Page 26 of Snowed in with My Protector

You don’t need to see well when everything he’s feeling is like a neon sign against my senses. I can feel it all.

His relief.

His worry.

His drive to ensure that I’m really okay and that I’m safe.

But I’ve never felt safer than I do right now.

Here’s a man who has killed for me, but there’s no violence in the way he’s touching me right now. The chaos that rages in his soul, brought forth by his past and his own insecurities, is nothing in the face of how I feel about him.

“I love you, Hutch,” the words are a whisper from my lips, but their depth ripples from me creating waves that I know will change everything.

After hating change for most of my life, this is one that I welcome. I embrace it with open arms and an open heart. I accept that it means my life will never be the same again.

And I’m glad for it. Why would I want to return to a life that ended in danger and fear?

No. I’d much rather have what I’ve found here with him—peace. Solace. Redeeming love. And a passion that sets my soul on fire.

Hutch’s lips curl up into a devastating grin and everything else fades away. He sets me down on the bathroom counter just long enough to shed all his clothing. It feels like he’s shedding so much more than the cloth encasing him.

My breath catches in my throat as I watch every inch of him being uncovered for me. All for me.

Tears gather in my eyes and I’m powerless to stop them from falling over my lashes and sliding over my cheeks. He’s there and cupping my face before I can wipe them away.

The worry in his eyes and the way the light bathes his form from behind him makes him look like an avenging warrior. There is blood splattered across his face, but it doesn’t scare me. It’s a reminder that he didn’t turn away from ending a life because it was a threat to me.

It makes me love him even more.

His voice is rough, “What’s wrong?” His eyebrows pull together and a fear fills his eyes. Shame colors his words, “Can you ever look at me the same way?”

“What are you talking about?”

“You know,” he swallows hard and looks away, but I can’t allow that and cup his jaw in my hands to make him look at me again, “you know what I had to do.”

“Hutch,” I whimper at seeing the darkness swirling in his eyes, the stark fear that I’ll see him differently now. Doesn’t he know? Doesn’t he understand? “I could never look at you any differently. You’re the man I was put on this earth to love; I know it deep in my soul. Because when my soul sings, yours joins me. Can’t you feel it?”

His entire body deflates, and he presses his forehead against mine. I know he hasn’t said the words back to me. I don’t need him to. I can feel his love for me. It echoes around us and wraps around me.

Words can be cheap. They can be used without thinking. Placations whispered with lies in the hearts of those who push them past their lips.

But this? It’s more than words, it’s sensation. It’s truth.

“I was so afraid you wouldn’t be able to look at me knowing what I had to do,” his words are raw, and they slice through me like knives.

As I slide off the counter, he steps back, and I see that my words have fallen short. He can’t feel the truth of them. That’s okay. I can give him more.

I can give him everything.

I slide the shirt I’m wearing, his shirt, off my body and his gaze rakes over my skin. The way he looks at me might as well be his hands gliding over my body. I could ask how he can question the way I feel about him, but I understand that fear.

How powerful it can be. How hard it is to trust. How faith is hard won and can still feel like sand slipping through your fingers.

When I step away from him, his hands reach for me but then fall to his sides like he doesn’t think he is worthy of touching me. I turn the water on in the shower without looking at him. With my back turned toward him, I slip my panties off and test the water.

It’s only once I step inside the shower that I turn toward the man who has protected me with shards of his soul, given them to the darkness in order to bathe me in light. My heart pounds in my chest as I hold my hand out for him.

How many times has he given me this same choice? And each time I’ve slid my palm into his, giving him my trust and all of me.

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