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“What’s wrong?” she asks.
“I can’t sleep,” I reply.
“Come here.” The soft cadence of her voice is like a siren song, and I find myself melting into the mattress, falling helplessly into her embrace. Instead of holding her in my arms like I normally do, I cover her body with my own and press my cheek against her chest. She wraps her thin arms around me.
“Thinking about your father’s case?” she asks.
“Among other things,” I reply, not mentioning my argument with Dean tonight. Or my estranged brother’s new tour schedule.
She rubs my back. “You don’t have to do anything, Caleb.”
I lift onto my elbows and stare down at her. “I know,” I reply softly, trying to breathe in her comfort. When our eyes meet, it feels as if it’s the first time we’ve stared at each other in months. “I don’t think I have it in me to defend that man.”
“Then don’t,” she whispers, touching my face.
“Deep down,” I continue, “I know that I could help him, though. I could get his charges lessened.”
She nods knowingly. “And you worry that you won’t be doing your job if you don’t help him?”
“He doesn’t deserve my help,” I add.
“I agree,” she says with a furrow in her brow.
“But when you have the power to help someone, and you don’t do it…” My voice trails as I let that thought drift off my lips.
“You are still a good man, Caleb.”
Am I?I want to ask. Am I a good man? It feels as if, down every road of my life, I’ve fucked over others for my own selfish goals. I stole Briar from another man. I drove away my brother’s friend.
For fuck’s sake, I made a wager with a man tonight over my wife, treating her like the spoils of war.
Am I truly a good man? Do I even deserve her?
Do I care?
I have what I want, and maybe I’ve gotten complacent. Somewhere along the way, I stopped appreciating what I had worked so hard to get. She is my wife. Iwonher because Ifoughtfor her.
And now I’m being challenged again. I didn’t lose her before, and I sure as fuck don’t plan to lose her now.
“Say that again,” I murmur, lowering my lips to hers.
“You’re a good man, Caleb,” she replies.
“You really believe that?” I ask as I press my mouth to hers.
She mumbles against the kiss. “Yes.”
Tugging her bottom lip between my teeth, I bite down, making her yelp in pain. After releasing it, I take her mouth in a brutal, possessive kiss. Her fingers scratch at my back as I tangle my tongue with hers, owning her mouth as my hips grind between her legs.
As I skate my teeth along her jawline, she gasps quietly. Reaching the side of her throat, I mutter, “What if I’m not, Briar? What if I’m not a good man? Would you still love me?”
“Of course,” she answers without hesitation.
“I don’t deserve you.” My lips trail lower, claiming every inch of her skin as I sink down between her breasts and over the softness of her belly.
“Yes, you do,” she replies with a hum.
When I reach her hips, I kiss a line above the hem of her panties, causing her skin to break out in goose bumps as she writhes on the bed.
