Page 71 of Ship Wrecked

What could she do but offer him another piece of her heart to break?

She shifted uneasily, sliding off his chest to reach the other side of the huge bed, where her own pillow awaited, comfortable and cold.

His thick arm closed around her waist and tugged her back.

“Where are you going?” Rolling onto his side, he wrapped her tight in his embrace. “I was just joking, sweetheart. I like having you sprawled on top of me. You know that, right?”

He’d thrown one heavy thigh over her legs, so she couldn’t move away. Not unless she told him to let her go.

She didn’t.

“I know,” she said, and pressed her ear against his chest, right over his heart.

It thumped steadily, each beat strong. As she listened, her breathing steadied, the metallic taste in her mouth melting back to mint.

“What did you call me earlier?” He sounded sleepy. “It wasn’t shit-boot. Something like ‘soot-no’?”

Gods above, she’d revealed entirely too much of herself today. “Sötnos.”

“Knowing Swedes, it still probably involves shit in some way.” Soft pressure against the crown of her head. A kiss. “What’s it mean?”

She bit her lip, but answered. “Literally? Sweet nose.”

“Sweet... nose?” His body shook as he laughed. “What the fuck, Pippi?”

Loath as she was to explain herself further, she couldn’t overlook the slight to her mother language. “American endearmentsdon’t make any more sense, Reedton. Grown adults call each other ‘baby.’ Parents refer to their kids as ‘sweet pea’ or ‘pumpkin,’ when human children are not, in fact, produce.”

He fell silent for a long moment, all laughter gone.

“It’s an endearment?” A quiet question as his arms hitched her tighter against him. “What’s the closest English equivalent?”

She’d answer him honestly, but then she was done with the topic.

His pulse might be strong and steady, but hers was skittering unpleasantly.

“Sweetheart,” she told him, her tone brisk and matter-of-fact. “Anyway, something occurred to me earlier.”

After a long pause, he let out a slow breath and stroked her hair back from her face. “What’s that?”

Okay. He was letting it go.

Her heart slowed, and she reached deep to find a genuine smile. Genuine amusement.

There it was. Her reliable companion through joy and desolation both, no matter who came and went in her life.

“We—” She snickered, and it wasn’t an act. Merely a redirection. “We basically just lived out that really explicit fic Alex sent us last week. Like, almost exactly. Remember? The one where we ended a joint interview by fucking on literally every flat surface in the hotel room, including the fold-down ironing board in the closet? Which somehow didn’t collapse under our combined weight, even as you railed me from behind?”

She’d applauded the author’s imagination, if not their grasp of physics.

“Remember?” Peter snorted. “I have that fic bookmarked. I considered it a key source of inspiration for today’s sexual exploits. Except for the ironing board bit. I wouldn’t want to explain tohousekeeping how it broke in half and stabbed me in the junk. Besides, they shouldn’t be asked to clean junk blood, so I was trying to be thoughtful.”

“Very generous of you,” she said, laughing.

“I thought so.” He yawned so hard, his jaw cracked. “Go to sleep, Pippi. You’ve got a nine-hour time difference to conquer.”

He was right. If she wasn’t leaving his bed, there was no point agonizing over whether she should. She needed her rest, and so did he. So after giving him a half-hearted poke for the Pippi reference, she closed her eyes and let herself relax against him.

“Good night,skitstövel,” she said.

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