Read Online Into the Tomorrows (Bleeding Hearts Book 1) by Whitney Barbetti - Free Book Online

on my lips, he was inside of me.
    He grunted and his hand moved up under me, encouraging me to raise up off the bed. He palmed one of my breasts as he thrusted against me.
    I felt my thoughts escaping this—and I couldn’t explain it. I should be in the moment with Colin. Each time he thrust, my back arched instinctively, but my mind was already thinking about how it was good that we weren’t face to face. Because I wasn’t sure what my face would tell him.
    Over and over, he slid into me. His movements increased and while I knew my body was climbing toward a release, I couldn’t stay mentally with Colin. It was like my thoughts were in a fishbowl, and I was plucking them out one by one. The disconnect from him was so significant that my body began to backtrack its climb.
    I squeezed my eyes tight and grabbed the hand he had cupped to my breast, covering it with my fingers as I encouraged him to hold me a little tighter.
    I’m slipping away , I thought. Let me go.
    But just moments later, he stilled, his fingers flexing into my hips as he released.
    And moments after that, he climbed off of me and walked into the adjoining bathroom. I heard the toilet flush and the faucet turn on before I let myself roll onto my back.
    My fingers trembled. I’d been close initially, but then my mind had taken over, pulling me further from Colin and further into myself. The disconnect between us was deep enough to drown me.
    I watched the light from the bathroom door, only partly closed. I listened as he brushed his teeth, the whirr of the mechanical toothbrush and then his spitting.
    And when the light flicked off, I closed my eyes and waited silently as he returned.
    The bed dipped when he climbed into it and I kept my breathing even, my body still.
    But I didn’t need to pretend to be asleep for long, because seconds later I heard his light snoring.
    After opening my eyes slowly, I immediately looked to the clock. Two-twenty-two. Six minutes.
    I listened to his breathing, to the sound of the breeze outside the window. To the creaks in the bed when Colin rolled over. I heard my heart beat; steady, easy. I wanted something that made my heart pick up, thunder in a storm. But my heart stayed calm, beating a different rhythm from his breaths.
    I wondered if Colin’s efforts to reconnect with me would mean I’d start to fill up what was empty within me. That this would backfire and instead of giving him the chance for him to finally see we were nothing but shells, I’d fall for him all over again.
    The last time I looked at the clock before I fell asleep, the time said three-thirty-one.
    And I’d felt no deeper attachment to Colin. I was still safe.

Chapter Seven
    I woke up first , so conditioned to waking up before my grandfather to prepare his breakfast and set out his meds.
    Colin and I had moved to opposite sides of the king-size bed during the night and I tried not to analyze that so much as I pulled on a sweater and exited the bedroom.
    I smelled bacon as I padded down the hallway and quickened my steps to find a very tall, deeply tan man in the kitchen.
    At first I just stared. His back was to me, so I took the opportunity to take in all his muscles and the ink that hinted on his left arm, spanning across his back, as he worked over the stove. He was wearing gray flannel pajama bottoms and no shirt. I must have made a noise because he turned around quickly, spotting me on the other side of the breakfast bar.
    “Oh, hello,” he said. His voice was warm, a little husky. My gaze skipped nervously over the ink I saw on his chest—but gave little attention to—and moved up his neck to a jaw that was covered in a short, groomed beard. I kept moving up, over full lips and defined cheekbones and brown irises.
    I was speechless for a moment, and quickly looked away from his eyes. He had long lashes, heavy lids. If I had to describe his eyes, I would have said they looked soulful, sleepy. And that sounded embarrassingly silly to