"Yeah." The word is barely a breath. "Right person."
I should pull back. Should be professional. Should remember that trauma isn’t the best way to begin a relationship.
Instead, I kiss him.
It's different from the desperate kisses before—slower, deeper, exploratory. His hands tangle in my hair while mine find the hem of his shirt. When I trace the bandage I applied earlier, he groans into my mouth.
"We should stop and sleep," he says against my lips.
"We should," I agree, pulling his shirt over his head.
The scars are silver in the dim light, a map of survival I want to memorize with my fingers. When I trace the burn on his ribs, he shudders.
"Savannah..."
"I need this," I whisper against his throat. "I need something real, something that's just ours, something Nathan never touched."
He pulls back to study my face, searching for doubt. Whatever he sees makes him nod slowly.
"Okay. But we do this right." He frames my face with his hands. "This isn't adrenaline or trauma. This is me wanting you. Has been since you took down that merc with an earring."
"That's what does it for you? Violence?"
"Competence." He kisses me again, slow and thorough. "Strength. The way you refuse to break."
His hands are gentle as they undress me, reverent in a way Nathan's never were. Every scar gets kissed, every bruise acknowledged. When he finds the mark Nathan left on my hip—fingerprints from when he grabbed me—something dark flashes in his eyes.
"I'll kill him for this."
"Later." I pull him down for another kiss. "Now, make me forget him."
And he does.
His mouth claims mine, hot and demanding, and he traces a path down my throat, each kiss a promise, each touch erasing the memory of hands that lied.
Where Nathan took, Sawyer gives. Where Nathan rushed, Sawyer savors.
"Look at me," he murmurs against my collarbone. "I need to see you."
I open my eyes and meet his gaze. The intensity there steals my breath—desire mixed with something deeper, something that makes my chest ache.
"There you are," he whispers, cupping my face. "Stay with me. This is us. No one else exists right now."
He kisses me again, and I arch into him, needing to be closer. My hands map the terrain of scars across his back, each one a story of survival, of the man who jumped buildings to save me.
When his palm skims over my breast, I arch into his touch, desperate for more. He takes his time, thumb circling until I'm writhing beneath him, small sounds escaping that I've never made before.
"So responsive," he murmurs against my throat, teeth grazing the sensitive spot where neck meets shoulder. "Want to find every place that makes you shake."
His mouth follows his hands lower, tongue tracing my collarbone, the valley between my breasts, the sensitive underside that makes me gasp. He lavishes attention on each nipple until they're peaked and aching, until I'm pulling his hair, unsure if I'm pushing him away or begging for more.
"Sawyer, please?—"
His tongue swirls around my navel.
"Oh God?—"
"Savannah." My name is a prayer on his lips as he moves lower, tongue tracing patterns that make me gasp. "Beautiful. So damn beautiful."
