Page 93 of The Young & the Sinner

Olivia

When I wokeup in the morning, I was no longer facing away from Mason. I was lying on top of him.

How did I get into this position?

His arms were still wrapped around me, and he was in a deep sleep. I looked up and watched him. He looked younger than he was, and I realized Mason spent most of his waking hours wearing a mask around other people. I had never seen him look so unguarded before.

I reached up and traced his jawline, which had fascinated me since day one. I smiled to myself. If I was being honest, everything about Mason fascinated me. I was fascinated with how much bigger he was than me, how hard he was where I was soft. How much… hairier he was than me. I could even see a few chest hairs coming out at the neckline of his shirt.

He made me feel feminine and fragile. Tiny. Something I was beginning to see as not such a bad thing.

His eyes twitched and I quickly moved my hand away. Then he woke, and I watched, riveted, as awareness begin to slowly seep into his blue irises, which were dimmer than normal. He was still no less beautiful.

“Morning,” he said, his voice hoarse from sleep.

“Good morning,” I said shyly, looking down to his chest. He tightened his arms around me a fraction, and my eyes jumped up to meet his. His smile was soft, and it helped ease away whatever awkwardness I was feeling then.

“I should probably go,” I said. It was still early yet, but Max was an early riser by nature, and it wouldn’t be long until he was up and ready for day.

Mason nodded. I wiggled a little on top of him, and when my thigh made contact with something hard, I let out a small gasp of surprise, and I pulled away quickly. Mason sucked in a sharp breath.

I wasn’t naïve. I knew what it was I had brushed up on. Unfortunately, the only hard-on I had ever come in contact with was Lorenzo’s, and I was trying to do everything in my power to forget about him.

“Sorry,” I said.

He nodded but didn’t say anything. I avoided his eyes when I moved out of the bed, and sneaked back to my room, still reliving my time with him last night. We didn’t do anything more than sleep, yet the whole thing felt scandalous.

I didn’t want it to end. I wanted to be with him every day and every night and, it could just be my imagination, but I swear Mason felt the same way, too.

* * *

I was excitedwhen October finally rolled around.

It was my favorite month of the year. It was autumn and Halloween and happiness. When I was little, Max would take me trick-or-treating, and when I got older, Lizzie and I would do a scary-movie marathon at either her house or mine. I was happy to be meeting her for coffee before school this morning.

I didn’t let the fact that I dreamt of Lorenzo the night before get to me. I didn’t want it to. It had been a while since I dreamt of him. So, I pretended that dream never happened, snuggled in closer to Mason’s sleeping body, and pretended it was enough.

I had been sleeping with Mason every night for the past three weeks.

His apartment was taking longer to fix then we had thought. As it turned out, his apartment wasn’t the only one in the building with busted pipes.

Now, two whole floors were inhabitable, and the landlord and his team were doing everything they could to make sure no other rooms and floors would be affected.

The apartment building was one of the older buildings in downtown Chicago and had been purchased by Mason’s landlord only five years previous. When the landlord hired a contracting company to come in and renovate it, he gave them a ridiculous timeline to get the job done. By trying to hit the deadline, they cut a lot of corners. Mason said the pipes bursting and damaging his floor and the floor above him were the results of that. Now, there was a big lawsuit coming, on top of disgruntle tenants. There was a possibility that everyone in the entire building would have to evacuate and find some other living arrangements.

So, Mason was staying with us indefinitely, and I was ecstatic.

The truth was that I slept better with Mason’s arms wrapped around me than I did by myself. We didn’t talk about it. It was an unspoken rule between us that Mason left his room unlocked so I could get in at night. There I would sleep in his arms, and he would protect me from the demons running rampant in my head during the daytime. He’d set me free at night.

We’d wake up early, and I would move back to my room.

We also didn’t talk about Max. There was no way in hell he would ever approve of me spending the night with Mason, even if all we were doing was sleeping. Not that I didn’t want to do more, because I did, but I didn’t know how Mason would react if I kissed him again.

When I found Lizzie in our favorite coffee shop at school that first Monday in October, she wasn’t doing anything. Just sat there, coffee cup in hand, and so lost in thought, she didn’t even see me coming.

I tapped her shoulder and she startled back.

I frowned. “Are you okay?”

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