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“Romantic,” I remember quipping. “Can’t wait to get bed bugs from this.”

He kissed me quiet, and now I watch as he touches me, gazing down into my eyes as his body lines up with mine. My mouth falls open as he presses inside me, filling me up for the first time.

The first time with him or with anybody else. It’s heated and tender, my hands on his shoulders, his holding his weight above me. He says my name over and over again, like he can’t stop, like it’s some kind of prayer.

“Are you okay? Does it hurt?”

I shake my head. It does hurt a little, the stretch and the pinch and being so full, but I don’t want him to stop. I’ve never felt so close to anyone before. All the sneaking around and meeting up in secret, the worry about what could happen if our families found out, all of that is worth it for this moment.

He kisses me again, lips trailing from my mouth to my neck, and I moan for him. He hits a spot inside me that I’ve never been able to reach while touching myself, and it lights a fire up my spine. It’s muted in the dream, but somehow it still feels so good.

Here in this dream, we still have each other. He doesn’t hate me, doesn’t turn his nose up and sneer when he sees me. Things haven’t fallen apart, and he’s still mine.

It hurts, knowing that outside of this dream, everything is so different, and part of me knows that when I wake up, none of this will matter.

When I do wake up, it takes a while for me to orient myself. I’m in an unfamiliar bed, and my head feels full of fog. There’s still heat under my skin from the dream, and there are warm bodies on either side of me. I can remember waking up in that motel room with Ares pressed tight to my back, and the way his body molded into mine.

There’s a body there now, and I press back into it, feeling answering heat. When I shift forward, there’s another hard line there as well, and it feels good to be pressed between them.

In my haze, I chase those good feelings, grinding between them, tilting my hips back and then rocking them forward. Someone groans, soft and sleepy, and I reach one hand out, touching the warm, smooth expanse of a solid back in front of me.

Behind me, a hand curves over my hip, and I press into it, making a little noise of pleasure. My shirt has ridden up in the night, so the hand touches bare skin, and that sparks more heat in me, making me want hands everywhere. It would feel so good to be touched and kissed and⁠—

Like a rising tide, the memories of the night before come trickling in as my head starts to clear. I remember I’m in an inn in the middle of nowhere Ohio, with Ares and his friends, having the world’s most uncomfortable sleepover.

Which means the two bodies I’ve been grinding between are…

Oh shit. Oh fuck no.

I go tense, trying to put as much distance as I can between my hips and theirs. There’s not much room to move, and somehow the pillows I put in place last night are gone now. There’s nothing between us anymore.

Me going stiff makes Tate and Ares wake up, and before they can ask any questions, I shove the blankets back and scramble out of bed, trying to move quickly so they can’t see the embarrassed flush on my cheeks.

“Well, good morning,” Tate says. His eyes are warm with amusement, like he’s happy to have woken up like this and not absolutely mortified. Well fucking good for him. He stretches languidly, and I can see there’s the beginnings of a bulge in his sleep pants.

I look away immediately, but unfortunately, that has my eyes landing on Ares. His face is closed off, shut down. There’s a frown on his lips, and he won’t meet my eyes at all.

When I look away from him, there’s Callan, sitting up from his spot on the floor, his eyes piercing into me like he can see right through me. It’s like he can tell what I was dreaming about and what happened in that bed, and I can’t work out how I feel about any of it, which just makes it even more uncomfortable.

Was he watching what just happened? Is he judging me? What the hell is he thinking?

This whole thing is spiraling out of my control, and I hate that. I can feel the stirrings of panic under my skin, the need to put things back into an order that makes sense to my brain rising. Before it can get worse, I grab some clothes out of my bag and go to the bathroom to wash up and get dressed.

No one says anything to stop me, so I come back out and then leave the room, needing to put some distance between me and… all of that.

There’s a different clerk behind the front desk when I make it downstairs, and she greets me with a warm smile. “Good morning. Is there anything I can help you with?”

“Do you think flights will be going out today?” I ask her.

She shakes her head, lips pulled into a sympathetic frown. “I’m afraid not. We got hit pretty hard by the snow overnight, so I’d be really surprised if there were any flights for the next couple of days. Were you on the plane that got diverted here?”

I just nod, disappointment and frustration twisting in my gut.

“I’m sorry your plans got ruined like that,” the clerk says. “If there’s anything I can get you to make your stay more enjoyable, please let me know.”

“What about car rentals? Are there any in this town?” I have no idea how far of a drive it is from here to Hope Falls, but I’d rather be on the road than stuck in that room with Ares and his friends for another night.

“There are,” she says. “But unfortunately, none of them will be renting cars out today. Everything is snowed in, and I don’t think they’ll be digging them out.”