Chapter Twenty-Nine #4
I feel his.
Because he’s losing it behind me. His hands are shaking. He’s breathing hard. His thrusts are haphazard. No to mention, he tells me. He says I’m beautiful. That I’m the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. He calls me gorgeous, stunning, breathtaking.
He calls me his wife.
Somehow, it makes him go first. Calling me his wife or maybe it’s the fact that my ass is just that tight. Whatever it is, he’s the first to come and growl, “Motherfuck.”
His dick throbs inside of me, lashing out cum, all hot and thick.
Which is what makes me go over, and I come.
I come so much, writhing and twisting, shaking, that my arms give out.
But he catches me. He gently detaches himself from me and cradles me in his arms. He places soft kisses on my face before shedding his shirt and draping it over me.
I’m thankful for it because once the heat of the moment is over, I don’t want anyone to see me but my husband. So when he kicks that asshole in his stomach hard enough to make him grunt before he carries me out of the cabin, I don’t mind. I nuzzle my nose in his sweet-smelling throat and smile.
He takes me to Rebel and puts me up on the saddle before climbing on himself. I’m settled against him as we take off at a slow gait when I remember something. “I saw you.”
His bare chest moves up and down with his breaths as he grunts, “Saw me where?”
I look up. “Through the kitchen window. With that cop.”
The moonlight hits him just then, revealing his clenched jaw. “You don’t need to worry about it.”
“It was the Turners, right? They sent him.”
“Told you, you don’t need to worry about it.”
“But Arsen, they’re not going to stop. Especially now that they know what you’re planning and—”
“They don’t know what I’m plannin’.”
My heart clenches in fear. He’s right. They don’t know.
No one else does; only him. He has been lying to everyone except me.
Although that’s not much consolation given he won’t tell me anything more.
And for the hundredth time since yesterday when he told Peyton and me about what he wants us to do, I think about finding a way to make him stop.
Only I can’t even imagine a way where he’ll give up taking revenge for the death of his ex-girlfriend.
“I think we need new rules,” I blurt out.
“Rules.”
“About the whole marriage thing.”
He at last looks down at me. “You mean where you don’t think it’s over just because I don’t show up all day.”
I frown. “Hey, it was a valid concern. It’s not as if you tell me things.”
His arm around my belly flexes. “What are the new rules?”
“We need to have at least one meal together during the day.”
“Dinner,” he suggests immediately, as if it was sitting on the tip of his tongue.
And I melt a little. “Where we talk.”
His chest moves with another breath, which I think is his way of agreeing to it. “What else?”
I breathe out, too, feeling slightly better. “And you’ll… keep me informed.”
His brow furrows. “Of what?”
“Of things. Of your day. Like if you’re okay. If you can’t make it to lunch, things like that.”
“Why?”
“So I don’t worry about you.” Before he can say anything, I go, “And don’t you dare not tell me to worry about you because I will and also because I will punch you in the face.”
His eyes circle around my features before he asks, “Is that a wife thing?”
“Worrying about her husband? Yes. You wanted a wife, didn’t you? Well, you got one.”
“Yeah,” he rasps, his gaze still studying my features, his arm flexing around my belly. “I got one.”
I refuse to let my heart race at his warm tone. “So? You’ll do it?”
“How do I do it?”
“Um, use a phone.”
“Don’t got a phone.”
“What?”
“Threw it away the moment we came back to the ranch.”
“You threw away your cell phone? Why?”
“Don’t need it.”
I look at him like he’s lost his mind. “You do need it. Everyone needs a cell phone.” Then, “People had cell phones eight years ago too, Arsen. You know that, right?”
His chest moves with a sharp, short breath. “Didn’t like it back then. Like it even less now.”
“But—”
“Makes the world feel more crowded.” He swallows. “Suffocatin’.”
My heart clenches then. It’s his PTSD, isn’t it. God, why won’t he just listen to me and do everything I tell him to do? His life would be so much easier. Then I wonder if all wives think that about their husbands.
I shake all these thoughts away and reach up to cup his jaw.
“Okay, this is what we’re going to do: You’re going to get another cell phone but you’ll only use it to call either Haven or Axton to let them know that you’re okay.
So they can let me know that you’re okay.
Just those two numbers. And the rest of the time, you’ll keep your phone switched off so no one can bother you.
Does that make sense? Can we do that at least? ”
“We,” he murmurs mysteriously.
“What?”
“You said we.”
“Um, okay. So?”
He looks at me a beat longer before replying, “Nothin’.”
I press my fingers to his jaw to get back his attention. “The world won’t feel so crowded then, right? With just you and me.”
His eyes bore into mine. “No.”
“So you’ll do it?”
“Yeah.”
Smiling, I reach up and kiss him. My intention is a small peck, but he grabs the side of my face and prolongs it, and it turns into long moments of bliss, all my worries and angst forgotten. At least for now.
Once we break, he growls against my mouth, “Same bed.”
I blink up at him, all dazed-like. “What?”
“We sleep in the same bed,” he declares. “Every night.”
I smile again and tuck my face in his neck, closing my eyes. “Okay.”
Several moments pass with us riding at a sedate pace when I blurt out, “Oh and I want two letters. Tomorrow. Because you forgot to write me one today.”
His response is to squeeze his arm around my belly and let me sleep.
Which I don’t wonder about. Not until he’s putting me down in his bed and I blink my eyes open do I realize he’s brought me to that barn again.
The one we had sex in the first time. I’m watching him go around the space, close windows, and divest himself of his clothes when I spy something on the pillow. A piece of paper.
My heart jumps in my chest when I realize what it could be. I reach out for it, and I’m right. It’s a letter. With one true thing. That he didn’t forget to write me this morning.
To my wife,
Last night was the first time since I got out that I was able to sleep without nightmares. And when I woke up the first light of the sun spun your skin into gold and I remembered why dawn used to be my favorite part of the day.
Your husband
PS: I know you wanted me to start and end the letter differently but nothing felt right or true except calling you my wife and me your husband.