I braced one hand on his shoulder and reached back with the other to hold the cot’s frame, riding him like I meant to memorize it. The old metal bit cool against my palm. The rest burned. He held my hips not to control me but to keep me steady, to tell me he had me, that he had no plans to be anywhere but here.
“Look at you,” he said, reverent. “God, look at you.”
“Look at me,” I echoed, and didn’t look away.
It built again, quicker this time, greedy, almost shocked at its own audacity so soon. I chased it and he let me, the pace turning rougher for a handful of breaths, then softening because we could. I felt the shake start in my thighs and drag upward like a fuse catching. He felt it too. His hands tightened. His hips rolled once, precise and devastating, and the fuse lit.
“Stay with me,” he said, rough as gravel. “Right here.”
“I’m here,” I said, and I was, completely, when it broke open again, sharper and brighter, dragging me down with a sound that didn’t belong to words. He followed me into it with a ragged oath, lifting off the cot as if he couldn’t help it, hands locking on my hips as heat spilled and the tremor took him. I bent, catching his mouth with mine, swallowing the sound he made like it was meant for me alone.
After, the room changed. Same four walls, same cracked shade, same crooked hook on the back of the door, but the air was different, easier in our lungs. The radiator clinked once like it approved. I folded down over him and he wrapped his armsaround me, one under my shoulders, the other across my lower back, holding me like something you don’t set down casually.
We stayed that way for a long minute, our breathing mismatched and then not. Sweat cooled. The cot groaned and settled. I listened to his heart count its way back from the edge. He pressed a kiss to my hairline. I felt it all the way to my feet.
“Any regrets?” he asked finally, voice still gone, as if he already knew the answer but wanted to give me the chance to change the story if I needed it.
“Only that we didn’t get a better cot,” I said into his neck, and he huffed a laugh that shook us both.
“I’ll build you a bed,” he said.
“You planning on sleeping in it?”
“Sometimes.”
I lifted my head to look at him. He was a beautiful wreck, hair a mess, mouth pink from kissing, eyes soft in a way I didn’t see often. I brushed my thumb over the cut that had scabbed at his cheekbone and then the bruise at his ribs again, gentler than before.
“We’ll go slow tomorrow,” I said, and meant more than one thing.
He nodded. “We earned it.”
I slid off to the side so he could turn and not pull anything. He gathered me close anyway, palm spreading over my stomach like a promise. The world outside kept doing what it always did. Inside, we had carved out a small, warm room where I could be soft and he could, too.
“Cap,” I said into the quiet.
“Yeah?”
“You’re under my ribs now, too.” I felt his breath catch. “Just so you know where to put your hand.”
He didn’t say anything for a second. Then he moved that palm, slow, and set it exactly where I meant. The pressure was steady and certain. Anchoring. Asking. Answering.
We lay there and listened to the house settle, and the slow, careful way we’d taken each other made a map I knew by heart already. Outside, somewhere, a siren wailed and faded. Inside, his heartbeat steadied under my ear, and the knot that used to live in my chest stayed quiet like it finally believed me when I told it we were safe.
For a long minute we didn’t do anything but breathe. My ear was over his heart. His chin rested in my hair like it had always been designed for that job. Outside, the creek kept talking. The floor cooled my knees. My knuckles throbbed. I felt extravagant and sun-wrecked and sane.
“I love you,” I said into his skin before the brain could micromanage it.
He went very still under me, the good kind. His hand slid up my spine, slow, like he was putting the words somewhere they would never get lost. “I love you,” he said back, simple as a door opening.
I wanted to cry, which was rude to my face, so I kissed him instead and tasted salt anyway. He wiped it away with his thumb like it was his favorite job.
“That first night,” he said, voice low, “was when I knew I loved you.”
“Which first night?” I asked. “We’ve had a lot of them.”
“The one where you wore the pink dress,” he said.
“That was our first date,” I said with laughter. “You barely knew me besides the kindergarten teacher.”
