"I don't know how to do this," he whispers into my skin.
"Yeah, you do." I pull him closer. Press my lips to the top of his head. "You just did it."
His fingers tighten on my shoulders. His breathing stutters, steadies, slows.
"Stay?" he asks, and his voice is so small it barely exists.
"Yeah."
"Vaughn?"
"Yeah?"
"It meant something."
I close my eyes. His heart beats against my chest, fast and fragile. The room smells like vanilla and sex and Robin, and my lion settles for the first time in months — not pacing, not restless, just still. Just home.
"I know," I tell him. "It meant something for me too."
He makes a sound against my chest — not quite a laugh, not quite a sob. His arms wrap tighter around me and his legs tangle with mine and he presses as close as physics allows.
Robin Martinez, who curls up with everyone, who touches shoulders and leans on strangers and falls asleep on any available surface — is holding me like I'm the first person he's ever really held.
Maybe I am.
I don't sleep for a long time. I lie there in the dark, Robin breathing slowly against my chest, his hands still gripping my back like I might disappear, and I think about what I heard through the door.I don't know how to do real.
Neither did I, before tonight.
We'll figure it out.
Chapter 9
Robin
My alarm goes off at 4:15 and for once in my life I don't want to get out of bed.
Not because the bed is winning. Because Vaughn is in it.
He came back. He came back upstairs and got into my bed and pulled me against his chest and held me until I stopped shaking. Until I stopped being terrified. Until I fell asleep with my face pressed to his sternum and his heartbeat slow and steady against my cheek.
And now my alarm is going off and he's asleep behind me, one arm heavy across my waist, his breath warm on the back of my neck. Our legs are tangled together under the sheets. His hand is resting flat against my stomach, fingers spread, like even in sleep he's keeping me close.
I let myself have twelve seconds.
Twelve seconds of lying perfectly still, memorizing the weight of his arm, the sound of his breathing, the way his body curves around mine like he was built to fit here. Twelve secondsof being a person who wakes up next to someone and that's normal and fine and not terrifying at all.
Then I slip out of bed as carefully as I can, because Gordon wants me at five and if I'm late he'll make the entire kitchen suffer for it.
Vaughn stirs. His hand reaches across the mattress, finds the warm spot where I was, and his fingers close on the empty sheet.
"Work," I whisper, pressing my lips to his temple. His hair is loose from the bun, dark across my pillow, and he looks younger asleep. Less guarded. The lines around his mouth are soft. "Go back to sleep."
He makes a sound — half grumble, half purr — and pulls my pillow against his chest instead. Buries his face in it. I watch him for three more seconds that I can't afford and then I make myself leave the room.
I shower fast. Dress in kitchen blacks. Don't look at myself in the mirror because I know what I'll see — the bite mark on my shoulder where Vaughn's teeth broke nothing but bruised everything, the redness on my jaw from his stubble, the look in my own eyes that I've never seen before.
I look like someone who was held all night by a person who means it.