Sleepless: an outtake from Home

by Cara Dee

  Sleepless

  an outtake from Home

  Cara Dee

  Sleepless

  A Home outtake

  Copyright © 2018 by Cara Dee

  All rights reserved

  * * *

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment and may not be reproduced in any way without documented permission of the author, not including brief quotes with links and/or credit to the source. The ebook version is, however, free and may be shared freely from its original source on the author’s website. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. This is a work of fiction and all references to historical events, persons living or dead, and locations are used in a fictional manner. Any other names, characters, incidents, and places are derived from the author’s imagination. The author acknowledges the trademark status and owners of any wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction. Characters portrayed in sexual situations are 18 or older.

  Edited by Silently Correcting Your Grammar, LLC.

  Formatting by Eliza Rae Services.

  Contents

  Camassia Cove

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  More from Cara Dee

  About the Author

  Camassia Cove

  Camassia Cove is a town in northern Washington created to be the home of some exciting love stories. Each novel taking place here is a standalone, with the exception of sequels and outtakes, and they will vary in genre and pairing. What they all have in common is the town in which they live. Some are friends and family. Others are complete strangers. Some have vastly different backgrounds. Some grew up together. It's a small world, and many characters will cross over and pay a visit or two in several books. But, again, each novel stands on its own, and spoilers will be avoided as much as possible.

  This is a free outtake taking place in Camassia Cove, and it centers around the characters in the novel Home. Before you read Sleepless, you need to have read Home, and for the full enjoyment, it’s recommended you’ve read Out too.

  If you're interested in keeping up with the characters, the town, the timeline, and future novels, check out Camassia Cove's own page www.caradeewrites.com.

  Chapter 1

  Dominic Cleary

  Living life on a strict routine, where each day was different from the other had kinda become our thing. Whoever took care of Thea in the morning had the car that day, so Wednesdays and Thursdays were mine. On Wednesday, though, it was because I worked all fucking day. First, eight hours at the Quad, then home to sleep for a few hours, then from ten in the evening to five in the morning as a bouncer in the Valley; then I cleaned Mike’s bar across the street from the club before I had to go home and get Thea ready for school.

  In short, Thursday mornings were a drag ’cause Wednesdays wiped me out. I was constantly thinking about going back to bed, preferably with Adrian, though he was balls deep in classes at that hour, and I wouldn’t see him until tonight for our shift at the Quad.

  Waking up without him fucking sucked.

  Thea held up a finger for the eleventh time today.

  “One more hairclip?” I hesitated.

  She nodded firmly.

  I yawned and stuck the next glittery hairclip into her curly hair. “I don’t think another one will fit, baby.”

  She got some attitude and informed me in rapid sign language that “her Daddy A” could braid her hair and use seventeen hairclips.

  “Well, I’m not him, am I?” I rose from the closed toilet and pointed toward her room. “Finish getting dressed. I’mma fix your breakfast.”

  She huffed, one of the few sounds I heard more frequently these days. Teach was killing me. A year and some change into our relationship, he was acing the Daddy work. He spoiled her rotten with attention and always went with the same excuse: he’d missed the first three years of her life. Therefore he had the right to “indulge.”

  Who’d’a fuckin’ thought I’d be the disciplinarian in our family? ’Cause fuck if Adrian was capable of taking Thea down a peg when the situation called for it. He was rigid about two things: food and education. He was all over meal-prep, her allergies, and texture issues and, of course, school. He didn’t miss a meeting; if Thea’s counselors recommended any books or documentaries, Adrian ordered them instantly. In fact, when the biannual reading list was updated before each semester, he went through it in a fucking month.

  But if Thea threw a tantrum at the store, I had to step in ’cause he immediately made it about her anxiety issues. He was so whipped for her. It didn’t seem to occur to him that, sometimes, kids were just little assholes.

  Opening the fridge, I snagged the shopping list off the door and tucked it into my sweats. I guess I could go to the store before I went home again. To sleep. Oh God, was I gonna sleep good. It was like this every Thursday. Last night had been particularly brutal too. Some woman was getting married this weekend, so she’d had her bachelorette party at the club, and I swear there’d been at least fifty of them. Fifty drunk women and the regular crowd.

  It paid well, though.

  “Eh!” The whiny grunt came from my little gangsta, who’d joined me to watch me make breakfast. She held up her arms.

  “I didn’t hear nothin’, Thea.” I sliced up a banana and put it in her yogurt, waiting for her whispered progress. I wasn’t gonna lie, it still tugged at the heartstrings.

  Her cheeks colored, and she shifted awkwardly. “Pluh,” she exhaled.

  I grinned and picked her up to sit on the counter. “Much better.” I rubbed our noses together.

  There was no schedule to speak of when it came to coaxing Thea to talk, and maybe the rest of the syllables in please would never come. But once there was progress, we didn’t go back. This was the one deliberate half word she could voice on command, so she could save her “ehs” for Adrian, who found anything she did cute.

  While Thea ate in the living room and watched some cartoons, I did my best not to fall asleep in Teach’s chair. Not the easiest feat when you were wearing new sweats and a hoodie that were snugglier than PJs.

  Something vibrated along my thigh, and it took my sluggish brain a beat to figure out it was my phone.

  It was my turn to grunt as I read the message from Zach.

  Don’t forget we have plans, bitch.

  “Motherfucker,” I muttered.

  That earned me a squeak and a sharp look from Thea.

  Oh, one other thing my Teach was rigid about these days: language.

  “I’m gonna tell,” she signed.

  I raised a brow. “So you don’t want nuggets after school?”

  She pressed her lips together and scowled into her yogurt. Going to McDonald’s a couple times a month was our secret, and my girl was an addict for those nasty, delicious nuggets. If Teach knew, he’d be horrified.

  “I want nuggets, Daddy,” she decided.

  Thought so.

  Half an hour later, I helped Thea out of the car, and we crossed the street hand in hand. She was skipping, all hairclips and Moana backpack. The latter was a gift from Teach’s folks, who were trying to lure us down to Florida by sending Thea Disney gifts.

  They didn’t judge me for my past, so they were cool in my eyes. I’d only met them once, when they came up here last Christmas. Plus, they adored Thea, also their only grandchild so far.

  “Wait up, hon.” I picked up Thea and changed directions, spotting a few of her teachers across the schoolyard. William Calvert was one of them. He wasn’t actually a teacher; he was her counselor, and she had a session with him after their morning exercise.

  My girl was distracted, more focus
ed on her friends milling about.

  “I want to say hi to Jeremy,” she signed.

  “In a minute.” I blew a raspberry on her cheek before reaching the teachers. William smiled politely and greeted Thea in sign. She replied, saying she had a cranky Daddy this morning.

  “You traitor,” I accused.

  William chuckled. “Reminds me of all you little rascals. At the end of the day, you’re cranky too.”

  He was on my side.

  Thea shook her head stubbornly.

  “I just wanted to ask if youse needed more parents signing up for the day trip,” I said, lowering Thea to the ground. “Adrian told me you might be short.”

  Thea was going on some hike next week, and in a group of ten kids, four had their own assistants—three of whom were in wheelchairs—and most of the kids had some kind of hearing impairment. There would be more parents and teachers than kids. And since the hike would be on a Thursday, I could surrender my precious sleep and help out.

  “I believe we have everyone we need for the actual hike,” William replied. “But my partner and I are going to check out the trail this Saturday, and we could use another pair of eyes or two. We have to make sure the trail is still wheelchair friendly.”

  Sounded perfect to me; Adrian and I were both off work. “Count me and Adrian in, then.”

  I hated driving in Westslope. I’d only had my license a few months, so the winding roads around the mountains up here weren’t my jam. Shitty reception and no people around meant I was stuck if I drove off the road.

  Zach, a buddy of mine, lived with his boyfriend in a castle-sized version of a log cabin. A far cry from his old apartment in Camas. Which was how we’d met last year. He used to run a corner store near where Teach and I lived. These days, Zach was the weirdest fucking dude, jet-setting between his old self who was more, uh, street, and this new guy who worked as a part-time model for a makeup brand in LA.

  I drove along the river until their house came into view. The cabin was built up against a mountainside and was situated on top of their garage. To the side of the house, by the riverbank, was their front yard of sorts. No fence or nothing, just a patio for barbecues. I parked next to it and heard music as soon as I stepped out.

  It was Zach in a nutshell. I was literally in the middle of the forest, and the only thing I heard was Beyoncé.

  The living room was all windows, and Zach got off the couch upon seeing me. I gave a two-finger wave and entered the garage, trailing up the stairs to their front door. The music faded, thankfully.

  He opened the door as I reached the landing, and two things hit me at once. The smell of whatever they were cooking in the kitchen, and— “Holy fuck, what happened to you?” I stared incredulously at him.

  Zach wore his life for all to see, mixing all the old with the new. Today, dressed in sweats and a hoodie like me, but he also had a two-hundred-dollar haircut, cropped short on the sides and shaggier on top, and his face… Was he sick? No, wait. I guessed it had to do with makeup.

  He blinked. “Are my eyes red?”

  Uh, yeah. They were completely bloodshot, especially his left. “Aren’t you supposed to have a stylist who does all that for you?”

  He made a face and opened the door wider. “I’m practicing putting on fake eyelashes for a tutorial.”

  I shook my head and stepped inside where it smelled even more like caramel and cream.

  Henry was in the kitchen. He was Zach’s man, much older, mad rich, a bit of a snob, but in a weirdly humble way. A philanthropist to the bone, one who also legit shipped a certain type of chocolate across the country because he had a craving.

  “Sup, Henry?” I jerked my chin.

  “Hello, Dominic.” Henry smiled and washed his hands in the sink. “Have you gotten any sleep at all?”

  Much like Adrian, Henry was one of those over-considerate people who remembered the most random things. In this case, my work schedule.

  “I’ll take a nap when I get home.” I leaned over the big kitchen counter to see what he got cookin’ on the stove. “Something smells fucking amazing.”

  Zach and I had hit the lottery with our men. Where Teach was always cooking up some new dinner, Henry liked the little things. Side dishes, homemade candy, desserts, and appetizers. Whenever the four of us got together, Zach and I ended up in severe food comas.

  “I’m trying my hand at making pecan fudge for a triple nut, double caramel cake,” he informed me with a knowing smirk. Knowing in the way he and Teach liked to be cockteases with what they made.

  “No, you can’t try it,” Zach said, grasping my elbow, “I already tried to bribe him with a blow job. Come on. We have work to do.” He dragged me toward the couch.

  “And it didn’t work?” I frowned.

  He snorted. “Oh, he accepted the blow job. Then, nothin’. Yeah, I can hear you chuckling, Henry!”

  I snickered through a yawn and threw myself on the couch. Spring was in bloom around the river outside the large windows, and there was just enough space on the coffee table for my feet. The rest was taken up by boxes upon boxes of fake eyelashes, a mirror on a stand, and some other shit.

  “You can wake me up when you’re done with that, you queen.” I tugged up my hood and sank down in my seat, arms folded over my chest, feet crossed at the ankles.

  “Fuck that, ass-licker,” he replied. “We’re gonna talk proposal ideas. You’ve been whining about popping the question to Adrian for like six months, and you still got nothing.”

  Well, that was why I’d asked for his help. It had to be perfect, and nothing I came up with seemed like it was enough.

  Henry came over with a tray of something, causing me to perk up a bit.

  “Your friendship has become more…colorful.” He set down two Cokes with crushed cherries in ’em and a bowl of homemade potato chips. He’d served them before, and it was likely he remembered how quickly I’d devoured them.

  “All it took was us getting drunk together,” Zach replied. “Thank you, gorgeous.”

  Henry straightened and smiled curiously at Zach. “When did you get drunk together?”

  “When you flew down to help your buddy with something in LA,” I replied. “Zach was miserable, and I was working at the club, so I told him to come down to the Valley.” And I hadn’t gotten drunk whatsoever. Not that he’d noticed, what with all the shots he’d inhaled. “Funniest shift I ever worked.”

  Mainly ’cause Zach’s drunk tongue was looser than a slut, and he’d shown me the dirty talk he and Henry texted each other the few times they were apart.

  Nothing broke the ice like Zach texting his man, “Fuck me raw, breed my ass.”

  “Fuck me, these are good,” I groaned around a mouthful of chips. “Thank you, Henry. I’mma name my second kid after you.”

  He shook his head, amused. “Your enjoyment is quite enough. You boys have fun. I’ll be in the kitchen if you need anything.”

  The way he doted on Zach—and me—left me quiet as Henry returned to the kitchen. The tip of Zach’s tongue poked out while he concentrated on putting some white paste on another set of eyelashes. I sat there with the bowl of chips resting in my lap, and it wasn’t the first time I felt thankful for our friendship, partly for selfish reasons. They hadn’t been together long, a little over six months, and they were going through many of the issues I struggled with in my relationship with Teach. The financial differences, the general inequality of where we came from.

  Zach had never been a punk on the streets like me, but he’d struggled a lot to provide for himself and his brother. Meanwhile, Henry was old money, had an Ivy League education, and had shirts that were more than a month’s rent.

  I was doing better these days. I had three jobs that made for one full-time employment, I’d gotten my driver’s license, and I could pull my own weight. But Teach was always one step ahead. Sure, he had eleven years on me, something I forgot easily. I guess I just wished shit was more equal.

  Teach deser
ved the best.

  “Do you ever feel like you don’t measure up?” I asked quietly.

  Zach paused what he was doing and glanced over at Henry, then back at me and smiled softly. “Only twenty-four hours of the day.” He tried to apply the delicate row of lashes and nearly poked his eye out. “Ow…” he whispered, squeezing one eye shut hard. “I just gotta remind myself of what Henry keeps telling me. He doesn’t want someone who’s like him. He wants me for who I am, for where I am in life.”

  Adrian had told me similar shit more than once.

  The only thing that seemed to work was when I advanced. The day I was hired at the Quad, I took my man out to a restaurant and felt I was almost worthy of being on a date with him. Yet, in the back of my mind, he’d always be the one who saved my life and gave me a home. How did I properly show my gratitude?

  Hopefully with the perfect proposal.

  “Do you think I’m proposing for the wrong reason?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” Zach replied pensively, wiping his eye of glue. “Do you wanna spend the rest of your life with him?”

  “Of fucking course I do.”

  “Do you wanna be married to him?”

  I smiled sleepily and returned the chips to the table. “It’s a good feeling, so I’mma go with a resounding yes.”

  “Then I don’t see how it could be for the wrong reason.”

  It wasn’t that simple. “It ain’t the only reason I’m doin’ it, though. I feel like I need to, ’cause he deserves it. You know how I fucked up our one-year anniversary.”

  It still embarrassed me. Teach had made us a romantic dinner and gotten a tattoo dedicated to us, this subtle, perfectly shadowed design on his shoulder. A car key representing the time we were new to each other and he’d offered me a place to sleep at night before I felt comfortable enough to move in. The key was wrapped in a white rose petal, because I’d once given him a white rose as a silly thing. It was the same night I’d told him I wanted us to be together. To commit and shit.