Free Freedom by S. A. Wolfe Page A

kitchen, she’s on my heels again.
    “You sure don’t know how to throw a sleepover. Maybe I’ll go through the Mercer file. I’ll call you if I need help,” she says as she walks up the stairs behind me.
    Fortunately, my room is the first one at the top of the staircase.
    “Sleep well,” I say. “When I come back from my run, I’ll make breakfast.”
    She shakes her head and walks down to her room at the end of the hall, muttering, “Sounds like an exciting Saturday.”
    I close my door and do a face plant on the bed. How am I going to sleep with her down the hall? I hear her grumbling in the bathroom before singing some twangy country song. I wait until I hear her walk back down the hall to her bedroom and close the door, then I dash to the bathroom and take the coldest shower of my life.

 
     
     
    Eight
    Emma
     
    It’s ten thirty-two and I am still awake, lying in the dark. Back in Jersey, my friends and I would be out drinking and dancing on a Friday night. It is one thing to live alone and spend some quiet weeknights knitting and watching TV, however it seems pretty pathetic to go to bed this early when I have a new, hot buddy down the hall who would rather sleep than talk to me. The laws of attraction are not working in my favor.
    I take my phone off the nightstand and check the time again. Ten forty. This is going to be a very long night. I might as well call Lauren and Imogene to see what they are up to and live vicariously through them.
    As I scroll through the phone list for Lauren’s number, I come across Dylan’s name. I forgot he added his phone number to my contact list on my first day at Blackard Designs so I can reach him when we are at work because the sound of machinery drowns out the PA system.
    Okay, hot stuff.
    I start texting. r u awake?
    My action hero is probably sound asleep. Building muscles and running endless miles to nowhere makes even the mightiest very tired.
    The phone in my hand pings.
    Go to sleep.
    I can’t help smiling, knowing he’s having trouble sleeping, too.
    I respond. I’m bored.
    That’s because you’re supposed to be sleeping.
    I laugh out loud and respond. Sigh.
    Stop.
    Still bored.
    There’s no response, however I hear heavy footsteps pounding down the hallway, coming my way. Dylan throws open my door and has a knee on the bed, one foot on the floor, and his hands on either side of my head before I notice he is only wearing boxer briefs. In the dark, his face is unreadable above me as I clutch my phone to my chest.
    “I’m going to kiss you,” he says in a raspy voice as he holds his face a couple of inches from mine.
    “Okay,” I whisper.
    When Dylan’s lips greet mine with a tender stroke, my heart begins racing from their slow assault on my mouth. His tongue darts in and out, touching my lips with soft flicks. Unlike our furious, hungry kiss in the kitchen, this one creates a burning need inside of me as his mouth tastes me, slowly at first and then deeper.
    He lingers on my mouth and all I can think about is how Dylan makes kissing a work of art. Then his lips graze my cheeks and circle around my temple, down to my chin, taking his time to cover every part with sweet kisses. When the stubble on his chin strokes my cheek, shivers run down my body from my hard nipples to my center. I am going to soak my panties.
    I drop the phone at my side and kiss his mouth again at the same time that I run my hands up his hard chest, feeling every punishing muscle he has created. He moans as I touch him, and our kiss deepens before coming to a lingering end.
    His mouth is slightly parted while short breaths escape as he looks at me. In the moonlight, his blue eyes glow whiter with a distinct intensity. I slide my hands back down his flexed arms to his hands, covering them with my own before I clasp his wrists. He has a hungry yet indecisive look about him.
    As much as I am attracted to him and beginning to like him a lot, I am just as confused as he is about what