“It’s what we have.”
I stop in front of her chair. She doesn’t look up, just reaches out and touches the back of my hand where it rests on the desk. Her fingers are warm.
“I need you to be sure,” I tell her. “This isn’t about comfort. It’s about choosing this, knowing what comes after.”
“I’m tired of being sure about everything else and unsure about you.” She stands, and now she’s looking up at me, her expression open in a way that steals my breath. “So yes. I’m sure.”
I bring my hand to her face, my thumb tracing the line of her jaw. Her breath hitches, but she doesn’t pull away. She leans into the touch. “Tell me what you want.”
“I want to not think for a little while.” Her hands come up to rest on my chest, over my shirt. “I want you to stop thinking, too. Just be here.”
We don’t rush. There’s no frantic tearing of clothes, no desperate race against the clock. We move to the small sofa against the far wall of my office, the one nobody ever uses. The leather creaks under our weight.
Her sweater comes off with agonizing slowness. As she sets it aside with methodical care, the red knit draping over my desk chair like spilled wine, I watch the firelight play across the curves of her bare arms—gold chasing shadows along freckled skin I’ve spent months fighting not to touch.
My uniform shirt follows, her fingers working each brass button with precise attention—not hurrying, savoring the act of undoing me just as much as I savor being undone, herknuckles brushing deliberately against my sternum with every small victory. The cool air of my office brushes my exposed skin, raising goosebumps, but her gaze is warmer than any fire could be, steady and unflinching as a hearth in midwinter.
When my hands settle on the curve of her waist, I can feel the solid strength of her, the steadfast presence of a woman who has stood firm against storms and still found ground to plant her feet. She doesn’t retreat beneath my grip, doesn’t soften herself to be more delicate or moldable.
She meets me exactly as she is—muscle and will and quiet ferocity—the press of her body against mine grounding me in a way I haven’t felt since before I learned how brittle the world could be. There’s no pretense between us, no careful distance—just truth, raw and undeniable, pushing up through the cracks in my control like green shoots through concrete.
She catches me watching, her lips curving as they graze my shoulder. The sensation sends shivers down my spine that have nothing to do with the chill in the room.
"You're staring," she murmurs, her breath hot against my skin, her teeth grazing the tendon in my neck just hard enough to make my breath hitch.
I let my fingers trace the dip of her spine, reverent in their path, counting each knob of bone beneath her skin like a priest with prayer beads.
"I'm remembering," I admit against her temple, inhaling the scent of her—coffee and cedar and something citrusy from her shampoo—letting it root me here, in this moment, where nothing exists beyond the stretch of her skin beneath my hands as they come to rest on her buttocks.
Her quiet laugh feathers over my collarbone, a sound so intimate it loosens something tight behind my sternum I hadn’t realized was clenched. "Remembering what?"
“How to want something without being afraid of it.”
My voice is rough, weighted with the truth of it—how long I’ve made wanting bleed into dreading, how often I’ve mistrusted the weight of my own hunger. Then, slowly, I guide us both down onto the couch, the leather cool against my bare skin, her body settling beneath me.
The world beyond this room fades—no duties, no dangers, no stack of unfinished reports on my desk or the ever-present gnaw of responsibility—just the soft sighs between us and the steady drum of her heartbeat against my ribs, marking time like a metronome set to the tempo of us.
It’s unhurried, every touch mapped with intention. Her palms skim the raised scars along my back, tracing the history there without expectation, without demanding I name the pain that put them there—just accepting them as part of the landscape of me.
My mouth follows the path of her skin, pressing lingering trails along the column of her throat, the ridge of her shoulder, relearning the salt and heat of her like a man starved for this particular flavor of salvation.
We don’t need words. Not now. The language between us is written in fingertips and sighs—her nails biting gently at my hips, my slow drag of teeth against her pulse point, the way her body rises to meet mine when I grip her just right, her thigh hitching up higher around my waist in unspoken demand.
When I finally sink into her tight folds, the air goes sharp between us, our breaths mingled and uneven. She’s so hot, so ready, her body slick with wanting, and the sound she makes—low and punched-out—wrecks me worse than any whiskey ever could.
And her eyes—God, her eyes. Open, unblinking, locked onto mine as if she could see every shadow I’ve ever carried right there beneath my skin. There’s no escaping into the dark here. No hiding behind duty or silence. Just her, the warmth of herbreath against my lips, the press of her fingers laced through mine against the couch cushions, the unbearable closeness of it all—like standing too near a bonfire, all heat and light and the threat of immolation.
We build the rhythm between us, slow and deep at first—each thrust measured, deliberate—then faster, needier, until the couch creaks beneath us and her teeth find my earlobe in a sharp punctuation mark of pleasure.
The moonlight cuts through the blinds in silver stripes, painting tiger-stripes across her skin as she arches beneath me, and I follow them with tongue and teeth, marking what’s already mine. When I take one flushed nipple into my mouth, rolling it with my tongue while my fingers tweak the other, she moans full-throated and unashamed, arching hard against me, her nails digging into my shoulders hard enough to leave half-moon souvenirs.
Our movements lose grace, our bodies driving toward desperation, until she shatters with a broken cry, her hips stuttering against me, dragging me over the edge with her, her name rough on my lips like something holy dragged through gravel.
After, there’s only the quiet hum of the night pressing in around us, her body curled against my side, her fingertips resting lightly above my thundering heart—as if checking to be sure it’s still there, still beating, still—I think—hers. She doesn’t speak, and neither do I. There’s nothing left to say.
Some truths, after all, are too deep for words.
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