cal must have rolled back over to spoon me again, but this is different. He’s hard. Really hard. All the way hard. Poking against my butt.

My mind is so blurry from sleep and a flood of sudden excitement that it takes me a minute to figure out what’s going on.

He’s turned on. It’s his penis I feel. It’s big and erect and pushing against my bottom.

The realization turns me on too—so quickly it aches. I’m flushed all over now and breathing raggedly. Holding myself perfectly still.

I have no idea what to do, but I don’t want to stop feeling this.

He must be asleep. He’d never let himself do this otherwise. Men get hard-ons in their sleep all the time. It doesn’t mean anything personal. I might be inexperienced, but I’m not completely ignorant.

One of his arms tightens around me. His breath hitches. His hips rock against me a couple of times.

I’m literally going to melt.

“Rachel,” he mumbles in his sleep. “Baby.”

I whimper. There’s no way I can help it. Because no matter what in his sleep turned him on him initially, right now he seems to be dreaming about me.

My own arousal is a throbbing ache between my thighs, and there’s nothing in the world I can do about it.

Before I can figure out the best action to take, his body suddenly jerks. He inhales sharply and grows stiff.

He’s woken up. I know it for sure. I’m embarrassed and terrified and still aroused, so I lie there motionless with my eyes closed.

With a muffled groan, he gets out of bed and stomps to the door, letting a draft of freezing air into the cabin as he goes outside. He never lets me use the outhouse at night when it’s this cold, but he goes out sometimes.

He’s gone a few minutes. When he returns, he walks over to the bed and scoops me up in his arms.

“W-what?” I don’t have to pretend to be confused and surprised.

He carries me over to my bed and lays me down. “Sorry, baby. You gotta sleep in your own bed tonight.”

* * *

I don’t let the weirdness or Cal’s gruffness cause me to miss the best times I’ve ever known. So the following night, as soon as he gets up to stoke the fire, I climb out of my bed and slip over to his like normal.

He shakes his head as he returns to the bed. “You don’t gotta keep doin’ this every night, you know.” Despite his grumbles, he doesn’t hesitate to pull me back into position in front of him.

“I like it. Not all of us are antisocial assholes who get all grumpy about being close to someone.” When he drapes an arm over me, I grab it and hug his forearm to my chest. “I like being close this way.”

He doesn’t reply, but that’s okay.

“How long do you think this cold snap will last?” I ask after a minute, mostly just to make conversation.

He grunts out a nonanswer that is probably supposed to mean he doesn’t know.

I don’t pursue the conversation since it’s clear he doesn’t feel like talking much tonight. That’s okay. He’s holding me, spooning me, letting me cuddle. It’s a lot more than I had even two weeks ago.

I close my eyes and enjoy the feel of his body relaxing against mine, his arm around me loosening, his breathing slowing down. Tonight he falls asleep before I do, which doesn’t usually happen.

It makes me happy for no reason I understand.

As he sleeps behind me, I’m aware of the most overwhelming flood of feeling. Attachment. Familiarity. Trust. Affection. Tenderness. I’d honestly thought my capacity for caring for other people was permanently marred, but I was wrong.

Because I’m feeling all of it for Cal right now.

He might be rude and stoic and grumpy and obnoxious and incapable of handling basic human connection, but he’s always done his best to take care of me. Even pushing me away whenever he gets turned on is probably an attempt to take care of me. He doesn’t know that I want him to feel that way. He doesn’t know that I feel that way too.

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