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Taya grips my bare length for one sweet, torturous moment. “I want to feel you.”

I slip inside of her, and as her inner walls clamp hungrily around my width, we groan in unison. Moving with her is like a dance, one smooth stroke after another until the sound of flesh against flesh is the only sound in the room.

I lose bits and pieces of myself with each stroke. When she clutches me close, and our bodies move as one, it’s impossible to tell where one of us ends and the other begins. It’s all sweat, tongues, skin and an ever-growing need for more. I push deep one last time, and her legs, wrapped around my waist, spasm. She bucks as my orgasm sets off her own, her muscles clenching and releasing while she rides out the waves until every drop of my cum is milked away. I hold her still so I can feel the way her walls spasm.

Our heavy breaths calm by slow degrees, and the sweat cools on our skin. It’s warm enough, luckily, that we don’t need a blanket. Skin on skin is more than enough. I pull her into my arms on the couch, and she nuzzles her body tight against mine, her eyes shut.

I mouth “happy birthday, Taya” against her shoulder and press a kiss there.

Tomorrow morning, I’ll run out and get her some flowers and balloons, maybe a small cake. God, I want to see the surprised happiness I’m hoping will light up her face.

She sighs heavily, as if fighting a losing battle against falling asleep. “I love you.”

My chest swells as if my heart just grew three sizes. A wide Grinch-sized grin plasters on my face. More than anything, I want her words to be true, not some feeling mumbled as part of a dream, because being with Taya is like finding my place in the world. I belong here, wrapped around her and growing drunk off the smell of sandalwood. I want her completely. Forever and always.

And I want to be hers.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Taya

The next morning,I awake to a wonderful, liquid feeling in my limbs and a note from Jim.

Stay in bed, birthday girl. Ran out to do a few errands but I’ll be back soon for round two.

My inner thighs clench together and tingle at the promise. Round two and if I’m lucky, round three and four later.

The world seems brighter and there’s a warmth within me that leaves me light on my feet. Peace has always been hard to come by, but my soul is quiet for the first time in my life. Love was always that thing in movies that made people sing in the rain and climb castle towers. Love was a knight in shining armor and a picket fence.

Yet, I have something better.

Something real and unconditional. Something I’m willing to fight for. I roll onto my side and a sparkle catches my eye. My engagement ring. As I study the gemstone Jim picked out, optimism buoys me into sitting up. After the day we had yesterday, I expected to be exhausted today. Instead, my body hums with newfound energy. Like speaking our truths last night had cut away the dead weight dragging me down, leaving me fresh and ready to embrace a brand-new day. A brand-new start of my life.

And the first thing I want to do with this new life? Make Lyons and Jim eat their words by cooking my husband an edible breakfast.

I slip into a comfortable pair of leggings and an old T-shirt of Jim’s, and then head downstairs. A quick perusal of “easy, quick breakfast recipes” on my phone pulls up a few likely options. I scroll until I find one that I’m convinced even I can’t screw up: microwave omelets in mugs. Yeah, okay, so I burned the microwave pancakes, but that really was a fluke. I’m pretty confident I can mix together eggs, cheese and ham in a cup, pressstart, and not cause a major explosion.

I hum while I crack the eggs, pleased when I don’t get even a single piece of shell into the mix. This is going to turn out perfect.

I tidy as I go, and by the time the mugs come out of the microwave, the kitchen is almost as spotless as when I started. I remove them and take a hopeful look inside. Yup. They look omelet-esque. Next I sniff and when that pans out, I bite the bullet and fork a tiny bit of yellow egg concoction into my mouth.

The texture is firm without being dry, flavored with the bite of sharp cheddar and the sweetness of ham.

I swallow. Holy shit. It’s actuallygood.

“Yes!” I shout to no one in particular, and then pump my fist before doing a little dance around the kitchen.

The front door opens and the grin splitting my face is probably more appropriate for someone who just won aChoppedfinal than a grown woman who cooked some eggs that don’t suck, but I don’t care. I grab a mug and a fork and hurry out of the kitchen to greet my husband as he walks in.

“Wait until you taste this, you won’t be able to make any burning-down-the-kitchen jokes any—”

The cup slips from my grasp and shatters on the floor, the loud noise drowning out my gasp. My nerves fire off as if they’ve been doused in gasoline and lit by a match, and my feet root to the spot. “Marco?”

Marco locks the door behind him. His head swivels a little too slowly, as if he’s taking in the surroundings. Then he grins—the kind that’s so wide it was more as if he wanted to eat everyone rather than say hello—causing the fine hairs along the length of my arms to rise and the temperature of the room to fall a little. “Hello, Taya.”

I take an involuntary step back and stumble slightly when something sharp pierces the skin of my heel.

“Careful, there. Looks like you got yourself a nasty cut.”

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