If you like music while you read, try "Without You" by for King and Country. It's what I was listening to while writing both of these chapters!
*****
~ SASHA ~
It had been such a wonderful night, Sasha didn't want him to roll off. But eventually, they separated, and despite her muttered grumbles, he turned her over and tucked her into his chest, his lips brushing her neck and her ear as they talked.
It was, she realized, the first time outside of their Solitude that they'd gone to bed early enough—and healthy enough—to simply chat.
It felt so sweet and so normal she tried to savor every moment, just be present in it, fix it in her mind.
She didn't want to admit it, but her mind kept tumbling her back to the Compound, to Nick, to the humans, to all the ways this plan could go wrong. And every time it did, fear, clawing and jangling, wanted to close her throat.
