Deep (Stage Dive, #4)(46)
And I do mean everyone. David and Ev, Lena and Jimmy, and of course my sister and Mal, what with me still sharing their suite. Thank goodness I was wearing a pair of the spanking new blue lounge pants and matching striped tank top, tiny bare baby bulge poking out in between.
“Liz.” Ben rushed me, engulfing me in his big strong arms.
“Hi.” I mumbled into his T-shirt-covered pec. Yeah, I’d kind of frozen. Generally, we didn’t do this, but also it felt far too good. My poor, tired body got shivery in the best way. The man was just asking for me to hump his leg or something. Desperate really wasn’t pretty.
“Are you okay?” he asked, studying my face.
“I’m fine. I just overslept. Sorry to worry everyone.”
He frowned, big hands cupping my face, gently turning it this way and that for his inspection. “You don’t look okay. You look tired.”
“I couldn’t get to sleep last night. I’m bouncing back from the cold just fine, though. No more Queen of the Phlegm or any of that.”
“You sure?” He gave me a dubious look.
“Screw you, bud. I’m glowing.”
The big jerk gave me a sheepish look. “Sorry. Just been worried about you.”
“Apparently my iron levels were a little low. I’m taking supplements now, eating more. I’ll be back to normal in no time. And really, I feel fine. I feel great! Being up and around is awesome.”
“Why couldn’t you sleep?”
My mouth worked fine, but really my brain was too sleep-addled just yet to invent a plausible lie on demand. Worse, my face began to fire up. Crap. Out of all the questions in all the world, I particularly did not want to answer that one. Not even a little.
“Why?”
“I don’t know, I just couldn’t.”
“Liz.”
“Ben.”
“Tell me why,” he barked.
“Because the walls here are thin, okay? It was too noisy. Now enough with the questions. I’m hungry.”
“Ha,” shouted Mal triumphantly, hands on hips. “Your nightly fun-time party boy bullshit kept her awake.”
“I’m on the other side of the f*cking building,” said Ben. “How the hell could I be keeping her awake?”
“But then, if it wasn’t you…” Anne’s brows slowly rose and she covered her mouth with her hand. “Oh dear. Sorry, Liz.”
I nodded, unable to face her just yet.
“What,” asked Mal, eyes full of confusion. “What are you two talking about?”
Jimmy snorted. A moment later, his brother did much the same. At least Ev and Lena managed to keep the bulk of their reaction on the inside. They were nice girls.
I’d never needed to know that my sister was a screamer. Never. That Mal was a screamer too just kind of confused me. If only you could have memories bleached from your brain. What an extraordinarily useful thing it would be.
“Pumpkin? Explain.”
Anne pulled Mal in close and whispered in his ear. Then Mal started snickering.
“It’s not funny,” said Anne.
“It kind of is.”
She shook her head, arms crossed over her chest.
“Lord of the Sex strikes again!”
“Shuddup.”
Huge grin in place, Mal smacked a kiss on her lips.
“So you got caught up on sleep okay?” Ben asked, ignoring their carrying on.
“Yes. Thanks.”
“We better get some breakfast into you. What do you feel like?”
“Hmm.” My tummy grumbled audibly. Me no care. “I want the biggest omelet known to mankind.”
“You got it.”
His gaze fell to my waist, then his hand followed, tentatively covering my bump. It was still early days in Bean world. The bump might have been caused as much by bad posture as anything. But I knew she was in there, growing and doing her thing. Magic.
“You mind if I…” he asked.
“It’s fine.”
The palm of his hand warmed my skin, his calloused fingers softly tracing over me, tickling ever so slightly (Turning me on, of course. Gah.) The side of his thumb rubbed gently back and forth, the callus giving me goose bumps. Actually, I’m pretty certain he himself gave me goose bumps. It didn’t even seem to matter what his hands were up to. And I had the worse feeling that I’d missed him this last week. His voice, his presence, all of him. I stared up at his face, spellbound. It came as naturally as breathing, feeling for Ben. Whatever he’d been up to while I was away didn’t even seem to matter just then. How dumb was my heart?
Meanwhile, the silence was starting to make me nervous.
“Fifteen weeks,” I said.
“Wow.” He smiled and I smiled back at him, lost. Same as always.
“Guess I should get dressed.”
“Nah,” he said. “Don’t worry. Come to my room and we’ll order your omelet. You can fill me in on everything over late breakfast.”
“Okay. I’d like that.”
We turned to face the assembled crowd. Every eye was on us—apparently our little conversation had held them enthralled. I’d kind of forgotten we had an audience at all, caught up in the moment.
“Man,” said David, his hand clapping down on Mal’s shoulder. “C’mon.”