Page 60 of An Endless Memory

With deliberate movements, I navigated down the hall. Her bedroom door was open and the light in the hall was enough to illuminate the inside.

“Can you see all right?” I asked in a low voice. Kellan’s even breaths filled the room.

She nodded. “I just need to grab a pair of shorts and a shirt before I get into bed.”

“Let me clean up the bathroom, and I’ll come back to check on you.”

I did as I said, leaving her to dress. I returned to her room with the drink and water. There was a clean puke bucket on her nightstand. She was tucked under the covers, but in the faint glow of the night-light, her shivers couldn’t be hidden.

“You’re cold.” I set the glasses down.

“It’s the bath. I’m sure I don’t have a fever. I’ll warm up in a minute.”

That wasn’t good enough either. My boots were already off, so I climbed into bed right behind her.

She stiffened and rolled to her back. “Eliot!” she whisper-shouted. “What are you doing?”

“Warming you up. Sorry. Shoulda asked first. Want me to leave or lend you my body heat?”

She blinked, and I heard her swallow. “You are really warm.”

“A damn furnace, honey.”

She sagged into the mattress. I crowded behind her. She was warm already, but her shivers lessened the closer I got. I wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her against me while strategically angling my hips back. My dick had taken notice of the woman in my arms, and it didn’t care that she’d been hunched over the toilet bowl less than an hour ago. She was soft in all the right places.

“Get some rest.”

“Mmm.” She sounded skeptical. “I don’t know if I can.”

“Want me to sing you a lullaby?”

Her soft chuckle shook her body. “Sure. I’ll be on the receiving end of one for once.”

The only song that came to mind was a country song about a toxic relationship, but it was a good one to sing acoustically. My shower would attest to that.

I started singing, my voice low, only for her ears. She was stiff at first, but eventually, her shivers subsided. Soon enough, her breathing grew steady.

I should go. She was warm and asleep. My work here was done. I could take the monitor and go to the other bedroom so I could get some sleep before Kellan woke up.

But I didn’t move. I relaxed around Lily, buried my nose in her sunshine-smelling hair, and drifted off.

Lily

I woke up in the snuggliest of cocoons. I was warm, my stomach wasn’t pitching in all different directions, and the fatigue from yesterday was fading. I wasn’t full of energy, but I could stay in this cozy nest for eternity.

My mind was sluggishly trying to wake up. A giant weight was pressed against my side—or was I pressed against it? A big, warm presence was in the bed.

Wasn’t I divorced?

Since when had I woken up this comfortable with Carter? He’d always complained about how much I wanted to cuddle with him. He’d said I was needy.

This wasn’t Carter in bed. I was divorced. I had also remarried.

I blinked my eyes open. Enough light backlit the shades to make everything clear. My gaze landed on a stubbled jaw, gone a little slack in sleep. His lips were slightly parted, and his eyes were still closed. The dark sweep of his lashes on his cheeks matched the shade of his stubble. A lock of hair fell over his forehead.

Memories from the night before crashed back. I had been throwing up. He had cleaned up the bathroom and ran me a bath. He sang to me before bed. What a nice voice. I had my very own singing cowboy.

For a little more than nine more months anyway.

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