*Matilda*
I finally understand why Juliet argued with Romeo that she’d heard the nightingale and not the lark. I don’t want my time with Rexton to end, for dawn to creep over the land, to awaken all sleeping things, to bring with it the reality of my life. But the time to leave comes too soon.
In his carriage, he holds me against his side as though he, too, is reluctant to let me go.
“I would apologize for my rudeness in not letting you sleep,” he says, his voice a low lullaby in the rocking carriage, “but I suspect you would view it as insincere.”
We have drifted off a couple of times, although not for long. But even during sleep-filled moments, I was acutely aware of the long length of his body pressed against mine, his chest to my back, his leg draped possessively over my hip. There
