Page 23 of SCRUMptious

Chapter9

L A U R EN

I drifted into consciousness—groggy,disoriented, and sore in places long unused—to find a muscled arm draped heavily across my torso. Slowly, I came fully awake, and that’s when everything that had happened the previous night came floating back. After weeks of flirting with each other and dancing around our attraction, I’d brought Donal back to my apartment and slept with him. Three times—three amazingly glorious, transcendent times.

With an inward chuckle, I acknowledged there was something to be said for youthful exuberance. Last night, Donal had seemed to want to make up for lost time. And I’d wanted … well, I’d wanted to get my fill of him before our time together was nothing more than a pleasant memory.

Hoping not to disturb his sleep, I tried rolling away, but my movement stirred him awake. “Where are you going?” He pulled me backward, into the cradle of his chest, and kissed the spot where my neck met my shoulder.

I shuddered and pushed him away. “I was going to grab some water. Do you want anything?”

He stretched his big body and sucked in a pained breath. “Fuck.” He sat up gingerly and leaned back against the headboard. “Can you bring me a glass of water and one of those pills Crawford gave me for thepain?”

Immediately, I felt an immense sense of guilt. I hadn’t thought once about Donal's injury while we’d been fucking. Except for when he’d first climbed awkwardly onto my bed, it’d been the furthest thing from mymind.

I reached for my robe hanging on the wall across from my bed, but Donal stopped me. “No, stay naked.”

I glanced over my shoulder at the young, muscled god sprawled across in my bed. Everything about him was sheer perfection while everything about me was … maybe not so perfect. I wasn’t fat, but I was somewhat out of shape, and things were a little more jiggly and wiggly than they’d been even a couple of years before.

Sensing my hesitancy, he shook his head. “You’re perfect. I love your curves. You look like a woman, not a littlegirl.”

With as much confidence as I could muster, I dropped my hand from the hook and pushed my shoulders back to stand taller as I turned to leave the room. Alas, I was a woman with a lifetime’s worth of insecurities weighing me down, so I also sucked in my rounded belly and hoped it didn’t look too rotund. I loved that Donal loved my body, but marching around in front of someone without a stitch of clothing to protect me from scrutiny would definitely take some getting usedto.

Returning with a bottle of cold water and his pill, I passed them his way and slid between the sheets. “Thanks,” he said, with a gulp before setting the bottle on my bedside table. Wrapping his arm around my shoulder, Donal tucked me in the crook of his shoulder.

I snuggled against his hard body and dropped a kiss to his pectoral. “I’m sorry about your foot,” I told him, my voice sounding loud in the dark, quiet room. I shared a wall with a guy who usually stayed up until dawn playing video games, but he’d been blessedly silent tonight.

Donal chuckled. “It sucks, I won’t lie to you.” He traced his fingers down my side, and I giggled and squirmed.

“What are you going todo?”

He sighed, his chest rising and falling under my cheek. “I have no fucking clue.” He grew quiet, and I let the silence hang between us. He’d been dealt a massive blow only a handful of hours ago and hadn’t had a chance to process what the doctor’s dire news would mean for his future. “I’ll figure something out though. You can’t keep a Casey down forlong.”

The determined optimism I heard in his voice made me happy. This wasn’t what he’d envisioned for his life, but he wouldn’t let it break him either. In that regard, he reminded me of myself at nearly the same age. If I could take the ashes of my former life and build a new one on top of them, I had no doubt Donal would be able to as well. He just needed to find a new passion; much the way cooking had becomemine.

He tugged me closer and rolled me on top of him. I braced my elbow next to hishead.

“Hi,” I whispered, looking down into his impossibly greeneyes.

He flexed his stomach and propelled himself up to kiss me. Dropping his head back to my pillow, he smiled up at me. “Hi.”

My eyes flicked between his, searching for some sign of sadness, but all I saw was satisfaction. And that felt damn good. I enjoyed that I’d put that look on his face, that in the face of uncertainty and upheaval he’d found contentedness in myarms.

In a blink, he flipped our positions so that he loomed over me. He dropped a kiss to the tip of my nose, and when he pulled away, his eyes had turned speculative. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Sure.”

“What are those small scars on your belly? They look kind of like …” His eyes flashed with … something I couldn’t name—fear? anger?—and he looked away with a tightening of hisjaw.

Shit. I hadn’t anticipated having this conversation with Donal since he wasn’t going to be in my life long enough for it to matter. Everything was fine now, but these scars were another reminder that an actual relationship with him was out of the question.

I scooted out from under him and pressed my back to the headboard as I pulled the sheet up to cover my naked breasts. Donal maneuvered his big body to join me. He surprised me by lacing our fingers together on the mattress betweenus.

I took a deep breath and reminded myself there was nothing to be ashamed of. My operation didn’t make me less of a woman. It did, however, mean I’d never be a mother. With my heart pounding in my chest, I said, “I had a hysterectomy three yearsago.”

He let out a relieved sigh, squeezed my hand, and brought it to his mouth.

That was not the reaction I’d expected.

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