Page 207 of Iced Up Love: Part Two
Jackson needed that.
And she... she needed it more than either of us have been willing to admit.
The sound of her voice had carried through the apartment earlier, soft at first, then breaking, then shifting into something else entirely, something that pulled tight in my chest and lower at the same time, something that made my body react before my mind could catch up to it.
I’d stood there under the water, eyes closed, letting it run over me while I listened, while I let myself understand exactlywhat had been missing, what we’d been holding back from her without meaning to.
And my body hadn’t been subtle about it.
Hard.
Immediate.
A response that had nothing to do with patience and everything to do with memory, with knowing exactly what she sounds like when she lets go, with knowing how she feels when she’s not being handled like something fragile.
But I didn’t move. I didn’t interrupt. Because this wasn’t about me. This was about them. So I stay until I know it’s over. Until the apartment settles again. Until I can step back into it without breaking something that finally started to mend.
I turn the water off, dry off slowly, deliberately, giving them that extra space, that extra time, before I pull on a pair of sweats and push the door open.
The apartment is quiet again.
Different quiet this time.
Softer.
I move down the hallway without rushing, my steps instinctively quieter as I reach the bedroom door, my hand pausing on the handle for a second before I push it open.
Jackson is on the bed.
Lying on his side, facing her.
Watching her.
His hand is in her hair, fingers moving through it slowly, like he needs to keep touching her, like he needs that constant reminder that she’s here.
She’s asleep.
Curled slightly toward him, her body relaxed in a way I haven’t seen since before everything, the tension gone from her shoulders, her breathing even, her face soft.
And she’s naked.
Completely unguarded, completely open, like she finally let herself drop whatever she’s been holding onto for days.
Jackson doesn’t look up straight away.
His gaze is fixed on her collarbone.
On the tattoo.
Property of Jackson.
The ink that sits just above where her skin is still healing, where the faint, angry lines of the cuts that tried to take it from her still linger, not fully faded yet, a reminder carved into her body of something that should never have happened.
His jaw tightens.
“He tried to remove us from her.”
His voice is quiet, rough, like he’s holding it in place with effort.
