Sleeping With The CEO
Chapter 65: Missing Piece

Chapter 65: Missing Piece

"Good morning, Derek," Emily said as she placed a tea cup in front of her boss, a muffin right alongside it. She knew that she had not been the easiest person to get along with, in the previous week, and she was using the food to apologize. She expected him to ask why she had been so quiet, or to at least reprimand her for it. But he did no such thing, instead he said

"Lovely morning to you too, Emily," And then he smiled, his green eyes lighting up. His pearl white teeth on display. His cheeks dimpling.

For a moment Emily was star struck.

She kept forgetting how handsome he was, but then from time to time he did things like...smile...and she was left breathless. Reminding herself that she was a grown woman in full control of herself, Emily smiled back, tucked a lose strand of hair behind her ear and left before she could make a fool of herself. She left so fast she never noticed the blush that bloomed on her boss’ face before he forced it away, taking a sip of scalding tea before hastily putting the cup down.

By that point, Emily was already at her desk and hard at work. But she was not busy with actual work. Having already knocked off most of her tasks despite it being so early, Emily was now focused on work of a personal nature...research.

People who said that if you failed at something, all that you had to do was try, try, and try again, until you finally succeeded were very wrong. You could not just keep repeating the same unsuccessful thing over and over again and hoping that the outcome would change. That was insanity...literally.

Which was why Emily, with a passion that she had not felt in a while, was planning for exactly how she was going to be trying again.

Her first plan was to go back to the small town, book the same room and then try to see of she would be able to fall asleep there. That plan was quickly scratched off for one very simple, and yet very important reason.

Money.

She did not have the money to book a flight there, pay for transport to the motel, pay for the room and then do it all over again in reverse the next morning.

Plus given how unsettled she had been when she had been in the room with Derek. Alone she would be terrified, she was trying to stop her nightmares, not add to them. So it was not that much of a hardship to abandon that plan.

In its place, Emily came up with the perfect replacement, if she could not go to the room. Then she would make the room come to her. And so she did what most people did when they were looking for very specific objects that would have been impossible or too expensive to buy any other way...she went online shopping.

There were a few key things that she felt she needed to replicate to get the mood just right.

The first one was the curtains. Those were easy enough to find in stores that specialized in vintage. Next came the pillows and pillow cases, they were a little bit harder to find. But where the pillows and pillow cases felt difficult, the bed covers were nearly impossible. Leaving the online stores, Emily ended up going through countless blogs and forums. Communities populated by people who either loved old designs, or were selling materials that were old. By some miracle, she came across a post that mentioned a store selling the bed covers she was looking for.

A phone call later, and Emily was the proud owner of a new set of bed covers. All that she had to do was wait for them to be delivered along with the rest of the other stuff.

Lucky for her, she did not have to worry about her mom seeing the new stuff arrive, and jumping to the wrong conclusions. The last time Emily had bought something on line there had been an epic misunderstanding.

She had seen a second hand wedding dress up for sale and had bought it. Not so she could wear it and walk down the aisle to her none existent fiancé, bit so she could use the material in a project that she had been working on. Her mother had been the one to sign for the package, and overcome by curiosity, she had opened it.

Emily had come home to find her mother a complete mess on the living room carpet.

"Why? Why would you not tell me that you are getting married? Am I truly such a bad mother that you think I do not deserve to know such wonderful news about by own daughter?" It had taken a whole lot of tissue paper, several scoops of ice cream, as well as some additional crying from Emily herself in order for the misunderstanding to be cleared up.

They had laughed about it afterwards, but just thinking about what her mom would think if she had to sign for the new items made Emily shudder.

"You are leaving me, arent’t you? Packing up and leaving you poor mom alone without even a goodbye," Shaking off the image, Emily just thanked her lucky stars that she would not have to worry about that happening since her mother would not be in.

And so with nothing more that she could add, Emily went about her day. Monday turned into Tuesday, which soon gave way to Wednesday.

By the time that Thursday rolled around, she could barely control her anticipation. When the clock struck five on Friday afternoon, she was very nearly the first one out the door.

Thirty minutes after she got home, her orders arrived and after signing for them she dragged them into her room. It took a few minutes to strip her bed, replace the covers and put away her usual ones.

Once that was done, Emily looked at the plain covers with pride. It might not have been the most exciting think to look at, but if it helped her sleep, then she was keeping it.

With a satisfied nod, Emily went to carry out the last step in the things that she believed would help her finally get some sleep...the shower.

The water at the motel had been luke warm, so that was what she made her shower water. To match the motel’s weak water pressure, she turned the knob only once and left it at that. It was an awful shower that did absolutely nothing to relax her...perfect...just like the one at the motel.

Once she was done with the shower, she got herself into the very same pyjamas that she had been wearing that night, and then she finally got under the covers.

If it worked, she would have good night’s rest and be assured of sleep for life. With that positive thought in mind, Emily closed her eyes and went to sleep. An hour and a half later she woke up.

Sitting up, Emily allowed herself a moment to just cry.

What was it? What was she missing? What had she done different that night?