I grip her thighs tighter, slamming into her again and again, her slick heat sucking me in like she never wants to let go.
She breaks first.
Her body seizes, back arching, mouth falling open on a scream as her climax rips through her. She tightens around me like a vice, and I swear I see stars.
“Diesel,” she sobs, shaking.
I thrust once, twice more, then I’m gone. I bury myself to the hilt and come hard, spilling deep inside her, forehead pressed to hers, trying to remember how to breathe.
For a moment, we don’t move.
Just breathing.
Just hearts pounding.
Then I lift her gently off the counter, carry her back to the bed, and lay her down like something precious.
She curls into me, one arm flung across my chest.
No words.
We don’t need them.
Because she’s here.
And I’ll never let her go again.
Chapter 9
Grace
It’sbeenaweek.
Seven whole days without a message. Without a threat. Without a car creeping behind us on a back road or a biker lurking in the rearview. The kind of quiet that should feel like peace.
But I don’t trust quiet. I’ve lived in the silence between storms. I know what it means.
Still, I try to let myself breathe.
Diesel hasn’t left my side unless he had to. We’ve slept tangled together every night since the rescue, his arm around my waist like a vow. His touch is steady. Gentle. Like he’s memorizing the places where it used to hurt and promising me it won’t again.
His voice has become the one thing that steadies me when the memories creep in like smoke.
I tell myself I’m safe.
I almost believe it.
When Sage asks if I’m ready to teach the art class at the children’s center, I say yes before I can talk myself out of it. I’ve always loved kids. Maybe because I was one no one saved. Maybe because I owe it to the girl I used to be, the one who still believed in color when everything around her went dark.
So I go.
The community center is bright and warm, its walls covered in paper flowers and stick-figure masterpieces. The kids file in slowly, curious, loud, open in a way I forgot was possible. I show them how to draw faces. How to shade hair. I let them borrow my pencils and they treat them like treasure.
I don’t know who smiles more, me or them.
For an hour, I forget.
And then I feel it.
