Chapter 24
Saoirse
The camp felt too quiet when we got back.
We moved through the motions—rechecking the perimeter, feeding Ajax from the last of our trail rations, setting the bedrolls—but it was all muted, mechanical. Like the real thing happening between us had nothing to do with these tasks at all.
Every time I glanced at Finn, I felt the aftershock of that kiss again.
It hadn’t been desperate. It hadn’t been messy. It had been… steady. Sure. The way I imagined falling should feel if you trusted the landing. I never had before, and I couldn’t quite wrap my brain around the idea that somehow—with him—I did.
I curled inside my sleeping bag, oddly relieved we hadn’t bothered with the tent as I stared up at the faint smear of clouds overhead, the gray deepening as evening slid toward full night. The trees whispered. Ajax snored softly at my feet in the space between us.
And I realized, with a hollow pang, that I wasn’t ready to let go of that feeling yet.
I wanted— needed —to be close to Finn. Not merely to have him there across the clearing. Here . Holding the pieces of me still rattling loose after everything we’d seen today.
I turned my head. He was sitting up against the base of a tree, arms folded loosely over his knees, keeping watch even now.
I hesitated for the briefest moment, and then before I could lose my nerve, I whispered, “Will you… hold me?” God, those words felt so awkward and weak on my tongue. I wished them back almost immediately.
Finn turned slowly. In the low light, his eyes looked almost silvered over.
For a heartbeat, I thought he might say no. That it might be too much. That I might be asking for something he didn’t know how to give.
But then he simply said, “Aye.”
Rough. Quiet. Certain.
He rose, crossing the small space between us, and my heart hammered harder than it had back at the compound as he shifted his bedroll beside mine. He stretched out, opening his arms without ceremony, and I shifted, slipping into his space. Into the warmth of him.
When had I started craving it? Craving him?
He tucked me in against his chest like he’d been waiting to. As if it was the most natural thing in the world. His arms came around me, and I felt something in my spine finally unclench.
I rested my cheek against his heartbeat and closed my eyes.
We didn’t speak for a long time.
The wind whispered across the clearing, carrying the clean bite of river water and pine needles. Somewhere in the distance, a wood pigeon cooed. Ajax shifted in his sleep but didn’t wake. And through it all, Finn’s hand traced slow, thoughtless patterns along my arm.
I didn’t mean to speak. Not really. But the words slipped out anyway, soft against the rough fabric of his shirt. “For someone who claims he doesn’t want to be responsible for anyone… you’re really, really bad at it.”
He huffed a sound that could’ve been a laugh—or maybe only a breath.
I tilted my head to look at him. “I mean it. You take care of everyone. Whether you want to or not.” I hesitated. “I didn’t see it before. Maybe I didn’t want to.”
His jaw tensed.
I saw the muscle jump there. Felt the way his arms tightened slightly, and I almost left it alone.
Almost.
But something about the way he held himself—this terrible, careful stillness—made me push the tiniest bit. “What happened, Finn?”
If he didn’t answer, I wouldn’t press him. But I could hold the space for him if he needed to get it out.
For a long moment, I thought he might let the silence close over the question like a wave, washing the shore clean.
Then he loosed a slow, fractured exhale. “There was someone—a woman—before the Royal Marines. Before all of this.”
I stayed still. Didn’t speak. Didn’t even breathe too loud.
“Catriona. We broke it off when I enlisted. She wasn’t made for being a military partner. We stayed friends. Close.”
He paused long enough that I could feel him gathering himself, like it physically hurt to say. Or maybe he was bracing himself for what came next.
“She got involved with someone else. Seemed good at first. But it wasn’t.”
His hand had stilled against my arm now, resting warm and heavy there.
“She called me once. Needed help getting out. I wasn’t…” A harsh swallow. “I wasn’t there fast enough. Because of deployment. Duty. All the shite that had been why we’d split.”
My heart fractured right down the middle.
“She died, Saoirse.”
Three simple words.
Quiet. Flat. Devastating.
“The arsehole went to prison. But that disnae matter.” A bitter sound. “I wasn’t there. I wasn’t enough.”
The wind stirred the trees. I could hear my own heartbeat, heavy and hurting in my ears.
“I didn’t trust myself to carry anything alive after that. Not until Ajax.”
Oh, God. My throat burned. And still, I didn’t try to fix it. Didn’t tell him he was enough. Didn’t tell him it wasn’t his fault. Because if he was going to believe any of that, he would have by now. So I merely… stayed.
I tipped up onto one elbow, brushing the side of his face with my fingers. Gentle. Deliberate. And pressed a soft kiss to his temple. A silent vow.
“You carry more than you think.” I whispered it against his skin. “And you haven’t dropped me yet.”
His breath hitched against my cheek. Barely audible. But I felt it, like the flicker of a match catching flame.
He turned his head slightly, and the stubble along his jaw scraped soft against my fingertips. I didn’t pull away. I couldn’t have if I’d wanted to.
And I didn’t want to.
Finn’s hand came up slowly, sliding through the loose strands of hair near my neck, curling there. Gentle. Anchoring. Asking.
I met his eyes in the half-light, and whatever permission he needed, he must have found it there, because when he kissed me, it wasn’t a question. It was an answer.
Everything else fell away.
It wasn’t slow for the sake of being gentle. It was slow because it meant something. Because we both needed to feel it, all of it. The warmth of his mouth, the sure touch of his hands, the way his breath shivered across my skin when I leaned in.
I pressed closer instinctively, my palm flattening over the steady beat of his heart. His mouth moved over mine with a kind of fierce patience, like he was memorizing the taste of me. As if he had all the time in the world.
And it unraveled me.
When he nudged deeper, I opened for him without hesitation. The slow slide of his tongue against mine made my whole body tighten, heat coiling low and certain. He pulled me further into his lap without breaking the kiss, cradling me like something breakable and wanted.
God, I wanted him, too. Not as a reaction. Not out of fear.
But because I was still standing. Because I could choose. And I was choosing him.
When the kiss finally broke, it wasn’t relief. It was need. Space to breathe so we didn’t drown.
His forehead touched mine, breath ragged. The press of it made something in my chest go soft.
“Tell me to stop.” His whisper was low and strained.
I caught his gaze with mine and felt the answer already rising in my throat. “Don’t you dare.”
Whatever had been holding us back snapped.
Finn kissed me again—harder this time—and guided me down onto the bedroll with maddening, devastating care. His weight settled over me, heat and muscle and the impossible calm of someone who knew exactly what he wanted and wasn’t in a rush to take it.
I reached for his shirt first, fingers clumsy with want. The fabric caught, twisted. He helped, dragging it over his head in one smooth motion, baring the planes of his chest, the long line of his body, the scatter of scars I’d tried not to look at in the stream.
Without thinking, I traced tip of my finger in a featherlight caress along the edge of a faded line across his ribs.
He shuddered, his breath hitching as he said my name in a low, quiet voice, as if it hurt and healed at the same time.
I didn’t answer out loud. Just tugged him closer.
His hands found me, sliding under my shirt with reverence that made my whole body tense and ache. His touch was searching. Careful. Not because he didn’t know what to do, but because he wanted to get it right.
When he pulled my shirt over my head, he stilled.
The air thickened. His breath caught sharp in his throat, and for a second he didn’t move.
I made myself meet his eyes. Let him see all of me.
He didn’t look away. Didn’t rush. He looked like he couldn’t believe I was real. Like he was grateful.
He lowered his mouth to my collarbone and kissed me there, soft, slow.
Another kiss followed, and another, trailing heat along the hollow of my throat, the edge of my shoulder.
Each one was like a spark struck against my skin.
Gentle, but building. Lighting me up from the inside out, until I was trembling under him with the force of it.
Wanting. Anchored. Oh, so ready.
When his hand slipped beneath the waistband of my trousers, fingertips brushing along the curve of my hip, something in me sparked hot and low. I arched into the touch without thinking, breath catching hard in my throat.
His lips grazed my skin. “Okay?”
“More than okay.” My fingers found his hair, curling there. “Please.”
He made a rough, raw sound I felt more than heard, and then he was moving, stripping away the last of what separated us with a kind of reverent urgency. Then we were bare. Skin to skin. Heat to heat. No space left between us.
He didn’t rush. He came over me like he was afraid to break the moment.
His weight, his warmth, the sheer presence of him sank into me, careful and devastating all at once.
When he finally slid into me, it wasn’t a jolt.
It was a breath stolen clean from my lungs.
My mouth parted in a gasp I couldn’t hold back.
He stilled, giving me space to catch up, brow pressed to mine, our breathing tangled and uneven.
I tightened my legs around his hips, pulling him closer, and the guttural, helpless sound he made lit something deep and dangerous in me.
He began to move. Slowly. Deliberately. Each roll of his hips sent sensation coiling higher, stealing thought, stealing time.
My world narrowed to this: the rhythm, the burn, the beautiful weight of him.
The way he held back like he was trying not to fall apart too soon.
The way he kissed me like he didn’t want to miss a second.
Then he froze. Breath sharp, body braced. “I didn’t bring anything,” he rasped. “Should’ve?—”
I cupped his jaw, grounding him. “I’m on birth control. And I’m clean. Last test was in the fall. There hasn’t been anyone since.”
His throat worked hard. “Me too. I swear.”
The relief that passed between us was almost physical. It shifted something in the air—thicker, heavier, closer.
He kissed me again, deeper this time. Rougher. Like nothing else mattered. When he moved, I met him for that slow, inevitable climb. Every inch of him dragging pleasure tighter and higher inside me until it ached. Until it trembled at the cusp.
I clung to him. To the heat of his body, to the wild, restrained strength of him. He held me like he was trying to memorize every part of me, touched me like he’d never forget.
There was no edge, no ending. Only the glorious pressure that built and built, until it finally shattered.
I broke with a sob into his mouth, everything inside me catching flame and then fracturing into something soft and wide open.
He followed not long after, his body seizing against mine, a sound I’d never forget rough in his throat as he buried his face in my shoulder and let go.
We didn’t move. Still tangled, skin warm against skin, breath slowing by degrees. I reveled in the soft thrum of being held. Being here.
His hand moved in slow circles over my hip, not even thinking about it. Like the rhythm had always been there, waiting.
And for the first time in forever, I didn’t want to move either.
Didn’t want to let go.