I hesitate, then add, quieter, “Your team coordinated with a local security branch. Same company you had overseas. They’ve got someone on call while you’re here.”
“Thank you.”
“Only if you leave the house,” I say quickly. “Inside, it’s just us. I wanted you to be able to relax. To not worry about someone figuring out you’re here.”
He exhales slowly, rubbing a hand over his jaw. “You didn’t have to do all that.”
“I wanted to,” I say. And then, more honestly, “It makes it easier. For both of us.”
He nods, accepting it without comment, but I can see the cost register anyway. Another layer. Another compromise.
“It’s all worth it to have you here,” I add.
Rafe looks back at me, softening. “Thank you,” he says. Not for the cameras. For the effort. Something in his expression shifts—something private. Something that feels like longing sharpened into need.
I move again. I reach for him, tug him close, and his hands come up instantly, gripping me like he’s been waiting all day to do it. We kiss again, deeper this time, the carefulness cracking under the pressure of months apart. It’s not frantic. It’s reverent. Like we’re both trying to remember the exact shape of each other.
My hands slide under his jacket, palms flattening against his back. I feel him inhale hard through his nose.
“Ollie,” he murmurs, and my name sounds like a prayer.
“I’m here,” I say, and it’s not just about this. It’s about everything I’ve failed to hold steady.
I guide him backward without really thinking, letting instinct take over. We stumble slightly down the hallway, half laughing into each other’s mouths, hands clumsy with urgency. Rafe’s fingers find the edge of my hoodie and tug. I pull it over my head, toss it somewhere unseen.
He does the same with his jacket, and his hoodie follows, leaving him in a T-shirt that clings faintly to his chest. He looks too good like this, cheeks flushed from the cold, eyes dark, lips swollen from kissing.
I feel dizzy with it.
We barely make it to the bedroom.
The moment we cross the threshold, the air changes. It’s warmer in here, softer. Less echo. The bed is made because I’vebeen keeping things controlled, like neatness can substitute for peace. But the sheets don’t stand a chance.
Rafe’s hands find my face again. Mine find his waist, his ribs, the place under his shirt where I can feel skin.
We kiss, and the kiss turns into something that takes over my body completely.
Clothes drop in pieces, not torn, not frantic, just discarded because they’re in the way. My hands shake slightly as I peel his shirt up and over his head. I pause for half a second because seeing his skin again—uncovered, familiar, painted in ink I memorized long ago—hits me like a memory and a longing in the same breath.
Rafe’s gaze catches mine. He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t need to. He just reaches for me again and kisses me like we’re sealing a wound.
We hit the bed in a mess of limbs and breath, the mattress dipping hard beneath us. Sheets tangle. Skin meets skin fast, clumsy, urgent—the air thick with our breathing, fabric whispering, the occasional breathless laugh when we knock knees or lose balance because kissing matters more than moving right.
It’s hands on skin that’s been starved. Mouths mapping familiar paths like we’re afraid we’ve forgotten them. Bodies that have waited too long finally collapsing into each other with a kind of reverence that feels almost holy.
Rafe buries his face in my neck, breath hot, voice rough. “I missed you so fucking much.”
Something in me splinters.
I lock my arms around him, holding on like gravity shifted. “Rafe, I need you.”
He nods once against my skin, already moving, reaching for the lube I left out without shame, without pretense.
His fingers slick, his body over mine, mouth dragging down my chest, heat following. His hand moves lower, and I spread my legs before he even asks, already open, already desperate for the connection.
Air punches out of me at the first touch. He watches my face, always watching, and when his fingers press in, I nod fast, breath breaking. “More, baby. I need you inside me.”
A feral “Fuck” leaves him as he takes my nipple into his mouth, fingers working with urgency and care that undo me completely.
