My breath stuttered and my eyes began to burn. “So, you see the prospect of a future with me?”
“Baby,” he said tenderly, “come inside and let’s talk about this, yeah?”
“Answer the question first,” I whispered. “Do you see the prospect of a future with me, Micah?”
He huffed out an exhale and reached up to scratch the back of his neck. “If, by prospect of a future, you mean do I have every intention of putting my ring on your finger and makin’ you mine for life, then yeah, I see that for us, Red. And I can’t fuckin’ wait.”
A choked sob burst from my throat a moment before I lunged for him. He caught me easily, lifting me off my feet so I had to wrap my legs around his waist and loop my arms around his shoulders as we kissed so hard and so fiercely, you’d have thought we’d been separated for years.
I vaguely registered his front door slamming before I felt him lower me onto the sofa.
“I planned on comin’ to see you tonight,” he said against my lips between kisses. “I was done giving you space. I was gonna tell you everything, Red, ’cause I couldn’t go another day without this.”
He hovered over me, resting his hips between my spread legs as we fed from each other’s mouths. “I love you, Hayden. Besides my family, I’ve never said those words to another person until now. But I do. I’m so fuckin’ in love with you it hurts.”
I felt a single tear break free and slip down into my hair as I whispered, “I love you too.”
“No more secrets, you have my word. From here on you, you get everything.”
I was so giddy I felt like I could have floated away had Micah’s weight not kept be grounded.
“Good.” I dragged my fingers through his hair, scraping my nails along his scalp as I told him, “I’m so happy about that, honey. But I need you to do something first.”
He pulled back and stared down at me, those green eyes shining bright with love. “Yeah? And what’s that?”
“Take me to bed.”
My man didn’t have to be told twice.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Hayden
The sound of Micah’s heartbeat echoed in my ear, a comforting, steady beat that would have lulled me to sleep if my brain wasn’t so busy trying to wrap itself around everything he’d just confided in me.
He’d carried me to his room hours ago, and we’d spent the entire day making up for losing a week together. We had sex and napped and woke up to do it all over again. At some point that afternoon, he’d called and ordered pizza from Momma Gianna’s, which we’d eaten in bed before going at it once again like horny teenagers.
The sun had long since set and he’d spent the past half hour telling me everything. He told me all about the case he and Leo had been living for months. He told me about Greg Cormack’s involvement, and chills formed across my skin when I found out what a monster the man was.
He finally explained who Charlie was, going in depth about the young woman’s life and the absolute hell she’d had to live through, not only with her current circumstances, but in her past as well. I had to fight back the desire to cry for this woman I didn’t even know as he told me all about her. By the time he finished, it was easy to see how he’d come to think of her as a kind of little sister and felt such a strong need to protect her.
My heart broke for him and Leo for how they’d struggled to bring justice to one of their fellow officers. It broke for Charlie Belmont, for Sidney Callo and her daughters. But at the same time, my veins were filling with rage that this asshole was walking around free as a bird while good people were suffering.
I dragged my fingers across his chest, distractedly tracing random patterns through the small smattering of short hair as I replayed his words in my head.
“Red? You good?” I tilted my chin so I could look up at his strong, chiseled face, the moonlight bouncing off the sharp plains and edges, making him look like a Greek god. One arm was braced behind his head while the other wrapped around me, holding me in place so tightly I couldn’t move. Not that I had any intention to. “Was that too much?”
I stopped drawing on his chest and draped my arm around his stomach, burrowing in and squeezing him tight. “No,” I replied adamantly. “When it comes to you and your life, Micah, I’ll always be able to handle it. I just hate that you’ve been dealing with all of this on your own. You need an outlet. You need to get this out so it doesn’t suffocate you.”
“You were that for me, baby. You and Ivy and Sylvia were my outlet. But it was pointed out to me recently that maybe I wasn’t utilizing that to the degree I needed to. I wanted to keep all this shit from spilling into your life and tainting it.”
I pushed up, bringing both hands to his chest and resting my chin on the backs of them so I could look right into his eyes. “That’s the thing about relationships, honey. When you love someone, they become part of your life. Your job is part of who you are, Micah. I don’t want you keeping things from me because you want to protect me from it. If you do that, I don’t get all of you, and I want all of you.”
His arm around me squeezed tighter. “I know that now.”
“Good. Because I’m a whole lot tougher than people think.”
His voice was low and husky as he replied, “Believe me, Red, I know how tough you are. It’s one of the many reasons I fell in love with you.”
“All right. Then it’s settled. If you need to let something out, I can take it, so I want you to give it to me. No more secrets.”
He lifted his head off the pillows and bent his neck so he could reach my lips. “Deal. No more secrets.”
With that, the heavy stuff was done, and Micah let me know he was ready to move on to something much more fun by rolling me to my back and sliding his thick, hard cock into me slowly. He made love to me the same way, taking his time and savoring every second of it.
Once we finished, he cleaned me up and we tucked in for the night. Curled in Micah’s arms, I slept harder and deeper than I had in a week.
Micah
Walking into the bullpen Monday, my mood was considerably changed from the week prior. I felt so damn good it was a wonder I wasn’t whistling a damn tune.
Ivy had come home from her dad’s the night before, and the moment she walked into the house and saw me kicked back on the couch, she’d let out a shriek loud enough to pierce my eardrums.
“You’re back!” she’d screamed before throwing herself at me and wrapping her tiny arms around me as tightly as she could. As soon as mine closed around her little body, the last piece of my heart that had been missing for the past week clicked back into place, and just like that, I was whole again.
“I’m back, Monster,” I’d told her, pulling in her soft scent. It reminded me of sugar and fabric softener. It was warmth and comfort, and I hadn’t realized how badly I missed it until that moment. “And I promise I’ll never disappear on you again.”
She’d been so excited it had been a nightmare trying to get her to go to sleep later that night. I’d had to read her favorite book twice, then make up a story about a little diva rocker princess who loved glitter and playing in the dirt before she finally passed out.