Page 119 of Filthy Lies

“It’s not just that.” She shakes her head. “I’ve been so unstable since the pregnancy test. The way I went from dreading it to wanting it to mourning it… I don’t even recognize myself anymore.”

I pull her to me, tucking her head under my chin. She burrows there with a grateful sigh like it’s the exact medicine she needed.“You’ve been through hell, Rowan. We both have. You’re allowed to want things, even if they scare you. You’re allowed to grieve for things that never were.”

Her arms wind around me, holding on as if I’m the only solid thing in a world gone liquid with uncertainty.

“I want to try again,” she whispers against my throat. “For another baby, I mean. When things are more stable.”

“When things are more stable,” I agree, running my hand down the slender curve of her spine. “I promise you, we’re getting there.”

She tilts her face up to mine, and I see it there—the trust creeping back into her eyes. She used to always look at me like this before the world taught her to be wary.

I’d like to make it so that’s the only way she ever looks at me again.

“Show me,” she says, echoing her words from earlier.

But this time, there’s no challenge in them. Only invitation.

I don’t need to be asked twice.

My mouth meets hers with a hunger that’s been building since I first saw her sitting on our bed, looking lost and broken. She melts against me. A soft sound of surrender catches in her throat as my tongue pushes into her mouth.

I want to devour her. To consume her doubt and fear and replace it with the bone-deep certainty that she is mine and I am hers and nothing—nothing—will ever change that.

She moans when I lay her back on the bed. My body covers hers like a shield against all the darkness in the world.

Including the darkness in me.

“I missed you,” she breathes as I trail kisses down her throat, lingering over her pulse point where her heart thuds with growing arousal. “Even when you were right here, I missed you.”

“I know.” I tug her shirt over her head and cast it aside. “I’m here now. I’m not going anywhere.”

My hands and mouth worship her body—the curves that still carry the memory of bearing our child, the scars that tell the story of all she’s survived.

When I reach the waistband of her leggings, I glance up, seeking permission.

Sometimes, I take.

Sometimes, I ask.

This is the latter.

She nods and lifts her hips so I can peel the fabric down her legs. Her body trembles as I pepper reverent kisses along her inner thighs and work my way towards her core.

“Vince,” she gasps when my tongue finally finds her center. “Oh, God, Vince.”

I devour her, each flick of my tongue a silent promise, each press of my fingers a vow. She comes apart under my mouth, back arching, hands fisted in my hair, my name a broken stutter on her lips.

But I’m not done with her. Not by a long shot.

I shed my own clothes, never taking my eyes off her flushed face, the way she watches me with hunger that matches my own.When I finally slide inside her, we both groan at the perfection of it.

No two things have ever fit together so well.

“Mine,” I growl against her ear as I begin to move. “No matter what happens, no matter what comes for us. You’re mine, Rowan. You and Sofiya. Always.”

“Yours,” she agrees. Her nails rake down my back hard enough to leave marks. Good. I want to be marked by her. Claimed by her just as thoroughly as I claim her.

We move together with growing urgency, my thrusts becoming harder, deeper, more desperate. The slick heat of her surrounds me, pulls me deeper, urges me toward completion.

---