Page 66 of My Revenant
“’Cause I’m being pathetic.” I cleared my throat, but the tears still didn’t stop running down the sides of my face—to my ears and into my hairline—as I looked up at him.
“Why?”
“I don’t know. I just am.”
“No, I mean, why do youthinkyou’re being pathetic?”
“’Cause we just had sex and now I’m fucking crying.”
“Who told you crying was pathetic?”
“I’m sure most people don’t cry after sex.”
“So fucking what? You’re not most people, and neither am I. When you feel things, you feel them deeply. You feel them with all of you. I like that about you. Don’t hide it from me.”
I nodded, because I didn’t know what else to say. He kissed my forehead, and I cried harder. I cried without trying to stop myself until the feelings emptied themselves out of me. Dex held me the whole time, kept me in his arms, peppering soft kisses over my face so much that when I finally stopped and he kissed my lips again, he tasted like my tears.
I was shivering now, from the cold, from the fragile state I’d found myself in. Dex pulled out of me, and as I feared, I suddenly felt so empty without him. “I’m going to get something to clean us up,” he told me, and I grabbed him in a panic.
“No, don’t leave me.”
“Okay, baby.” He reached for his discarded shirt instead and used that to clean us up as best he could, then tossed it with the tied condom to the floor and shifted us until he could peel back the covers of his bed, pulling me into him as he covered us with them.
He was so warm. I wrapped my arms around him and nestled in closer. I felt so tired and so secure, and I knew if I didn’t move from here, I’d fall asleep like this.
I couldn’t bring myself to care.
twenty-seven
Dex - Past
RABBIT IN THE SHEETS, FIRE IN THE STREETS.
The nightmares didn’t come for me. With Jonah’s body against mine, I slept deeper and more peacefully than I could ever remember doing before.
When my eyes opened to the early-morning sun leaking in between half-closed curtains, I knew it was later than the usual time I’d wake up. I didn’t even set alarms anymore, because I never slept in, yet here with Jonah I didn’t even have to try.
I just had to hope he wouldn’t run from me again when he woke up to realize he’d spent the night. Yesterday’s progress extended far deeper than sexual. He’d let me into his soul as well as his body, and I so desperately wanted to carve out a home for myself there in the depths of him. I wanted to live in his soul, let it soothe what was lost of mine.
It didn’t matter that I’d be late for work—if I wasn’t already. I didn’t dare move in case he took this away from me again. I wanted to soak up as much of him as I could so it’d sustain me for the time we had to be apart.
By the time Jonah stirred beside me, I’d been lying there for hours, just holding him, watching him sleep, committing him to memory. I was no artist, but I could paint a picture of him with my eyes closed from how deeply I’d etched the image of him into my psyche.
Peaceful features twisted, regaining their sharp edges. His brow furrowed the way I’d expected it would, and his eyes opened slowly,as though waking up was an extremely difficult task and he had to fight himself to do it, both winning and losing simultaneously.
“Morning, Rabbit.” I spoke softly, bracing myself for the moment he’d pull away. Jonah’s eyes finally focused, taking me in, and he surprised me as he softened again, letting his eyes close once more as he grumbled unhappily and wriggled closer to me under the covers. His arm, which had been lying lax over me, tightened once more with consciousness. His nose was cold as it burrowed into the curve of my neck, but I didn’t mind. I’d give him my warmth. I’d give him everything. “How are you feeling?” I received another incoherent murmur in response.
So, my rabbit wasn’t a morning person, then. I pulled him in closer, wrapping my body around him, my legs tangling with his until we were a knot of limbs, and Jonah sighed with what sounded an awful lot like relief.
He mumbled something else.
“What was that?” I asked, unable and unwilling to mask my amusement.
“Time is it?” he repeated, only slightly more comprehensible.
“Mmm, does it matter?”
“Don’t you have work?”
