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“I can’t protect you, not physically. I’m not strong enough. But I can give you this. So let me. You just choose the ingredients and decide what you think looks good.”

“I thought cooking was a science.”

“Baking is. And aspects of it certainly are. But mainly, you have to do it with your heart.”

He frowned. “Bad news. My heart is singed to the point where it can no longer feel anything.”

She got up on her tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek, and he felt like he had been punched. “Liar,” she said.

“Esme,” he said.

“Don’t be grumpy. Let’s make crostini.”

He couldn’t tell her no. He couldn’t disappoint her. Being around her made his skin feel like it was on fire. What had just happened with them upstairs had been… Shouldn’t there be some kind of fallout from that? Shouldn’t she be upset with him? Instead she just seemed fine with it. With him. With everything.

Almost like she…wanted him to be as he was. And for that reason, he decided to go ahead and put toppings on the tiny bread.

It was companionable. Baking with her.

It was…nice.

It only took a few moments for them to toast in the oven, and then afterward they set up a small table in the kitchen, and she happily devoured more than half of what they had made.

“I liked it,” he said.

“Cooking?”

“Cooking with you.”

Chapter Thirteen

Adonis had shared a lot with her last night. Not just in words, but with his body. He’d given her so much.

She wanted more.

She wanted to be able to access that part of him more easily.

When she needed it. When she needed him.

It couldn’t only be through anger.

He’d told her that violence was what he understood. What he had the easiest access to. She could relate to that. Fighting with him was easier than anything else, because agitation was easier than vulnerability.

But there had to be an easier way for them to be honest with each other.

The sex had been raw, intense. Even more than anything they’d experienced before that. She was okay with it. Because she wanted him. The parts of him that were rough and hard. The parts that were challenging. The parts that were sexy, of course. She wanted the parts of him that didn’t quite know how to be a human man. She wanted all of him.

Because he was one of the most important people in the world to her. She loved him.

He had been so worried about what had happened between the two of them. So afraid that he’d been rough.

But afterward, there hadn’t been a wall up between them. And that meant more to her than anything.

After they ate, she went to bed, and he hadn’t joined her, which she found irritating, but she found him easily enough the next morning, sitting in the kitchen drinking a cup of coffee.

“Good morning, my husband,” she said.

“Good morning,” he said, looking at her warily.