“Agreed,” I replied.

He dug the pads of his fingers in slightly before they relaxed.

“Okay,” he murmured.

I lifted my hands to wrap them around his wrists and took a deep breath.

Then I cautiously said, “Honey, I hesitate to mention this, but I think today proves you’ve got some issues to work through.”

Both his hands slid back into my hair. He stuffed my face in chest and burst out laughing.

I found this reaction both a relief and a little weird, but even so, as usual I wanted to watch him laugh, but couldn’t because it was dark and my face was smushed to his chest. He didn’t stop laughing before he let me go, but bent at the waist, put a shoulder in my belly and hefted me up.

This action was more than a little weird and a surprise, so much so I straight up girlie shrieked, “Raid!”

He turned and walked out of the kitchen, ordering, “Quiet, babe, I got some issues to work through.”

Oh boy.

I knew what that meant.

“Um… maybe we should find alternate outlets to battle that burn,” I suggested to his back, my hands gripping his tee at his sides.

I became perplexed when he didn’t head up the stairs, but unlocked and opened the front door and strode out to the porch. He turned right as he swung me around. He was still holding me, but we were front to front and I frantically grabbed hold of his shoulders so I wouldn’t go flying when his hands slid down and yanked my knees up at his sides.

Then he sat in the porch swing with me astride him and tipped his head back to look at me.

“Think, my girl f**ks me in her porch swing, that’ll beat back the heat.”

“Raid—”

“Or at least that heat. She’ll be building a better kind of fire.”

I needed to get a handle on this situation.

Therefore, I slid my hands up to his neck and dipped my face closer. “Sweetheart, I like this idea but I’m being serious.”

“Baby, bein’ seriously serious, you are the only thing in four years that has come close to getting me to a place where I can even begin to think I might be able to bear those flames.”

Automatically my hands shifted to his face, palms to his cheeks, fingers wrapped around his ears and my forehead dropped to his as my eyes closed.

“I want to be that for you,” I whispered.

I was both alarmed and pleased that each one of those seven words was weighted with precisely just how much I wanted what I said.

“Good, honey, ‘cause you already are.”

Oh God.

I loved that.

I pressed my forehead into his tight before I angled my head and touched my lips to his.

I moved back slightly, opened my eyes and gave in. “All right, then I suppose I’ll f**k you in my porch swing.”

I watched him grin. “My own, personal firefighter with pretty blue eyes, fantastic tits and a sweet pu**y.”

His words were sweet (well, most of them) and it was good he was breaking the heavy mood, but I still pulled back a bit and slid my hands down to his neck. “Uh… just to say, I’m not comfortable with you always talking about my sweet, uh… you know.”

His brows shot up. “You crawl on the floor for me and you don’t like me talkin’ about your pu**y?”

That sounded ridiculous.

“Well—”

“Hanna, I love my sister’s cooking so I’m gonna talk about it. Mostly I talk about that to her so she knows what she does is good and people appreciate it. I love Broncos football, so when they’re playin’, I’m gonna watch it. I’ll probably talk about it, though it’s unlikely I’ll talk about it to you. You’re a girl, so even if you like the Broncs, women can’t talk football. And don’t get uppity, that shit is just plain true. And I love my baby’s pu**y, so I’m gonna talk about that too. If you want me to share that with my crew and not you, I’ll fill them in on the goodness I got in my bed, but just sayin’, I’d rather talk about it to you.”

I would rather that too.

“Fair enough,” I conceded.

“Now, are you gonna f**k me or spend the next hour talkin’ to me?” he asked.

“I suppose I’ll f**k you,” I muttered.

His voice held humor when he returned, “Obliged you’d make that sacrifice for me.”

I glanced at the swing then at him. “Uh… how do I f**k you?”

“Babe, you’ve ridden my lap before.”

This was true.

I looked to the porch ceiling at the hooks holding up the swing then down to Raiden. “Do you think the swing can withstand this activity?”

“I don’t know. What I do know is I wanna find out.”

I bit my lip and looked back at the hooks.

I then stopped biting my lip and surveying the hooks because I was up, and then I was up, again being hefted on Raiden’s shoulder.

“Raid!” I shrieked.

“We’ll break the swing in another time, maybe when you’re drunk,” he muttered, walking to the front door.

“I was good,” I told his back. “I was just strategizing.”

“You don’t have to strategize a mattress.”

This was true.

We were inside and he’d started up the steps when I informed him, “You can put me down. I can walk.”

“Waste of time,” he replied. He turned on the landing, kept ascending and asked conversationally, “So, clue me in. When am I Raiden and when am I Raid?”

I held onto his tee and stared at his back a second before I asked, “Sorry?”

We entered my room and he made for the bed. Five strides (I counted) and I was on it and he was on me.

Only then did he explain, “In the beginning all you did was call me Raiden. The first time I seriously tested you and that sweet pu**y of yours,” he grinned when I frowned and went on, “you let Raid slip. No one calls me Raiden. Not even my Mom. Now you’re usin’ ‘em both, and I’m tryin’ to sort out where your head is at with which is which.”

I thought about this and then shared, “I’m not certain there’s rhyme or reason to when I use one or the other.”

“Is there rhyme or reason to anything you do?”

For a second I contemplated my eyebrows (which I couldn’t see, but I tried) before I looked back at him. “Not really.”