“I’d travel if it was forsomethingreal.”
“You don’t think conventional therapy is real?” Jed cocked me a half grin. “Don’t answer that. I know where you’re coming from, and trust me, this dude wrote the book on letting stuff go instead of taking it to thegrave.”
I speared him with a sharp look. Jed was a wise motherfucker, perceptive and shrewd, but he and Glenn were close. Had been for two decades. Did he know about Maggie? But as he met my gaze with a steady one of his own, I realized that it didn’t matter. Somehow, over the weeks I’d known him, Jed had become a friend, and whatever he knew—or perhaps suspected—my secrets were safe with him. “What’s theguy’sname?”
“Raffi. He served with Glenn and me in Iraq. He doesn’t say much, but I imagine you won’t either. I’ll reach out to him later. Tell him to expectyourcall.”
Ash came in as Jed was speaking. His concern for Jed was obvious, but Jed found a grin from somewhere that would’ve convinced even me if I hadn’t seen the brutal scars on his leg and hip. “Whatcha gotthere?”
“Um…” Ash glanced down at the dish he was clutching. “Yams, I think? I got distracted by the rolls Max had me kneading. I kinda lost track of what else he wasdoing.”
Jed laughed. “Sounds like Max. He didn’t tell you that fucking around with bread was good for your soul, did he? ’Cause he really believes that, but somehow, I’m still a grouchybastard.”
Ash put the dish on the coffee table. “He did say something like that, but for what it’s worth, you’re not thatgrouchy.”
He disappeared again. I sat up and peered at the eleventieth weird vegetable dish I’d seen on this trip. “Don’t take that as too much of a compliment. He’s probably comparing youtome.”
Jed chuckled again. “Young ’un, you don’tknowshit.”
* * *
Ash shutthe bedroom door and drifted to the huge window. The rain had stopped at some point in the evening, but drips from the cabin roof still trickled down the glass. “I’m so proudofyou.”
I paused in the action of stripping my socks from my feet. “What thehellfor?”
“For everything you’ve done since we got here. I know how hard it is for you to talk about the things thathurtyou.”
He wasn’t looking at me, but I felt his gaze all over my skin, piercing through the armor I’d already started to shed. I ditched my socks and padded across the warm wooden floor. I kissed his neck and wrapped my arms around him, pulling him close. I didn’t say anything, but I didn’t have to. Half the time, Ash knew my mind better thanIdid.
“Does Max remind you ofyourmom?”
Case in point. “Yes, actually. I didn’t realize it until tonight, but he really does, and you know what? It doesn’t hurt as much as I thought itwould.”
Ash leaned back into me, the heat of his long, lean body grounding me like it always did. “Why do you thinkthatis?”
I shrugged. “Because I guess she’s not truly gone while there are still people like Max in the world, and I like that. She was one in a million, but he’s got a million all ofhisown.”
“I think that’s the nicest thing you’veeversaid.”
“Fuckyou.”
“Youwanna?”
I paused as the thunder rolled in from the mountain. I was so fucking hot for him, but it hadn’t occurred to me he’d be willing to do anything about it. “I alwayswantyou.”
Given the months leading up to this moment, I half expected him to tense up in my arms, but he spun slowly to face me and draped his arms around my neck. “We’ll have to bequiet.”
His throaty whisper lit a spark inside me. I ripped his hands from behind my neck and dragged him to the bed, not that he took much persuading. We hadn’t been wearing our sweats and T-shirts long, and they found their way to the floor even faster before I pushed Ash back on themattress.
I’d always been good at teasing him, and the fact that he let me meant the world. I worshiped the sensitive spots I knew so well and made it my mission to find new ones while he trembled silentlybeneathme.
He was sweating, his chest flushed red when I finally took him in my mouth. My own dick throbbed, rigid and weeping, but Ash’s cock felt so good sliding down my throat that I could’ve come from that alone if he hadn’t had otherideas.
With a sharp intake of breath, he pulled me off him, and then he moved like a fucking ninja and flipped us over. I waited for his mouth to close around my cock, but he flipped me again and yanked me up onto my hands andknees.
His tongue flickering along the seam of my ass set me on fire. Rimming was something that usually happened the other way around—I could count on one hand the number of times we’d done it—and I was sorely unprepared for the mind-blowingsensation.
I dropped my face to the pillows and clenched my hands into fists as my mouth twisted in a groan I somehow kept lodged in my throat. My chest heaved and my toes curled as the sweet torture went on and on. I was about ready to combust by the time hepulledback.
