Beau’s palm slides slowly over my stomach, up my ribs—an absent, intimate touch that makes heat ripple through me again, even in the calm of morning. He rests his hand there like he’s claiming the fact that I’m real.
“Come back here,” he murmurs when I shift.
“I am here.”
“More,” he says simply.
I roll slightly onto my back to face him. The sheet slides down my shoulder, and his gaze tracks it—controlled, but hungry under the control. His eyes are bright in the morning light, that startling blue that makes me feel seen in a way that’s both terrifying and addictive.
“You look different,” I whisper.
Beau’s jaw flexes once. “So do you.”
“Good different?” I ask, because apparently I crave reassurance like oxygen now.
Beau’s thumb strokes my cheek. “You’re glowing.”
My cheeks warm. “I’m… moisturized.”
A low sound rumbles out of him—something between a laugh and a groan. He leans in and kisses me, slow and deep, like he’s reminding me exactly what happened last night.
My hand slides into his hair without permission.
Beau’s arm bands around me, pulling me closer, and for a second I forget every fear I’ve ever carried.
Then his phone buzzes.
Once.
Twice.
Beau stills like a switch flips inside him. He breaks the kiss, eyes closing briefly as he reaches for the phone on the nightstand.
I watch his face change as he reads the screen—calm sharpening into focus.
“What?” I ask quietly.
Beau sits up, sheet low on his hips, muscles tense under skin that’s marked with faint scars and old lines of strength. He looks like a man built for survival, not softness.
“Haven 7,” he says. “Call came in.”
My stomach drops. “Is someone hurt?”
“Not yet,” he says, already moving, pulling on jeans. “Lost hiker. Trail 9. Weather’s shifting.”
I sit up too, clutching the sheet to my chest like that will keep him here. “Beau, it’s early.”
His gaze lands on mine, and something soft flickers there.
“This is the job,” he says.
The job.
Reality.
The thing that always comes for him in the end.
I nod, trying to be supportive, trying to be the kind of woman who doesn’t cling.
