The scream filtered into a hung-over dream so I couldn’t be sure if it was real or imagined. ‘You hear that?’ I asked him. My mouth was bone dry. He said nothing, his slow, sleepy breath rattling in his throat. ‘Hey.’ I nudged him and he rolled on his side, the muscles in his back slipping and shifting as if his body were liquefying, man becoming river. He grunted as he turned, dragging the sheet so it twisted like a toga, flashing that distinctive tattoo. His breath grew quiet. I tried to piece him together. Broad, bronzed shoulders. Scruffy dark hair. I looked at his back, as big and silent as a continent, his spine a groove swooping down to the furred cleft of his buttocks. What was his name? Hell, what had we done together? A solid thrum between my thighs responded before cognitive memory could answer. I flopped away from him, squinting. The room was cream and gold, its walls slanted, the curtains glowing with light as pale as honeydew melons. I licked my teeth. Outside birds trilled and chattered, and I couldn’t hear even a murmur of cars.
