I close the distance between us and claim her lips with mine, pouring every ounce of love and devotion I have into the kiss. She gasps into my mouth, giving me the perfect opportunity to push my tongue past her lips to twine with hers. Sparks of pleasure race down my spine, and I groan as I pull her body close against mine and lose myself in the kiss.
It’s been so long since I’ve had her pressed against me like this and my cock makes that known. My erection pulses against the zipper of my jeans, and judging from the way Ollie grinds herself against me, she can feel it too.
I’m not sure how long we kiss before I finally pull away, both of us flushed and breathing hard. I press my forehead against hers, unable to distance myself from her.
“I love you, Ollie,” I breathe as I gaze into her emerald eyes. I thought I’d been in love before, but I was wrong. The depth of my feelings for Ollie blows any of that out of the water.
She lights up with a mixture of pleasure and happiness. “I love you too, Theo,” she replies, no hesitation. “You are my rock. The man I cometo when everything feels so bleak and overwhelming. You’ve helped me through so much, and I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
My heart soars with joy, and a stupid grin spreads across my lips. Sure, I’ve had women tell me they loved me before, but it’s different coming from her. Probably because for the first time in my life, I’m the one who declared their love first. I’m the one who took the leap and hoped that the other person felt the same way.
Unable to help myself, I kiss her again. Ollie moans into my mouth and clenches her hands on my shoulders while rubbing her breasts against my chest. My cock is painfully hard in my jeans and the way she grinds against me isn’t helping the situation.
With a groan, I pull away from her intoxicating lips. “I wish I could bury myself inside you right now.” As if to remind me of the reason why I’m not balls-deep inside her, pain rockets up my spine from my thigh and ass. I grit my teeth. Stupid fucking gunshot wounds.
I’mnevergetting shot in the ass again.
“You can fuck my brains out once you’re fully healed.” The heat from Ollie’s eyes dissipates, and her face softens with genuine affection, an expression I’ve never seen a woman direct at me before. It makes my heart stutter and my breath catch in my throat. Any annoyance from my injuries floats away, forgotten beneath the overwhelming devotion I feel for this woman.
A low grumble startles both of us.
I glance down at her stomach with a frown. “Is that…?”
Her cheeks redden. “I skipped lunch.”
A huff of laughter escapes from my lips. “Guess it’s a good thing I brought some food then, huh?” Reluctantly, I pull away and steer her towards the log.
As she sits on one side, I set about tearing a piece of bread, cutting some cheese and placing those along with a hunk of the venison and some of the pickled vegetables onto the plate. “Wish there was some fruitbut the closest I could find were these tomatoes.” I place the half-empty jar onto the log and then hand her the plate with a flourish. “M’lady.”
She smirks at my antics and takes the plate. “This is far more than I would have expected, so don’t worry about the fruit.”
I nod and set about making my own plate. Once done, I have to perch awkwardly on the log because my ass and thigh are still peppered with half-healed holes and sore as fuck. Something I didn’t really think through when I came up with the location of this date.
Oh well. The pain is worth the joy on Ollie’s face as she digs into her food.
I do the same, humming at how good the venison and cheese taste. I’ll have to tell Alex that the new recipe he used on the meat is fantastic. While we eat, we fall into an easy conversation about our lives before the world ended. It’s something Ollie avoided like the plague when we first met, but I love hearing her talk about how she aspired to be a vet until she realised how expensive it was, so she changed to something else.
“So that’s what you were before everything went to shit? An animal behaviourist?” I ask around a bite of bread and cheese.
She nods. “And an animal trainer. I mostly focused on dogs and horses, but I’ve trained cats, chickens and even a budgie.”
My eyebrows shoot up. “You can train chickens?”
“You can train pretty much anything. Hell, zoo keepers would train lions, tigers, elephants and even alligators to do certain things like stand still for blood draws or to check their weight. Granted, alligators can only be trained to do simple things, but you can still train them.”
I lean closer as she grows more animated the more she talks. You can tell that this is her passion from how she lights up and how her eyes sparkle with excitement. It just makes her that more beautiful.
Eventually, the food from our plates disappears, and the light fades. Ollie’s still grinning, looking like she’s won the lottery as I pack away our picnic.
“Thank you for this, Theo,” she says softly as she reaches out to grab my hand and laces our fingers together. “It was sweet, and I really enjoyed it.”
I lean down and press a chaste kiss on her lips. “I’m happy to hear that. Now we should probably get back before Rhys and Alex start worrying.”
She snorts. “I bet Rhys the hardass is already worrying.”
I chuckle as I sling the packed-up bag over my shoulder. “You’re probably right. I don’t know about you, but I prefer if he didn’t spank my ass.”
“Hm, shame. Sounds like a great time to me,” she says with a cheeky wink before the two of us step out of the clearing hand in hand and make our way back to the cabin.
