Page 57 of Beyond Reason

Apparently, he was remembering the same thing, because the wicked look on his face had nothing to do with innocently remembering our plans to move here together.

“I thought it would be nice to remember the good things, to see how much being in a different place would help.”

And I wanted us to be safe. I wanted him to be safe. He’d loved it here before—there was no reason for us to leave any time soon.

“I remember the first time you brought me here, Axel.” He pushed away from the counter and moved toward me. There wasn’t a ghost lingering over his form anymore; there was just his eyes, so perfect and warm and focused on me. “You wanted to show me a part of you that you hadn’t shared with anyone else. You said this was your favorite place to come and think, to escape from the world. A place your life as a Cleaner had never touched. That was why I loved it—because it was part of you, a piece of your heart that was just for me.”

He sounded so sure of himself, and his fingers were so warm and solid when they slid along my jawline. When he twisted those slender digits into my hair and pulled my head down, I didn’t resist. My mouth met his, warm and yielding.

“Mmf…” There were words somewhere in the moan I let out, but I couldn’t quite figure out how to make them properly form. We still had a lot to do—we needed to secure the perimeter and make sure that no one had followed us. I had new security cameras that I needed to hook up… but the long list of necessities flew out of my mind when he shoved me back against the door and lifted up on tiptoe so he could press his body flush against mine. When his tongue licked the seam of my lips, I opened my mouth obediently.

The last time he’d done this, he’d been taller than me—tall enough to pin my arms above my head, and broad enough that his body easily covered mine and kept me held to the door by sheer strength.

This time, he trailed his hands along my wrists and circled them, pressing them to my side—this time, it was his presence alone that kept me pinned.

It had never been about his size, about his strength or his ability to physically control me. It had been Xavier’s presence.

It had been Xavier.

The body he was in didn’t matter.

I pulled back from him before we got too distracted. If I let him keep kissing me like this, there was every chance I was going to end up bent over the countertop again, and we hadn’t even settled in. I knew it was unlikely, especially since I had a security system set up to alert me if anyone entered the house, but I wanted to check the perimeter.

I wanted to make sure he was safe.

He let me step away from him, though I noticed the slightly disgruntled expression that crossed his features. It was cute, if I was being honest. Especially since we’d established that I was usually the one with that expression.

I didn’t think he’d appreciate me calling him cute, though.

“It shouldn’t take long to get everything inside. Let me check the bedrooms and we can—”

“Go get the stuff out of the car, Axel. I think I can handle sweeping the house.”

“I—”

Xavier pulled his gun and waved it in front of my face, rolling his eyes as he took off down the hallway. “I’ll scream if I need your help. And we both know I don’t scream, so…”

He trailed off as he stepped around the corner, and I fought with myself not to follow him. Honestly, none of the motion sensors had been tripped, there was no one in the house but us.

It would be fine.

And maybe it would help him feel more like himself if he took on the role of protector every now and then. I’d brought him here for a reason, even though the prospect of him remembering everything still made something in my chest seize in panic.

At least if we were here, it would be a little harder for him to run off if he got angry with me. I had to tell myself that, even though I knew he would do whatever he wanted to do and I probably couldn’t stop him.

I still overloaded my arms with our bags so I only had to take one trip from the car to the house, but he was already back in the kitchen and rifling through the cabinets by the time I came inside.

“No one would squat here, Axel. There’s nothing to eat.”

“I ordered groceries.”

“I’m not that hungry, anyway. I want to go explore.” He sounded far more excited than he should have, but his eyes were already flashing from the window to the lake, and I couldn’t help but follow his glance.

We’d spent a lot of time by the water, somewhere in the center where a wooden platform floated. I could remember days and nights wrapped up in each other’s arms. After he’d died, I hadn’t come to tend to anything in so long that I wondered if time had taken it all away and left it to rot.

“All right,” I answered. Maybe it was the thought of that time passing, the way his death had stolen away so many moments that we could have had.

It might have just been the excitement on his face. Whatever it was, I wanted to give into him, to give into the moment.

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