Keiran
T HREE YEARS AGO
She was wearing his hoodie. Again .
The sleeves were too long, the hood too big, and she looked like something he should've locked away from the world.
watched her tiptoe barefoot across the marble floor, muttering to herself while holding a giant mixing bowl like it could explode at any moment. Her hair was piled messily on top of her head, a few caramel strands escaping to frame her face. She had a smudge of flour on her cheek, and he found himself staring at it, wondering when this – her – had become so fucking important to him.
"You're going to make a mess," he warned, stepping into the kitchen.
Cadence turned. "I measured this time."
"Last time, the flour exploded."
"That was your fault," she said piously. "You startled me."
Her eyes lit up despite her accusation, and that thing in his chest twisted again – that uncomfortable, unwelcome feeling that made him want to simultaneously shield her from the world and show her every dark corner of it.
He crossed the room slowly, until her back was pressed against the counter.
"And if I do it again?"
His wife gasped when he reached past her to take the bowl. "!"
"Hmm?" He set it aside.
"You're ruining the batter—"
He kissed her, and the way she melted instantly in his arms...
Fuck .
That was what always got to him.
Her complete and instant surrender, with the way Cadence's fingers were now clutching his shirt as her hips arched eagerly toward him.
"I w-was trying to bake," his Cadence gasped when he moved to her neck.
"You're sweet enough."
's heart clenched as he felt her smile against his skin. He'd never known what peace felt like before her. Never expected to find it in a girl who baked cookies at midnight and tripped over her own feet when she saw him without a shirt.
He lifted her onto the counter, slid between her thighs, and kissed her until her laughter turned to gasps.
She was soft. Willing. And deliciously bare and irresistibly wet under the hoodie.
"No underwear, Mrs. de Laigny?" he purred against her ear.
His Cadence's blush deepened, but her eyes held his without shame. "I was waiting for you to come home."
Ah, fuck.
His wife killed him every time she said things like that.
"Do you know what you do to me?" growled.
His Cadence shook her head, eyes wide with that intoxicating mix of desire and innocence.
"You make me forget, Cadence. Every damn time," he gritted out while pushing the hoodie higher.
"F-Forget what?"
That I don't deserve you.
That being with you is a mistake.
That if I ever lose you, it's for the better.
All of it was the truth.
But because he was a selfish bastard who could no longer imagine a life without her—-
I love you.
And this, too, was true.
He loved her to the point of madness. And it was this madness that could no longer be satisfied. Madness that kept him from reaching the bedroom.
It was madness that had him sweeping everything off the counter so he could take her on the kitchen counter. Her legs hooked over his broad shoulders as he pleasured her with his mouth. His tongue. And later on, with his fingers pinching her nub to make his wife come so, so hard that she would eventually pass out in his arms.
Mine.
Mine.
You're mine, Cadence.
And at that time, had believed it would always be so.
But he was wrong.