Chapter 40
Ace
Ishould give her space.
That would be the right thing.
The smart thing.
She’s been through hell tonight. Hell before tonight. More than any woman should ever have to survive.
She needs rest.
Time.
Quiet.
Instead, I’m still standing here with my hand on her face and my body half wrapped around hers like letting go is the last thing I want to do.
Maybe because it is.
The house has gone mostly still around us. Trigger and Beast are outside doing one more perimeter sweep. Blaze is in the other room, digging through everything Daniel left behind, muttering to himself and pounding keys like he can outwork the night.
But in here—
It’s just me and her.
Tessa’s fingers are still curled in my shirt.
Not gripping as tightly now.
Just… holding on.
Like she doesn’t want to let go either.
“You should sit down,” I say quietly.
She gives me the smallest nod.
I guide her to the couch, but when she lowers herself onto it, she doesn’t move away from me. Doesn’t create distance. Doesn’t do any of the careful, guarded things she used to do.
She just looks up at me and says, “Stay.”
Like she already knows I’m not going anywhere.
I sit beside her.
Close.
Closer than I probably should.
Not touching her at first.
Giving her the space to choose.
A few seconds pass in silence.
Then she shifts.
Slowly, carefully, she leans into me and rests her head against my shoulder.
My chest tightens so hard it almost hurts.
I slide my arm around her without a word.
She exhales.
Long. Tired. Like something in her finally lets go.
“You ever feel weird when it’s over?” she asks softly.
“All the time.”
Her cheek stays against my shoulder. “Like your body doesn’t believe it yet.”
“Yeah.”
“That’s how this feels.”
I look down at her. Her face is pale with exhaustion. Her eyes heavy. But there’s something else there too. Something open. Unhidden.
I brush a strand of hair back from her face.
“It’ll hit in waves,” I tell her. “Adrenaline drops, your mind catches up, your body starts replaying everything. Could be tonight. Could be tomorrow.”
She gives a quiet laugh that doesn’t sound much like laughter. “That’s comforting.”
My mouth twitches.
“Sorry.”
“No, it’s okay.” She closes her eyes for a second. “At least you’re honest.”
I study her profile.
The stubborn little lift of her chin.
The way she tries to be brave even when she’s exhausted.
The way she doesn’t ask for comfort, even when she clearly needs it.
“Tessa.”
“Hmm?”
“You don’t have to pretend with me.”
Her eyes open.
She goes still beside me.
I can almost see the words landing inside her.
“I know,” she whispers.
But her voice says she’s still learning how to believe that.
A beat passes.
Then another.
Finally, she says, “In prison, if people saw weakness, they used it.”
My hand stills on her shoulder.
She keeps talking, quiet and steady, like if she doesn’t stop moving through it, maybe it won’t swallow her whole.
“So I learned to keep everything flat. My face. My voice. My reactions.” She swallows. “You cry alone. You panic alone. You break alone. Because if anybody sees it, it becomes theirs.”
Something hot and vicious moves through my chest.
Not at her.
At everyone who ever made her live like that.
At every person who taught her to carry pain like it was contraband.
My arm tightens around her.
“You’re not there now.”
She laughs softly again, but this time it’s sad. “I know that in my head.”
“Your head’s gonna take a while to catch up.”
She tilts her face up to look at me. “How do you know?”
Because I’ve lived some version of it myself.
Because men like me don’t come home from what we’ve seen and just switch it off.
Because I know exactly what it is to sit in a room that’s safe while your body acts like it isn’t.
But I don’t give her all of that.
Not yet.
“Because I know what it’s like when your mind keeps living somewhere your body already escaped.”
Her gaze stays on mine.
Soft. Searching.
And something shifts between us again.
Not heat this time.
Not at first.
Something deeper.
Recognition.
Understanding.
She lifts a hand and rests it lightly against my chest. Right over my heart.
“You do that too,” she says quietly.
It isn’t a question.
I could lie.
Say no.
Say I’m fine.
Say whatever version of strong I’ve been giving the world for years.
But this woman has already looked straight through me more than once.
So I tell her the truth.
“Yeah.”
The word is rougher than I intended.
Her hand stays where it is.
Warm.
Steady.
“What happens?” she asks.
“When?”
“When it catches up.”
I stare ahead at nothing for a second, jaw tight.
Then I look back at her.
“You want the clean version or the real one?”
A faint flicker touches her mouth. “The real one.”
Of course she does.
I nod once.
“Sometimes I can’t shut my head off. Sometimes I hear something out of place and I’m halfway to a weapon before I even think. Sometimes I go days feeling normal and then one little thing hits wrong and I’m right back there.” I pause. “Sometimes I don’t sleep much.”
Her expression changes.
Softens.
Not pity.
Thank God, not pity.
Just understanding.
“Is that why you’re always watching everything?”
“Part of it.”
“And the other part?”
I look at her.
No way around this one.
“The other part is you.”
Her breath catches.
I don’t take it back.
Don’t soften it.
Don’t look away.
Because it’s true.
Since the day she started walking past me like I wasn’t worth her attention, some part of me had been tracking her. Watching. Noticing. Wanting.
And now that she’s here, now that I know what it feels like to almost lose her—
Yeah.
There’s no pretending otherwise.
“Tessa,” I say, voice low. “You matter to me.”
The room goes very still.
She blinks once.
Twice.
Like she’s trying to make sure she heard me right.
Then she whispers, “Ace…”
I slide my fingers gently under her chin and lift her face a little higher.
“You matter,” I repeat.
This time, she doesn’t look away.
I see everything move across her face—fear, hope, disbelief, want.
Then she leans in and kisses me.
Slowly.
No panic.
No desperation.
Just her.
And God, that’s somehow worse on my control than anything else.
I kiss her back with the same care, letting it build instead of taking. My hand slides into her hair. Hers curls into my shirt again, only this time it isn’t because she’s scared.
This time it feels like need.
She shifts closer, turning toward me fully, and I move with her until she’s half in my lap and I’m bracing her against me like she belongs there.
The kiss deepens.
Warms.
Her mouth softens beneath mine and then opens on a shaky breath, and that sound nearly wrecks me.
I pull back just enough to look at her.
Her lips are kiss-swollen. Her breathing uneven. Her eyes dark and searching and so damn beautiful I have to lock my jaw not to lose my mind.
“Tell me to stop,” I say.
Her hand slides up the back of my neck.
“I don’t want you to stop.”
Every muscle in my body tightens.
I search her face one more time.
Making sure.
Making damn sure.
“What do you want?”
Her throat works.
Then she answers, soft but certain.
“You.”
That word goes through me like a live wire.
I kiss her again, deeper this time, and she comes with me willingly, pressing into my chest, into my hands, into everything I’ve been holding back.
My palm glides down her back, slow and steady, learning the shape of her. She shivers, and I force myself to keep this measured, gentle, even though everything in me is burning hot and fast.
This isn’t about taking.
This is about showing her.
Showing her that she’s safe.
That she gets to choose every second of this.
That no one is taking anything from her ever again.
I trail my mouth along her cheek, her jaw, the sensitive spot just below her ear.
She gasps quietly and her fingers tighten in my hair.
“Ace…”
“I’ve got you,” I murmur against her skin.
Her head tips back slightly.
Trusting me.
And that undoes me more than anything else tonight.
I press another kiss to her throat, then another, while my hand stays steady at her waist, grounding her, never pushing, never demanding.
She touches my face then, fingertips brushing my jaw like she’s memorizing me too.
“You’re so careful with me,” she whispers.
I lift my head and look at her.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
The answer comes easy.
“Because you deserve careful.”
Her eyes shine at that. Not with fear. Not with panic.
With feeling.
Too much of it.
She kisses me before I can say anything else, and this one is softer than the others, but somehow even more intimate. Like she’s giving something, not just taking comfort.
We stay like that for a long moment.
Kissing slowly.
Breathing each other in.
Letting the night strip away all the distance that used to stand between us.
Eventually I rest my forehead against hers and force myself to slow down before I take us someplace neither of us is ready to rush into.
She’s breathing hard.
So am I.
Her fingers drift down my chest. “You’re shaking.”
I let out a rough huff of laughter. “Yeah.”
“From me?”
“From almost losing you.”
That sobers her instantly.
Her hand stills over my heart again.
“You didn’t.”
“No.” My thumb brushes her cheek. “But I got close enough to know I never want to feel that again.”
Emotion flickers over her face.
Raw and unguarded.
Then she shifts, curling into me, tucking herself under my chin like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
I hold her tighter.
Outside, a door opens and closes. Somebody moves down the hall. Blaze coughs in the other room.
Life. Noise. The rest of the world.
But here, on this couch, with her folded against me and my hand spread across her back, everything narrows down to one thing.
Keeping her here.
Keeping her safe.
She’s quiet so long I think maybe she drifted off.
Then she says, barely above a whisper, “I don’t know how to do this.”
I look down. “Do what?”
“This.” She swallows. “Let someone in. Need them. Trust that they’ll stay.”
My chest tightens again, but gentler this time.
I brush my mouth over her temple.
“You don’t have to know all at once.”
“And if I mess it up?”
I lean back enough to make her look at me.
“Then we mess it up and figure it out.”
That gets the faintest smile out of her.
Small.
Tired.
Beautiful.
“You make that sound easy.”
“It won’t be.”
At least she knows me well enough now not to expect lies.
“But I’m not going anywhere.”
She studies me like she’s weighing the truth of that.
Then slowly, carefully, she nods.
And something about that feels bigger than any kiss we’ve shared tonight.
A choice.
Not rushed.
Not born out of fear.
Real.
She shifts again, settling more comfortably against me, and I pull the throw blanket off the back of the couch and drape it over her. Over us.
Her eyes are heavy now.
The crash finally catching up.
“You should sleep,” I murmur.
“What about you?”
“I’ll be right here.”
That gets me another one of those searching looks.
“On the couch?”
“If that’s where you want me.”
She doesn’t hesitate this time.
“Yes.”
I smile despite everything.
“Then yeah. On the couch.”
She nestles closer, one hand still fisted lightly in my shirt even as her eyes start to close.
Like she needs something solid to hang on to.
She has it.
She’s got it.
I settle deeper into the cushions, one arm around her, the other within easy reach of the weapon on the table, because some habits don’t die and tonight I’m not interested in trying.
Her breathing evens out little by little.
Soft.
Warm against my chest.
Asleep.
I stare into the dim room and listen to the sounds of the house around us. My team. My people. The woman in my arms.
And for the first time in a long time, exhaustion doesn’t feel like emptiness.
It feels like something else.
Something dangerously close to peace.