Chapter Thirteen
When Nicole gradually surfaced to awareness the next morning, having slept in a bed for the first time in over a week, she felt rested and excited about her day. Then she noticed that Rafe had left the bed, and immediately felt a twinge of loss of the vast warm presence of the man who had so totally hijacked her body, mind, heart, and soul for the past searingly intense week. She stretched under the sheets and covers, luxuriating in the blessings of not sleeping on the floor, marveling at how much she had previously taken for granted that she now appreciated. That included being sober, as it had been over six weeks since the bender that had gotten her into jail and eventually into this rather outre form of rehabilitation that seemed to be working so well.
What the lanky
