“God, how I missed you,” I said as I turned and reached for my belt buckle.
She licked her lips as her gaze raked up and down my body. “I’m really glad you’re safe, Doc.”
I slid the belt out of its loops with one hand. “I missed you, too, my Liz.”
She sat there, perched on her knees on the mattress, her hair spilling all around like a beautiful halo of darkness. I reached out and turned off the light, allowing only the first morning rays of the sun pouring through the window to illuminate her body.
I toed off my shoes. “You are a vision, my Liz.”
She reached her hands out for me. “Come here, Doc. There’s something clearly on your mind.”
I grinned as I walked toward her, ripping off my shirt. “There are a lot of things on my mind.”
I wanted to hold her. I wanted to kiss her. I wanted to squeeze her and hug her and cuddle her and sleep with her at my side so that I knew, every second of every day, that she was all right. I wanted to press every part of me against every part of her. I wanted to make her scream until my name was the only thing etched in her throat. It could have been her. Any one of those sets of eyes could have been my Liz?—
“Doc,” she said as her thumbs smoothed over my stubble.
I focused back on her, only to find a look I’d never seen before on her face.
“What?” I asked.
I wasn’t sure what I whispered.
“Doc,” she whispered as sympathy furrowed her brow. Her thumb swiped again and I felt something wet against my skin. “What happened out there? What did you guys do?”
I leaned my lips down and captured hers, but I tasted salt. I reared back, checking to see if she was crying. But she wasn’t.
WasIcrying?
“Daniel,” she urged softly as she cupped my cheek. “You’ve got me all sorts of worried. What did you guys get into out there?”
“Can—Can I just?—”
I eased her back down to the bed, her hair splaying across the pillow. I wanted to run my fingers through it. I wanted to tuck her head beneath my chin and cradle her against me forever. But first, I needed to hear it.
Her heart beating.
My ears had to hear it.
“Oh,” I sighed with relief as I laid my ear against her chest, finding that steady rhythm.
I closed my eyes as she carded her fingers through my hair. “Talk to me. Please.”
I swallowed hard and nuzzled softly against the feel of her beating heart. “Plan went off without a hitch.”
“I’m sure it did, since you guys all came back unharmed. But I know something happened out there. What happened?”
I wasn’t sure if I wanted to tell her. My Liz was strong, though. At the end of the day, she was military. She had training in this kind of thing. Death and destruction weren’t new to her, and a woman didn’t have to be in the military to experience that. The more I lived, the more I realized that the plight of a woman was constantly fending off the one side of the species that wanted to both procreate with them and kill them.
Wait a second, she was military.
That reminded me.
“I have something for you,” I said as I sat up.
She quickly pushed herself upright. “What is it?”
I swung my legs over the bed and jammed my hand into my pocket.
