Until I have all of him.
“I love you.” He rests his forehead against mine, a satiated smile spreading on his lips before he kisses me.
“I love you,” I breathe, wriggling a little beneath him, greedy to feel the final twitches of his spent cock inside me.
“Baby,” he murmurs, easing up onto one elbow to gaze at me.
I trace over his face, admiring every perfect angle of him. Then I drop my gaze to his chest, lifting my hand to place over his heart.
I freeze.
“What’s that?”
He smiles with a smoldering passion that makes me tingle all over.
“What’s it look like?”
I run my finger over the new ink that’s been added inside the ‘B’ on his tattoo.
“It looks like you had my name and social security number tattooed on you.”
He drops his eyes to his pec. “Yeah, does look like that, doesn’t it?”
I poke him, and he lifts his glittering eyes to my face. “I’m never getting separated from you again, Jude,” he says, his voice suddenly serious. “I’m going to make sure we can always find each other, no matter what.”
My vision blurs. “I like the sound of that.”
“There’s no mistaking who my heart belongs to.” Slade’s gaze softens and he strokes my hair, his own bathed in soft light from the lone candle. It lights him up with a golden glow.
A man with a golden soul.
And this time, the only shadows are the ones behind him.
48
JUDE
“I’msorry it took so long. But you’re free now.”
Slade squeezes my hand, as Mal takes the lid off the urn and tips it. Fine dust spills out into the waiting breeze and is swept away, disappearing within moments.
Sinclair sniffs and wipes her eyes, leaning into Denver’s side. Sullivan and Sterling stand together at Mal’s side, Sterling with his hand on Mal’s shoulder as he stares out over the railings of the boat at the ocean.
It was Mal’s idea that we do this. The headstone at Slade’s grave in New York was removed when the body was exhumed. Sterling made arrangements for the body of the crew member to be cremated. And when we flew over for the wedding, he came with us, strapped into his own seat on the plane.
We still don’t know much about him, only that he asked to be paid in cash for the couple of days he was going to help on Sterling’s yacht. Whoever he was, he didn’t want anyone to know. Maybe he was hiding from something. Or maybe he was just feeling lost. Slade said something about not all lost souls being helped. But I don’t like to think of him as a lost soul. Ilike to think of him as an explorer. One who just chose to travel alone.
“God rest your soul,” Mal whispers.
Sterling squeezes his shoulder, and I let go of Slade’s hand, nodding at him. He goes to stand with his uncle, brother, and father, and I give Sinclair a small smile as I pass her and Denver, leaving them all to have this moment together.
Tate and Halliday are further back on the deck of the yacht, watching from a distance with Molly and Mattison. Tate pats the sofa, and I sink into it beside her.
“They needed this. They all did,” Tate says.
“They really did,” Halliday agrees, cradling a sleepy Mattison.
“I know,” I say.
