Page 35 of Unexpectedly Wanted
A moment of silence slipped by.
Then I couldn’t help myself, and I pointed out, “You didn’t answer the other question.”
His chest expanded as he drew in a deep breath. I heard the rhythmic beating of his heart speed up ever so slightly under my ear.
“Go to sleep, Milo,” he said instead of answering.
“But—”
“I don’t have an answer I’m ready to give you yet,” he said softly.
Well, that did nothing to help me. I wondered what he would answer with. Was it too deep and meaningful to share with me at this point, since it wasn’t like we were really friends? Was it because we weren’t close enough for him to want to tell me? Or was he scared about how I’d react to whatever it was?
“Turn your brain off and go to sleep,” he said. Then he placed another kiss on the top of my head. It was sweet and tender, and I didn’t know what to think about it.
“Okay,” I said with a yawn.
I closed my eyes and focused on the parts of him that were touching me. The parts of us that crossed and how it felt having him against me.
It didn’t take long before I felt the heaviness of slumber trying to pull me under. I wanted to fight it, to stay awake and name all the parts of our bodies that were pressed together. But then Remy’s words were like an echo in my ear, telling me to go to sleep. An echo of a command that I couldn’t fight against.
13
Remy
Milo was acting weird this morning.
Weirder than normal.
He practically flew out of the bed the second his alarm went off, and shut himself in the bathroom before I could even fully open my eyes, mumbling something about needing to rinse off since he felt “sticky still in places.”
Had last night been a mistake? I didn’t think it was and I sure as hell didn’t want it to be one. But it was clear that Milo was freaking out and unsure how to handle the morning after.
I tried to shrug it off as I got ready for the day. Part of me wanted to barge into the bathroom and slip into the shower with him, if nothing more than to see what he’d do. I smiled at how he’d get flustered but wouldn’t tell me to get out. That thought alone had me staring at the closed bathroom door for a good, long minute.
But in the end, I decided to give him some space.
After I was dressed, I grudgingly made my way down the stairs, wishing like hell that Milo didn’t have a second floor. But all the wishing wouldn’t change that fact. Just another crack in this farce. I wouldn’t own a house where I had to climb stairs on a daily basis.
I rounded the corner to the kitchen and locked eyes with Milo’s dad. He was sitting at the table alone, a steaming cup of coffee in front of him. He sent me a flicker of a smile before lifting the cup to his lips.
“Morning,” I greeted as I shuffled over to the coffeepot to pour my own cup.
“Morning,” he parroted, not unkindly.
“Is, um—”
“She’s in there getting ready,” he told me, like he knew what I was asking. “It’s going to be a while since she only just started.”
With a nod, I moved to sit at the table across from him. Something told me this man needed to talk. That he had something heavy sitting on his shoulders. I might not have been a huge fan of Milo’s parents, but if there was something I could do to maybe ease the tension and bring them closer together in a way that was healthy for Milo, well, I wasn’t going to turn my back on that.
I didn’t know what to make of Harold. I could tell you that I didn’t care for Milo’s mother one bit. But her husband? He was a man that tended to blend into the background. Which made it hard for me to get a read on the man. There were times when his tone suggested that he knew how ridiculous his wife was, but it didn’t seem like he was the kind of man to put a stop to her shenanigans.
“Milo’s doing the same,” I said lamely.
He hummed as his head nodded.
“Listen, son,” he said, looking at me pointedly. “I know whatever is going on here isn’t real.”
