We're a family.Broken pieces that somehow fit together into something whole.
* * *
That night, after the kids are finally asleep, Hades finds me in our bedroom.I'm standing at the window, looking out at the darkness.
"Hey," he says softly."You okay?"
"Yeah.Just thinking."
He comes up behind me, arms wrapping around my waist."About?"
"About how different everything is.A few months ago, I was engaged to someone else, living a completely different life.And now..."
"And now you're stuck with me and five kids."
I turn in his arms to face him."I'm not stuck.I'm exactly where I want to be."
His eyes search mine."Even after everything?The violence, the nightmares, all of it?"
I cup his face in my hands."You saved me, Hades.Not just from Ethan, but from a life that was slowly killing me.You gave me purpose.You gave me love.You gave me a family."
"You gave me the same thing, Angel.Before you, I was just going through the motions.Now I've got something to live for."
He kisses me then, slow and deep.It's the first kiss like this since the warehouse.The first time I haven't flinched away from intimacy.
When we break apart, his eyes are dark with desire and something deeper.Love, maybe.Or need.
"I want you," he says roughly."But only if you're ready.No pressure, no expectations."
Am I ready?My body still aches in places.My mind still carries the trauma.
But I'm also alive.And I want to feel alive in every way.
He looks at me like he’s holding back a storm, waiting for a sign.I give it to him, my voice low, trembling but certain.
“I’m ready,” I whisper, heart hammering beneath my ribs.“I need this.Need you.”
His brow furrows like he’s about to ask again, but all he says is, “You’re sure?”
I don’t answer with words.I pull him down into another kiss, deeper this time, hungry and deliberate.My mouth opens for him and I taste the heat on his tongue, the breath he releases when I press my body flush to his.His hands slide under my sweater slowly, reverently, fingertips brushing my skin like I’ll break beneath them.
Still, his touch is tender.Careful.His thumbs stroke along my waist like I’m something sacred.I shiver under him, not from nerves, but from the way he’s looking at me.Like he’s seeing every part of me and loving it all.
“Tell me if you need to stop,” he breathes into my mouth, lips ghosting mine.
“I will,” I promise, breathless.“But I won’t.”
We drift toward the bed like gravity’s pulling us there.Every step crackles with tension, my skin already aching to be touched again.I lift my arms so he can slide my sweater up and off, and his eyes drop to my chest, warm and wanting.He kisses my collarbone, slow and soft, before reaching behind me, fingers fumbling with the clasp of my bra.
It falls away and I feel the air against my skin, and then his mouth, hot and gentle, pressing a kiss between my breasts.I gasp, hands tangling in his hair.He doesn’t rush.Doesn’t grope or grab.He maps me with lips and tongue, worshipful, like he’s learning me by taste.
He kneels to peel away my jeans, kissing the dip of my hip, then the inside of my thigh as he drags the denim down, inch by inch.When he sees the scar on my arm, the one I always try to hide, he pauses.Then he lifts my wrist like it’s delicate and brushes his mouth over the line of pale skin.
“Beautiful,” he murmurs.“Every part of you.”
Tears well suddenly, not from hurt but from the unbearable softness of it.No one’s ever looked at me like this—like I’m something whole.Like I’m not broken, or used up, or wrong.
“I love you,” I whisper, voice cracking.“I’m so in love with you it terrifies me.”
