Page 116 of Romancing in Rot

Everything I should have written. Every truth that burned through me when she looked at the floor and waited for me to agree.

Not a burden.

Wanted.

Chosen.

Mine to stand beside.

Mine to protect because she matters, not because she is weak.

I kiss her like I can make her feel the difference. Like I can press the truth into her skin until every ugly thing Russ left behind finally shuts the fuck up.

Her breath breaks against my mouth. Her fingers drag down the front of my shirt. Her nails scrape over me, dragging the fabric tight across my shoulders. She isn’t pulling away. She isn’t shrinking.

I grip her waist and turn us, backing her against the end of the shelf, slow enough that she can stop me if she wants to.

She doesn’t.

Her back meets the metal with a soft rattle of loose hooks and half-empty pegboard. I cage her in with my body, one hand sliding up to cradle the side of her face, thumb brushing her jaw, avoiding the cut at her throat.

Her body fits against mine, soft where the rest of the world is sharp, warm where everything else has gone cold. Her fingers climb from my chest to the back of my neck, threading into my hair, and every thought in my head goes up in smoke. I feel the tug all the way down my spine. Feel it in my knees. My ribs. The place where wanting has been living quiet and hungry for years.

My hand flexes at her waist, fingers digging into fabric instead of skin because if I start learning the shape of her under my hands, I’m not sure I’ll survive stopping.

Her teeth catch my bottom lip, and my hips press into hers before I can stop them.

Clair gasps against my mouth.

My forehead nearly hits the shelf beside her head as my lips skim her jaw.

I brace one hand against the metal, trying to keep my composure. The shelf rattles behind her and something small falls, hits the floor, and rolls away into the dark.

Neither of us looks.

Her pulse beats hard beneath my fingers.

Fast. Stubborn. Alive.

That blade touched her.

He touched her.

My mouth turns rougher before I can stop it.

Clair rises onto her toes and pulls me closer.

My control goes thin.

Her palm presses over my heart, and it pounds wild beneath her hand. No hiding it. No pretending this is only adrenaline. No room left for the careful distance I told myself was keeping her safe.

She is safe.

With me.

Because I would cut my own hands off before I used them to make her feel small.

Her mouth moves against mine, slick and desperate, and the whole ruined store narrows to warm breath. Soft lips. Her pulse beating stubborn beneath my thumb.