Protecting Jennifer [COMPLETED]

Chapter 21

I woke up to something tickling my nose.

It must have been late because the sun was lighting up the curtains of Lance's window, casting small shadows across the room. I opened my eyes and almost had a heart attack when I saw Lance's face almost pushed up right next to mine.

The panic in my head was immediate as I lay there, trying to figure out what the hell had happened. It was only when I felt how numb and heavy my hand was did I realise that we'd moved closer to each other during the night until our noses had touched. He'd thankfully kept to his word and not touched me other than that, and even then I had a feeling he didn't mean to do that on purpose. In fact, now that I glanced across the bed, I realised that he hadn't even moved. It was me who had moved closer to him, tucking my elbow just above my knees, keeping tight hold of Lance's hand as I slept.

His breath against my face startled me out of my frozen state and I pushed myself backwards as the reality of the situation hit me, gasping at the pain of the pins and needles in my hand as it pulled against Lance's hold.

The sound must have woken him up because within a minute his eyes were wide open, looking quite disorientated but still open, watching me with concern. "Sh, hey. It's okay. Don't, you might hurt yourself." He said quietly. The gravelly sound of his voice stopped me panicking and I giggled at it even as he slowly released his hold on me and rubbed my wrist gently with his fingers. "What a great morning greeting." He murmured with a low chuckle as his hands cradled my wrist.

"I'm sorry I just..."

"It's okay. You panicked." He sent me a small smile before yawning loudly. "I just don't want you to accidentally hurt yourself. We've had enough injuries for one weekend."

My smile lessened as he said it and I was finally able to take in the whole extent of Lance's injuries. The light was streaming from behind him so I couldn't see it very well besides the shadow he was creating around me. However, I did notice his tousled bed head and his sleepy eyes, one a lot smaller and puffier than the other. His cheek looked slightly swollen but his nose was the worst, a dark coloured smudge across the top of his nose running towards his cheeks like a dust of freckles.

"Oh Lance." I whispered as he dropped my wrist. His eyes turned to me in surprise but I was already reaching forward to touch his face with my fingers. "You're so swollen."

"You should see yourself, Jennifer." He chuckled as he closed his eyes at my touch. "You're going to need a hell of a lot of makeup to cover that bruise on your head. It's going to look like we've been fighting."

I gasped and lifted my fingers away from his skin. That was the last thing I wanted. I didn't want anyone knowing of what happened last night. "What about work? What are they going to say?"

Lance shrugged and pulled my hand down for a light kiss. "I'll talk to Frank and see what he can do. We might have to just deal with it. I hope you're good with a makeup brush."

"What if they think you've hit me?" I whispered as my other hand reached towards my head. I flinched at the tender touch just before Lance stopped me.

"Be careful. I don't think they'd think that I'd hit you due to the state of me. No offence, baby, but I don't think anyone would believe you did this to me." He pointed to his face and I cringed at the sight. He merged his hand with mine and shuffled around the bed, his face creasing with pain for a brief moment.

Of course, his stomach.

I wanted to ask him if I could see if there was any visible bruising but I didn't want to come off as too forward. I also didn't know how I'd react myself if he lay half naked next to me. I didn't want to freak out like before so it probably wasn't a good idea to push myself so early in the morning without fully being awake.