The tension that once defined every interaction has given way to something easier to inhabit: respect that runs both ways, humor that isn’t edged with defense, a genuine pleasure in each other’s company. Charles teases Nathaniel, and Nathaniel gives it right back, and every time it happens my heart swells with joy. He deserves to feel at home with his own family.
And I think, not for the first time, how strange and beautiful it is that this is allminetoo. The family I married into, the one we all worked to mend simply by choosing not to walk away, no longer feels tenuous or conditional. It feelswhole.
The sound of footsteps in the doorway breaks me out from my reverie. I look up, and there he is.
Nathaniel steps into my office, and the shift in the room is instant—like heat brushing over my skin. He wasn’t supposed to be back until tomorrow. The realization hits me in a rush of pure, unbridled happiness.
I take him in with a sense of awe that I’ve never quite outgrown. Time has left its imprint on him in ways that I find endlessly compelling. He still has that arresting beauty I noticed the first day I met him, but it’s been refined by years of coming into his own—sharpened, steadied, worn in to confidence that doesn’t announce itself.
Marriage has settled into him. So has the hard-won peace he’s made with his family. It all sits easily on his frame, on the broader shoulders and stronger build shaped not by vanity but by routine, endurance, and the demands of a life lived at full tilt. He carries himself like a man who knows exactly who he is andno longer needs to prove it. I love this version of him more than I thought possible.
I’m on my feet in a heartbeat, drawn to him in a way that feels almost elemental. He spreads his arms and I fold myself into the solid line of his chest. His body eases the moment his arms wrap around me. I bury my nose into the cashmere at his collar, breathing him in.
He tips my chin up and kisses me, slow and assured, sending warmth through me in a way that never dulls.
When we part, he rests his forehead against mine. “Imagine my disappointment,” he murmurs, “when I came home a day early to surprise my lovely wife…and she wasn’t there.”
I lift my wrist to check the time. The blue dial of my watch glints under the office light—the one he gave me for our first Christmas together, still among my most cherished possessions—and I wince. It’s nearly eleven. I look up at him, sheepish. His expression tells me he’s already clocked what this means.
Still held against him, I lift my hand to his face and let my thumb trace the faint shadows beneath his eyes, the ones he always pretends aren’t there. I can already imagine what the past week back in London has looked like for him. Even though he never complains, I can feel how hard he’s been pushing himself. My thumb brushes along his cheekbone.
“You look tired,” I say.
He answers my concern with a light scoff, dismissing it as if his own limits are beside the point. “I’m fine,” he replies, already redirecting. “You’re the one I’m worried about.” And then, as predictably as breathing, he mutters, “I’m going to have a word with him about easing up on your workload.”
I smack his arm. “Nathaniel, don’t you dare.”
He looks at me, unimpressed. “You’re overworked.”
“I volunteered for it,” I remind him. “Ienjoyit.”
“Perhaps too much,” he grumbles under his breath. “I’m still jealous of how much time my father gets to spend with you.”
I roll my eyes, but my smile gives me away.
He leans in and kisses me once more. When he pulls back, his tone leaves no room for negotiation. “You’re done for today. I’m taking you home.”
Before I can respond, he’s already in motion—closing my laptop, lifting my coat from the chair, slipping my bag into my hands with the practiced ease of someone who’s done this often enough to know I won’t truly resist.
We head toward the elevator and without thinking, I drift closer, my shoulder brushing his side. His arm comes around me, firm and familiar, drawing me in. He presses his lips to the top of my head, and I feel my whole body relax.
Imissedhim.
He makes these trips back to London when he has to, to keep everything running smoothly, even though I know how much he hates being away. He always makes the trips brutally efficient—red-eye flights, unforgiving connections, meetings stacked one after another—anything to shave off another night apart. I don’t love the toll it takes on him, but I understand it. Nathaniel has always been relentless once he decides something matters.
And if I’m honest, I love this part of him too. The way, even three years into our marriage, he still wants to race home to me as quickly as he can.
When we reach the lobby, the Rolls-Royce is already waiting at the curb. The driver steps out, opens the rear door for me, and Nathaniel and I slide into the backseat together.
The door shuts, and I feel it immediately—that familiar pull low in my belly, warm and insistent. I don’t resist it. I don’t pretend that I don’t know where it leads. I turn toward him and climb into his lap, my knees bracketing his hips. Nathaniel looksup at me with a knowing smile, already reaching for the control panel.
Once the privacy screen clicks into place, his hands are on me and my mouth is on his. We meet in a searing kiss, his palms warm and certain at my back and my fingers threading into his hair, tugging just enough to draw a breath from him.
It’s clear that time hasn’t cooled anything between us. If anything, it’s refined it, intensified it, fused love and desire so completely that I can’t tell where one ends and the other begins.
What I’ve felt for Nathaniel has always been a fever—one that leaves me delirious with happiness—and I pray that it will never break.
I lose all sense of time and space when his lips are moving against mine, his tongue licking fervently into my mouth. I barely notice the car slowing or the way it rolls forward slightly as it comes to a stop.
