(Present)

We talk all night and she fills me in on the stuff that I’ve missed. She recalls the days that followed her diagnosis and how terrified she was. She talks about it in such vivid detail, it’s like she’s lost in that memory.

She talks about feeling like her body betrayed her and thinking she must have done something to piss off the universe somehow. She tried to deny that it was happening for a while but Kat wouldn’t let her put off dealing with it. She cried, shouted at the heavens, and wrecked her apartment. When all of it was over, and she was ready to deal with the reality, the first thing she did was tell her mom.

She tells about the day she went in for the operation and how cold the room was. She said she felt empty and miserable. Kat and her mom tried to cheer her up but all that did was make her feel bad that she was taking up so much of their time. I want to know everything but when she gets to the chemo treatments, her words are covered in pain and her eyes are wet. I suggest we stop because I don’t want to make her relive it if it’s too much for her.

“No, I want you to know. I want to share this with you,” she says softly. I nod and take her hand as she recalls being too weak to get out of bed, losing her hair, and spending most of the day vomiting.

“Christ, I should have been there,” I swear angrily.

“You couldn’t have known.”

“I should have picked up on it somehow. I knew you and Jack. I should have seen that there was something else going on.”

“I made it hard for you to think anything other than what I said. This wasn’t you. This was me and please don’t blame yourself because the decision was mine. And I made the wrong one.”

“I hate to think you were in pain and I wasn’t there,” I reply.

“You’re here now. We’re here now. And for the record, it wasn’t all bad.”

“Oh really? There’s a good part to having cancer?” I reply.

“Well, not ‘good,’ but it helps you know who your friends are. Kat was wonderful. And my mom and I found each other again. I found out I was much stronger than I thought. Also when you eat like fifty popsicles in one sitting, no one judges you.”

“Fifty!” I laugh.

“What can I say, it helped.”

“Yes and I’m sure you hated having to eat so many,” I tease.

“It was hard but I powered through it,” she lies, knowing it’s her favorite cold treat.

“You are a brave woman,” I reply, bringing her closer to me.

“Maybe but my doctors were very happy to get rid of me. According to them, I was the worst patient they had in a long time.”

“Why did they say that?”

“I’ll tell you,” she says, “but first you have to promise not to press charges.”

“Ah, okay…” I reply as I narrow my eyes.

“I was getting ready to be taken into the OR when I realized I forgot to bring something with me—something very important. I called Kat and she ran back to my apartment and got it for me.”

“What was it?”

“Remember the tiny tin soldier you found near our cabin?”

“Yeah, we left it on the windowsill, standing up. We vowed to lay it down if either of us changed our minds about getting married.”

“Well—and this where the not filing charges comes in—I broke into the cabin and took it. I know it sounds crazy but I wanted to have him near me. So, I stole—I mean borrowed him. And on the day of my surgery, I ended up forgetting to take him.”

“So you held up a lifesaving operation for a tin toy?”

“I held up a lifesaving operation so I could have something of yours near me.”

“Come here,” I reply as I embrace her tightly against me.

“And to the nurses’ credit, they made sure the soldier was standing and facing me the whole time,” she adds.

“Do you still have it?” I ask.

“I returned the soldier to the cabin. It felt wrong to keep him but I delayed returning him even after I got better.”

“Why?”

She locks eyes with me and speaks softly. “I couldn’t let him stand upright on the windowsill. The whole point was that he was guarding our marriage and since the engagement was broken, I had to lay him down flat and I didn’t want to. I know, it’s really stupid.”

“It’s not. I thought the soldier would remain standing upright too,” I admit. We grow silent for a while, both lost in our own thoughts. I flash back to our time at the cabin, how happy we were. Shay’s voice pulls me back to the present.

“Logan, when all of this is over…where will that leave us?”

“That’s a good question, where do you want this to go?” I ask.

She takes a deep breath and replies with a vulnerable voice, I’ve never heard before. “I want to be your wife. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. But even if you’re not ready for that, even if we never end up down the aisle, I just want to be with you. I know I messed things up but I want to try again, can we try again? Or am I too late? Logan, did I lose you for good?”

“I know it wasn’t easy talking about what you went through. I know you only did that to show me you are ready to let me in. That means a lot to me. The truth is, we were never really apart. You were always in my thoughts, just beyond my reach. Shay, I love you.”

I stand, take her hand, and walk her into the bedroom. She stands before me, glowing from the light bouncing off the moon and into the window. I plant light kisses on her forehead, the tip of her nose, and the hollow of her neck. I kiss along her delicate jawline and up to her earlobe.

When I glide back down her neck, using my tongue, a moan escapes her lips. I kiss everywhere but her lips, wanting to save that for last. But Shay has other plans; she takes my head between her hands and draws my tongue into her warm mouth. We’re entangled in a torrent of deliberate, scorching kisses.

The more I get of her mouth, the more I want and the harder my dick gets. It’s not just that part of my body that’s reacting to her. I can’t get my heart to stop pounding against my chest. She’s doing things to me that no other woman has ever been able to do.

Christ.

I want nothing more than to rip off all our clothes and sink inside her, but instead I take my time. I want to revisit all the places on her body that amaze me, essentially taking the long way home. Also, she deserves to be made love to and admired thoroughly.

God, there’s so much to admire.

My hands explore her body with just as much eagerness as my mouth. I try to stay on task but she’s skillfully flicking her silky warm tongue across my chest, making my world go dark.

Damn this feels good.

My cock is aggressively pushing against my jeans; I have never been this fucking hard before. As if she hears my thoughts, Shay glides her hands down to my zipper and sets me free. My cock springs out, eagerly seeking her. I’m too gone to be graceful as I pull my jeans past my hips. Now, I focus on getting her just as naked as I am. I unzip her dress and watch as it falls to the floor. It’s like unveiling a fucking masterpiece. I have to step back so I can fully appreciate it.

“God, you’re gorgeous,” I say, shaking my head in disbelief. There’s only one last thing left to do: remove her black-lace-trimmed bra and panties. I want to see her naked but no way am I rushing this. I feel like I’m unwrapping the biggest and the best fucking gift I’ve ever been given. I unhook her bra and slide the straps down her bare shoulders. I suppress a growl.

But when her bra slips off, she does something she’s never done before—she covers her bare breasts by crossing her arms in front of them. Her breasts can’t be hidden fully by her arms but she does her best to hide as much of them as she can. One look in her eyes and it’s easy to see this isn’t a game she’s playing. She’s not trying to prolong the seduction. She is genuinely ashamed.

Argh! I’m such a fucking idiot. She’s worried about the scars she got during surgery. I read up on the subject but I never connected it because in my mind, it didn’t change anything for me. Even if she had lost her breasts completely, she’d still be the hottest fucking woman I’ve ever known. But it’s different for her because even though she was able to keep her breasts, it’s clear the scars bother her.

“Anika,” I call out softly. She looks down at the floor and my heart aches. I never want to see that look of shame on her face again. I lift her head up and make her look into my eyes.

“You don’t have to show me if you don’t want to. But you should know that nothing, not one thing, can make you less attractive to me.”

“I had a very good surgeon. She made a small incision under the fold of my breasts but it’s still a scar. I didn’t care what other guys thought about it but with you…I can’t stand the thought of you seeing it and thinking it’s ugly.”

“I’m not in love with you for your breasts, although God knows they are enough. The reason why I’m in love with you is because you are the embodiment of all the things I want to be. You’re fearless, strong, and you have the biggest heart of anyone I know.

“Anika, your curves keep me up at night. The small of your back, nape of your neck, and your luscious lips…I love all of that. But the thing that I am in love with, the part of you that I got on a plane to protect, is your heart. That’s what made me want to marry you—your heart. Like I said, you don’t have to bare your breasts to me if you don’t want to. But if you do, the only thing you’ll see on my face is awe. Because I can’t fucking believe I get to make love to you,” I admit.

She stares into my eyes and after a suspenseful pause, she slowly drops her arms to her sides. I get a full view of her chest. Jesus, they are even more beautiful than I remembered.

I see the thin scar line under her breasts. It does nothing to take away from how stunning she is and always will be. I don’t have to tell her that because she sees the way I’m greedily looking at her chest. I’m unable to keep myself from licking my lips in anticipation of getting a taste.

She throws her head back and laughs. She reaches out, wraps her hand around my neck, and pulls me into her chest. I lick the underside of her right breast while kneading the left one. I caress her nipples with my tongue, warm them in my mouth, and suckle them between my lips until they are rock hard. Shay sighs my name as her eyes roll to the back of her head.

She arches her back so I have even greater access to her breasts, grabs a fistful of my hair, and gives me an order. “Bite me, baby,” she says in a choppy, breathless voice. I do as I’m told—careful to not apply too much pressure. I think I hit the mark because she calls out “OHMYGODYES!” as she latches onto my biceps.

I can’t take much more; I’m about to lose my fucking mind if I don’t get inside her. But I’m not done. I walk around her and get a 360-degree view of her: my own fucking paradise. I nibble the back of her neck, glide my tongue between her shoulder blades, and lick down her spine. By the time I make my way back to the front, she’s shaking and squeezing her thighs together.

We get back to kissing, and that act alone sends us to yet another level of desire. I gently pick her up and walk her over to the bed.

“Logan, now. I need you in me, now,” she says after I lay her face up on the bed.

“Hang on, baby, I’m thirsty,” I reply as I slide her panties down her legs and part her thighs. I bury my face inside her. She tastes like wonder and sunlight. She grinds her hips into my mouth as she groans.

The sensation forces her to lift her hips off the bed. She tries to get away from my lips but I can’t let that happen. I need to drink as much of her as I can. She clutches at the sheets and gathers them under her fingers. She twists and turns in ecstasy and begs me to keep going and to stop, all at once.

I can feel her body on the edge and mere seconds from going over. I reach for the box of condoms in the drawer of the nightstand. I put one on and embed myself where I have always belonged—inside her. We stare into each other’s eyes, interlock our hands, and together we reach a series of earth-shattering orgasms. They roll in one after the other. When it’s all over, we lie in each other’s arms, sweaty, flushed, and euphoric.

I turn to face her and can’t get myself to look away. She’s absolutely glowing. She smiles playful and says, “What are you looking at?”

I kiss her forehead and reply with certainty, “The woman I’m going to marry.”