The single word stripped every worry from the room.
I crossed to him.
Noah leaned against me before I had fully wrapped my arms around him.
One hand settled at the back of his neck. The other spread across his lower back.
His face fit beneath my jaw.
He smelled like sleep, soap, and the wool blanket from the couch.
I held him carefully at first.
Noah tightened his arm around me.
“More.”
I closed the space.
His body softened.
The pressure of the morning remained—money, contracts, deadlines—but it moved farther away. Not gone. Nothing was gone.
Simply held outside the circle of my arms for a moment.
“I needed this,” I said against his hair.
“You did?”
“Yes.”
“You looked like you were carrying the whole yard on your back.”
“I usually am.”
“That was not modest.”
“I have many flaws.”
Noah rubbed his right hand slowly over my back.
“I can’t fix the money.”
“No.”
“I can’t work all day.”
“No.”
“I can do this.”
His arm tightened.
My throat closed.
“Yes.”
We stood in the kitchen, holding each other as rain began again against the harbor windows.
