Chapter Seventy-Three

**

“You gonna stick by me?”

“Maybe….”

**

Letty fell asleep again sometime during the drive home…didn’t even wake up when I pulled up to the house.

“Hey, babe,” I said lowly, nudging her arm a little, “c‘mon, we’re home…”

Letty just kind of grunted, rolled away from me. I knew she wasn’t gonna be waking up anytime soon.

“Okay,” I said, laughing to myself as I got out of the car. I was still grinning when I got over to Letty’s side and opened the door.

“So…” I said, poking her a little, “should I just leave you out here, or you coming in to bed?”

“Bed…” Letty mumbled. I knew she wasn’t really awake, though. She has this weird thing, where she can have a complete conversation with you while she’s sleeping, and in the morning, she won’t remember any of it.

“You know,” I said as I picked her up and started walking towards the house, “I can’t take you anywhere lately…always falling asleep on me. You tryin’ to tell me I’m boring or something? Or maybe you just like being carried around or something…”

Somehow I got Letty inside, upstairs and into our room without waking Mia up. Laid her down on the bed, fumbled with her boots, nearly drove myself crazy tryin’ to get them off of her. And then her jeans - took nearly ten minutes to get those off. The shirt was easy enough…just had to pick her up, pull it over her head and then toss it into the corner with the rest of the dirty clothes.

I stripped down to my boxers and then collapsed next to Letty. She nestled against me, and I just laid there and watched her for a while. I couldn’t believe how lucky I was to have her…couldn’t believe how much I loved her. I never really thought, after Linder, that I could have a normal life…thought I’d fucked everything up.

I kept thinking of Miguel…thinking about the way he’d looked at her, at the party. I should’ve seen it coming, I guess…should’ve known that eventually there’d be some guy who was into her, thinking we weren’t together anymore. Right then, I started thinking of ways to show everyone - especially Miguel - that Letty and I were still together…had always been together, were always gonna be together…

Started thinking, at least until Letty rolled over, pressed her face against my chest. Then, it was just the two of us again.

“Don’t ever leave me, okay baby?” I whispered, kissing her forehead as I closed my eyes.

“Never…” I heard Letty mumble, right before I fell asleep.

“Dom!” Mia shouted as she opened the door, “You’re gonna be late! My alarm didn’t go off this morning or something…so I don’t have time to really make breakfast. I can do toast, maybe an egg… Or I could just bring something by the garage for you later, after my first class….”

“I’m not going to the garage today, Mia,” I said, interrupting her.

“Wait…what? Why?” she asked, confused.

“Well…Letty has the day off from school, so I thought we’d just hang out together before the race tonight.”

“Oh. Okay,” Mia said, turning back towards the door. “I’ll just…I’ll just leave, then… But…Dom?”

“Yeah?” I asked, sitting up to look at her.

“That’s really sweet of you, what you’re doing. I know Letty’ll love it, that you’re taking time off from work to hang out with her. I’m…Well, I’m really glad things are working out for you guys.”

“Yeah, me too,” I said, smiling as she closed the door.

Within a minute, I was back asleep.