Page 373 of Dirty Discipline, Vol. 1

“Thank you,” he replied. “I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have been able to move this on my own.”

“No, I mean… thank you for sleeping here the night… so I wouldn’t have to be alone.”

“Oh.” He arched his eyebrows, then nodded. “It’s all right, really. If ever a place could cause nightmares and evoke a fear of the dark, it would be this one. Believe it or not,” he flashed her a wry grin. “Beneath this devil-may-care grin and strong, masculine veneer, I had a hard time getting used to this place when I first arrived, too.”

Audrey matched his smile with one of her own, which gradually faded away as she found herself staring at him again. And he back at her. A lengthy silence stretched between them, filling the room with an odd awkwardness that she hadn’t experienced before.

Morgan really was a good-looking man, black and white notwithstanding. His shoulders were the right kind of broad; his waist the right kind of narrow. And his ass… yup, the man was the right kind of everything from head to black and white sock-hop shoes.

“Well,” she reluctantly said. “Good night.”

“Good night,” he replied.

They sat watching each other for another minute more before she shed her shoes and crawled under the blankets of the bed. Fully dressed, she rolled her back to him, closed her eyes and tried her best to sleep when she really didn’t feel like it. A moment later, all her attempts became null and void when, after hearing each of his shoes hitting the floor one at a time and listening to the soft rustle as he made up his impromptu bed, she heard the unmistakable sound of an unzipping zipper.

Her eyes snapped open. He was taking his pants off?

Her whole body flushed hot as she locked her eyes on the wall dead ahead of her. Morgan hummed a brief tune under his breath, but then lay down and the room fell quiet once more.

She was still wide awake a good half hour later when he let out the first of many soft snores. The burning heat in her cheeks was only half as uncomfortable as it was between her tightly clenched thighs. She didn’t want him, she told herself furiously. She didn’t even like him.

And she especially was not fond of snorers, she thought as he let out a particularly loud one at decibels sufficient to rattle the glass in the window frames.

She had to be out of her mind.

Covering her head with her pillow, she tried to get some sleep.

The next morning breakfast was bacon and eggs, buttered toast and grey-tinted orange juice that tasted just like it looked—a dull echo of what it should have been—and still her breakfast sat like an indigestible lump inside her. Particularly when Morgan said, “You wanted me to warn you before we got attacked by spiders, so consider this it. We’ve got a while before it actually happens, but just so you know, from here on out, things are going to get a bit hairy.”

“Oh,” Audrey said, putting the last sliver of toast back down on her plate. “Great.”

Morgan brushed his hands together over his own plate and said with a grin, “Well, are you ready to go hunt down your father?”

“Do we actually find the man?” she asked.

“Nope. Although we do find the biggest spider on the face of the planet.”

Audrey slunk down even lower in her chair. “Great,” she repeated, with even less enthusiasm.

“It’ll be all right,” Morgan assured her. “Remember, we’re the heroes. Heroes make it through everything.”

There wasn’t a lot of comfort in that, but there was also no way for her to get out of this. So, when Morgan left the house that morning in search of her father, she went with him. She dragged her feet the whole way, but she went.

It was a bright, clear, sunny grey morning, and yet they were the only two people on the streets. Just like the night before, no pedestrians, morning joggers or cars passed them on the roads, but then the vacuum hadn’t sucked at her so she knew the movie hadn’t started ‘rolling’ either.

“This is just too quiet,” she commented as they walked side-by-side toward the end of town. “It’s just as bad as last night. Only worse now, because it’s daylight.”

“I think it’s peaceful,” Morgan said with a smile. He walked with his hands tucked into his back jeans’ pockets. “Everything is quiet, serene. No motorists drag racing up and down the street with holes in their mufflers.”

“No birds singing or gentle breezes, or insects buzzing over the flowers or crickets chirping,” Audrey pointed out. “Or frogs at night or the odd dog or cat darting through the yards or across the road. There’s nothing. Just… nothing.”

“There’s you,” Morgan said, smiling down at her.

Audrey ignored the compliment. “I can’t imagine fifty years of walking this road without another person to offer companionship or conversation. How could you stand it?”

“I didn’t,” he said. When she glanced over at him, he suddenly crossed his eyes. “I went crazy about forty-nine years ago.”

Audrey stepped off the sidewalk and started to cross the street, but he caught her arm, laughing as he pulled her back to him. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding!”

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