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Tears fill my eyes as my anger toward him ebbs away.
“I know,” I whisper weakly.
Taking his hand again, I lead him to the bathroom.
Leaving him in the middle of the room, I turn the shower on and pull JD’s tank from my body.
When I turn around, I find him staring at the bathtub longingly.
“Soon,” I promise him.
His dark eyes turn on me and I feel the heat in that look right between my legs.
“Good. I want a repeat of bath time at the cabin.”
Tucking his thumbs into his waistband, he lets his boxers fall down to his ankles.
“I want a repeat of almost everything that happened there,” I confess before letting my own underwear drop and stepping under the spray with him.
As gently as I can, I clean him up, letting the dirt from their escape wash down the drain while being careful of his healing cuts.
Each day they look better, but it’s going to be a while yet until he’s fully healed.
I work in silence, letting my fingers gently brush over the skin of his back, my eyes tracking the ruined and broken skin.
Suddenly, a memory slams into me and I gasp before acid swirls in my stomach.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, watching as Mav walks through the living room stiffly.
We announced our marriage to the world just over two months ago and since that day, things have been… different.
Every day I wake up with a knot in my stomach, concerned that it will be the day he tells me that he made a mistake. That he doesn’t want me here anymore and sends me back to my father.
“Nothing,” he replies without so much as looking back at me.
Maybe it was naïve of me to believe that life would continue as before once everyone knew that we were together. Even if it is fake.
He married me to protect me. Apparently, wives are off-limits, even to the highest-ranking Hawks. So now I’m his, now I’ve taken his last name, I should be safe.
But he’s also acting like he no longer wants me.
There was a stupid, fickle part of me that hoped wearing his ring and taking his name would force him to take action regarding our physical relationship.
But if anything, now I’m officially his, he’s pulling even further away from me.
It hurts. But it’s a pain I can cope with if it means I have him in my life.
My hero.
I’m not sure he’ll ever fully understand just how important he is to me, what he’s given me here. But I will forever be grateful for everything he’s done.
It’s also why I’ll hold my head high and walk out the front door without looking back if he tells me that I’m done here.
I’m achingly aware of the sacrifices he’s made by taking me in, by making me such an important part of his life.
I’d be a fool to think that it won’t ever change.
He had a life before me.
