Chapter Eighteen

Meg couldn’t remember the last time she’d fallen asleep in someone’s arms. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d woken up in the early hours, either, not with those arms still wrapped around her.

She let out a shaky breath, eyes closed tight, as she considered the warm body breathing steadily behind her. Chance. A man she had met less than a week ago. A man who had fucked her better than anyone ever had.

She opened her eyes. The room was blanketed in darkness apart from where the door was open an inch or so. Light outlined the gap in the door. It was coming from the living room, maybe the kitchen, maybe even the little office. Meg didn’t know. She hadn’t turned any of the lights out before or after they’d ended up in the bedroom.

She shifted slightly, Chance’s arm tightened around her. It was draped over her side and on her belly. Meg was not the slimmest of women, and when she lay on her side there was a bit of a roll. Chance had his hand tucked around it. For some reason, that made Meg’s heart clench.

She shifted again. His leg moved against her. At some point, she’d tucked her feet in-between them. She couldn’t ever remember doing that before. But then, she couldn’t remember having sex with a man who she knew was lying to her. Didn’t that part usually come much later?

She shivered. They were going to have to talk. They were going to have to do what Meg had intended for them to do when she’d suggested they go to her place. Hash it all out between them. Get to the bottom of whatever the hell was going on. They couldn’t do it here, though. Not wrapped up in each other’s arms. Not all warm and comfortable and cozy.

Meg slid out of bed. Chance’s arm tightened around her as she did so, as if trying to keep her there. Meg moved it aside. She didn’t turn and look at him, not until she was next to the door, inching it open, watching the light fall upon his face. He remained asleep. His features relaxed. His stupidly, attractive features!

Meg hurried through the door and into the living room. She grabbed her satchel from where she’d dropped it by the front door and dug inside until she found her Android. She brushed her thumb over the screen, waking it up, then hurried back through to the kitchen. The laundry basket was in there. Meg had intended to take it downstairs and do a wash. She pulled the first thing off the pile. It was an oversize Twenty-One Pilots tee. She shrugged it on. It smelled musty. She decided not to think about that.

Kate’s face was one of the icons on her home screen. Meg stabbed her thumb at it and waited. It rang three times before Kate picked up.

“Katie, are you awake?” Meg whispered.

A sigh came from the phone. Kate had clearly not been awake. “I am now,” she said.

Meg sidled along the floor until she was next to the refrigerator. From this angle, she could see around the kitchen and into the bedroom. Chance was still sleeping. She could just about see his face through the gap in the door. “Good.”

“Meg, why are you calling me at…two in the morning?” Kate asked. “I only went to bed an hour ago.”

“An hour ago?”

“Mindhunter,” Kate said. “We were binge watching. Why are you whispering?”

“I need to speak to you,” Meg said.

“So, speak.”

Chance shifted slightly so that his arm was visible. Even relaxed, Meg could see the muscles there, all kinds of defined and touchable. How often did he work out? How much cardio and CrossFit did it take to get those sort of arms and those sort of abs? Meg had always been suspicious of men who spent hours and hours in the gym. It suggested a level of obsessiveness. Her parents had the same level of obsession with their running, but at least they did it together.

“How often does Will work out?” she whispered.

“What?”

“Will,” Meg said. “Workouts. How often?”

She could practically see Kate shaking her head. “I don’t know, a few times a week?”

“Chance is more defined,” Meg said. “He probably does it every day.”

“Chance?” A pause, a long pause, and then. “He’s in your apartment, isn’t he,” Kate said, and there wasn’t a question there.

Meg pressed her back against the refrigerator. Only once she felt the cool metal against her back did she realize how hot she was. “Yes.”

“Oh, Meg, you didn’t,” Kate sighed.

“I did.”

“But…we talked about this…you were going to be careful.”

“I believe what I actually said was that I was going to play the game, wherever it led me.”

“It’s led you to his bed!”

“My bed.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Whose bed?”

Will’s groggy voice was clear through the distance that separated them. Meg winced even as Kate said, “Go back to sleep.”

“Is that Meg?” he asked.

“Of course, it’s Meg,” Kate snapped. “Who else calls me at this time of night?”

“Is she okay?”

“No. She’s an idiot.”

Meg frowned at that. “I’m not sure I’d use the word ‘idiot’—”

“She slept with Chance,” Kate continued as if Meg hadn’t spoken.

“Of course, she did,” Will said. “We knew last night that she was going to. She was talking herself into it throughout dinner.” He paused. “You know what this means?”

Kate mumbled something unintelligible.

“What did you just say?” Meg demanded.

“She owes me a back massage,” Will said.

Meg snuck a quick glance back around the fridge. Chance continued to slumber. She clutched the Android tight to her ear as she hissed, “You were betting on this?”

“Just on how long it would take,” Kate said.

“How long did Will give me?” Meg demanded.

“Tonight.”

“And you?”

“I thought at least another week,” Kate said. “But then, I didn’t factor in your stupid. Tell me that you at least got some answers before it happened. That he told you what’s going on. What he’s doing. Who hired him.”

“It just happened,” Meg said.

“It totally did not.”

“Kate, it did!” Meg replied. The moments in the office flashed through her mind. How she had bumped against him, how hot she had felt, how shaky, and how it had somehow made sense in that moment to kiss him, to make him feel shaky, too. Meg closed her eyes. “I had this whole plan to shake him up a bit, flush out some of his lies,” she whispered. “And then, the next thing I know we’re kissing, and it all got out of control.”

“Meg, this is day five.”

Meg snapped her eyes open. “Five?” It felt like much longer than that.

“Since you met him,” Kate said. “Five days.”

“I guess it is.”

“Don’t you think it’s a bit fast?”

“To do the naughty?”

“To do a lot of things!”

Meg almost laughed. “Geez, Kate, I’ve had plenty of one-nighters in my time. Most of them poorly thought out, this is true.”

“I know that,” Kate said. “I remember the mornings after. The difference is, they weren’t actively lying to you.”

“So far as I knew,” Meg said.

“And they weren’t important,” Kate plowed on. “Chance is important. And not just because of X-Tech.”

“I don’t know what you mean…”

“I can hear it in your voice,” Kate said. “You’re in the kitchen, aren’t you? Next to the refrigerator, looking around the corner at the bedroom. Chance is asleep in there, and you snuck out to call me.”

“Your point?”

“You haven’t snuck out of your bed in years,” Kate said. “You don’t even usually let them in your bed. The way you’re acting with him…” She sighed. “I’ve never seen you like this with any other guy.”

“I’ve never felt like this for any other guy,” Meg whispered.

Silence. It fell between them. Meg almost winced again. Had she really just said that? And yet, it was true. Meg had never experienced this level of intense sexual attraction before. It had been there from the first, and it was even worse now she’d experienced what having sex with Chance was actually like.

She snuck another look around the refrigerator. Even asleep he was so damn attractive. Her stomach fluttered. Butterflies. He gave her butterflies! Was it any wonder she loved having sex with him? His body was amazing. His cock fit her perfectly. And he was just so attentive. There was no jumping in and simply going for it. He’d asked her what she liked. Had eagerly given it to her.

She closed her eyes. The way his body had felt above her as he climaxed…the tremble that had run through him…the cry of pleasure that he had given… Meg’s pussy clenched. She wanted to do it again. She wanted to spend the next month doing nothing else but being satisfied by him and satisfying him in return.

“Meg?”

Meg gritted her teeth and made her way across the kitchen and into her office. Her replica Enterprise, crafted to hold her tiny little screwdrivers, pens, and pencils, was on the floor. One of the warp nacelles was slightly bent. Meg picked it up and placed it on the desk. She ran her fingers along the point where Chance had pushed her ass. They carried onward and upward to the profile board. The words “X-TECH” leaped out at her.

“Christ, Kate,” she whispered. “What am I going to do?”

“I don’t know,” Kate said.

“Chance is going to wake up soon. You know what that means.”

“The morning after.”

“Yep.”

“You don’t have to deal,” Kate said quickly. “Not if you don’t want to. Will can come and pick you up. You can sleep here. Get some distance. Get some perspective.”

“Distance and perspective are not what I need,” Meg said.

“What do you need?” Kate asked.

There was only one answer that Meg had to give. “I need the truth.”