He doesn't slow. Doesn't give me time to recover. Just keeps fucking me through it, chasing his own release.
"Again." Thumb replacing my fingers on my clit, circling with brutal efficiency. "You're going to come for me again."
"I can't?—"
"You can." Leaning down to bite my throat, hard enough to sting. "And you will."
The combination of pain and pleasure, the overwhelming fullness, his thumb on my clit—it's too much. A second orgasm builds faster than the first, sharper, almost painful in its intensity.
"Cole—"
"Let go. Give it to me."
I shatter again, this time taking him with me. He buries himself deep, a rough sound tearing from his chest as he comes. Hot inside me, filling me, marking me as his.
We collapse together, breathing hard, sweat-slicked and tangled in sheets.
Minutes pass in silence. Cole's weight is heavy on me, grounding, real.
He shifts to the side, pulling me with him. "You meant it. About choosing this."
"Yeah." Tracing patterns on his chest, feeling his heartbeat slow beneath my palm. "I know who you are now. All of it, not just the parts you show everyone else. And I'm still here."
"Good." Direct, matter-of-fact. "Because I won't pretend to be something I'm not."
"I'm not most people." Meeting his eyes. "I'm a federal agent who spent three years undercover with a criminal organization. I know violence. I've participated in it when the job requiredit. What you did tonight had purpose and control. You stopped when I asked. That's what matters."
"Yeah." No doubt in his voice. "It was."
"I'm sure." I settle against his chest, listening to his heartbeat. "I saw your face when you were hitting Kline. It wasn't pleasure. It was justice. Cold, calculated justice for threatening Gemma and coming after me. That's not something I need to fear. That's protection I can trust."
He's quiet for several minutes, hand moving through my hair with gentle repetition.
"I need you to understand something," he says finally. "What you saw tonight—that's who I am. Delta Force trains you to be lethal, precise, controlled. To cross lines when the mission requires it. That doesn't turn off."
"I'm not asking you to." I lift my head, meet his eyes. "I'm asking you to let me see all of it. The controlled VP, the protective brother, the lethal operative. All the parts of you."
"Even knowing what that means?"
"Especially knowing what that means." I kiss him again. "I've spent my career pretending to be someone else, hiding who I am to get the job done. I don't want to hide with you. Don't want you to hide with me. I want honest, even when honest is hard."
His expression shifts. Acceptance. "You're serious about this. About us."
"Yeah." I settle back against his chest. "I'm serious. Question is whether you can handle being with a federal agent who watched you beat a suspect and chose not to stop you."
"I can handle it." His arms tighten around me.
I close my eyes, exhaustion finally catching up. "We'll figure it out together."
We fall asleep tangled together, both still carrying the weight of what happened.
Sunlight wakes me. Cole's arm is heavy across my ribs, his breathing steady against my neck.
My phone buzzes on the nightstand. Text from Martinez:
AUSA wants full debriefing this afternoon. Evidence processing complete. Kline's looking at decades in federal prison.
I text back:
