Vicious | ongoing

chapter nine

C H A P T E R
N I N E

You know when you wake up from a really good dream with a gorgeous guy and you just want to go back to said dream and pretend the weight on your lower belly is his arm and not some pillow? That's about how I felt when I snuggled back into bed. Only, it wasn't a bed but a coach, and whatever I was leaning into was breathing.

I tried to gage what time it was as I saw the sun outside on its ascent. It bathed the entire room in a comforting orange, spilling its warmth across all it touched.

It couldn't have been more than 4 am.

I built up the courage to look to the sleeping figure beside me.

Demetrius was on his stomach, hardly giving me any space— if I wasn't already awake, I would definitely have fallen off the bed— and I found myself tempted to touch the hard lanes of his back. But, in horror, I watched as they flexed as he moved. It took me a moment to regain a steady breathing rhythm when he settled properly again.

With great difficulty, I unwound our legs from each other and tried to move out from under his arm that was, in fact, draped across my waist. He didn't show any signs of stirring except from turning his head to the other side.

You would've thought I'd done this before with how aptly I slid, quite literally, off the couch and, whilst picking up any of my things, went out the door. Maybe all of Cecilia's morning escaping from people's bedrooms was rubbing off on me. I shook my head to clear the thought, vowing to never voice that out loud.

• • •

At breakfast, I made no particular effort to look to the door when Demetrius entered, late. Technically, he couldn't be late because there was no set time, not really, but there was an unspoken set time and he was half an hour late.

I chanced a glance. He wasn't looking at me. I almost sighed in relief; he wasn't going to make this awkward or weird. But then, a twinge of something pulled at my stomach. Disappointment? I clutched my cutlery a little too hard in an attempt to perish the thought.

"You look dark," Cecilia said to me as she took her attention away from the person beside her, who she'd been talking to for the past thirty minutes.

I looked to my arms. The slight redness has gone down, leaving me a few shades darker. I shrugged. "I guess so." I picked up another piece of food, dangling it on my fork. "We were out for most of the day," I said.

"Did you not have a parasol?" She asked, eyebrow raised.

"We did, yes," I told her. "I guess it went through."

"Huh," she said on a sigh. "Guess we need new parasols. I can't show myself to the public all red."

"When do you ever go out?" Josiah said.

"I could do," she replied, defiantly.

"But you don't."

"But I could."

"The day you spend more than twenty minutes out there," he said, pausing to think. He put his knife and fork down, leaning on his hands. "I'll let you rule for a day."