I buckled his jeans and crept down the stairs. She would need sleep. I left Olivia under the covers.

I saw the boxes in every corner of every room. It might take some time, but I’d help her unpack them. She wasn’t going to have to sell this place. It would be our home. The perfect place to raise our children.

I smiled. This was what I should have done all along. I never should have left her. It took almost dying in the ambush to realize the most important thing in my life was Olivia.

I opened the fridge in search of food. I was starving.

The wind howled outside and the wind pelted the windows. It was too dark to see which direction the storm came from. I had lost track of time. I had taken one look at Olivia on the porch and my groin took over for a while. All the lust and primal need for her had broken free.

The second round was for her. She needed to know I could take her to bed in more than one way. Rough and wild wasn’t always my style. I could love her with slow strokes, pushing her to her limits in a whole new way.

I grabbed some butter and cheese before searching the pantry for bread. I wasn’t a cook, but I could whip up a few grilled cheese sandwiches.

Within minutes the kitchen smelled like grilled cheese and I heard footsteps overhead.

“Hey.” Olivia appeared in the doorway.

“Hungry? It’s not gourmet but I was starving.” I grinned at her.

She crossed the room, throwing her arms around my neck. The sobs were light at first, but as I wrapped my hands around her waist her body began to shake.

“What’s wrong? What is it?” I felt the panic. The fear was spreading through me. I didn’t know what to do.

She sniffed, trying to regain control before she could look at me. I looked down at her. The tears rolling down her cheeks. “I woke up and thought you were gone.”

“Oh, God.” I pulled her to my chest, pressing her against my bare skin. “No. I’m not leaving. Never.” I tipped her chin toward me. “You’re mine, baby. You couldn’t get rid of me if you wanted to.”

She smiled. “Never leaving?”

“No.” I kissed her lips gently. “You’re mine. I’m yours. It’s a forever thing now.”

She loosened the grip on my neck. “What do you mean?”

I had learned a lot as a Ranger. I had learned how to read the enemy. How to anticipate danger. How to train. How to prepare my body for combat. But it took losing my best friend and almost dying a second time to learn time was fleeting. Nothing was guaranteed.

I had hidden his secret from Olivia long enough. We needed to start our future now. She had to know the truth.

“We need to talk.”

Her eyes widened. I could sense the fear.

“I’m not leaving. That’s not it.” I led her to the kitchen table.

“All right. What is it?” She waited for me to answer.

“Here’s the thing.” I rubbed at the scruff on his jawline. “I have no doubt you want all the same things I do.” I pulled her into my lap. “I want a future with you. I want to live here with you. I want a family with you.”

She swallowed hard.

“You want all that don’t you, Liv?”

“Yes. It’s everything I want. It’s all I could think about when you were gone. I thought it would never happen.” Her voice was quiet.

I squeezed her to me. “I knew you did or I wouldn’t have taken you the way I did.”

She looked confused and I knew I had to explain.

“Baby, you’re mine now.” I felt her pulse quicken. “You’re mine. The one woman made for me. The only one I’m supposed to spend my life with.” I inhaled. “I knew it the minute I laid eyes on you. But I had to leave again. And I couldn’t promise you I’d make it back.”

“I was scared you wouldn’t come back.” Her voice was quiet.

She lowered her eyes and I felt the sadness from the memory. It was enough to bring me to his knees, separating a man from his woman was a living hell.

“Hey.” I tilted her gaze toward me again. “I didn’t want to leave you. I hated it. But my mission wasn’t over. I made a commitment to those men that I would get them out alive, and I had to do it. I had to do for them what I couldn’t do for Elliot.”

My heart pounded. All the pain was still there. The pain of watching Elliot die. The pain of leaving Olivia. It never left me.

“Keep going,” she whispered. “I want to understand.”

“You and I couldn’t be together until I finished the mission. I swear I wouldn’t have left you if I hadn’t given my word. But I don’t break a promise. I never break my word.” His throat tightened. “The past month was absolute hell without you. But I’m back for good. But in order to be back for good and never have to leave again, I had to tell the Rangers you were pregnant.” My hand moved to her stomach.

She gasped. “Pregnant? We didn’t use protection this time.”

“No, we didn’t.” Just talking about it stirred a sensation in my cock. I wanted her again. I didn’t know when it would ever be enough to leave me satisfied.

“When I signed on for another tour with the Rangers, there was a clause in my contract that said if I started a family, I could leave and stop touring.” I swallowed hard.

“Liv, I didn’t put that clause in there...Elliot did. Elliot was my Commander. He was promoted two months before the explosion.”

“Holy shit,” she whispered. Her eyes darted back and forth across my face. Her grip on my shoulders tightened.

Yeah. Exactly. Holy shit.

“I didn’t know about the clause until he died. He knew I didn’t have much of a family growing up and always talked about how his childhood and how happy he was growing up coming to this house in the summer.”

Her eyes began to mist over and I powered on.

“I was with him when he passed and in his last breath he made me promise to take care of you. To fix the house. To make you safe. I didn’t expect…I didn’t expect this.”

I waited for a question. A comment. A slap. But she stared at me.

I had faced burning buildings. Gunfire. Kidnapping. But nothing scared the shit out of me like the silence I was holding in my arms.