Page 111 of Caught Looking

“I appreciate everything you’ve done, Janet. The entire team.”

She gave me a nod, squeezed Seth’s shoulder, and then left.

“We’ll give you two some space,” Willa whispered as she joined Olivia, Chris, and Everett in the next car that arrived, leaving us alone.

I watched as Seth paced off the rest of his nerves, giving him space to calm down. When I saw his shoulders finally ease away from his ears I stood up and went to him. I wrapped my arms around his waist and pressed my cheek to his chest—right over his rapidly beating heart. “It’s over.”

He squeezed me tight and let out a ragged sigh. “Is it? Really? It still feels like another shoe is waiting to drop.”

I kept going over the facts. Owen was in jail. The bomb was gone.We are free.It was like I’d been in protection mode for so long my body couldn't calm down until my mind was absolutely sure. “There aren’t any more shoes. Owen was the problem. Owen is gone.”

Owen is gone.Another hundred pounds of stress lifted off my shoulders.

Seth’s hands slid up my spine, then his hands found my face. “Owen is gone.” There was still so much worry, so much fear in his soft brown eyes.

I would do just about anything to never see him like this again. Making Seth happy, giving him pleasure, brought me endless joy. It was two sides of the same passionate coin. We both felt so much, so deeply. I loved him loudly. With my whole being. And what made us so perfect for each other was that Seth operated exactly the same way. It was impossible to love that freely without feeling pain and sadness just as deeply. And while that may have caused us a lot of pain over the last couple of months, it also gave us the greatest gift of all. “You want to know something good?”

“Absolutely.”

I smiled up at this gorgeous man that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. “You’re only this worked up because you love me.”

He relaxed. “I love you so fucking much, Annalise.”

“Some couples need months or even years to truly understand what they mean to each other. Owen gave us two gifts.” I wanted to see the good in this situation because it outweighed the bad by so much. “He got us together and he proved to us how much we love each other. We’ve been in a crucible but we survived. Now we just get to love each other.”

I got the smile I craved. Seth grinned down at me, all that worry finally vanishing. “Now we just get to love each other.” He kissed me soft and sweet, then hard and deep. “And I’m going to love the fuck out of you, Annalise Ryan. I’m going to love you so hard.”

My heart took off at a gallop because as much as I loved soccer, loved the life I built, it was missing one integral piece. A partner to live and love hard with.

Now we had each other.

31

SETH

The sale on the mansion was complete and the former Marcus Mayfield house was now the Butler-Ryan home. It was plenty big enough and we had everything we could possibly want. Annalise even transformed the guest room beside the gym into a yoga studio, complete with mood lighting and scented humidifiers. But because I had stupid amounts of money and wanted to buy something for us too, I made one more special purchase.

“Is a blindfold really necessary?”

“It’s fun.” I had my hands on her hips as I steered her into the elevator.

“Your definition of fun is different from mine,” she grumbled. She wore a floor-length gold dress and high heels because we’d just come from a fancy fundraiser held by Kristin Holt and Travis Brantley. I had on a tux that had earned me a very unexpected blowjob in one of the private bathrooms. I was pretty sure I had a pink ring around my cock from her lipstick.

But then again, I’d lifted her skirt and had dessert before we ever left the house.

Owen Montgomery put us through hell but in the end he didn’t matter. He might have been the catalyst that brought us together but we never thought about him unless the lawyers called. I planned to ignore him for the rest of my life.

The elevator dinged and the doors slid open. Once they closed I pulled the blindfold away. “Tah-dah!”

She stood absolutely still. “It’s…a door?”

“Not just any door.Ourdoor.”

She shot me a very confused look.

“Our home is where we’ll live together. Where we’ll entertain guests and have visitors. I decided we needed to add one more property to our portfolio.”

Her confusion multiplied. “You bought a new condo?” Once the mansion was ours we rented out my old condo and her house to teammates who needed places to live.

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