“Are you sure you should be moving so much?” I don’t mean to sound like a nervous mother hen, but it’s only five days after a bear tried to gnaw off the man’s shoulder and he’s doing calisthenics. He only uses one hand for the jumping jacks and squat jumps, and I guess technically sit ups don’t directly involve his bad shoulder, but it just looks wrong.

“Got to move after surgery.” He grunts, barely sweating as he does, like, number three thousand. Stopping for a swig of water, he elaborates. “Surgeon once told me he had a 90-year-old nun who shattered her wrist. She was in a cast for three months. When it came off, she had full mobility and no atrophy. Guess why?”

I shake my head, marveling over not only the story, but the way Knox is chatting. He’s been this way since waking up post-surgery. As if before he’d been all tied up, but now something deep within has loosened. Before, the man had taken “strong and silent type” to the next level. He’d still melted my panties off, but also frustrated the hell out of me. Now? Each affectionate grin, each story he shares, the way he reaches out to touch the small of my back, looking at me with such gratitude and devotion, I’m having a hard time not just dissolving into a puddle.

Especially with his shirt off. He’s barely put one on since that bear ate one right off of him. Maybe he figures it’s easier that way, since we can keep an eye on his injuries, making sure there’s not bleeding or worse through the gauze.

“Knitting,” Knox divulges with a grin.

“What?” With all those muscles on display, pecs and abs and biceps, I’ve honestly forgotten what we were talking about.

“The nun, she knit every day, all day. So her wrist healed like a 19-year-old.”

Now he’s doing one-arm push ups like it’s no big deal. Next thing you know he’s going to tell me to sit on his back for added resistance. I’d probably do it just so I could cop a feel.

Because another thing that’s changed since he’s woken up? He hasn’t tried to touch me. Sure, he’s reached out and given me a reassuring pat on the head or a hug to his side, like I’m his sister or an aunt who nursed him back to health. That’s it. It’s driving me crazy.

Call me fickle, maybe insane. I’ve gone from fearing he’ll touch me to craving it so fast I’ve got whiplash. If he just put on his damn shirt, or if there were anywhere else to go but this tiny cabin, or even if there were typical distractions—TV, Internet, ANYTHING—it might be easier to think about things other than the mind-bending orgasms he’s given me. Or what he told me he was going to do to me next. And how much I want exactly that.

“You could join me.” He looks up with that lopsided grin that makes my head spin. Now he’s progressed to burpees, which he’s somehow able to do over and over without getting winded. He may have left the SEALs, but he hasn’t stopped the training.

“I’m good, thanks.” The four-block walk to and from my apartment, the occasional yoga class my roommates talked me into, that was about it for me and exercise.

“You look like you could stand to burn off some energy.” He has a teasing look in his eyes. Can he tell how I’m burning up with lust? I (mostly) kept it in check while the man was on death’s door, shirtless and sweaty with fever. I said mostly. The man was mouthwatering. “You’re pacing across the floor.”

“There’s nowhere to go!” I gesture around the tiny cabin in exasperation. Snow’s piled all around our home. It’s not as if a plow has come along to create a nice, flat path for a refreshing outdoors walk.

“You getting stir-crazy?” He stands, concern in his eyes. Glistening with sweat, a bead moves slow, right between his pecs. I could trace it down, past his belly button, right where he’s got the start of some hair by his waistband. Such flat, hard abs. “Where would you like to be right now? If you could be anywhere?”

In your arms. The thought forms, but I filter it out before it escapes my lips. “I don’t know, I guess a beach. Somewhere sunny and pretty.”

“Would you have on a bikini?” He reaches out and fingers the bottom of my T-shirt. As always, my breasts are on hyper-alert around him, my nipples going hard without even direct touch. My whole body is quivering for him and it’s damn embarrassing.

“I guess.” I don’t meet his eyes, wanting but afraid to show him how much. This is all so much more than I’ve ever felt before, more than I’ve ever experienced.

“I’d like to see that.” But instead of taking me into his arms, he folds my hand in his. Old buddy, old pal. “Come here, I need help with something.” He leads me into the bathroom. “I’ve been using a washcloth the past couple of days, but I think I’m ready for a shower.”

What’s he doing? Is he dropping his sweatpants? And he’s been going commando? I have to look away. I’m only human.

I hear the sound of the shower turning on.

“Do you think you can help me? Keep an eye on my shoulder and back, make sure everything looks OK while I get clean?”

“Sure,” I grit out. I guess I’ll help him, but this seems excessive. And where has all his heat gone? Doesn’t he—?

His lips are on mine before I can form another thought, kissing me hungry and demanding. My hands fly up, arms around his neck in a heartbeat as I press my body to his. He feels so good, his skin hot in my hands, his muscles corded and strong and—I’m touching his bandage.

“I’m so sorry!” I try to pull away. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You’re not going anywhere,” he growls, pulling me even closer.

“But, don’t you want me to keep an eye on you while you shower?”

“I’m messing with you, Olivia. I’m just trying to get you naked in the shower with me.”

“Oh.” A smile curves at the edges of my mouth. “You are?”

He nods, serious, as if confessing. “I am.”

“But that’s so… playful.” I’m at a loss for words, trying to describe the shift I see in him. “Before the accident you just—”

“Grabbed you and finger-fucked your ass?” He fills in the blank and I wince at the crude yet accurate description. And I blush, remembering how I’d loved every second of it. “I figure I’ve done enough taking without asking. I’ve been trying to go easy on you, let you come to me for a change.”

Relief floods me, making me smile and press myself against him again, kissing his neck. He tastes salty and masculine and if he waits even another ten seconds before kissing me again I’m going to have a heart attack. “You want me to come to you?” I whisper, reaching down and taking his cock in my palm. It’s long and hard, so impossibly large and throbbing. I give it a slow pull, enjoying how I’m starting to learn his body, the thrill of his response.

A low, hungry rumble sounds in his chest, as if the beast he’s been tamping down is waking. He scoops me up, despite my cry to watch out for his shoulder, and I forget anything but his body once we’re under the warm wetness of the shower. He sucks me through my shirt, then peels it off, feasting on my breasts like a starving man.

He pulls off my panties and sweatpants, and then his fingers are between my thighs and all I can do is sigh and revel in how good he makes me feel. He searches and discovers, up against my most sensitive spot, probing and demanding. I’d started in charge, reaching for him, but now all I can do is cling on, swept away in his assault.

“Need to feel you cum,” he grunts, plunging his fingers up deep inside my slick channel, his thumb against my clit.

“Knox!” My head tilted back, I surrender, letting it engulf me, the yearning, burning need I’ve had building inside me for days. I quiver and scream out, cumming for him quick and intense just like he wants.

“That’s it. So beautiful.” He keeps a rhythm in me, coaxing out wave after wave, leaving me breathless and flushed. I lean against his rock-hard chest, the water beating down against my back. “I thought you didn’t want me anymore.”

“You thought I didn’t want you?” He palms his thick cock. I’m mesmerized by the sight of it, dark red, engorged and so ready.

“Knox, I want…” After years of no, asking for it comes slowly to me, but the avalanche of need rumbling within pushes me onward. “I want to have sex.”

His muscles stiffen, tight. “Are you sure? I want this to be your decision.”

I smile, this big, gruff SEAL with his tender concern for my consent. He’d wrung it so easily out of me before, making me beg in the same breath as I’d protested. But it meant a lot to me that now he waited, giving me space.

I look up into his eyes so he can see my sincerity and nod, “Yes, I’m sure.”

He wastes no time turning off the water and handing me a towel.

“We could…in the shower.” I miss the heat of the water and don’t want to wait any longer.

But he shakes his head. “It’s your first time. I don’t want to hurt you any more than it’s going to. I’m so much bigger than you. But don’t worry.” He bends down and grazes my bottom lip with the pad of his thumb, then captures me in a deep kiss. Sweeping a hand along my cheek, breathing hard, he breaks off and makes a promise. “After this, I’ll fuck you hard against the wall in the shower as many times as you want.”

It sends a thrill through me to want, even need that feeling of raw possession. For now, though, he towels me off gently, thoroughly.

“I thought I was supposed to be helping you,” I tease, seeming to be the only one still aware of his serious injuries.

“I’m fine.” As if to prove it, he picks me up as if I weigh nothing and carries me over to the bed. He lays me out and gazes at me as if I’m the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen. “You blow me away, Olivia.”

I think to respond, telling him I feel the same way, but then he’s kissing me, hot and worshipping, all over my skin. Each curve and dip of my body, the swell of my breasts, the indentation of my waist, the sway of my hips seem to fascinate him as he licks and tastes, palms and strokes until I’m panting and nearly desperate. Has he forgotten what we’re here to do? No more foreplay.

Reaching out, I grasp his cock and he groans, his neck corded, the veins in his arms standing out.

“Please,” I whisper, looking up into his eyes, stroking his length. “I need you.”

“You have no idea.” He reaches over to the bedside table, takes out a condom and rolls it down his length. Then he parts my thighs, easing his weight down between us. “Tell me if you need me to stop or slow down. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Knox!” I grab his hips and tilt toward him. Finally, his tip is at my entrance, slick and welcoming for him.

“Ah, fuck.” He closes his eyes as if he’s hurt as he eases in the tip.

“What? Are you OK?” Is it his shoulder?

“You feel so fucking good. So tight, so wet.”

I close my eyes, surrendering to the sensation as he pushes in, stretching me so wide I’m shocked he can fit. It feels tight but so good. I adjust my legs wider still, wanting all of him.

He stops and I can feel him, pushing up against my barrier. I tense, knowing this next part is going to hurt. “Just breathe.” I let out a full exhale and it’s over with a sharp pinch. Then he’s inside, really inside me, filling me in a way I never knew possible. My mouth opens in a gasp as I clutch on to him, overwhelmed.

Now it’s his turn to ask, “You all right?”

“It’s… you’re…!” I pant, inarticulate as a deep, aching desire rolls through my body.

“I got you. Let me make you feel good, baby.” He props himself up with his uninjured arm, cradles the other under my ass and starts to move. The earth moves with him. I close my eyes and feel his thickness, the way he plunges, the momentum as he starts to go faster, sparking a fire within my core. Words are tumbling out of my mouth, pleading for more, telling him yes as I claw at him, sweaty, trembling. An orgasm is building in me, more slowly than ever before but somehow throughout my whole body, as if every cell has come alive and is singing to his touch.

“So. Good.” He’s panting now, too, the man who doesn’t break a sweat at 100 burpees, punctuating his words with thrusts. There’s an animalistic ferocity to it, this claiming, mating, and I want all of it, his scent, his sweat, his grunts and groans. I want his cum all over me, inside me.

“Fuck me, Knox.” A deep moan escapes me as I cling on, feeling him drive into me harder, deeper.

“Yes,” he groans, starting to play with my clit, rolling it in rhythm with his thrusts. “Cum for me, baby. Cum on my cock.”

So filled and owned, I tear at the sheets, writhing beneath him, bucking into his cock until he’s buried all the way to the hilt. And I cum on his cock, so hard my eyes roll back in my head and I nearly black out.

“That’s it!” He thrusts again, driving into me, tensing, until the explosion rips through him. Plunging into me, he lets himself go and it pushes me to climax again, that feeling of both of us coming undone together, limbs intertwined, twisting and tumbling into feeling so damn good.

Panting, nearly disoriented, I lie by his side, unsure what’s happened, exactly, unable to put anything into words. It’s like he’s shared a whole new side of him, and introduced me to a whole side of myself I never even knew existed. I never want to leave him, never even want to leave this bed.

I think I love him.