I tuck my journal under the mattress by the side of the bed I’ve been sleeping on. A full week has passed since I was released from the hospital and moved into Nick’s apartment. My injuries are healing well, and they barely hurt. Nick tends to my bandages each morning and every night like my own personal physician. He’s amazing. Never making me feel less than for what I did. He just accepts the things he cannot change and moves on. I want to learn from him.

We’ve spent the week moving around each other in harmony. Making meals, working in the gym, side by side. I’ve never felt more happily settled in a routine. Twice a week, therapy with Dr. Batchelor, who is easier to trust than I thought she would be. Lunch with Dr. Hart, who insists I call her Monet or Moe like everyone else. I can sense her sincerity to be friends with me. I may invite Grace next week. They already know each other, and Grace has been calling my phone nonstop all week with requests to meet up. All of which I’ve denied, wanting to let my wounds heal a bit more figuratively and literally. Overall, it’s been a wonderful week. Being with Nick, spending time with him in his home, is easy, simple, and feels right. I don’t know how he feels about it yet, but he seems content. Definitely not eager for me to find a place of my own. Every time I suggest it, he tosses the paper aside and tells me to just relax and enjoy my time with him.

Stepping out of my clothes and into the shower, I turn the water on and adjust to a barely scalding setting before I get under the spray. The instant prick of pain that sizzles along my skin offers a touch of bliss. Would this be one of the healthier ways to deal with my need for pain?

I pour shampoo into my hands, rub them together, and slather my hair with the flowery scent. Nick loves the way I smell. He tells me all the time. I also have a bit of an obsession with his citrus and leather scent. He uses some type of hair product that his friend Genevieve sells to him that, mixed with his natural scent, turns into an orangey smell, but the leather…that’s all my man.

My man.

I laugh deliriously as I rinse out the shampoo. Nick’s shower is incredible. The pressure is fast and hard. He says he had to upgrade the shower when he moved in because he works his body hard in the gym and needs the water therapy. In my opinion, a large tub would do wonders, but he’d need to renovate the bathroom to do that. Of course, I could do that for him. Maybe as a thank-you present for helping me through this past week.

Storing the idea away for another time, I start to sing. The shower is the only place I can be free enough to let the music inside me out.

I hum the tune at first and then get louder with each verse until I’m belting through the lyrics for “Wild Horses” by the Rolling Stones. The song moves my heart in ways so many others haven’t. Words of suffering and pain have always resonated so clearly with me over the years. I’ve got my eyes closed when I sing my heart out to the last line.

“Fuck, Honor!” Nick’s voice startles me and makes the images the song inspired disappear instantly inside my mind. “Babe, you’re a songbird.”

Nick steps into the shower completely naked. It’s not the first time I’ve seen him naked, but this time feels different. More meaningful. The energy around us both is hypercharged and magnetic.

Nick brings his hands to my waist and tugs me flat against him. “You can sing like angel,” he whispers in awe.

I shake my head. “No, I can’t. I just…”

He runs a hand up my bare back, causing goosebumps to rise over my skin even against the heat of the water. “Yeah, babe, you are. Fucking incredible. We’ve gotta get you singing on stage.”

My eyes practically bulge out of my head, and I try to back away, but he doesn’t allow it. “No, no, no, not possible.”

His lips twist into a wicked, sexy slant. “Oh yes, anything’s possible, Dove. Anything. Sing something else for me?”

I cringe. “Here? Now?” I run my fingers down his sculpted arms, arousal flickering through my body at his nearness.

“If you do, I’ll reward you,” he taunts in a husky timbre while bringing a hand down and squeezing bare ass. The movement forces his hard length against my belly, and I moan, knowing just how badly I want him inside me. He’s been denying me all week, stating that he wanted me fully on board mentally and physically when we took that last step. I’ve almost been to the point of begging for it, I want him so badly.

“Will you fuck me if I do?” I raise my eyebrows and purse my lips, waiting for his answer, hoping for the response I want.

He cocks his head to the side and gets his face low enough to look me in the eye. “No, Dove, I’m not gonna fuck you the first time. I will make love to you, though.”

A ribbon of heat flutters along the surface of my skin and flushes my cheeks.

“Sing to me.”

“What do you want me to sing?”

He holds me close, our bare skin touching from knee to chest. I tremble against him, but he’s there to keep me upright. “Our song.”

“Which is what?” My voice shakes, wondering how he sees us. What song he’ll chose that speaks of what this thing between us feels like for him.

“Hallelujah.”

I swallow around the lump in my throat, and the steam billows around us in the confined space. I close my eyes and start to sing the song that would change me for the rest of my life. When I get to the part about the woman in the moonlight, I tip my head back and give it my all, each verse ringing through the bathroom walls. Nick’s hands move over my body as I sing. Caressing, worshiping…loving.

A certain verse speaks of my own tale of broken love with my parents, my brother, myself. This time, I sing of love from my heart, for the man cradling me, bared in body and soul. I’m learning anew what love can truly be if it’s given freely and without limitations.

By the time I get to the end of the song and sing the very last hallelujah, his lips are on mine. Nick ushers me against the wall of the shower, drinking deeply from my mouth. His hands cradle my face as he kisses me. He doesn’t have to speak to tell me what this kiss means. I know from each press of his lips to mine, his tongue to mine, this is it. This is when our bodies, our hearts, and our souls will connect in an unbreakable bond that will span time.

He kisses me so hard and so long, the water goes cold. He moves back a few inches, holding my face with one of his hands.

“We’re starting over. Both of us, right now. No longer are we alone. When I take you, I’m claiming you. We no longer live alone because we live for each other. Support one another in all things. Be there for the good and the bad.”

“Sounds like a proposal,” I barely croak out.

“Call it what you want. I have no doubt we’ll get there too. For now, we live for the other. Promise me, Honor. You’ll live because I need you alive.”

“I love you, Nick.” The words come out at the same time two tears fall from each eye. One for him, and one for me.

His smile is as bright as a new day. Full of hope, wonder and, dare I say, love. “Good,” he says, and for now, it’s enough.

Nick turns off the water, grabs my hand, opens the shower door, and pulls us both out. With gentle movements, he dries me with a towel, each pass of the fabric as though he’s fanning the flames of lust. I close my eyes and enjoy this moment of devotion. I’ve not felt anything like it before, and I want to remember every last second.

Without delay, Nick has scooped me up, walks me into the bedroom, and lays me on the bed that’s quickly becoming our bed instead of just his bed.

“Do you have any idea how beautiful you are?” He shakes his head as his gaze runs over every bare naked inch of me. “I don’t even know where to start.” His voice is rough and laced with desire.

I point to my lips. “How about here?”

He smiles and straddles my body, not bringing his big bulk over me, just hovering before he takes my lips. His tongue peeks out, running along the length of each lip before flicking against my teeth when I smile. Who knew Nick would be a little playful as well as dominant in the bedroom? All too quickly, his playful side disappears, and his mouth devours mine, sucking, nibbling, biting until my lips feel swollen and bruised.

I gasp when he plucks at my bottom lip and pulls back; his normally light eyes are dark and focused. He grabs my hands with both of his and lifts them above my head. “Hold on to the headboard and don’t let go until I tell you.”

“What happens if I let go?”

“Defy me and find out,” he warns, and I make a mental note to hold on to the headboard as tightly as I can. The last thing I want is for him to stop touching me, and the worst he could do to me would be that. I’m so primed and ready for this next step in our relationship. I physically need him.

I grip the wooden rungs and arch up, presenting my breasts.

He grins salaciously. “An offer I can’t refuse.” And before I can take a breath, he’s got one of my nipples in the wet warmth of his mouth. It’s heaven and hell all at once because I want to touch him, hold his head to my breast while he ravishes me.

Nick laps at my nipple with the flat of his tongue, making it throb and ache deliciously. He wraps his other hand around my neglected breast, pinching and plucking at the erect tip to the point of pain.

“How does that feel?” He sits up and works each peak until a burning sensation ripples from them throughout my body, creating a euphoria I’ve never known.

“Mmm, good.” I gasp and arch into his touch when he pinches harder.

“You try to get closer when I press harder. Do you want more?”

“Yes! God, please.”

He pinches and twists my nipples until they are fiery hot pokers. Rivers of pleasure dance through my body and to the place between my legs.

“Please, Nick.”

“Oh, Dove, I’m going to enjoy hearing you beg in the future, and I’ll do it until your throat is raw. Now, though, I’m just figuring out some of your thresholds. This pain makes you feel alive, does it not?”

The concept slams into me like a hose putting out a fire. “Oh, my God!”

He grins devilishly and plucks at my burning tips again until I have to shut my eyes tight from the delightful pain.

“I told you, there are more ways to get what you need. Honor, I’m going to make you hurt so good. Give you a healthy outlet for that ache inside.”

I nod, tears filling my eyes and falling down my cheeks. This man accepts me. Understands my need and wants to fill it, not stop it.

Nick swipes my tears away before nudging both of my knees with his. I do one better, spreading myself wide open for him. An offer.

His lips go into a flat line, nostrils flaring, and eyes intent between my open thighs. “You giving me this?” He cups my sex roughly, dangerously. I want so much more.

My silence is defining.

“Words, Dove. Right now, I’m going to bury myself inside you, and I need to know that it’s mine, when I want it, how I want it. Just like your heart…your broken soul. I’m taking it all.”

“You can have it,” I whisper, more tears falling.

Nick leans over to the side table and pulls out a condom. I stop his hand and shake my head. “I’m safe and clean.”

“You letting me have you bare?”

“You want all of me?” I firm my jaw and lift my head, feeling prideful and beautiful.

“Fuck, yeah.”

“I want all of you.”

Once the word leaves my mouth, he notches his thick cock at my entrance, wraps both of his hands around my hips, and slams home. I cry out at the intrusion, his mighty length large and thick inside my walls. I suck in several breaths and shimmy my hips, attempting to accommodate his girth, but I’m not sure anything would do. He’s huge. Everywhere.

Nick lays his body over mine, curls a hand under us to grip my bum where he curves his hips, and tunnels his cock deeper. I ease my head back and push down with my hips, wanting him inside as far as he can go. I bite my lips with the pain that move brings, washing over my lower half like a true bathing of his soul into mine.

“You will take all of me, Dove.” He growls and sucks on a sensitive spot at the base of my neck.

I’m awash with overwhelming sensations of pleasure, pain, need, and desire. I raise both of my knees up his sides. He takes that opportunity to press against the back of my thighs and thrust deeper.

“Sweet heaven,” I call out, gripping the rungs of the headboard so tight I’m sure I’ll have indentions in my palms.

“Fuck yeah it is. Warm, beautiful heaven. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, I should have taken you sooner.” His voice is raw, gritty, and coated in lust.

I smile against his neck and lay a round of kisses on every patch of skin I can reach. He groans and swirls his hips, crushing my clit in the process. My entire body goes stiff as an orgasm races through me. My toes curl, and my fingers tighten around the wood above my head as I go off.

Nick runs his hands up my arms and unfurls them from the rungs. “Hold me, babe. Touch me.”

Glorying in the ability to finally put my hands on him, I run them all over his sweat-misted back, feeling each bump of his spine. He fucks me hard, lifts up off my chest so I can see his magnificent body. His shoulders are wide and full of sinewy muscle. Each pec is a hardened square with a brown, almond-shaped nipple I’d like to lick and bite. Down farther is sheer male perfection. He works hard at keeping his body healthy and toned. I draw a fingertip down the center of his chest and over each brick of his eight-pack.

“Everything about you is hard,” I whisper, touching all over his upper body.

He smiles, opens my legs wide so my knees fall out to each side. He takes his thumb and swirls it around my clit, which reacts like a lightning bolt to the rest of me. I jerk and tremble, the pleasure obliterating all thoughts besides ramping up for another explosion.

“And everything about you is soft. Your body…” He runs his hand over my inner thighs, up my abdomen, and to my breasts, where he gives them a little squeeze. “Your heart.” He comes over me and kisses the skin above my heart, which repositions his dick in such a way to torture me with pleasure.

I moan and grip his hips, wanting him to stay where he is. His dick is gliding along the most perfect place; I feel like my insides are going to explode in sheer ecstasy.

“That the spot?” He kisses me as I sigh and moan into his mouth.

Nick uses his talented hips, rotating and stirring his length inside me, crushing that hot bundle of nerves with each rotation. I curl around his body, bringing us as close together as we could possibly be.

He fucks me slow and long, until I’m panting, squirming, pushing, and pulling for that last little bit that will send me over the edge.

“Gonna love you like this forever, Honor.”

“Nick!” I tip my head back and let out a long breath of air as the orgasm pounds through me.

He picks up the pace with his hips, hammering into me in short bursts. His mouth covers mine, and his massive body locks around me. His cock seems to get bigger, thicker, until both of us fall over the edge of the cliff into nothing but ecstasy.

“I love you, Honor. I fucking love you,” Nick whispers in my ear as his body shudders and his release fills me.

Closing my eyes, I hold this man to my body and open the broken parts of my soul, allowing this moment to fill some of the empty holes.

“I love you too.”

---

A pounding on the door breaks through the warm haze of sleep swarming around me. Nick’s naked body is pressed up against the back of mine, his arm locked around my waist. I press against his back, snuggling closer as the knocking sound comes again.

“Nicholas Salvatore Salerno Jr.! You better answer this door for your mama, or I’ll call your father and have him break it down!”

I sit up like a shot in the dark and pull the sheet up to cover my chest. Nick rolls over and starts laughing.

“What’s going on?” A nervous panic swirls around me instantly.

“My mother is here.” He chuckles and scrubs at his eyes.

“Why?” I rub my head, our lovemaking flickering through my mind like a sexy movie on repeat.

Nick gets out of bed stark naked. I admire his form longingly, my gaze focusing on his thick cock and sculpted muscles. My mouth waters at the idea of bringing him into my mouth, making him crazy for me. Taking him over the edge into bliss.

He narrows his eyes and points a finger. “None of that,” he says, sounding more Italian in that moment than I’ve heard him.

“What?” I blink innocently.

“Looking at my cock like it’s your next meal.” He grips his length and gives it one long stroke.

I moan, and he shakes his head. “Fucking knew it. Perfect goddamned woman. Wants me to fuck her face even when my mother is banging at the door.”

The reminder of his mother has me scrambling out of bed. “It’s not my fault all of your maleness is so…so you!” I wave my hands and look around the room, finding my yoga pants on the floor and one of his shirts. I tug them both on as he zips up his jeans and walks bare-chested out of the room.

Oh, my God. He’s got nothing but a pair of jeans on, and he’s going to answer the door. His mother is going to know what we did.

Like his mother doesn’t already assume.

“There you are. I thought I would have to call the cavalry out on you,” I can hear his mother say from the other room.

I take a few precious moments to run my fingers through my hair and find a speck of courage to walk out and meet his mother.

“Where is the girl? I want to see her. You can’t hide her away in your love nest forever!” she scolds.

I take that moment to exit the room. I wave shyly. “Hello.”

Nick’s mother is more beautiful than I imagined. She’s small, curvy, and stunning. Her hair is as dark as Nick’s and her smile just as kind.

She lifts her hands to her heart in a prayer position. “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! You are real! And so beautiful!”

Guess that answers where Nick got one of his favorite religious sayings.

“Come, come child, let me get a good look at you.”

I pad close and stretch out my hand to shake hers.

She shakes her head. “No, no, no. That’s not how we greet one another in this family.” She holds her arms out and embraces me in an all-encompassing hug. “I’m Josephine or Jojo, or Mama. Whatever ever makes you comfortable, my darling girl.” She pulls back and holds both of my cheeks. “My boy has done well. Son, she will make me beautiful grandbabies.”

I’m certain my eyes are about to pop out of my head, and I cough.

Nick laughs. “Yeah, Ma, she will.” He answers as if it’s every day that you introduce your girlfriend to your mother and blatantly admit to the prospect of having children. We haven’t even talked about kids. We just admitted we loved one another.

Oh, my God! We admitted we loved one another.

In all the touching and lovemaking, that little admission slipped to the wayside. Now that I’m awake and standing in front of his mother, the memory of him whispering he loved me is running rampant in my mind. Did he mean it? Was it something he said in the heat of the moment?

Nick comes over and tugs me to his side, looping an arm around my shoulders and kissing my temple. “Ma, this is my girl, Honor Carmichael. Dove, this is my mother, Josephine.”

“It’s so good to meet you, Josephine.” I grip Nick’s waist and hold on tight.

“So, tell me, Honor, are you Italian?” she asks while lifting a bag off the floor and walking into the kitchen. She starts unloading several Tupperware containers onto the counter.

“Um…” I try to come up with the right words, but Nick cuts me off.

“Five percent, Mom.” He winks at me.

His mother beams. “I knew it.” She wipes her hands on a dish towel and throws it over her shoulder. “Now, you both look hungry.” She gestures to the stools at the bar. “Sit, sit. I will feed you, and you will tell me all about how you met and fell in love.”

I shakily make my way to a stool and gratefully sit down before I fall down. I am not used to a mother who not only cares this much but makes a point to insert herself into her children’s lives because of concern and love instead of status and keeping up with the Joneses.

His mother opens all of the Tupperware she brought, gets the plates, and dishes out more food than I can usually eat in two days, let alone one meal. Lasagna is cut and steaming hot. A bowl of minestrone soup, thick slices of garlic bread, and some steamed fresh veggies are sitting in front of me, making my mouth water. I haven’t smelled food so good in ages.

Nick digs in like nothing is strange about his mother popping over, laying out a feast, and grilling him about his girlfriend. Without knowing what else to do, I tuck into the food and answer Josephine’s questions as best I can.

When she leaves, she hugs me not once, but twice, and kisses me on both cheeks.

Nick walks his mother down and out of the gym. She must have a key if she was able to reach his door inside the building. Thankfully she doesn’t have a key to the inside, or she’d have found us in a more precarious position, and I would have died from sheer embarrassment.

“My mother likes you,” Nick says as he comes back from downstairs.

“I like her. She’s full of happiness and love. What’s not to like?”

“Care to tell me about your mom?”

Instantly, ice fills my veins. My mother is nothing like the loving, joyful woman who pushed her way into Nick’s home so she could make sure he and his new girlfriend were okay. My mother doesn’t even know where I am, and she probably doesn’t much care.

“Not today. I want to end this day on a happy note.”

He comes over to me and tucks me against his chest. I wrap my arms around him and know as long as I’m in these arms, I’ll be fine. Nothing can hurt me here.

“Okay, Dove. But soon, yeah? You have to let me in on the good, bad, and ugly.”

I nod and hold him tighter. “Soon.”

“How’s about we cuddle up and watch some TV like an old married couple?”

I chuckle into his chest. “Sounds perfect.”