That got him the breathy, “Layne.”

He had her. He not only had her, pretty soon he was going to have her. Thank f**k.

He put his mouth to hers and whispered, “I gotta turn the lights out and secure the house. Go upstairs and get na**d for me, baby.”

“I don’t know if I can –”

“Sweetcheeks. Go upstairs and get na**d for me.”

“Layne.”

“Do it.”

She pressed her head back into the couch and whispered, “But… I don’t think I can be quiet.”

Layne grinned again.

She probably couldn’t. She was a moaner eighteen years ago and she was again last night. She was great at giving head, mostly because she liked doing it and it helped when she moaned how much she liked it around his cock.

“We’ll get creative,” he promised and her eyes got round. “Go upstairs, honey, and get na**d for me.”

“Okay,” she whispered, he rolled to the side, she shot off the couch but strutted up the stairs.

Layne took his time as he secured the house, turned out the lights and followed her.

He found her na**d in his bed.

He got na**d and joined her.

Then he did everything he promised and then some.

And he just managed to muffle her moans with his hand the first time she came, his mouth the third time and she muffled them in a pillow the second.

* * * * *

With Rocky dead to the world and pinning him to the bed, Layne stared at the dark ceiling and remembered his dream.

“Do you get it?” Rocky whispered in his ear.

“Get what, baby?” he whispered back.

“Why I left you?”

He didn’t get it. She’d finally explained it and he still didn’t get it.

That wasn’t a scene she acted out on his couch that was real.

Fuck, Rocky didn’t even f**king get it.

Which made Layne wonder why she left him? Why she took everything from their house, jammed it into her room and lost two days? Why she spent every day for eighteen years struggling against connecting with him? Why she spent the last months since he’d been shot losing that struggle but grasping at it?

Why was she so afraid of the f**king dark?

And what was that he felt coming off of her, seeping in the room so strong it even pressed against him, reeking of a fear that was more than fear of the f**king dark?

He knew one thing. That fear wasn’t a fear of dark and wild. That fear was dark but it wasn’t fear of him. It was a fear of something sinister.

Layne had no answers to these questions.

But he knew who did.

Chapter Seventeen

Fighting to Win

Layne felt her moving against him, over him, her hair sliding on his shoulder, her lips at his throat, she shifted astride him, he felt her knees at his sides, her bottom settle into his crotch, her br**sts against his chest.

His hands went to span Rocky’s hips.

He opened his eyes.

* * * * *

Layne saw dark ceiling.

Rocky was astride him, her lips moving from his throat to the hinge of his jaw, her h*ps in his hands.

She wasn’t a dream.

Now, this was how he wanted to wake up yesterday.

“Baby,” he murmured, her lips left his jaw and he saw her head come up, her hair falling down to frame both of their faces.

“Morning,” she whispered, that soft, sweet word said with her warm body on top of his drove into his mouth, down his throat, burning a golden trail through his chest, his gut, straight to his cock.

She tilted her head and her lips hit his.

The moment of impact, his hands slid in, his arms going around her waist, one slanting up, his fingers gripped her hair, she opened her mouth, his tongue slid in as he growled and rolled her to her back.

* * * * *

Layne was at the bar doing pull ups wearing nothing but shorts, ankle socks and running shoes.

He’d pulled up when one of the double doors to his bedroom swung open, Rocky walked out and stopped dead.

He dropped down and hung there, staring at her.

She had her hair wrapped in a towel, a huge bundle of dirty laundry piled in her arms and her body wrapped in his plaid, flannel robe.

Jesus, where’d she find that f**king robe?

He’d had it since he was seventeen and he had no idea why he kept hold of it. His mother bought for him it to take to Ball State. He’d skipped a grade, going from sixth to eighth and therefore graduated from high school early. He remembered she’d given him that robe with tears in her eyes, distraught, she’d told him, that her baby, not even a man, was going away. He remembered it had annoyed him immensely because he thought he was a man. He’d worn it sometimes during his freshman year in the dorms when he had to walk the corridors to get to the bathrooms and then never wore it again.

He’d had it when he was with Rocky, obviously, but she’d never worn it. She’d had her own robe but mostly she strutted around in his tees. So she wasn’t the reason he kept it.

He had no clue why he kept it. He just did.

Looking at her now, Layne was glad he kept it and he was equally glad Rocky had dug through his shit to find it. She looked adorable in that old robe.

“Hey sweetcheeks,” he greeted and she stared at him as he pulled himself up, chin over the bar, then slowly lowered himself down.

“Is that taking it easy?” she asked in a tone that stated clearly any answer other than “no” and any future action other than him letting go of the bar and hitting the shower was unacceptable.

“Yep,” he replied and pulled himself back up.

She glared at him as he slowly let himself down and continued to glare at him as he pulled himself back up. Then she stomped to the stairs.

She returned as he was hooking his ankles under the bar at the weight bench he’d declined and he was about to roll back to do sit ups. He twisted to watch her glare at him as she walked back to his room, one hand holding the handle of a coffee mug, the other hand precariously balancing a pile of his folded clothes under which, hooked on her fingers, were hangers on which hung his ironed shirts.

“Your mother re-ironed everything I ironed yesterday,” she told him in mid-strut, tone now displeased. “She says I don’t do it right.”

She didn’t wait for him to respond, not that he had a response, she walked into his bedroom and kicked the door closed.

Layne twisted back and rolled down, grinning.

“Pancakes!” Vera shouted from downstairs and three seconds later, Tripp tore through his bedroom door, racing down the hall to the bathroom.

Tripp was a big fan of his Grandma’s pancakes and there was a reason why, her pancakes were the shit.