Page 239 of Taken Away

“Not because you’re hurting.”

“Because I’m here,” she whispered. “Because you are. Because tonight I don’t want to feel like something someone forgot to come back for.”

Something moved through his face.

Pain.

A kind of fierce tenderness.

He kissed her again, slower this time.

Aubrey rose into him, and he gathered her close, one hand at her back, the other cradling her face as if he could hold every broken piece of her without cutting himself.

When he lifted her, she wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her face against him.

He carried her down the hall without hurry.

In the bedroom, he set her on her feet beside the bed and kissed her again.

Every kiss said what he did not yet know how to say aloud.

You are here. You are wanted. You are not alone.

Aubrey touched his face.

There was still grief in him. She could feel it—not between them, but beside them.

She kissed him anyway.

And he let himself be kissed.

Let himself want.

Let himself hold a living woman in the dark and not apologize to the dead for needing warmth.

When he drew her down with him, it was not desperate.

It was careful. Tender.

His hands moved as if asking permission even after she had already given it. His mouth found her shoulder, her throat, the curve of her jaw, each kiss softer than the last until Aubrey felt cherished in places she had only ever learned to protect.

She whispered his name once.

He answered by holding her closer.

And for a while, there was no murder.

No will.

No Anne.

No Blackwood pressing its history through the walls.

There was only Bennett’s hand threaded through hers.

His breath against her hair.

Telling her he wanted her.