Chapter 469

• I lie awake in the night with his body coiled around me possessively, his face buried in the back of my hair, breathing deeply in his sound sleep. My arm has been freed from the restraint, and it’s only the bedding keeping me captive as he’s still not gotten under the comforter with me. I must have dozed off at some point, and he took it off, but I can only remember tossing and turning until he switched off that damn movie.
• His arms are wrapped around my upper body, his fingers entwined with mine; I sigh and relax into his hold, needing this as a balm for yesterday's events. I’m too weak for this game; already, that ache of insecurity threatens to engulf me from the lack of his body joining with mine.
• He’s right. I don’t just need the sex, though; I need the small things—the gestures and touches, the attentiveness and kindness, too. All the stuff he deprives me of when he wants to win a stupid game. It helps, though, that even in sleep, he needs to cling to me and revives my will a tiny little bit, giving me a little inner strength.