Page 97 of Pocket Wife

I rise over her, and she spreads for me, her thighs falling open in welcome. I position myself at her entrance and pause, looking down at her.

“You are certain?”

“Rethan, if you do not⁠—”

I press into her.

Her words break into a cry, and I cover her mouth with mine, swallowing the sound. The bond blazes between us, pleasure feeding pleasure until I cannot tell where my body ends and hers begins. She wraps her legs around my hips and pulls me deeper, her nails raking my shoulders.

“Yes,” she breathes. “Yes, Rethan⁠—”

I move with her, the rhythm building, and she meets every thrust. The alcove fills with our breath, the creak of wood beneath us, the soft sounds she makes against my skin. I kiss the bruise on her ribs, the scrape on her shoulder, the edge of her lips.

“Look at me,” she says.

I do.

“You are mine,” she says. “Do you understand? Not the Authority’s. Not Helix’s. Mine.”

The possessive heat in her voice undoes me.

“Yes,” I say. “Yours.”

“Say it again.”

“Yours. Only yours. Always yours.”

She pulls my mouth to hers, and I move deeper, and the bond tightens like a wire pulled taut. Her pleasure becomes mine. My need becomes hers. We move together, the old platform creaking, the dusk light fading, the world outside shrinking until nothing exists but her breath and my name on her lips.

She shatters first, her release a wave that pulls me under with her. I follow a breath later, spilling into her on a low, broken sound I feel in my ribs. Our hands find each other, fingers threading together as the last of it ebbs through us both.

Neither of us stirs.

The irrigation tower holds us in quiet darkness. Outside, the first stars appear beyond the small window. Somewhere distant, a pump hums to life.

Lucy lets her head fall against my shoulder, laughing.

It is not a happy laugh. It is the sound of a woman who has carried too much and found a place to set it down.

“Rethan,” she says.

“Yes.”

“We can win this.”

I press my lips to her forehead. “Yes.”

She lifts her head to look at me. “And then we are going to figure out what comes next.”

I kiss her mouth, soft and slow. “Together.”

“Together.”

She rises reluctantly, pulling on her clothes with the same slow care I used to take them off. I dress beside her, our shoulders touching, our breath still finding rhythm.

When we climb down from the alcove, the night has fully fallen. The cistern field lies quiet beyond the ridge. The witnesses have gone to rest.

Lucy takes my hand.