I’d been sitting in the dark, even with all the lamps lit and the gray light of day filtering through the windows.

And then she was there, and the dark fell away. Not sure how long this bright feeling will last, but I grab it with all I have. Even if it’s just this moment, she’s here, with me, and she loves me.

Words fail me. I don’t know how to explain this to her, how I’ve missed her, too, how I thought I’d lost her forever. So I take her face in my hands and kiss her.

She kisses me back fiercely, nipping at my lower lip, and I groan, jolts of pleasure rushing down my spine. She kisses me like she’s thirsty for me, like she wants to breathe the air I’m breathing. Words can lie, but kisses cannot. I drop my hands to her shoulders, then grab her underneath her arms and drag her up to me. Leaning back in the armchair, I drape her over me, wrap her up in my arms and crush our mouths together again.

She tastes so fucking good, like chocolate and mint and brown sugar. I might never stop kissing her. Breathing is seriously overrated. The only thing better than this would be to sink inside her.

I’m so fucking hard I ache. The tiny moans coming from her in between kisses only serve to ratchet up the pressure in my gut. She’s sitting on top of my hard-on, squirming, and my dick is trying to fuck her ass through our layers of clothes.

But I don’t stop kissing her. If this is good for her, I can stay like this forever, her taste and her moans on my lips, on my tongue. I still can’t believe she’s here. I’d do anything to keep her with me, even if it means blue balls for days.

Her hands wind up in my hair, tugging just enough for sparkles of pain to enter my vision. Oh fuck… feels so good. My dick is trying to drill a hole through my pants. She’s killing me. I want her like I’ve never wanted any girl before.

She drags her fingers over my head, down the back of my neck, scratching her nails over my skin, and I hiss, arching up into her.

“Mia.” I draw back to look into her dazed gaze, because I need to know. “What you said earlier… you meant it?”

“I suck at playing games,” she breathes. “You can trust that I’ll always tell you the truth. I love you, Rook.”

No games, no questions. No hesitation.

And I don’t want to think more about it—because I want it to be true too damn much.

“Good.” I kiss her lightly on the mouth. “That’s fucking good.”

Her mouth smiles against mine. “Speaking of fucking… how about right now? I can’t wait any longer.”

I want to laugh, but I also want to weep, because the dark is lurking right beneath the surface of this joy, waiting to pounce.

So instead I twist so that I can pin her underneath me and press myself in the warm space between her legs. “Right now is perfect.”

* * *

“What happened to those practical mini-skirts you used to wear at the hotel?” I growl, fighting with her pants.

“Uniform,” she breathes. “Hotel uniform.”

“Well, I think the FBI should borrow the design. So much easier to get inside you that way.”

“Now you have to work for it,” she says, and I bend over her, to bite the mound of her breast. To mark her.

I have no problem working to make her mine, and if that means I have to rip her pants to shreds, I will. Just watch.

We end up on the thick carpet. I drag the pants down her long legs, and undo her shirt, revealing her white lacy panties and bra.

My mouth goes dry. So fucking pretty. Hot. She’s the kind of girl who’s prettier the more clothes I remove. I need her naked underneath me.

Right fucking now.

And somewhere between one breath and the next, I’m inside her, her legs wrapped around me. This weird skipping of time has been happening less and less since I left the hospital, but it still happens. It’s as if my mind disconnects.

I know she said she’s on the pill, though, and that it’s okay, and that’s all my overloaded mind could process. I find myself looking down at her, her expressive eyes wide, hazed with pleasure, her arms looped around my neck as I thrust inside her. Her dark hair is spread around her like a storm cloud, her tits are bare, her nipples rosy and taut, and her pussy clenches around me so hard I grunt, my whole body tightening.

“Mia ….” Fuck, she’s beautiful. How did she end up here, underneath me? With me? Saying things I want to believe but can’t?

“I’m here,” she whispers, her eyes going heavy-lidded. “But you got lost inside your mind for a while there.”

“Sorry, I…” I still, panting through the incredible feeling of her heat around my dick, against my bare skin. “Fuck.”

“It’s okay. Come here.” She tugs until our noses touch. She kisses me, soft and sweet, then bites into my lower lip, hard. Harder.

The pain focuses my wandering mind and I shudder, my body clenching with need.

Her small teeth release my lip, licking over it, soothing, and I’m all here now, one hundred percent accounted for.

She did this for me. Gave me what I needed. Brought me back.

“God, I love you,” I growl, and I’m inside her, moving, chasing after pleasure. Working to take her along with me, over the edge.

“Rook…” My name is a breath on her lips.

“What do you need?”

“You.” She digs her nails into my shoulders, and I can’t help a moan as the pain/pleasure shoots straight to my dick. “All of you.”

“Then stay.” I brace my hands on either side of her head and start rocking inside her in earnest. “Stay with me.”

She gasps, head falling back, legs tightening around my hips. “Yes.”

“Mia …”

“Yes, I’m staying. Yes, I love you. Yes, Rook, yes.”

My rhythm falters. My heart is banging inside my chest. “But I’m…”

“Perfect,” she murmurs. “In every way.”

I fall into her, pounding into her until she cries out my name, until my body bends in two and I come and come, pouring myself into her until there’s nothing more in me.

I’m spent. Done.

Her hand is in my hair, stroking. My cheek is resting on the softness of her breasts. I’m lying half on top of her, on the carpet, my heart racing, my eyes burning.

“Shh,” she whispers. “It’s okay.”

“I don’t know what the fuck’s wrong with me,” I tell her. “I’m so fucked up.”

“Life was hard on you lately, but you’ll be okay,” she says. “I love you so much.”

Those words again, and I close my eyes, letting them sink in. “Because you can slap me with no consequences?”

She laughs quietly. “And whip you. Let’s not forget that.”

A smile tugs are my lips. I can taste the salt of my own tears. “Stay?”

“For as long as you want me to.”

“I know you have your life, your job—”

“You’re more important than any job,” she says, her hand tugging on my hair. “I want another chance, Rook. I was… so scared when you passed out at the warehouse. When the doctor said you were bleeding inside. I just…”

Her voice catches.

The weight on my chest, on my shoulders, lifts a little. I raise my head to look at her face. “Stay forever.”

She sighs. “For you, I would.”

The burn is back in my eyes. “My mind’s a fucking mess. Sometimes I can’t get up from bed in the mornings. Sometimes I don’t know what I’m doing. How I can keep going.”

She nods. “I will be here. I’m not leaving.”

“What if I drag you down with me?”

“I’ll take the chance. I’ll take you as you are. That’s what love means.”

Her gaze is clear and true. She can’t lie, not to me. She means it all.

I’ve lost everything that mattered to me these past weeks. My family, my identity, my purpose in life. But I found her, and in the dark I found myself in, I think I might have found the brightest light.