She shot him a grumpy look over her shoulder as she filled the kettle at the sink. “Your mother is something else.”
“Sorry.”
“You don’t need to be sorry, it wasn’t your stupid idea that I go work for her. That’s all on me.”
Something about that didn’t quite feel right, but he couldn’t sort out what. He’d told her over and over again that she didn’t need to work. He made decent money, and after a few years on the force, his salary would be more than enough to support a family. Until then, he supplemented with his army reserve duty. They were fine. But Liv wanted to work, and in Pine Harbour, her options were limited. And while she was happy to talk about babies in the abstract, she kept taking her pills religiously.
He wasn’t in ahurryto start a family, exactly, but it was on his mind. Maybe it was because he was three years older than her. Or that he came from a large family himself. Liv had a sister, who lived in Vancouver, and her parents were divorced and living at opposite ends of the province. None of them were close. Whereas even though Rafe’s two younger siblings were at school in cities further south, they came home at least once a month for a family dinner. Speaking of which…
“Dani and Tom are going to be home this weekend. Ma wants to do a big dinner—“
“On Sunday, I know, she told me today.” Liv ripped a tea bag out of a cardboard box then jerked the cupboard open, looking for a mug. He said a small prayer of thanks that he’d thought to do the dishes before she got home. At least their new place would have a dishwasher. And a backyard, which would be nice in the summer. It had been a long winter stuck in a tiny apartment together. Getting used to living together.
Even though he was twenty-five, he’d lived at home until he went south to for the three-month long Police College course after he was hired on to the OPP. As long as they paid nominal rent, his parents didn’t say a word about any of their grown children coming and going. So this had been his first real home of his own, a fact that Liv found shocking. Even though she was only twenty-two, she’d lived on her own since she was eighteen.
Their differences made conversations like this a challenge for Rafe. If she was mad at him, why didn’t she just yell at him? Tell him he was a fuckwad and how he could fix it? That’s what his family would do. Well, his mother wouldn’t say fuckwad. She’d call him an idiot.
“Hey, Ma hasn’t said anything inappropriate to you, has she?” He was grasping at straws and he knew it.
Liv shot him ayou totally don’t get itlook. No shit. “No.”
“You want to tell me how I can make this better?”
“Make what better?”
“You’re in a bad mood.”
“Yeah, sometimes that happens.”
But it didn’t feel the same as when he had a bad day at work. Because when she rubbed his shoulders and kissed his head, it made it all better. And the closer he got to her as she simmered with undefined rage, waiting for the kettle to boil, the worse her mood seemed to get.
“I just need some space, okay?”
“Yeah, sure.” But the week before she’d told him how much she missed him now that they were often working opposite shifts. Space seemed like the wrong thing, even if it was what she asked for. He hovered in the kitchen door for a minute, then returned to packing up the living room for the move.
She came and found him after half an hour and tugged him to bed. Four months into their marriage and this was still amazing to him, how much they continued to want each other—and how different it was than anything he’d had with women in the past.
She shoved his t-shirt up, splaying her small hands across his midsection and his dick jerked to attention. Her touch undid him every single time. “Liv,” he said, his voice rough with desire. “We should talk.”
“Nothing to talk about,” she breathed, sliding her hands north to circle his nipples, then higher still until he got the message and pulled his shirt off entirely. “I need you. I need this, us together. I need to feel your love for me.”
He watched as she lost her own shirt, then tugged her hair out of its ponytail. He slid his hands through her silky waves then lifted her effortlessly into his arms. “I love you with all of me. Not just my body. I love talking to you, baby, and I want to know about your shitty fucking day. Don’t shut me out.”
“I’m not. I just don’t want to talk about it. I want…” She wiggled in his arms and sighed as his mouth found the valley between her breasts. He breathed in the scent of her skin. Faint remnants of baby powder deodorant and a fruity body wash teased his nose, but mostly he just smelled her. His wife.
“I want you to be happy.”
“I am. Right now, with you…this is perfect.”
— —
“Master Corporal Minelli, do you have a minute?”
Captain Jacobson strode toward him across the parade square and he stood at attention. “Yes, sir.”
“There’s an opportunity we’d like to put your name forward for, if you can get time off work.”
“What sort of opportunity?”
