Chapter 22
After a long, hot shower, I let Brickhouse in and collapsed into bed. The second my head hit the pillow, I fell into dreams. Sleep dragged me under so hard it felt like I’d been hit by a tranquilizer dart.
At some point before dawn, the mattress dipped.
Aiden’s familiar weight and warmth pressed against me as he shoved Brickhouse off my feet.
The dog gave a sleepy grunt and wandered to his bed in the other room.
Aiden slid in beside me, his arm heavy around my waist, his body a solid wall of heat.
I sank against him without waking fully.
Hours later, he stirred again, stretching out over me. His hand slid up, fingers threading through my hair, sweeping it away from my face. I blinked my eyes open to find him watching me. His blue eyes were vivid in the early light. He dipped his head and brushed his lips beneath my jaw.
“Why do you taste like…” He trailed off, licking his lips. “Chicken breading?”
I groaned softly. “I must have missed a spot.”
His chin rested against mine, his breath warm. Seconds ticked by as he obviously thought through scenarios. “Did anybody get hurt?”
“No.” My arms slid up around his shoulders, my nails grazing over the muscle there.
“Did anybody get arrested?”
“Thankfully, no.” I smiled up at him. “It was close, but no arrests.”
He studied me. “Anybody I need to beat the hell out of?”
I laughed quietly. “Nope. Everyone’s fine.”
He nodded once, apparently satisfied. “Then we’re good.”
“Yep. We’re good.” I wasn’t about to tell him about the flour explosion, Zippy’s tantrum, or the photos in the morning paper. That could wait. Right now, his body felt warm and solid, and the weight of him pressed into me in all the right ways.
“I missed you last night,” he said, his voice rough.
A slow smile curved my mouth, heat unfurling through me. “You were gone for less than a day.”
“I know.” He kissed me softly, his lips lingering. His fingers threaded through my hair, pulling it away from my face with an erotic bite. “Life’s smoother when you’re in it.”
“Smoother?” I whispered, my heart doing an odd little stutter.
“Yeah. The rough edges calm down.”
I wasn’t entirely sure what he meant, but the words made something warm deep in my chest. That faint Irish lilt in his voice softened the edges of everything. I bit back a grin, not wanting to ruin the moment by giggling like a teenager.
“Did you check out the warehouse that exploded?” I asked, trying to focus.
“We did,” he murmured, his nose brushing mine. His hand slid lower, tracing down my side. The touch sent a spark straight through me, quick and bright.
“You’re back faster than I expected,” I said, breath catching.
“There wasn’t much to do.”
I frowned. Even when his words were soft, there was a tension beneath them, a coiled thread that hadn’t been there before. “What’s going on?”
He met my gaze for a long moment. “I leave Monday.”
My heart tightened. “Undercover?”
“Yeah.”
I looked up at him, memorizing the lines of his face, the faint shadow of stubble, the way his eyes softened when he looked at me. The air in the room felt still, the only sound our breathing.
“Where to?” I asked finally.
He hesitated. “You know I can’t say.”
“Yeah,” I murmured. My throat felt dry. “I know.”
He leaned down again, brushing a kiss across my lips, and for a moment, all the questions, all the worry, all the chaos of the last few days disappeared. There was only the warmth of his skin, the solid weight of him, and the silent promise that he’d come back.
Whenever Aiden went undercover, he didn’t play the cop. He played the criminal. A guy with the gun, the temper, and the kind of past that didn’t get forgiven. And every time he went deep, he walked a line so thin it made my stomach hurt just thinking about it.
“How long will you be gone?” I asked, keeping my voice steady.
“There’s no way to know,” he said quietly. “It’ll take a while to infiltrate.”
He didn’t say the rest. He didn’t need to. Deep cover meant no calls, no texts, no messages slipped through back channels. It meant radio silence, like he’d fallen off the edge of the world.
I reached up and threaded my fingers through his thick, dark hair, holding on to something real while I still could. “I’ll miss you.”
“Ditto.” His eyes darkened to a shade that lived somewhere between blue and midnight. The color didn’t have a name. “Anna—”
“No,” I said softly, shaking my head before he could finish the thought I saw flicker behind his eyes.
He didn’t answer, but I knew what was there. Every once in a while, when life piled up and his job demanded too much, he thought about ending it. About walking away from us. About taking the easy way out.
But it was too late for that. For both of us.
“I was just—” he murmured.
“Absolutely not,” I said firmly. “You don’t get to check out when things get hard.”
His jaw tightened, but he nodded once.
“I’ve always accepted your job,” I said, my fingers still tangled in his hair. “And you’ve accepted mine. So we’re even.”
Sure, mine wasn’t supposed to be dangerous, but that hadn’t exactly worked out so far.
I’d been shot at, chased, nearly blown up, and had my share of bruises to show for it.
“I know it’s difficult,” I said. “But remember who you are. Remember that you have me to come home to, and you’ll make it through. ”
He pressed his forehead to mine. “You’re tougher than you look.”
“I’m exactly as tough as I look,” I said. “And smarter.”
That got a faint smile. It didn’t reach his eyes.
I could have asked why it had to be him.
Why not Saber or one of the others on his task force?
Why Aiden, who had already given enough blood and time to the job to fill a book?
But I didn’t ask. It was his decision, his mission.
The man lived by the job, and no matter how much I hated it, I had to respect it.
“Any news on your cases here?” I asked, partly to change the subject, partly to keep him grounded in something normal. “Specifically, the dynamite case.”
He shook his head. “Nothing yet. The lab back east is at least a week out on the dynamite. The Washington State lab’s the same with the prints and DNA from your grandmother’s shop. Could be two weeks before we get anything.”
“So we’re stuck,” I said.
“For now,” he agreed. His voice was calm, but there was frustration under it. Aiden hated waiting. Hated being powerless more than anything.
So I tried to keep him grounded. “Will you still follow the case from wherever you are?”
“I will,” he said. Then he looked at me, eyes steady and too clear. “But I need to know you’re really okay with this.”
I swallowed hard. No. I wasn’t okay with it. I hated that he kept putting himself in danger, and I hated that he might not come home. “Of course,” I said. “I trust you’ll make it home.”
He leaned down, his lips ghosting over mine.
Then I kissed him because there were no words that could fix what was coming, no promises that could make the time apart easier. There was only this. The warmth, the weight, the heartbeat under my hands. The reminder that he was still here, for now.
His control snapped, and I felt the shift like a live wire in the air between us.
He took over the kiss, deepening it until my pulse thudded in my ears.
His hand tightened in my hair, anchoring me to him, his mouth commanding and certain.
The world narrowed to his breath, his taste, the heat building between us.
I matched him, hungry and reckless, the rest of the world fading away.
My hands slid over the hard planes of his back, over the tension and muscle that marked every hour of his job and the danger that came with it.
Aiden Devlin was strength and chaos wrapped in control, and when that control broke, it was like being caught in a storm that knew my name.
He kissed me again, slower this time, with a kind of reverence that stole my breath. When his mouth left mine, it traced the line of my neck, finding the spot that made my spine go liquid. I could barely think, and maybe that was the point.
Every touch of his hands reminded me how fragile time could be.
He was leaving again, and soon the space beside me would be cold, the scent of him only a memory clinging to the pillow.
I wanted to hold on, to memorize everything about him—the roughness of his jaw, the sound he made when I whispered his name, the way he looked at me like I was the only anchor he had left.
I bit his lip.
He paused and then took over the kiss, going deep, tightening his fingers in my hair and holding me still for him. He kissed me hard and completely until my ears were ringing, my breath gasping as I kissed him back, lighting completely on fire.
There was nobody in the world like Aiden Devlin, and I’m sure nobody could kiss like this. He kissed down my neck and along my collarbone, then up my jaw to bite into my earlobe, his hands already roaming my body. He pulled off my shirt and reached my breasts.
He moved down me and spent time with each breast, having fun, making me moan before moving all the way down and using his mouth in a way only he could.
I orgasmed once, crying out his name. He spread me wider and made me do it again. I was panting by the time he reared up.
Flipping me over onto my hands and knees, he grabbed my hips, plunging inside me with one hard push. My back arched and I threw my head back. This was new and wild.
He hammered inside me with definite power, one arm snaking up between my breasts to grasp my throat. He held me, pulling me back into his powerful thrusts.
With each hard movement, I gasped, climbing, feeling Aiden Devlin inside me, around me, everywhere. I broke on the sound of his name, climaxing wildly. Seconds later, he did the same. We both came down hard.
He flopped us under the covers, spooning his powerful body around me, his heart thundering against my back. The air still hummed with leftover energy, the kind that clings to skin long after everything else has gone still.
He pressed a kiss just below my ear and exhaled against my neck. “You really are going to miss me,” he murmured.
“Apparently,” I managed, still breathless.
His chuckle was low and warm, but even half-asleep, I could feel the tension humming beneath his skin. He was already half gone, mind turning toward whatever dangerous mission waited for him.
“I’ll go over to the parade and your Nana’s shop opening today,” he said, voice rough with fatigue. “But I leave tomorrow.”
Tomorrow. The word landed hard.
He brushed my hair away from my shoulder and kissed the bare skin there, his lips lingering for a moment longer than necessary. I rolled to face him, trailing my fingers along his chest, feeling the steady rise and fall beneath my palm.
“Well then,” I whispered. “We’d better make this morning count.”
The corner of his mouth lifted, slow and dangerous.