She was quiet long enough that my heart started to pound.
"You're sure?"
"I've never been more sure of anything." I tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "We lost eight years. I don't want to lose another day."
Her eyes were bright. She pressed her lips together.
Nodded.
I pulled her into my lap. She came easily, legs folding around me, her arms around my neck. I kissed her forehead. Her nose. The corner of her mouth.
"Welcome home," I said.
She pressed her face into my neck. Breathed in. Held on.
"I'm already home," she whispered. "I have been since the day you opened the door."
CHAPTER 16
Sloane
I woketo the weight of Garrett's arm around my waist. His breath warm against the back of my neck.
His heartbeat. The solid warmth of him pressed against me. Morning light through the curtains, painting everything gold.
He'd asked me to move in three days ago.
It felt fast. Eight years of silence, a few months of circling each other, and now this, my toothbrush next to his, my clothes claiming the left side of his closet. Waking up tangled together like we'd never learned how to sleep apart.
But it wasn't fast. Not really.
We weren't starting over. We were picking up where we left off. All those years between us, the long way around to the same destination. The scenic route through hell, maybe.
But we'd made it.
Garrett stirred behind me. His arm tightened, pulling me closer. His nose brushed the curve of my shoulder.
"You're thinking too loud," he murmured against my skin.
"Sorry."
"Don't be." A kiss to my shoulder blade. Another, higher, against the side of my neck. "What time is it?"
"Almost seven."
He groaned. The sound vibrated through his chest and into my back. "Shift starts at eight."
"Marianne wants me in the office." I stretched, body protesting the idea of leaving this bed. "She's assigning something new."
"Already?" He propped himself up on one elbow. Sleep-rumpled hair. Stubble dark along his jaw. Gray-blue eyes soft in the morning light. "The corruption piece just published."
"That's how it works. One story ends, another starts."
I rolled onto my back. Reached up to brush the hair from his face. "She mentioned a billionaire. Money laundering that isn't really money laundering. The kind of thing that takes months."
"Sounds like you."
"Sounds like a lot of late nights."
