Page 47 of Sexting My Best Friend's Brothers
But looking at Tessa, lying on my couch, smelling like sex and her perfume… a possessive growl rumbles in my chest.
“I don’t know,” I admit. “Usually… yes. But this feels different.”
“Different how?”
“Different like… I’m not sure I want to share,” I whisper.
She traces the scar on my chest.
“Maybe you won’t have to,” she says sleepily.
She rests her head back down. Within minutes, her breathing evens out. She’s out cold.
I stay awake.
I stare at the ceiling, the adrenaline fading into a cold knot of dread in my stomach.
My phone vibrates on the coffee table—one short, sharp buzz.
I don’t need to look to know who it is. Asher watches the grid. He knows we’re together. He knows I broke the treaty.
10
TESSA
Waking up in a strange bed usually starts with a moment of panic. The disorientation. The frantic search for a phone. The sudden, crushing weight of regret.
But waking up in Owen Branson’s bed doesn’t feel like panic.
It feels like… sinking.
The mattress is so soft it swallows me whole. The sheets are high-thread-count cotton, cool against my bare skin. And it smells like sweat, sex, and stale breath. It’s in the pillows. It’s in my hair. It’s even seeping into my pores.
I keep my eyes closed to stop the morning light from ruining the illusion, pretending for a few seconds I’m just a normal twenty-five-year-old woman who went home with a hot guy from a bar. I can pretend I didn’t just sleep with my boss. I can pretend I didn’t just cross a line that my best friend drew in the sand years ago.
I shift my legs. My muscles ache—a deep, heavy soreness that reminds me of exactly what we did. My lips feel raw and bruised.
“Don’t frown,” a raspy, sleep-rough voice murmurs right next to my ear. “You’ll get wrinkles.”
My eyes fly open.
Owen is propped up on one elbow, watching me.
His hair is a chaotic mess of dark waves sticking up in every direction. There’s a pillow crease on his cheek. He looks sleepy, rumpled, and unfairly devastating. The sheet is pooled at his waist, leaving his broad, sculpted chest completely bare.
I spot a scratch mark on the hard slab of his pec—a red, angry line.
I did that.
Heat rushes up my neck, flooding my face.
“I wasn’t frowning,” I lie, my voice cracking. “I was… processing.”
“Processing?” Owen grins. It’s a lazy, wicked grin that makes my stomach flip. “Is that the corporate term for ‘regretting the best sex of my life’?”
“You’re very confident for this early in the morning.”
“I have reasons to be confident.” His gaze drops to my chest. The sheet has slipped, exposing the curve of my breast. He doesn’t look away. He looks at me with a hunger that shouldn’t be possible after what we did last night. “You were loud, Tess. I think my neighbors probably hate us.”
