But then she looked at me, and I knew she felt it too. Whatever this was, we were in it together.
"So," she purred, running a finger down my chest, "how many more times do you think we can go?"
"As many as it takes."
Dawn was breaking.
The sky lightened to the color of a fading bruise, streaked with gold where the sun pushed against the horizon.
We were tangled together on the bed, her leg hooked over mine, my arm pinned beneath her neck, our skin sticky and bare. A pleasant soreness settled in my muscles, familiar but different from post-mission fatigue—no crash, just a deep satisfaction.
I couldn't name this fluttering sensation spreading through me, but it occupied every cell, every nerve ending, every breath that synchronized with hers.
This was new territory—this peace, this vulnerability with another person. Like removing a bulletproof vest I'd worn since I was a boy.
"Are you scared?" she asked, voice barely a whisper, her breath warm against my collarbone.
I thought about it. About everything I'd done, the proverbial blood on my hands, everything I'd been trained to be, and everything I could lose now that I had her.
"Sometimes," I replied honestly. "But not as much when I'm with you."
She smiled, then reached out and traced my jaw with her thumb, the pad of her finger catching on the first hint of stubble. "I can work with that."
So could I.
54 kimmy
Seve—Milo drove me to the airport.
It felt like an out-of-body experience, sitting shotgun in my Honda Accord with him behind the wheel in public. No mask, no disguise, nothing but his semi-confused face open to the world.
He steered the car with one hand and looked very cool doing it. Sunlight poured in through the windshield, so bright it looked fake. But I didn't care because I could really see him.
I studied his profile as we merged onto the freeway. The morning traffic was crap, but he handled it like he handled everything else—unblinking, almost supernaturally calm.
His hair seemed a little longer than I remembered when I first saw him, curling up a little at the nape of his neck and falling across his forehead in the most charming waves.
His jaw looked even sharper in the daylight, but he'd shaved. The scar at the corner of his mouth stood out only a little. It made him look a little less perfect, but to me, he was perfect in any way.
There wasn't much speaking.
He just drove, switching hands from time to time. I remembered him doing the same when he was in my apartment, stapling his wound. For a while I just watched his long bare fingers on the wheel, the way they flexed around the leather.
It made me wonder if I was normal. Because normal women probably didn't admire their men's fingers that much. Or maybe they did if thosefingers knew the right way to bring you to the brink of orgasm over and over.
I cleared my throat. "I didn't know you were ambidextrous."
"When I was a child, I broke my right arm and it took a while for it to heal. I had to learn how to use my left hand to be able to take care of my daily needs."
"I'm sorry to hear that."
"It's fine. It was a long time ago and I got a useful skill out of it."
"You didn't have to come with. I could always drive by myself."
He shot me a look, quick and dismissive. "It's alright."
"You sure?" I pressed. "Because you look like you're about to bite the steering wheel in half."
