Zach paid the cab driver the rest of his fare when he parked in front of my house. I went to the door to unlock it, and Zach caught up with me when I slipped inside. He locked the door behind us, and I went straight down the hall to the kitchen where I filled a cup with warm water and salt. I stirred it around and handed it to him when he came in the kitchen behind me. He stared down at it.

“It will clean the cuts in your mouth,” I said flatly.

He looked like he wanted to say something snarky, but he took a mouthful and swished it around. He spat it in the sink and repeated the process. Soon, it came out free of blood, and I planted my hands on my hips and nodded approvingly.

“See, I told you it wasn’t bad,” Zach said.

I rolled my eyes. “You’re impossible.”

He grinned sheepishly. Then his smile faltered, and he put the glass in the sink. “Sorry the night took such a shitty turn.”

I shrugged. “Brett has a way of doing that. But I think that’s the last time we’ll ever have to see him. He learned his lesson.”

“I hope so.”

“He’s not a brave guy, Zach. He’s a coward. He won’t go looking for another fight. Not after you and Ryan embarrassed him and his guys like that.”

Zach leaned against my kitchen counter and reached for me. He pulled my hips to him and slipped his hands into the back pockets of my jeans. “We embarrassed them, huh?”

I nodded. “Humiliated is probably a better word.”

Zach threw his head back and laughed. His fight with my ex clearly hadn’t phased him. “You may have enjoyed it a little too much for your own good,” I teased.

“Guilty.”

I rested my hands gently on his chest. “I don’t like feeling like a damsel in distress.”

“Whoever said you were a damsel?”

“I’m just saying. I don’t need you to rescue me all the time. I’m not that kind of girl.”

“Oh, baby, I know that.” He tucked my hair behind my ear. “You scare the shit out of me. I never for a second thought you were a damsel. But if I’m around, your fight is my fight because you’re my girl, and it’s my job to keep you safe. Not because I don’t think you can do it yourself but because I want to do it for you.”

It was impossible not to smile up at him. “I can accept that.”

“You sure?” he teased, gently tapping his finger on the end of my nose.

“I’m sure,” I whispered before I stretched up to my tiptoes to plant my lips on his. He tasted salty, but I didn’t care.

Zach wrapped his arms around my waist and held me to him as we kissed. I cupped his face in my hands, running my fingers through his facial scruff, and gave into him, letting myself sink deeper against him and handing over control.

Zach began undoing my jeans, and I smiled into our kiss and nipped at his bottom lip. He nipped back playfully and tugged my jeans down my hips. I began shimmying them down the rest of the way, but he lifted me by my waist and turned us around. Then he placed me on the counter, which was cold on my bare ass.

I didn’t care. I kissed him more hungrily, and he tore my pants off the rest of the way. Then he worked my panties down. They got caught up around my right ankle, but he didn’t waste any more time. He pushed himself between my legs and kissed me so forcefully that the back of my head hit the cupboards behind me.

I held him to me and slipped my hands up his shirt. I traced his muscles and dipped my fingers into the waistband of his jeans. He must have been ticklish because he chuckled into our kiss and flinched when my fingers grazed over his hips.

I worked to undo his jeans. He tugged them off once they were undone, and his boxers followed shortly after. I pulled my shirt over my head and was left in nothing but my black bra. Zach paused for the briefest moment to soak in the sight of my body. He kissed my bare shoulders as he hooked his arms under my knees to pull me to the very edge of the counter.

His cock rested against my clit. I wiggled against him, encouraging him to hurry up. His lips moved from my shoulder to my chest where he kissed the top of my breasts along the top of my bra. I hugged his head to me and arched my back as he bit my breast playfully.

I reached behind my back and undid my bra. He ripped it off me and threw it over his shoulder. Then he went back in to pay special attention to my nipples, which were hard and sensitive. I kissed the hair on his head as he swirled his tongue over my nipple.

I took the initiative and reached between my legs to stroke his cock. He was so hard. A tight knot of need formed below my belly, and my body screamed for his. I pulled him to me and pressed the tip of his cock inside me.

Zach planted his hands on the cupboards on either side of my head. “Just can’t hold out, can you?”

I shook my head.

He leaned into me, pressing himself in deeper. I held on to his forearms and moaned softly as I took all of him.

The adrenaline from the fight outside the pub had erased all the side effects I had been feeling from the alcohol. I was completely present, as I knew Zach was. The moment we were sharing was intimate, gentle, and sweet. He had told me he wanted to take care of me and protect me.

My heart hammered in my chest.

He’d said that he understood I was not a damsel. He knew he didn’t need to fix my problems for me. But he wanted to. He wanted to take the heat for me. He wanted to stand in the line of fire.

And they hadn’t just been words. The fight with Brett was enough to show that he was willing to put it all on the line for me. I’d seen the fury in his face when he crouched down to talk to Brett while the rest of us waited in the cab. I’d sat in the back seat, face pressed to the glass like a puppy wanting the window to be rolled down, fixated on the two men on the pavement. I wasn’t sure exactly what Zach had said, but he’d looked menacing as hell from where I was sitting.

He was defending me. He was saying what needed to be said.

I stared into his eyes as he thrust slowly in and out of me. I was so wet I could hear it. He could too. He groaned as he paused before pushing back in.

“Zach,” I whispered. He kissed me. It was tender. It was everything a girl dreamed of a kiss being, minus the lingering coppery taste of blood. I held his face in my hands and pulled away. “Zach.”

“Yes, pretty girl?”

“I love you.”

Zach froze above me. His face stretched in a wide grin that made me swoon. I giggled as he kissed the tip of my nose and then my lips. “I love you too,” he said softly.

And then there was no time for talking. He fucked me like he might not ever get the chance to again, which was ridiculous because in my mind, I knew one very simple fact: he and I were going to be together forever. He was what I had been waiting for all these years.

I just knew it like I knew my hair was red.

We moved from the kitchen to the bedroom where Zach helped himself to a condom without asking permission. He rolled it on, and I climbed up on the bed on all fours. He climbed up behind me and pushed me down flat on my stomach. He made me bend one knee and bring it up to my elbow, flat on the mattress, and he went to his knees behind me. He grinded against me, his cock moving in the most delicious way inside me.

He leaned over me and grabbed a fistful of my hair to force my head back so I was staring up at him. He watched me as he fucked me, and soon, I couldn’t keep my eyes open. My voice was hoarse as I cried out with ecstasy. My climax was powerful, and it shook me to my core.

Zach came shortly after and released my hair. I laid down on the bed to catch my breath, and he slipped away to clean up.

When he came back, he slapped my ass and fell to the mattress beside me. Then he pulled me against him, and we lay side by side, the heat of our bare skin warming us. He pulled my hair over my shoulder and rested his chin there. His light scruff tickled but in a pleasant way.

“So,” he said. “All I had to do to get you to say you loved me was to kick Brett’s ass again?”

I laughed, and he kissed my neck. “I think I’ve always loved you, Zachary Flynn.”

“Always?” he asked, leaning away so he could look me in the eyes.

I nodded. “I mean it. Even when I was too young to understand what loving someone meant, I think I loved you. And it never went away. I got better at suppressing it I guess, but after I saw you again five years ago, all bets were off. I never stopped thinking about you. Just ask Rosie. I talk about you all the damn time.”

“Then why be with Brett?” he asked.

Had anyone else asked me the question, it would have pissed me off. But it was Zach asking, and he didn’t have bad intentions. “I don’t know,” I confessed. “Maybe I didn’t think I deserved any better for what I did to you. For lying about Sam. For being afraid to just reach out and tell you what was happening and what I wanted.”

“That makes me sad,” Zach said.

“Me too. But it also makes me glad. Because at the end of the day, we found each other again. And we still have so much time ahead of us. And Brett has a broken nose right now,” I added with a laugh.

Zach laughed too and hugged me tighter. “That he does. And a broken ego on top of that.”

I rolled over to face him and nuzzled in tight to his chest. We stayed like that for a couple of minutes, and I listened to him breathe. Then I looked up at him. “Hey,” I said, getting his attention. He looked down at me. I could see how tired he was. It had been a long day. It was almost three in the morning. He’d been up early for work, partied with us at the pub, and then had to fight Brett and his goons.

But I wanted to tell him something.

“Yeah?” he asked when I didn’t say anything right away.

“I think it’s time you meet Sam.”

His eyebrows shot up with surprise, and then his whole face stretched in a brilliant smile. “Are you sure? It’s not too soon?”

“I’m sure.”

The way his eyes glittered might have been tears, but I wasn’t sure, so I didn’t say anything when he hugged me again and rested his chin on top of my head. I wrapped my arms around him and smiled into his chest.

“Now I’m fucking terrified,” he said a few minutes later.

I smiled bigger. “Good. That means you care.”