54. Keaton （Skee）
Keaton (Skee)
"I love it." The words leave me before I've finished taking in the room.
Soft gray bedding. The reading chair beside the window. The warmer wood tones. The absence of memories I'd spent months carefully walking around instead of through.
My gaze moves slowly across the room before finally settling on the woman standing beside the bed. She's watching me with nervous eyes, twisting the edge of her sweater between her fingers as though she's preparing herself for disappointment.
"I..." She swallows. "I wasn't sure if—"
"I love it," I repeat quietly.
Not because of the furniture. Because she looked at a room I'd abandoned months ago and saw something worth bringing back to life. Because somewhere between unpacking boxes and choosing lamps, she'd decided I deserved to have a bedroom again.
Something inside my chest shifts. Not suddenly. Not violently. More like a lock quietly sliding into place after searching for the right key.
I know this feeling. Or...I know what I'm looking at. The evidence has been accumulating for weeks.
Every unnecessary coffee. Every song. Every excuse to hear her voice. Sleeping outside the Gallagher estate because I couldn't tolerate another night without knowing she was alive. Wanting her beside me instead of merely safe. Wanting her to stay. Wanting...Home.
The conclusion is no longer avoidable.
I love her.
The realization doesn't scare me. What scares me is how completely certain I am.
I could tell her. The thought appears almost immediately. Just say it. Tell her. Three words. Simple. True.
Wrong. She's still married. Ronan is still missing. She's been free for less than a week. The last thing Maeve needs is another man asking her to carry the weight of his feelings before she's had the chance to rediscover her own.
No. She deserves time. She deserves freedom. She deserves the opportunity to choose a future without anyone standing beside her hoping she'll pick them.
Even if...God help me...I already know what I'll do if she doesn't. I'll chase her. Not because she owes me anything. Because she deserves to know that someone can love her without asking her to become someone else first.
That thought should concern me. Instead...It feels inevitable. Like sunrise. Like gravity. Like Matt reaching for Rachel's hand without looking because he already knows she'll be there. For the first time in my life...I understand him.
Movement pulls me back to the present.
Rachel is already walking toward the door, collecting the empty ice cream bowls from the nightstand.
She pauses beside me just long enough to bump my shoulder with hers. "I'll call you tomorrow, Maeve." Then, quieter as she passes me..."I'll see you later, Keaton."
I nod, though I don't actually hear most of it. My attention never leaves Maeve. Green eyes. A nervous smile. A tiny crease between her eyebrows that only appears when she's overthinking.
She's beautiful. Not because of the way she looks. Because she's standing in the middle of a room she'd rebuilt for me. I close the distance between us. Slowly. Giving her every chance to step away if she wants to.
She doesn't. I brush my fingers beneath her chin before leaning down and kissing her.
It's gentle. Unhurried. The kind of kiss that says everything I can't.
When I pull back, she smiles. "I didn't think you'd be back tonight."
I tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear, letting my fingertips linger against the softness of her skin. "We finished earlier than expected."
"The mission?"
I nod. "The target never crossed state lines."
"So..." Her smile grows. "...you wanted to come home early?"
I meet her eyes. "No." Another slow stroke of my thumb across her cheek. "I wanted to come home to you."
Maeve's smile falters, not from sadness, but from the weight of what I just said. She searches my face as though she's trying to decide whether I understand what those words mean.
I do. Maybe not every consequence. But every feeling.
She steps into me without another word, her forehead resting lightly against my chest. My arms find her automatically, holding her the way they always seem to now—as though my body has already accepted what my mind only admitted a few minutes ago.
Home.
She breathes deeply, a long, soft exhale that vibrates straight through me.
I don't move. I just hold her, letting the silence of the apartment settle around us. The air in this room smells different now. It doesn't smell like cold dust or lingering ghosts. It smells like her soap. Like clean cotton. Like her.
"Keaton?" she whispers into my shirt.
"Yeah?"
"Are you going to sleep in here tonight?"
My brain doesn't need to run a single calculation. "Only if you're in the bed with me."
She pulls back just enough to look at me, her green eyes dark and soft in the warm glow of the lamp she’d chosen. "I rebuilt it for us."
The word hits me right in the center of my chest. Us.
My hands move to the hem of her sweater. I don't pull it up. I just hook my thumbs into the soft knit, my knuckles brushing the bare skin above her hips. I keep my eyes locked on hers, my voice dropping low, steady, and deliberate.
"I want to worship you, Maeve. In our bed and to take my time. I want to look at every inch of you...because I never want to forget what it feels like to have you here."
A faint shudder runs through her, her hands sliding up my chest to frame my neck. "Please."
"Tell me yes," I demand gently. "Tell me you're mine tonight."
"Yes," she gasps, her fingers tightening in my hair. "Yes, Keaton. Yours."
I slide the sweater up over her head, setting it aside, leaving her in just a soft lace bralette.
I don't rush. My hands frame her waist, my thumbs tracing the curve of her ribs, counting each sharp intake of her breath.
She is stunning. Every line of her body, every soft curve, is a masterpiece my mind has already memorized, but touching her in the flesh makes my pulse roar in my ears.
I lift her gently, setting her down in the center of the soft gray bedding she picked out.
I drop to my knees on the floor beside the mattress, bringing us eye-to-eye. I reach out and slide my glasses off my face, setting them on the nightstand. The world blurs around the edges, sharpening down until the only thing in my focus is her.
"You are so beautiful, Maeve," I whisper, my hands tracking down her thighs. "Every single piece of you."
My fingers hook into the waistband of her pants, slowly drawing them down her legs along with her underwear. I strip off my own clothes with precise, efficient movements, leaving nothing between us, before leaning over her on the bed.
I start at her ankles.
I press a slow, lingering kiss to the arch of her foot, then the soft skin behind her knee, moving up to the curve of her hip. She gasps, her fingers clutching at the gray sheets, her hips arching slightly at the slow, worshipful pace.
"Keaton—"
"Shh," I murmur against the skin of her stomach, pressing my lips to her belly button, feeling the rapid, frantic fluttering of her pulse beneath my mouth. "Let me look at you. Let me have this."
I move higher, unhooking her bralette and tossing it aside. I cup her breast in my hand, feeling the heavy, perfect weight of her, before taking her nipple into my mouth.
A sharp, broken sound tears out of her throat, her back arching off the mattress. "Keaton, please... I need you inside me."
"Not yet," I whisper against her skin, moving to the other side, giving her the same slow, agonizing attention until she is writhing beneath me, her hands tangled in my hair, pulling me up.
When I finally climb over her, settling between her bare thighs, her eyes are wide and completely blown out with desire. I rest my weight on my forearms, crowding into her space, my chest pressing flush against hers.
"Look at me, Maeve," I say, my voice thick and gravelly.
She locks her eyes onto mine, holding my gaze in the dim light.
"This is us," I whisper, my hands sliding under her hips, tilting her up to meet me. "Starting right here."
I push forward, slowly, deliberately sinking all the way into her until I am buried to the hip.
Maeve lets out a long, breathless cry, her legs wrapping around my waist, pulling me as deep as I can possibly go. My mind shatters completely. The quiet, profound peace of this room, of this woman, fills every empty corner of my chest.
I hold myself still inside her for a second, my forehead resting against hers, our breaths mingling in the dark.
"You okay?" I whisper, my voice low and thick.
"More than okay," she breathes, her hips shifting up into mine, pulling me deeper. "Don't stop, Keaton."
My brain goes completely silent, and then I begin to move.