The morning Routine

~ 8 years later ~

I woke to the familiar sensation of being crushed; I wriggled, pushing my shoulder backwards. Liam shifted his weight off of me slightly. He was spooning me from behind, breathing deeply into the back of my hair. His heavy arm was draped over me, pinning my arms to my chest, he was holding my hand tightly, our fingers interlaced, his leg was slung casually over mine. I could feel the usual 'morning glory' pushing against the small of my back.

I quickly silenced my phone alarm and elbowed him in the stomach. "Six o'clock," I mumbled sleepily, closing my eyes.

"Ten more minutes, Angel. I'm still tired," he murmured, pulling me tighter to his chest.

"Nope, no ten more minutes. Last time it turned into another hour, and Jake nearly caught you in here," I mumbled, elbowing him in the stomach again.

He moved his arm and pinned my hands down to the bed near my head, in a praying position. "Just ten more minutes, Angel," he whined. I sighed and closed my eyes again. There was no arguing with him when he was like this, I just didn't have the energy this time of the morning to get into a fight with him. We both drifted back to sleep, instantly.

"Amber, you had better already be up!" my brother shouted, banging on the door. I jerked up and so did Liam, it was almost half past seven.

"Er…. yeah I'm up already, Jake," I shouted back, glancing at Liam who was rubbing his face, looking a bit dazed.

"Good. I'm going to have breakfast. Hurry up will you. Liam's driving today so be ready to leave in thirty minutes," Jake called through the door, before stomping off down the hall.

"Jeez, Angel, why didn't you wake me up?" Liam accused, frowning.

I looked at him warningly and gave him my best death glare. "I did, you jerk! You said 'ten more minutes' then pinned me to the bed to stop me from elbowing you!" I growled sarcastically, doing a bad impression of his voice.

He chuckled and pushed me back down on the bed, pinning my hands above my head and rolling on top of me. "Pinned you to the bed? Were you dreaming about me again, Angel? I could make that dream come true for you," he mocked, with his face inches from mine.

"Yeah, you wish! Now get the hell off me, Liam, and go get ready. You're driving today, apparently," I hissed, nodding to the window. He sighed and pushed himself off me, pulling on his jeans and t-shirt. He climbed out of the window, silently, sliding it back down after him. I walked over and locked it before heading in for the quickest shower ever.

Exactly twenty-six minutes later, I trudged into the kitchen with a frown, Liam was there leaning casually against the counter, eating my cereal. Damn it, every morning! His brown hair was messy in his usual just got out of bed look, which to be honest he did get out of bed and it looked just like that. All he ever did was run his hands through it a few times and add a bit of wax.

He looked the same as he did every morning, like a freaking supermodel. He wore low slung ripped jeans that showed his boxers a little, and always made the girls swoon. Today he wore a white t-shirt that showed off his perfect sculpted body, and an orange and grey checked short sleeve shirt over it, which he wore completely unbuttoned. His blue eyes were glittering with amusement as he looked at me.

"Running late this morning, Angel?" he asked with a smirk.

I gave him a drop dead look, making him chuckle. "Shut up, Liam! Why the hell are you eating my cereal again? Don't you have any food at home?" I asked, snatching the bowl from his hands and eating the contents. He just watched me with an amused smile.

Jake threw me a juice box. "You do look a little harassed this morning, Ambs. Everything OK?" he asked, looking at me a little concerned.

I glared at Liam again as he started to laugh. Of course I looked harassed, I had half an hour to get showered and dressed. "Slept in," I muttered with a defeated sigh.

Jake had no idea that Liam slept in my room with me every night, if he did he would go crazy. Jake was very protective of me, he always had been, but he had gotten worse since my dad had left when I was thirteen. Well, I say left, but in reality Jake and Liam came home early from hockey one day to see that my father had beaten me senseless, and was trying to rape me. Jake had finally snapped, and he and Liam had beaten the crap out of him, almost killing him in the process. They had thrown him out of the house and told him that if he ever came back, they would kill him. He never came back though, that was three years ago.

A little while after that, my mom got a job with a huge electronics firm, she was the PA to the director and so she travelled a lot. She was gone twice as much as she was here, so we only saw her for about one week a month, if that. Jake was my only supervision, although at times it was more like I was the one taking care of him.

Liam was also very protective of me, but we still didn't get on - even though he had literally spent every single night wrapped around me in my bed for the last eight years. He had snuck back into my room the following night after seeing me crying again and we had ended up falling asleep again. After two weeks it had just became a regular thing. It wasn't something that we ever talked about, I just left my window unlocked and he let himself in once his parents had checked in on him to make sure he was asleep. We had never once been caught in eight years. We'd come close a couple of times though. A couple of years ago, Liam's mom had found his bed empty, but he took the hit and lied, saying he'd snuck out to a party and stayed at a friend's. No one suspected he was next door with me.