Page 117 of Hard to Hold

It doesn’t have to be spoken aloud. It’s in the soft sigh we both emit when he slips into me. It’s in the gentleness of his lips as he kisses the tear tracks from my cheeks. It’s in the lacing of our fingers together as if we never want to let go. It’s how our bodies fit together in an action as old as time but is intimately special for us.

We make love bathed in the morning sunlight, eyes locked on one another’s, with no sense of urgency, even though it feels like the world is burning down around us.

But there’s nowhere else I’d rather be right now. There’s no one else I’d want to be breaking my heart.

Our bodies move together as our foreheads touch, and our emotions swell to a point where it almost becomes painful to breathe.

I welcome the sudden rise of pleasure in my orgasm only for its ability to drown out the heartache for a moment.

Only for its ability to give me one more memory with Rush. One more sensation to recall. One more moment to cherish.

I look up at him with the sun like a halo around his head. His eyes reflect everything I feel, and I have to hold on to the idea that this is enough for me. It has to be. And in owning that notion for all it’s worth, I lean forward and press a kiss to the compass tattoo on Rush’s chest.

To those who wander.

No matter where I went in life, it would always let me find my way back to what was right. It was her compass so I’d never lose my way.

My only hope is that someday he’ll find his way back to me. To what is right.

Because I love him with all my heart.

CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

RUSH

DESIRE IS SOMETHING I KNOW and understand firsthand. The desire to play, to win, to live . . . to have a woman. Simple, basic, masculine wants.

But as I sit on the tarmac waiting to take off, with my hat pulled low over my forehead and my eyes closed, I know there’s something about Lennox Kincade that makes me question if I’ve ever really understood what desire was before.

I don’t think I had a clue.

Before she came into the picture, I used the sensations desire induced to help numb me from my past.

But maybe that’s where I was wrong.

Perhaps I’ve always been numb.

And maybe, just maybe, it was Lennox I needed to make me feel again.

To make me live again.

To realize what I thought was living all along was really just existing.

The plane pushes away from the gate and as much as I miss home, as much as I need to get there right now and set shit straight, a part of me will still be here.

Will always be with her.

I need you, Nox.

You have me.

The woman who showed moment after moment that she believed in me.

Had faith in me.

You’re where you are because of you, Rush McKenzie. I beg you. Let. Me. Fight. For. You. You are worth fighting for.

Has faith in me. She’s the most magnificent woman I’ll ever know.