His pupils are blown wide, nothing left but a thin ring of blue around the edges. He reaches down to where we are joined, scoops up what is ours, and traces my lip with it. I lick it clean. The salt, the musk, the raw intimacy of it makes my head spin like I'm drunk on him.
I shiver.
He pinches my chin, holds me still, then closes his mouth over mine.
The kiss is a mark. A claim. Something feral and unambiguous from this dominant man who is somehow, inexplicably, my husband. It does not ask. It does not question. It simply declares.
My belly trembles. My nipples tighten. I feel well and truly ruined in the best possible way.
Then the kiss shifts.
His mouth stays firm but grows soft at the edges. It becomes something else entirely. A kiss between lovers. One that carries the weight of intimate knowledge, of shared heat, of a history we're still writing, and a future neither of us has dared name yet.
He pulls out of me slowly.
When I feel his cum begin to slip free of me, he pushes it back inside.
The gesture is primitive. Possessive beyond reason. And it sends a bolt of raw awareness crashing through every nerve ending I have.
"Mine," he says against my mouth, and kisses me like he means to make sure I never forget it.
His possessiveness is a living thing. It curls around my throat, slides down my chest, settles hot between my legs, and grips me from the inside out, until I’m held together by nothing but the weight of his claim.
Then he rolls off and falls on his back next to me.
The cool air snakes over me. Before I can get cold, he pulls me onto his chest.
I cuddle against the sculpted planes and draw my fingers over the coordinates tattooed into his chest.
“Are those?—”
“It’s where I lost my team on that last mission. I wanted something to remember them by.”
His voice is heavy with regret.
My heart clenches in my chest. “I’m sorry.”
He nods and falls silent for a few seconds. “I got the compass and North Star because I was directionless after leaving the Marines. I needed to mark my search for my true north. The anchor and chain, seemed to signify my search for somewhere to land.”
I rub my cheek against his chest, feeling the need to comfort him.
“And this?” I touch the numbers next to the coordinates which have been tattooed over his heart. “This seems like a date.”
I read the numbers in my mind. That’s five years ago. That’s…wait a minute. I jerk my gaze to his. “Is that…the day?—“
“When we met. Yes.”
Oh my God. He inked the day we met into his skin?
“James,” I whisper.
His face softens. “I had to. You made such an impression on me.”
Emotions crowd my throat. “You… You never forgot me?”
“I couldn’t.” He half laughs. “This was my attempt at exorcising you.”
I give him a what-the-hell? look. “You tried to exorcise my memory by inking the date we met into your flesh.”
