We don’t have much time. I can hear movement deeper in the structure. The others will find us if we linger.
My grip tightens once at her waist. A promise. A warning. Both.
She looks up at me, eyes bright, mouth soft, waiting.
I don’t answer her question with words.
I answer it by staying exactly where I am, by not letting go, by making it clear that caught means kept – even if only for a moment.
Quick doesn’t mean rushed.
And just because the hunt is over doesn’t mean the lesson is.
A month. That’s how long I’ve gone without this weight in my arms. Without her heat, her mouth, her voice saying my name like it belongs to her. The moment I have her again, everything inside me snaps tight and vicious and certain.
She’s real. She’s here.
I crowd into her space and she doesn’t retreat – she melts. That does something dangerous to my chest. Her hands are already on me, nails biting through fabric like she’s afraid I’ll disappear if she loosens her grip.
“I missed you,” she breathes, wrecked and honest, and it guts me harder than anything else could.
I press in, claim the space between us, and she gasps like her body recognises mine before her mind catches up. I watch it happen – the way her spine arches, the way her lips part, the way she goes pliant and demanding all at once.
God. She’s always been like this. Soft only for me. Sharp everywhere else.
“Don’t you dare go slow,” she whispers, defiant even now. “I waited a month for you. Don’t you dare.”
The sound she makes when I move against her – when I finally stop holding back – scrapes straight down my nerves. She’s vocal, helplessly so, and I catalogue every reaction like I’mengraving it into bone. The hitch in her breath. The broken little sounds she tries and fails to swallow.
“Yes,” she murmurs. “Like that. Hatchet— Daddy, please?—”
Her voice goes higher, needier, and instinct takes over. I cover her mouth, firm but careful, my palm a shield instead of a muzzle. She whimpers into my hand, eyes going wide – and then dark with understanding.
I’m protecting her. Even now.
Her hands clutch my wrists, not to pull me away but to anchor herself. She shakes beneath me, wrapped tight around every movement, and the sensation hits me like a vow I don’t get to take back.
Mine. Not owned. Chosen.
Every thrust – every controlled, relentless motion – is a promise carved deep:I’m not leaving again.I don’t care what the world says. I don’t care whose blood ties you to tomorrow. You’re here now. You’re choosing me now.
She says my name like a plea and a prayer.
“Don’t stop,” she begs, breathless and wrecked. “Please don’t stop. I need it – I need you. More. Hatchet, more?—”
I feel it when she breaks. Feel it in the way her body locks around me, in the way her breath shatters against my palm, in the way she sobs my name like it’s the only thing holding her together.
I stay right there.
I don’t pull away. I don’t rush. I keep her grounded through it, forehead pressed to hers, breathing her in like oxygen. I hold her like something precious and volatile, like if I let go even for a second the world will try to steal her back.
It won’t get the chance.
When her shaking eases, I loosen my hand just enough for her to breathe freely again. She smiles – lazy, ruined, satisfied – and whispers, “I knew you’d come back for me.”
I press a kiss to her temple, silent and absolute.
I always will.
