Beneath This Man (This Man, #2)(70)

We sit like this forever. I whisper in his ear, hoping he will recognise me and snap out of his night terror. Is that what this is? I have no idea. He is definitely not awake, I know that much.

‘Ava?’ he mumbles in my neck after an age. His voice is cracked and throaty.

He’s awake. ‘Hey, I’m here.’ I pull back and cup his face with both of my hands. His eyes search mine, looking for something. I’m not sure what.

‘I’m so sorry.’

‘What are you sorry for?’ He’s worrying me even more now.

‘For everything.’ He falls back, taking me with him so I’m lying across his wet chest. My body is soaking, but I don’t care.

My head rests on his chest and I listen as his heart rate slows. ‘Jesse?’ I say nervously. He doesn’t answer. I lift my head to look at him and see he’s fast asleep, looking peaceful. What was that all about?

I lay on him for hours, my mind racing with reasons for him to be sorry. Bloody Hell, maybe I am reading too much into this. There’s plenty for him to be sorry for. Lying to me, deceiving me, drink, his unreasonableness, his possessive streak, his neurotic behaviour, trampling my meeting today, his…

I doze off, running through all of the reasons why Jesse could be sorry.





Chapter 13


‘I love you.’

I feel familiar lush lips brush over mine as I come round, and I open my eyes to Jesse’s stunning face suspended above me. ‘Wake up my beautiful girl.’

I raise my arms over my head and stretch. Oh, that feels good. I blink up at him and note he’s dressed. My sleepy brain quickly registers that with Jesse dressed already, there is no danger of being dragged around London on one of his punishing runs.

‘What time is it?’ I croak.

‘You’re fine, it’s only six thirty. I’ve got a few early supplier meetings at The Manor. I needed to see you before I go.’ He leans down and kisses me, and I get a taste of his minty breath.

Supplier meetings? What sort of supplies would that be? I snap a lid on those thoughts immediately. It’s too early and anyway, if it is six thirty, then it really does mean it’s too late for a fourteen mile trip around London, so I couldn’t care less what supplies they could be.

‘My eyes don’t have to be open for you to see me.’ I complain, as I reach around his back and pull him down. He smells yummy.

‘Come and have breakfast with me.’ He pulls me up from the bed, and I wrap my naked body around him in my usual chimp-ish fashion. ‘You’re creasing me.’ he says with zero concern, carrying me out of the bedroom and down to the kitchen.

‘Put me down then.’ I bite back. I know he won’t.

‘Never,’

I smile smugly as I absorb him in all of his fresh water loveliness. ‘I don’t need a reminder f*ck. You can still come to lunch.’

‘Mouth.’ He laughs. ‘I’m sorry. I really needed to see you before I go.’

I stiffen instantly at his words. Well, one word in particular; sorry. Shit! I had forgotten about his midnight meltdown. Well, not forgotten, it just hadn’t landed in my morning brain yet.

‘What’s wrong?’ He’s sensed my sudden tenseness. He places me on the cool marble, but it doesn’t shock me like it did the other morning. I’m too busy searching my brain for the best way to approach this.

‘You woke up in the night.’ I inform his concerned face.

‘I did?’ His brow furrows, and I don’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed.

‘You don’t remember?’ I ask tentatively.

‘No.’ he says on a shrug. ‘What do you want for breakfast?’ He leaves me on the counter and goes to the fridge. ‘Eggs, bagel, fruit?’

Is that it? ‘You said you need me.’ I throw it in the air and hope he catches it.

He doesn’t. He lets it drop straight to the floor and tramples all over it. ‘And? I say that when I’m awake.’ He doesn’t even turn away from the fridge.

‘You said you were sorry.’ I place my hands under my thighs.

He turns around from the fridge. ‘I’ve said that when I’m awake too.’

This is true, he’s said it all when he’s awake, but he was in such a state.

He smiles. ‘Ava, I was probably having a bad dream. I don’t remember.’ He turns back to the fridge.

‘You were just a bit frantic, I was worried.’ I say timidly. It wasn’t normal.

He shuts the fridge door, harder than is really necessary, and I immediately regret bringing this up. I’m not scared of him. I’ve seen him go off at the deep end plenty of times, but the way he is holding himself is making me wary. I don’t want to start a fresh day on a quarrel. It was just sleep talk, after all.

He wanders over to me chewing his bottom lip, and I watch him with caution. When he reaches me, he muscles between my legs and takes my hands out from under my thighs, holding them between us and stroking the tops with his thumbs.

‘Stop worrying about what I say in my sleep. Did I say I didn’t love you?’ he asks softy.

I feel my brow knit. ‘No.’

His green eyes twinkle as one side of his mouth tips upwards at the corner. ‘That’s all that matters.’ He plants a kiss on my forehead.