Page 218 of Tormented Billionaire Romance Series

CHAPTER21

CARTER

Iwoke early the next morning and immediately wondered why, as neither my alarm, pager, nor phone were going off. Nor could the disturbance have been caused by some source outside the house; when I listened, I heard only the soft whisper of wind sliding past the bedroom window, the faint roar of the rowdy ocean.

Maybe a dream?

If it had been one, I couldn’t recall.

I gave a mental shrug and let myself start to drift off again. The heavy warm blankets and Megyn’s body pressed against my back were too irresistible. Just another hour of sleep. Or two. However long until my alarm went off. Or had I turned it off the day before, anticipating—hoping?—that I would have my lovely guest in bed with me? I couldn’t recall right then and as the seconds dragged on and sleep settled around me, the details began to seem less and less important.

Then it came again, the sound which had awoken me. I recognized it for what it was this time, in my more aware state. It was a sigh, breathy, drawn-out, almost melancholy in a way that tugged at my heartstrings.

Unless Antonio had snuck in the room, or I had a ghost, that sigh could only come from one person.

“Megyn?” I murmured, my voice thick from sleep. I rolled over and looked at her.

She had clearly been wide awake for some time. Nothing in particular declared that, but rather it was a series of small hints that added up to the obvious. Her breathing, her rigid posture as she lay on her back with her hands clutching the blanket to her chest like a small child, and, most of all, her wide-open eyes regarding the blue ceiling with blank awareness.

She didn’t respond.

I nudged her. “Megyn?”

Please tell me she doesn’t have sleep paralysis or something like that.

Megyn stirred and glanced over at me. Her mouth made a little O-shape of surprise. “You’re awake?”

She was just a little out of it, then.

I held back my sigh of relief. Letting on that she had worried me would make her feel bad. “Well, baby, I could ask you the same question. Been awake for long?”

Megyn nodded.

“Bad dream?”

“Not really, no.” She gave a shrug. “I just don’t always sleep well.”

I hugged my arm around her middle. “You could have woken me. We could have gotten some tea or had an early breakfast. We still can.”

“You’re so nice,” she murmured. “I was just thinking, is all.”

“Share them? Your thoughts, that is. I’ll give a quarter for them.”

“Isn’t it usually a penny?”

“Inflation,” I said.

Megyn giggled a little. “Okay. I was just wondering how you figured out who I was.”

I propped myself up on my elbow. “It was your laugh, at first,” I told her. “After the party, I felt like I’d know your laugh anywhere. And I did. And your shoes really convinced me.”

Megyn giggled a little more. “I kind of played against myself with that one, huh? But how did you get up the courage to actually make a move? It could all have been a coincidence. And you hardly knew me.”

“Well, it seemed like there were too many coincidences for it to just be a coincidence.” I laughed. “And I did talk to Maggie about you.”

“Wait. Maggie?”

“I had lunch with her and Brian.”

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