Into You

Chapter 22

'Oh shit.'

It was one of those moments when your heart just starts beating faster for no good reason. Or maybe there was a good reason. Lauren has just woken up in bed, with her boss. Her boss who kissed her not thirty-six hours ago. That can't be good, right?

Quickly, she ran through a mental checklist:

Camila's still dressed, check.

She herself is still dressed, check.

She's not hurting from bites or scratches, check.

There are no marks on her that she can see, check.

There are no marks on herself that she can see, check.

Fingers... check...

Safe.

Well, she hopes she's safe. She probably won't really know what the fuck happened until the woman next to her wakes up. Fuck, she hopes she didn't do anything stupid. She doesn't drink anymore, so the likelihood is that nothing happened. She'll most likely remember, right? She's pretty sure she'd remember if something happened with her anyway.

With her nerves jingling, she just lay there, looking on as Camila slept next to her, laying on her right side facing her. Her plaster cast was stretched across her stomach now, fingers flexing and her nose twitching slightly as she dreamed away. It's funny but her mom always used to say that you see the real person when they are asleep, when their mask is finally dropped and you can see past the bullshit they've created to hide themselves from the world.

She's absolutely right, as usual. You totally can. She can see that now. She can see what a lovely young lady Camila Cabello really is. With her mask gone, you can see the youth, see the fresh-faced beauty that hides behind a workplace scowl and hard, unforgiving eyes.

It wasn't until the woman opened her eyes and looked at her that she realized how long she's been staring at her. She blinked as Camila stretched and yawned, anxious to make out like she'd only just woken up herself.

"Hey," she said as Lauren allowed her head to flop back onto the pillows. "Morning."

"Good morning," she replied as if having her boss in bed was the most natural thing in the world and she wasn't freaked out by it, just two people sharing a space, nothing more than that. "I think I need to get up."

Camila's plaster-covered arm pressed down onto the raven-haired's stomach who made to get up, to run from this fucked-up situation as hard as she could. She held herself down, firmly stopping herself from running away from the embarrassment and giving herself the chance to pull up her professional walls once more.

"Are you ok, Lauren?" Camila asked, cutting through.

"I'm fine; a little tired still, but otherwise fine."

"Well, we don't have to be up until breakfast and it's still pretty early. Why don't you get some more sleep?"

"I'm not tired anymore," she lied, "I really think I should get up."

"If you're not going back to sleep, I really think you should talk to me about things, Lauren. I think you need to talk to someone."

She looked across at her, those big brown eyes burning through. "I'm fine," she told her again.

"But you had a nightmare again."

"Obviously," she said shortly, building up those defenses again.

"It was a bad one, wasn't it, a really bad one?"

"It wasn't nice, no."

'Just fucking leave it, Camila, please, just fucking leave this alone. Stop digging because you won't like what you'll find.'