Page 26 of Your Soul to Keep

Holding me in place.

Sheltering me.

The eye in my storm.

Just as he had been back then.

And where did I leave him?

I squeezed my eyes shut to ward off the guilt and breathed deep.

He was here.

I was here.

It wasn’t an illusion. There was something between us, something I’d felt with him from the beginning, something I hadn’t felt since.

Would he only give me tonight?

I dug the fingers of one hand into his ribs, the other into the back of his neck.

I’d take it.

If this was all I’d ever have of him, I’d take it and hold it close to my heart. One night with him could warm me the rest of my days.

My need combusted.

“Gabe,” I panted, ripping his shirt out of his jeans and shoving my hand up to palm his ribs. “Gabe,” I breathed, lost in a world of sensation, saying his name once more just because I could. “Gabe.”

“For fuck’s sake, Shae,” he groaned, his big hands roaming up and down my sides, brushing the sides of my breasts before flattening them to his chest as he breathed my name like life-giving oxygen into my lungs.

I laughed, then sobbed, hope and grief competing for dominance. My hands crawled up the back of his shirt, the muscles of his back flexing beneath my palms.

So warm.

Full of life.

I could almost feel it seeping back into me.

He cradled my head in his hands as he kissed me, long, drugging kisses giving way to sweet nips and a gentle brushing of lips as he drew back.

My hands drifted down to his lean waist as I blinked up at him. “Gabe,” I whispered his name in wonder and smiled drunkenly, my head fuzzy from hours of crying and forced socializing.

“Baby, baby,” he whispered, his eyes searching mine. “I don’t want this to be about grief.”

I nodded, bringing my hands around to hold his handsome face, the sweetness of connection easing the swelling ache of grief billowing in my chest at the reminder.

Tipping his head forward, he pressed his forehead to mine.

His words niggled at the back of my brain, their meaning slowly penetrating, the growing weight of shame dragging me down into the soft cushions of the couch.

My brow furrowed. “This?”

He nodded. “This. Us. Sex.”

This.

Us.

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