The oxygen rushes into my lungs. The lust in my bloodstream ignites into flames. It propels me toward my climax, and I shatter into a million pieces. I hear him groan as he follows me over and comes inside me.
He slumps over me, his heart beating as fast as mine. Our sweat-soaked skin melding and sticking to each other.
He pulls out of me then rolls onto his back, depositing me on his chest.
I cuddle into him, my eyelids closing. He runs his fingers down my hair, over my back, resting them possessively on the curve of my hip.
“I love you,” I whisper.
"And I love you." He kisses my forehead. “You’re mine, Ember. Mine to love. Mine to claim. Mine to protect. Always.”
"Areyou going to tell me the story of how you got the scar on your cheek?" I prop my elbow on the kitchen counter and cup my chin in my hand.
We napped for a bit, and when my growling stomach woke us both up, he insisted he was going to make me brunch.
My favorite thing in this world might be my husband cooking for me.
My father used to show love the same way. Feeding people was his language.
James has that in him too, though he'd never admit it aloud.
Today he’s cooking me breakfast, dressed in a pair of gray sweats with a dishcloth slung over his shoulder. And he’s barefoot. Lucky me.
He cracks open a beer and pours me a glass of wine, insisting it's almost noon, and we're both on holiday today, so we're allowed.
I take a sip of the wine and relish the crisp, fresh notes of green apple and pear.
He scoops the scrambled eggs onto a plate. Then moves the bacon and sausages around on the other skillets. He has all four burners at work, cooking a full English breakfast. The scents make my mouth water.
"Ambush. First deployment. They had the element of surprise; we had the numbers. We handled it." He turns to me, holding the spatula. “Bullet caught my cheek. It could have been my skull.”
A cold hand clutches my heart.
It makes me realize how lucky I am to have him here. How lucky we are to have found each other.
I slide off the barstool and walk over to him, then put my arms around his waist.
"I’m so glad you weren’t wounded further."
"Me too." He wraps his muscled arm around my shoulders and pulls me in close. "It happened on my first mission."
"And you went back?" I look up at him.
"I was young, foolish. Filled with bravado and idyllic visions of contributing to my country for the greater good."
"And now?" I search his features.
I wish I knew him when he was younger. Seen him without this cynicism and need to hide his emotions from the world. He’s sharing more of himself with me, so that’s a start. But I hope one day soon, he realizesthat it makes you stronger, not weaker, when you open up and share what’s on your mind.
"I’m older, wiser, more measured. I’m proud of what I accomplished in the Marines. But equally happy I left when I did.”
“That last mission changed you, didn’t it?”
He looks down at me in surprise. “You sensed it?”
“You're different from when I last met you. That man was more open. I mean, you preferred to communicate in grunts even then, but you were less controlled. You didn’t have such a tight rein on your emotions.”
He turns sideways and, without letting go of me, switches off the hobs and places his spatula down.
