17
Kate
England
August 1944
“Read it again,”I said, my eyes closed against the hot afternoon sun, the skirt of my yellow flowered dress hitched up midthigh as I worked on my tan.
William tugged a lock of my hair.
“Bossy,” he said, and I laughed and shielded my eyes from the light as I looked up at him.
“Please?”
“As if I could resist you.” His eyes swept down my body and something inside me squeezed sweet and low.
I rolled over onto my stomach, propping my chin on my hands, and he sighed, setting down the book of poetry he’d found earlier that morning when we’d poked around a bookshop that had become one of our favorite stops in a nearby town.
“How can I read when you’re looking at me like that?” he asked, stretching out beside me and tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.
I leaned forward, closing my eyes as his warm hand cupped my face, his lips finding mine. He rolled me gently onto my back, his injured leg, nearly completely healed now, intertwining with mine as my free hand made its way slowly up his arm, pausing to brush my fingers over where a bullet had pierced his skin, and then to his shoulder before digging into his hair and pulling him closer.
He swore softly against my lips, pulling away and staring down at me.
“Shall we go back?” he asked.
He’d rented a room in a small hotel in the neighboring town. We’d gone a half-dozen times, the woman at the front desk giving us empathetic smiles whenever we checked in and then out the next morning, always at an ungodly hour because of my work schedule.
I leaned down and pulled my dress up an inch, looking at my tan line.
“Not yet,” I said, and he laughed and rolled onto his back.
I could care less about my tan, what I really wanted was this moment. How many more of them would we get? I couldn’t bear the thought. I wasn’t sure what spell William Mitchell had put over me, but for once in my life I didn’t want to overthink it. I just wanted to be in it. Fully. Immersed in him and us. Never wanting to come up for air.
“Shall I read more then?”
“Yes, please,” I said, plucking three blades of grass and carefully knotting one end before proceeding to braid them.
His voice was low and husky as he read again a poem about a rekindled love, found the first time by chance, the second by happy accident.
“And I shall love you,” he read. “Forever. For always. Forevermore.”
There was silence as the words floated around us.
“Forevermore,” he said again, his voice a whisper.
I stared across the blanket into his denim-blue eyes. I had never had a sense of home before. The one I was born into I’d been made to feel unwelcome in. The one I’d shared with my aunt and uncle, while cozy and warm and accepting, had never felt quite like mine. Despite their efforts...their love and encouragement to make the space mine as well, I’d always felt a bit like a guest. And then there were the barracks I’d found myself in. Fun in ways, but certainly not home.
But William...he had no roof to shelter me. No four walls to ward off the elements. No floor, no door, no window. Yet being with him felt like home. He was home. My home. The only place I’d ever felt I’d belonged.
I smiled at him.
“Forevermore,” I whispered, and then handed him the braided strands of grass, which he plucked from my fingertips, put it in the book to mark where he’d left off, and jumped to his feet.
“I can wait no longer,” he said, holding out a hand, his other on his heart. “I must make you mine, milady.”
I rolled my eyes and shook my head.
