"I Surrender"

Chapter 5: Wednesday

Liam does, much to Fallon’s disappointment, manage to last the whole night without waking her and giving in. However, it is apparently not without difficulty, as she discovers once she finally wakes and is met with his frustration.

Her sleep had been heavy and dreamless, clearly so exhausted that she slept the whole way through the night, pretty much dead to the world. As she slowly wakes and attempts to take in her surroundings, the first thing she notices is that she is comfortably wrapped around a warm body, velvet skin on skin, her whole form rising and falling slowly as the man beneath her breaths in and out. It’s no surprise that she had managed to sleep so well with the calming, almost rocking motion, and for a moment she contemplates allowing herself to fall back into oblivion until her mind cruelly reminds her that it’s a weekday and she, unfortunately, cannot spend the whole morning napping in the arms of her fiancé. No matter how much she wants to.

“Oh, good morning sleeping beauty,” Liam mutters, his voice toneless as she begins to stir.

“Hm, morning,” She mumbles back, her mind still sluggish from sleep and nestles closer to Liam, her eyes remaining closed, “What time is it?”

“Seven-thirty.” He answers back, his tone still sharp and to the point.

She groans. That confirms that she definitely doesn’t have time to sleep in with meetings scheduled early in the day. Practically forcing herself to give up all hope of remaining in her comfortable state, she blinks her eyes open, compelling them to focus. All it takes is lifting her chin a little and flicking her gaze up to take in the vision of her fiancé, his head resting against the pillows, staring up at the ceiling. His jaw is uncharacteristically clenched, unusually unwilling to meet her stare, and her head tilts subtly to the side in confusion, instantly realising that something is off. Lifting her head from his chest to get a better look, her eyes trace his features carefully to try to better make sense of his lack of emotion towards her and that’s when she recognises the darkness under his eyes, his hair more kempt than it usually is, his whole demeanour giving off signs that he’s stressed about something and likely hasn’t slept as a result.

“Liam, what’s wrong?” The concern in her voice chips through his icy exterior, causing him to breathe out a soft sigh and eventually meets her gaze, their eyes locking, and she can see the frustration reflected in them, “You look exhausted, did you not sleep at all?”

He’s looking at her like she should know what’s wrong, which only muddles her mind more because unless something happened in the night that she doesn’t know about, the reason for his current demeanour is a complete mystery to her.

“Look me in the eyes and tell me that you don’t remember anything at all from last night and that you were honestly asleep the whole time,” He says, only furthering her confusion. Had she said something to upset him in her sleep?

“I was, I swear to you. The last thing I remember before falling to sleep was that you were reading your book, what happened last night?” Her heart picks up its pace, worried that she has offended Liam in some way and simply cannot remember how.

But then Liam’s expression softens a smidgeon, indicating he believes her, and she catches the corner of his mouth twitch like he is on the cusp of smiling. It relaxes her slightly, but she is still completely in the dark about why he is so stressed and tired.

“Don’t you think that the position you’ve woken up in this morning is a little precarious bearing in mind you’re completely naked?”

Oh, she sees the issue now.

It comes flooding back to her that she had rather shrewdly attempted to seduce Liam last night by sleeping in the nude, on top of the covers, and despite beginning the night on her own side of the bed, she had somehow ended up pressed against Liam’s side with her legs tangled with his, her head on his chest and an arm slung over him. She supposes that for someone who was trying to win a no-sex challenge and had spent the majority of the day preceding that with a hard-on, that may have made things rather difficult. It makes sense now as to why Liam struggled to sleep.