“You are so f**king beautiful,” he whispered hoarsely, one hand sliding up her back to cup her head, his touch gentle and sure, tempered by his care of her injuries. “And you’re mine now.”

“Always have been.” She struggled not to rock up into him like she wanted to do. “And you’re mine now?”

“Always have been.” Holding her gaze, he began to move. It was heaven. He’d had her every way she could have imagined, and every time felt like the first.

The thought took her over the edge, and she took him with her. After, still breathing hard, he lifted his head, his gaze searching hers. She put her fingers over his lips to still any questions of her comfort, because in truth she’d never felt better. Sated male satisfaction lit his eyes and they lay together, waiting for their heart rates to return to some semblance of normal. “I waited a long time for you,” she finally said.

“I know.” He wrapped his arms around her and buried his face between her breasts. “Turns out I’m a little slow on the uptake.” He breathed her in deeply—taking comfort from her, she realized, her heart swelling. He’d never allowed himself to take comfort from her before, but he did now.

“Sometimes I think about my life before I let you in,” he said. “I was afraid that loving anyone this much would make me weak.”

“So I take it since you’ve dropped the l-bomb, you’re longer worried about that?” she teased.

His arms tightened. He wasn’t playing. “I’m going to drop more than the l-bomb, Holly. I want you. The forever kind of want. No more messing around.”

Forever. The air left her lungs, and something new replaced it. Hope. Affection. And a love that warmed her from the inside out. He had a way of erasing all her doubts, of reinstating her confidence. He could make everything right in her world with one word, a touch. She hadn’t been sure a man could do that for her, but he did, and she thought maybe he was offering to do it for the rest of her life, but she had to be sure. She’d been wrong before and couldn’t bear to be wrong now. “Maybe you should define forever.”

“Is there more than one meaning for the word?” he asked.

“So…you mean forever like a diamond ring and white picket fence, that kind of forever?”

“Yes. But not white picket,” he said with a head shake. “Rail-horse fencing.”

She just stared at him. “Let me get this straight,” she said. “You went from worrying about being weak to wanting a fence with me?”

“I don’t give a flying f**k about being weak. You’re the only thing I care about. You make me whole. You make me feel. You make me…” He searched for the word. “Everything.” He pulled her tighter to him. “It’s always been you, Holly. And it always will be. Say yes.”

“Yes,” she said instantly. “To everything.”