Awake (Reflections Book 3)

by A. L. Woods

  I killed the ignition, my fingers brushing against my car keys. “You ready?”

  The lights from the house reflected in Raquel’s eyes. She didn’t nod or acknowledge what I said. After a beat of a second, her voice cracked. “A lot has changed in eight weeks.” She leaned back in her seat, the leather of her jacket crinkling with her shift in position.

  “It has,” I agreed, my eyes following the stroke of her thumb against her opposite knuckles. “What are you thinking about?” I knew it was unlikely she would give me a straight answer, but I would never stop trying. I knew it was only a matter of time before she realized that while I may never crawl inside of that head of hers, I wanted to be a sounding board for her and her thoughts.

  Raquel took in a deep breath, rubbing her open palms on the front of her dress. “I keep wondering if I should be more upset about everything that’s happened.”

  “You’re allowed to feel however you want about it.” I pulled the keys from the ignition. Maybe it was instinct or my subconscious energy, but my fingers found the spare house key that sat on the ring, the one Trina had returned to me. I ran the pad of my thumb along the grooves and teeth, memorizing them, listening to the soft rise and fall of her breathing to my right.

  “I’m tired,” she admitted, shoving her hair out of her face.

  My fingers twitched against the keys, wanting to brush the wayward strands away for her instead. “Do you want some coffee?”

  “No.” She shook her head. “Not that kind of tired.”

  “Oh.” I pressed my thumb against the sharp edges of the key, my throat growing thick with each second that passed between us. The air inside the car was heavy with something I couldn’t place. “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m tired of,” she looked up at the starless sky through the moon roof, “telling myself this isn’t okay.”

  My Adam’s apple weaved, ignoring the edgy energy that assailed me. I didn’t want to rush her into saying whatever it was she wanted to express. I ignored the way my stomach roiled, the sinking sensation dragging my balls right along with it.

  Raquel met my eyes in that moment, her teeth worrying her bottom lip before she released it. “I love you. You know that, right?” The poignant way she whispered it made it appear as if it was precipitating something nefarious. I wanted to fling the car door open and book it for the house. My insides felt vitreous, like one wrong word and I might shatter.

  All I could do was manage a nod and try not to think about upchucking all over my chinos and clean dash out of nerves. My eyes swept over the soft curve of her profile, engraving every feature, dip and swell of her face in my memory. I had looked at her countless times before, but never through the eyes of someone who felt the earth shifting beneath his feet.

  I was on the verge of talking her out of whatever she was about to say when she shocked the hell out of me.

  “I want to wake up with you every day.”

  I whipped my head in her direction, my eyes wide while I studied her. Raquel rolled her lips together, fiddling with her hoop earring. “I don’t want to argue with myself that it’s too soon anymore,” she said. “Nothing about our relationship has been on an appropriate timeline, but I’m tired of denying myself what I want because of the emotional or mental constructs I’ve built up in my head.”

  My spine straightened in my seat, my waist twisting so I could look at her dead-on. “What are you getting at?”

  Her laugh was rife with the tremulous energy that ping-ponged between us. “I’m not very good at this.” She shrank in her seat, her hands curling into balls against her thighs. All I wanted was to mollify whatever was making her a ball of tension, pull her into me and tell her that whatever she wanted to say, she could say it and we would work it out.

  But I said nothing.

  “If the option is still on the table…” she shifted, crossing her ankles in front of her. She squared her shoulders. “I’d like to accept your move-in proposal.” Her smile was soft, but I saw the anxiety in the corners that deepened at my silence.

  I blinked at her. My addled brain took my words and cognitive thought on vacation, somewhere warm with granules of sand that filled my throat, and the soft crash of waves in my mind that blanketed me like white noise.

  I gawked at her. “You want to move in?” I asked hoarsely, my elbow sliding from the door seam.

  Her shoulders sagged, her head nod feeble. “I can’t cook, and I’m not that tidy, but I’m quiet and sarcastic, and I make a mean fluffernutter.”

  I recoiled, making a wrenching sound. “Those are disgusting.”

  She jerked in her seat, stiff as a rod, eyes tapering at me. “Take that back right now.”

  I unbuckled my seatbelt, found the lever that pushed my chair back and slid as far back as I could. “They are.” My thumb found the eject button on her seatbelt and pushed down on it. She slid the seatbelt off from across her middle. She mirrored my gesture, then cleared the center console to lower herself into my lap.

  Raquel twined her arms around my neck. She could barely keep the shiver that escaped her under wraps as my hands coasted up the outsides of her thighs, beyond the veil of her dress that enveloped her. My chilly hands palmed the flesh of her ass, dragging her against me. She made it impossible to keep my hands to myself.

  “Who thought it was a good idea to put marshmallow creme and peanut butter on bread, together?” I demanded.

  Brushing her lips against mine, she whispered against my mouth, “A culinary genius.”

  “There is zero nutritional value in a fluffer—”

  She silenced me, pressing another firm kiss against my lips. Lips still planted against mine, she spoke, “Don’t finish that sentence.” With that, Raquel rocked her hips forward.

  A curse rolled off my lips. Fine. I would pin this argument for now.

  I shot her a roguish smile. “How about you just let me put the tip in?” I bargained that she would find me as irresistible as I found her.

  “Sean,” she warned when I slid forward the palm I had been using to grope her. Her arousal earlier paled compared to the dam that existed between her legs now. “Yes or no?”

  “Yes, I want to put the tip in, but if the rest of me follows suit, it’s not my fault.” I shifted her body forward, my mouth finding the column of her throat, running my teeth along the vein there. Her pulse kicked hard and fast against my mouth, and I wanted nothing more than to suck, nip, and lick the spot while burying myself inside of her.

  “That’s not what I was referring to with that question.” My roaming hands stilled, sliding down her thighs until I was cupping the crook of her knees.

  Her chest rose and fell as she collected her bearings, her cheek protruding where her tongue probed the inside of her mouth. “Do you still want me to move in?”

  I swept my tongue over my upper lip, rolling my lips together. “That depends.”

  The remark swiped the amusement that had been coloring her face. Her arms folded across her chest, her body rigid in my lap. “On?”

  “On whether you intend to make fluffernutters in our place.” I didn’t miss the way she preened on top of me at my usage of the word “our.” She bloomed like a flower, and it was the prettiest thing I’d ever seen. “I gotta confess, I’ve never bought marshmallow creme in my life. It seems a little sacrilegious, culinarily speaking.” They may as well have vetoed the ingredient from our repertoire in culinary school, and my family sure as shit never ate the stuff.

  “Tell you what,” she started, heat radiating in her eyes, “I’ll let you spread marshmallow creme on me to help refine your palate.”

  Well, that was one hell of a visual. My brows hit my hairline, lips tilting with amusement. My dick was hard as a steel pole, and I was ready to show her that the only creme I was interested in was between her legs. I would wager it was much sweeter, anyway. “Hemingway, while that visual makes me impossibly hard,” I began, reinforcing the point by swiveling my hips against her, inducing a small
sound from her that had my balls kicking, “the only creme I’m interested in eating is yours.”

  She moved to kiss me, but I caught her by the chin, looking into her eyes. “I want you to move in with me.”

  She exhaled, her eyes searching mine. “Really?”

  “Really.” I drew her in, kissing her with a tenderness that didn’t match the feverish energy that had me wanting to watch her bounce on my cock and cream all over it while she was at it. “I love you.” I rolled a lock of her hair between my fingers. The shit was smooth as silk. “There’s nothing more I want than to come home to you and your disgusting fluffernutters every day.”

  “They’re not disgusting, you food snob,” she protested with a growl, rolling her firm hips forward.

  I stilled her for a moment. “They’re gross, and I am not a food snob.” I grimaced for one measly beat of a second before a wolfish grin had my lips parting and my teeth baring. “But hey, since you’ve offered to let me spread marshmallow creme all over you, this arrangement is sounding pretty sweet.”

  “Wait, what?” She gasped when I tickled her sides, my mouth nipping at the creamy stretch of skin that made up her throat, running the tip of my nose against her jawline. “What’s sweet? Me moving in, or the marshmallow creme?” She dragged me closer, the blunt edges of her nails biting into the back of my neck, teasing the edges of the hairline.

  “All of it, Hemingway. Every fucking part,” I hummed. “Now, let me sample the goods. I’m hungry.” The heady scent of her arousal hit my nose as I moved to hike up the dress past her hips.

  I didn’t even get a good look at the lace of Raquel’s panties I suspected matched her bralette before a stocky, looming shadow that could only belong to one person bounced against the hood of the car and drew my attention.

  Dougie’s knuckles rapped hard against the driver’s window. I didn’t even hear that fucker approach, and he made an elephant’s footsteps sound feathery light. I was too distracted by her, wanting her, needing her.

  Raquel was startled, though. At Dougie’s presence, she jerked upward, coming within an inch of knocking herself right the fuck out on the cabin ceiling. Steam left his mouth like a dragon’s, his hands buried deep in his pockets.

  I pressed my lips against the tip of her nose, the blush heating her skin against mine, before I looked at him.

  He cleared his throat, eyes bouncing from our compromising situation to the starless sky above. “As entertaining as it is to watch you two borderline fuck from the living room window, Pen has sent me out to inform you that you’re drawing a lot of attention to yourselves.” He swallowed back a smile. “Including that of your sisters.”

  “Shit,” Raquel murmured.

  I rolled my eyes. Just our luck. “Should have let me fuck you before we left,” I muttered, groping her hard. The motion elicited an involuntary-sounding soft pant from her that almost had me foregoing my scruples and fucking her senseless at the end of the road sans the prying eyes.

  No, she deserved better. I knew she did.

  So did my sisters. Dougie clearing his throat outside reinforced it. I wasn’t into exhibitionism. Smoothing her dress back into place, I helped her keep her modesty as she climbed back over the center console of the Jeep. She lowered the sun visor, popping a quick glance at her makeup. Her lipstick was still intact and didn’t bleed at the edges of her mouth.

  I had every intention of changing that later, and I wouldn’t mind seeing its deep berry color like a ring around my dick, either. Nothing said Happy New Year like a blow job.

  “Would you two hurry up? My nuts are about to snap clean off,” Dougie huffed.

  “That would be unfortunate, but at least you had one spawn,” she quipped.

  “I heard that,” Dougie shot, clapping an open palm on the roof of the car, sneering at her.

  “You were supposed to.” She rolled her lips together to keep from laughing, brushing her hair out of her face.

  “Ready, Hemingway?”

  Raquel pushed the visor closed, tilting her head at me. “To start a new year with you? Absofuckinglutely.”

  I shimmied the spare key off the key ring, her eyes following my motion. I held the key out to her, placing it gently in the center of her palm.

  “To new beginnings.” She leaned forward, cupping both sides of my face in her hands, and kissed me with a tenderness that warmed my insides.

  A total contrast to what was happening to Dougie’s outside of the Wrangler.

  “Guys, seriously. Could you do this inside? In front of the fireplace? Alcohol to warm your veins? A guest bedroom to fuck in if you absolutely have to?”

  I laughed against Raquel’s mouth, breaking the kiss to throw my head against the seat.

  Dougie grunted. “I’m so glad you find this funny, motherfucker.”

  But it was funny. The whole thing was damn hilarious. We were sitting in the car in the driveway of the house where it had all started. And we were content, drunk on happiness, although I couldn’t understand that persistent niggling suspicion that something was about to go wrong. The thought infiltrated every happy thought I had like a shadow, lying in wake, waiting for its moment to strike.

  “We should get in there before he claims he’s got hypothermia,” Raquel suggested, her palm closing around the key. She winked at me before snatching her belongings from the floor and throwing the car door open.

  I hung back a minute, watching her head for the front porch while Dougie yammered her ear off about God only knew what. At first he was all scowls, as if he was lecturing her for the both of us, and then he slung a heavy arm around her shoulders, drawing her closer as they plodded in sync to the door, all smiles and laughter.

  They were getting along. Something I had once thought impossible.

  So why did I feel so unsettled?

  I didn’t know what the jarring suspicion was; it was an elusive thing that escaped me every time I tried to get hold of it…like my hands were swiping at thin air and coming up empty-handed.

  With her palms cupped around her mouth, she called out from the porch, “Sean?”

  I chalked it up to unsubstantiated anxieties. We were about to embark on the biggest chapter of our lives, together. Our best friends were having a kid. Life was a far cry from what it had been a few months ago. It was different, and everything was changing.

  I’d never lived with a woman before, but I knew one thing for certain.

  Raquel transcended the ordinary.

  She was the one.

  And someday soon, I had every intention of making her my wife. With my hand on the door, I lost myself to the cold winter night and played off the whispers of warning from the rustling trees around the house as paranoia.

  That was the rational thing to do, right?

  CHAPTER THREE

  “Look who graced us with their presence.” Penelope’s voice sounded grating, her manicured hand clinging to the doorknob of the colonial. I offered her a withering smile as I dipped past her. My cheeks heated when the house erupted into hoots and hollers. A group of men clapped when Sean cleared the doorframe and stepped into the foyer. He grinned, shrugging out of his peacoat. I mirrored his movements and placed our coats in Penelope’s outstretched hand, watching as she moved to deposit them in the office next to the foyer.

  My skin pebbled with awareness as my eyes worked over the desk I’d been bent over a few weeks ago. The office had changed little. The only actual difference was that the imposing, brooding man who’d stolen my heart no longer sat behind it.

  In typical Penelope fashion—it shouldn’t have surprised me that despite the knowledge of what had occurred on that desk—she didn’t retire that specific piece of furniture for something I hadn’t christened. Nothing a cleaning exorcism wouldn’t buff out, she assured.

  Sean’s hand found my waist, his lips pressing down on my temple. “Do you want a drink?”

  I leaned into the kiss. “Sure, but can you believe she kept that desk in there?” I asked in
a whisper, tracking Penelope as she closed the glass-paneled doors of the office behind her.

  “Can you believe we didn’t give her a better reason not to?” He chuckled. My lips thinned with consideration at the suggestion, though I struggled to keep the glee from my gaze.

  “There’s still time.”

  His firm fingers curled against my hip. “I love it when you talk dirty.”

  “You both need chastity belts,” Dougie grumbled, grabbing Sean by the bicep, drawing him away to the antsy and raucous group of guys who were the source of all the revelry.

  “I’ll get you a beer,” Sean called over his shoulder in my direction. The gesture warmed my insides. We were moving in together. Two months ago, I couldn’t stand him. Now, I couldn’t stand not being with him every single day.

  Chanel No. 5 registered in my nose before Penelope’s arms wrapped around my waist from behind, her head leaning against mine. “You look cute.”

  I spun in place, turning to face her. She was wearing a stormy gray Merino wool dress with a fringed capelet that ended above her knee. The distressed fabric carried on through the cuffs of the long sleeves, a pearl button fastened the sleeves together. She paired the dress with midnight black leggings, her gold-plated chain-linked earrings catching in the warm glow of the black and brass statement light overhead. She curled her flaxen shoulder-length hair and brushed it out, looking every bit the modern-day Disney princess.

  “Well, you’re a twelve out of ten.”

  “Thank you,” she sniffed, fiddling with the modest engagement ring on her finger. “I feel like a beached whale.” The dress she wore wasn’t form fitting, and unless you knew she was expecting, you couldn’t tell.

  “A beautiful beached whale.”

  She shot daggers at me with her eyes. “Bitch,” she muttered. I erupted into laughter, allowing her to link her arm with mine and lead me into the living room that was bustling with lively energy. There were bodies everywhere. I didn’t even realize she and Dougie knew this many people. My eyes scanned the room, trying to pick out any faces I might recognize.