“I didn’t marry you because it was convenient,” he continues. “I married you because the moment you stepped off that stagecoach, my life made sense in a way it never had before. You think I don’t see what this town is doing? I see it. And I am choosing you anyway.”
Tears blur my vision. I hate them. I’ve cried enough for one lifetime.
“What if they never come around?” I whisper.
“Then they’ll never shop here again,” he replies without hesitation. “And I will still wake up every morning married to the bravest woman I know.”
Brave.
No one has ever called me that.
“I love you,” he says, simply, like it’s a fact as solid as the floor beneath us. “I loved you before you believed me. I’ll love you long after this town forgets why it ever turned its back.”
Something in my chest finally gives way.
I sob once, harsh and ugly, and Grady is there immediately, pulling me into him, my face pressed against his shoulder. He holds me like I am precious.
“I’m scared,” I admit into his shirt.
“I know.”
“And I don’t know how to be the woman you deserve.”
He tips my chin up gently, forcing me to look at him.
“Rose,” he says softly. “You already are.”
I kiss him then.
Not carefully. Not politely.
I kiss him like a woman who has finally decided to believe she is loved.
Grady
This time is different.
There is no hesitation when she pulls me toward the bedroom. No distance, no veil, no hesitation. Rose undresses me with shaking hands, eager and hungry all at once, as if she’s memorizing me.
She looks her fill and then I do the same. I’ll never get tired of seeing my wife’s supple flesh free of all lace and cotton. Bouncy and flushed a healthy pink, her curves make my heart pound and my cock ache.
“You are the best thing that’s ever happened to me. If I had my choice of women, I would still pick you,” I whisper against her lips.
It’s the honest truth. No flattery here. In a garden of women, I would still pick my Rose. Thorns and all.
Her breath shudders as I kiss her scarred skin deliberately, tenderly, tracing every raised line.
She clings to me when I lay her down, her legs wrapping around my hips, her mouth seeking mine with a quiet desperation that wrecks me completely.
I take my time, sinking my cock as deep as our bodies will allow. It takes every ounce of control I have not to come inside her immediately. Everything about her sets my body on fire. The way her nails dig into my shoulders when pleasure overwhelms her. The way she says my name when I thrust into her.
She meets me stroke for stroke, both of us chasing the same overwhelming wave of pleasure.
When she shatters beneath me, I follow her over the edge, holding her tight, my face buried in her neck.
After, she rests against my chest, tracing idle patterns over my skin.
“I love you,” she says quietly.
