We shed the rest of our clothes with more urgency than grace, leaving a pile of wet denim and cotton on the floor. I pulled her into the shower, under the spray, and we both gasped as the hot water hit our frozen skin.
For a long time, we just stood there. Letting the heat sink in. Letting the cold leach out. Just holding each other.
Then her hands were on my chest, fingers tracing the old scars along my ribs—shrapnel souvenirs from a life that felt very far away right now. I watched her face as she touched me, watched the way the water ran down her cheeks, plastered her hair to her neck.
“A lot of things could’ve gone wrong today. Those puppies… Al Pacacino… Us.”
“But they all went right.” I cupped her face in my hands, tilted it up to mine. “We’re here. We’re safe.”
I kissed her. Soft at first, tentative, like we were learning each other all over again. The water poured over us, hot and cleansing, washing away the cold, the fear, the lingering echoes of everything we’d survived to get here.
Her mouth opened under mine, and the kiss deepened. She pressed closer, her breasts against my chest, her hips against mine. I was already hard—had been since I’d started undressing her—and she made a small sound when she felt me against her stomach.
“Beck.” My name on her lips like a prayer.
I stepped her backward until she was against the tile wall, one hand bracing beside her head, the other sliding down her body. Over her breast, her ribs, her hip. Lower.
She gasped when I touched her, her head falling back against the tile. I watched her face as I stroked her, I knew what made her breath catch, what made her moan, what made her fingers dig into my shoulders. And I was merciless.
“Please,” she whispered. “I need?—”
“I know what you need.”
I lifted her, and she wrapped her legs around my waist, ankles locking at the small of my back. The angle was awkward, the shower too small, the tile slippery under my feet—but none of that mattered when I pushed inside her and her whole body shuddered.
“Oh God.” Her voice broke on the words. “Yes.”
I held still for a moment, buried deep, feeling her pulse around me—so warm andalive. Her eyes were closed, lips parted, water running down her face like tears. Beautiful. So goddamn beautiful.
Then I started to move.
It wasn’t gentle. We’d been gentle in our early days, careful, learning each other’s boundaries and broken places. This wasn’t that. This was relief and release, survival translated into something raw and hungry. Her nails raked down my back. My fingers dug into her hips hard enough to bruise. The sound of our breathing mixed with the rush of water.
“Harder,” she gasped. “Beck, please?—”
I gave her what she asked for. Drove into her with everything I had, felt her tighten around me, heard her cry out as she shattered. The feel of her coming undone pushed me over the edge, and I buried my face in her neck as the world went white for entirely different reasons than the blizzard.
We stayed like that for a long moment, pressed together, hearts pounding in unison. The water was starting to cool by the time I finally set her down, both of us unsteady on our feet.
“We should probably get out,” she said. “Before we drown.”
“Survived a blizzard.” I grinned. “Death by shower would be embarrassing.”
She laughed, and the sound filled the tiny bathroom, bounced off the tiles, settled somewhere in my chest where I’d keep it forever.
We dried off with towels that smelled like industrial detergent and dressed in the emergency clothes stashed in the guesthouse—sweats and T-shirts, worn soft from washing. Not glamorous. Perfect anyway.
Jet had claimed the foot of the bed by the time we got there. He lifted his head when we approached, tail thumping once against the mattress, then settled back down. Permission to proceed, apparently.
Audra curled against my side, her head on my chest, her leg thrown over mine. The storm still raged outside, wind rattling the windows, snow piling up against the door. But in here, it was quiet. Safe. Ours.
“Last Christmas Eve,” she said softly, “I was in a motel in Nevada. Didn’t sleep. Just sat in a chair by the window, watching the parking lot. Waiting for headlights that might mean death.”
My arm tightened around her.
“This is better,” she said.
“Yeah?”
