Page 77 of Wife Number One

It felt like a hundred years since I’d last slept. My eyes were gritty and heavy, yet sleep refused to come. I stared at the damn ceiling in my bedroom for at least two hours, willing myself to just go the fuck to sleep.

It was 2:00 a.m. when I gave up.

I sat up, scrubbing my hands over my face with a groan of annoyance that I felt right to my damn toes. Not bothering to get dressed, I jerked open my bedroom door and stared across the room at Kara huddled on the shitty cracked leather couch.

She had her eyes closed, but she was scrunched into a tiny ball, shivering beneath a blanket that clearly was doing shit to keep her warm.

“What the fuck?” I muttered. Goddamn prospects. They hadn’t even bothered to get her a blanket or a pillow? I padded down the hallway where there was a cupboard full of shit nobody had a place for. I yanked it open, eyeing the overflowing shelves for something she could rest her head on.

Not a fucking thing.

I don’t know why I expected more. I shared this place with a bunch of twenty-somethings who couldn’t have cared less whether they slept on a bare mattress or the floor. Most of them probably didn’t even know what a washing machine was. Aloha and Queenie weren’t as Neanderthal, and I would bet Queenie had clean sheets and blankets in their bedroom, but she was in there with the kid and I didn’t want to wake either of them up.

Fuck, the last thing I wanted was to hear Hayley Jade screaming again. It was a sound that was so filled with fear it had eaten me up all the way down to my soul.

I looked back at Kara. I was sure I could hear her teeth chattering. And was that the fucking blanket Ratchet’s ugly mutt dog laid on when he stayed here?

In horror, I realized it was.

I stormed back to stand over her and reached down and ripped it off her sleeping body so fucking fast it whipped up and hit me in the face.

Kara woke with a start. “What…”

“You aren’t sleeping under a fucking blanket not even good enough for Ratchet’s mutt.”

Before she could protest, I picked her up, holding her tight in my arms because I expected a fight.

To my surprise, I didn’t get one.

Her chilled body sank against mine, so fucking cold she didn’t even argue with me, just sought out my body heat.

Goddamn it.

I stormed back into my bedroom and tossed her into my bed, watching her tits bounce with the impact.

My dick thought about getting hard, and I issued a command for it to piss off before I chopped it off.

Kara’s eyes were owlishly big. “I can’t take your bed. I don’t want you to have to sleep on the floor.”

“Good. I wasn’t fucking going to.” I crawled across the mattress and flopped down on the pillow next to hers. I dragged the covers up, not looking at her as I made sure she was properly covered by the thick quilt.

She was stiff as a board next to me. “I can’t…”

I sighed. “You can’t what? Be warm and comfortable? Yes, you can.”

“I can’t sleep in your bed, Hawk. I’m married. It would be a sin.”

I opened one eye. “You watching me jerk off with your nipples so hard they practically begged for my mouth was the sin. You already committed that. Sleeping in my bed now instead of freezing your ass off on the couch is just human decency. Go to sleep.”

I closed my eyes, but I could tell she was watching me.

I opened them again. “What?”

“Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For being kind.”

---