Chapter 27
LACEY
I made it halfway up the walk before my feet refused to carry me one more step.
The porch light flickered like it always had—one more thing on the never-ending to-do list Dad had promised to fix and hadn’t.
The house sat quiet and heavy, a shadow with all my old worries inside it.
If I opened that door tonight, I’d have to paste on a smile and talk around the pieces of me that still rattled from Dallas.
I stared at the knob, then at the truck idling at the curb.
Bodie hadn’t pulled away. It wasn’t too late.
I turned and jogged back before I could talk myself out of it. He lowered the window, that half-grin already waiting for me.
“Change of heart, Mayor?”
“Don’t call me that,” I said, breathless. “Not tonight.”
His fingers curled around the top of the steering wheel. “Get in.”
I did.
We didn’t talk much on the way to his place. The radio murmured something low and twangy, the windows fogged at the edges, and every few blocks his knuckles brushed mine like he couldn’t help but keep checking to make sure I was still there.
By the time he turned off the main road, the dark had deepened to a velvet sky, the kind that feels like warm hands over your eyes.
A short gravel drive led to the house he’d bought when he took the job at the sheriff’s office.
I hadn’t been there before, but it looked exactly like I expected it to…
solid, lived-in, and just a little weathered around the edges.
“Home sweet home,” he said, cutting the engine.
He came around and opened my door. The cicadas sang in the weeds. Somewhere down the road a dog’s bark echoed through the night.
Inside, his space smelled like cedar and coffee and him. His boots lined up by the door. A stack of mail and a few sets of keys sat on a table by the door. The living room held a huge couch and a scarred coffee table that looked like it had survived his college days.
“Hungry?” he asked, brushing his thumb along my wrist. The touch was easy and familiar.
“Starving.”
Ten minutes later we were shoulder to shoulder at the kitchen island, stealing bites of leftover chili out of one bowl. I’d gotten to the point where I could almost laugh about the night before. It would have broken me if he hadn’t been there for me.
“Thanks again for coming to get me.” I looked down at the counter because it was easier than being vulnerable with him and looking him right in the eye.
He was quiet long enough that I looked up to see if I’d said something wrong.
His hand came up to cup my cheek. “I would’ve driven to El Paso. Or New York. Or the moon if you needed me.”
“Your truck never would have made it to the moon, Bodie,” I said, my lips curving up in a soft smile.
“I still would’ve tried.” He wiped a smear from the corner of my mouth with his thumb. “You still okay, Sweets?”
“Better than okay.” And I was. I thought I’d be tongue-tied and nervous after last night, but I felt more at ease than I had in a very long time.
A slow smile spread across his mouth. “Good.”
We rinsed the bowl. He handed me a T-shirt soft from too many washes.
I changed in the bathroom and tried not to overthink how right it felt to tug on something that smelled like him.
When I came back, the living room lamp was low and the hall light spilled gold across the floor.
He stood there barefoot, in a T-shirt and jeans, his hair a little wild like he’d run his hands through it while I was gone.
“You look—” He stopped himself, his eyes warm and appreciative.
“I’m not the mayor tonight,” I said. “And you’re not the sheriff’s deputy.”
“It’s just us.” He reached for me, his palm against my jaw was the rough warmth I’d dreamed about. The first kiss wasn’t a question. It was a continuation of what we’d started the night before.
The room faded away. I fisted the front of his shirt and tugged. He pulled me closer, one hand at my waist, the other sliding up my spine in a slow, sure path that made every nerve in my body hum in anticipation.
“Still good?” he murmured against the corner of my mouth.
“Yes,” I managed as lips moved from my cheek to the spot under my ear that made the whole world blur.
We didn’t hurry. We didn’t have to. He lifted me up, and I laughed against his mouth while I wrapped my legs around his hips.
He carried me into the hall and pressed my back against the wall.
The file cabinet of reasons to slow down rattled around in my head.
I ignored it. Nothing could distract me. I’d wanted this for too long.
He carried me down the hall, bumping off the walls as our lips connected over and over again.
When we entered the bedroom, he gently set me down in the middle of the bed.
Then he flipped on the bedside lamp and pulled his phone out of his pocket.
He set it face-down on the nightstand, like he’d decided the rest of the world could wait its turn.
I was more than happy to be the focus of his attention. And with a look in his eyes that said last night had only been the beginning, he climbed onto the bed, the mattress dipping under his weight.
“Come here.” He kissed me again, slower and deeper, until everything else faded away.
I learned the rhythm of his breath and the places that made it catch, like when I scraped my nails down his abs, when I bit his lower lip and didn’t let go, and when I rolled my hips just right and he growled my name like it broke something inside him.
“Jesus, Lacey…” he groaned, voice wrecked. “You’re gonna kill me.”
I smiled against his throat, then kissed my way lower. “Not before I bring you back first.”
He learned my tells like the way my thighs clenched when I was close, the way my breath caught when his fingers slid between us and circled just right, and the way I whispered please when I really meant don’t stop.
“Look at me,” he said, his voice low and rough as he pushed into me again, slow and deep. “I want to see your face when you fall apart for me.”
I did. And I did.
He didn’t just move, he took what he wanted. Like he owned me, because in the moment, he did. His mouth found mine over and over again like he couldn’t get enough, like he never would.
“You feel like home,” he muttered against my skin, his words hot at my collarbone, his hands spreading me wider. “I’ve never—fuck, I’ve never needed anyone like this.”
I arched under him, desperate and open and aching. “Then take me. Don’t hold anything back.”
He didn’t. Not once. Not even when my nails dug into his shoulders or my voice broke on his name. Not even when he reached between us and made me come so hard I saw stars.
“That's it,” he whispered, kissing my cheek, my jaw, my mouth. “That’s a good girl.”
We moved like we were starving, like we’d waited too long and didn’t have the patience to be careful anymore. Every thrust was a vow. Every gasp a confession.
Later, when the room finally went dark, it wasn’t because we were done. It was because we needed the dark to hold everything we weren’t ready to name. Still tangled, still panting, I curled into him, my skin slick with sweat, my lips swollen from too many kisses.
My cheek rested over his heart. I could feel it beating, steady and sure underneath his skin.
“I don’t want this to be a mistake,” I whispered, not sure where the words came from, only that they were true.
He brushed his fingers over my temple. “It’s not. And if you try to run, I swear I’ll chase you.”
My laugh caught in my throat. “Promise?”
Bodie kissed me like he was making an oath. “Yeah. I’d chase you to hell and back, Sweets. But I’d rather keep you here.”
He pulled me close again, his fingers drawing slow circles between my shoulder blades. I threaded my hand through his and held on.
And for the first time in a long damn time, I believed him.