Page 35 of Light on Love

“Is this my punishment?” she asks as he slams into her again. Brett lets out a gruff laugh, slapping her ass. Her fists clutch the sleeping bag below her and she’s breathless as the tension in her body uncoils.

Brett falls forward, his hands settling on either side of her, and he drops his head to rest between her shoulder blades. They stay like this until their breathing begins to even out, and only then does he lay on his back beside her, pulling her to rest on top of him. Laurel nuzzles into her favorite spot on his chest, and he slowly glides his fingers through her hair.

After a moment, Laurel breaks the peaceful silence. “That used to sound like the scariest thing in the world to me, belonging to someone,” she admits, refencing their conversation out at the fire. “My mom always wanted me to be like her, an accessory for a wealthy man. I just knew I didn’t want her life. The idea of shrinking myself down, it terrified me. But... the further I am from what was planned for me, I think you’re right. If it’s the right person, then you get to belong to each other. And that’s something else entirely. Something that would be pretty great.”

Brett tightens his arm around her and presses a kiss to her temple.“I think it would be an honor to belong to you, Laurel Montgomery,” he whispers.

20

It takes a week for Laurel to convince Brett that her ankle feels good enough to return to training. His side, she had pointed out, was a much worse injury, and he’d returned to all his normal physical labor on the ranch the next day. Brett had finally agreed with hesitation, and they had spent another week finding a new routine for themselves.

He had insisted she limit her time on the files, so she didn’t end up in the same place she was, mentally, after the attack. She insisted on more duties on the ranch to fill the freed-up time. Brett was eager to agree, handing her over to Floyd at the end of each training session in the mornings. After running through her tasks with the horses, she returns to the files until Brett comes in for dinner. Dinner they now always ate together.

They spend the evenings either on the porch or in front of the fire, and then taking care of the sexual tension that would become too much, usually building up the most during training. With each day, Laurel feels a constant pull between happiness she’s never known before, and fear that, eventually, this bubble would have to burst. The ever-present voice nagging her that the situation is temporary.

Sitting in bed with the sun starting to peek over the mountains, she examines the wound on Brett’s side in the soft morning light. There is a pink scar coming in and she runs her fingers across it lightly.“Will you have this scar forever?” she asks as he pulls her to face him, bring her up to straddle his lap.

“Maybe. A lot have healed and gone away when I thought they wouldn’t though,” he says with a shrug.

Laurel thinks about the scar from a bullet she found on his back in the shower last week, and the other one on his arm. And then there’s the series of scars along the side of his jaw. She’s torn between wanting to know what happened, and feeling sick about all Brett has put himself through. Laurel moves to trace her hand across the scars on his jaw next, pursing her lips. Brett remains unnaturally still as her fingers dance across them, a talent that comes with his deadly skills. She looks up to find him watching her, something like regret in his eyes as his jaw flexes under her touch.

“What does this look mean?” she asks, motioning towards his eyes.

Brett tightens his grasp on her hips and says, “I spent a long time focusing on how they all had wives and kids to get home to. I didn’t. And as their team lead, it was my responsibility to do whatever it took to get them back to their families. I did a lot of things that were reckless, things that were outside of the team mentality and our training. The thingsthat earned me these scars. I was lucky as hell; I’ve seen guys do everything by the book and not survive.”

Laurel runs her hand through his dark messy hair while he talks, tightness pulling at her chest from his words.“And now I just sit here and think about how dumb I was to have almost thrown away a chance at a life. I never would have imagined I’d be sitting here with a gorgeous, brilliant woman in my arms, and at my ranch. All of this would have been gone before it started.”

“You weren’t always planning to take over the ranch?”

“That’s the part you took from what I said?” he laughs. “My dad started talking about leaving it to Grey once I joined the military. I wasn’t sure what would happen. Plus, it was hard to prioritize anything over the guys looking at me for survival. It’s hard to justify taking anything for yourself.”

“But you’re not in a war zone anymore and Ray looked to you when he needed to find me help. You took on a threat for him again anyway,” she says as his fingers start massaging into her back.

Brett smiles warily, “actually, it wasn’t quite like that.”

“How so?” Laurel asks, leaning into his kneading fingers happily.

“It wasn’t for him.”

Laurel furrows her eyebrows in confusion. “Who was it for then?”

“For the first year or so, after Ray took over for me as team lead, he’d call pretty regularly for advice. He was my friend, and I had always relied on him as my number two during ops, so I was happy to help him feel confident in the role. And then one day he called me to tell me about some new profiler the captain was bringing in. He wanted my advice, asked if I’d ever heard of something like that before. He wanted to know if he should trust her. My response was something like, how the hell am I supposed to know? I told him to give her a case and find out. So, he did.”

Brett stops and smiles, giving Laurel a squeeze. “After you supplied him with that first profile, he called to tell me about it. From then on, his calls became less frequent.”

Laurel is silent, taking in the information.The first shot I was given at my job, the turning point that helped me get started, was because of Brett,her brain thinks, working frantically. He continues massaging her and she lets out a sighas his thumbs press into her lower back, the feeling causing her body to tingle. While her mind processes what Brett is saying, the need for his touch rages inside her, slowing her thoughts.

“When he did call after that, it was mostly to talk about the good advice this fierce, little blonde woman had given him, and how well the operation turned out because of her. So, by the time he called to tell me you were in danger… well, the only reason I agreed to have someone here at all, was because it was you. I needed to meet you, help you, Laurel.”

At some point, Laurel’s jaw has fallen open in response to what he’s relaying to her. His eyes are warm and patient, as he lifts a hand cup her face. “When you got here, I panicked at first,” he says, chuckling softly. “I didn’t want to freak you out with how I already knew you. And then actually having you here turned out to be so much better than I imagined. Even with the constant fear that someone will come to hurt you, even knowingwhyyou’re here.”

Laurel can feel her eyes welling up, the tightness in her chest fully constricted now. The depths of her want for this man just keep reaching further, and in this moment, she knows without any doubt that the feeling is love. She’s in love with him.

“This whole time, you said it was worth it to protect me. The threat to you and your home. Youalwaysmeant because it was me?” Her stomach flutters as she tries to sort her thoughts. “But you weren’t like this when I first got here, you seemed… unamused by my presence.”

“Yeah, that was me panicking,” Brett says, resting his hands on her hips. “I need to know what you’re thinking,” he adds nervously.

What am I thinking? I love you! I love you so much I feel like I’m going to burst, she shouts internally. Instead, though, she says, “I’m wishing I wouldn’t have had to wait a year to know you too.” Her voice is barely a whisper, still in awe of what she’slearned and how she feels. She watches as Brett’s shoulders sag with relief and then she takes his face in both hands and kisses him, desperate to ignore the nagging question of how she’s supposed to love a man when she lives on the other side of the country.

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