The silence in Dr. Thorne's office after they led him away was deafening. It was the silence of a vacuum, the aftermath of a storm. The chalkboard was a chaotic tapestry of our shared genius, a monument to the intellectual seduction that had just taken place. My heart was still hammering, a frantic drum against my ribs, but the fear had been replaced by a shaky, soaring exhilaration. We'd done it. We'd actually done it.
The door opened again, and Clyde slipped back in. The corporate assassin disguise was gone, replaced by his usual jeans and a tight black t-shirt that did nothing to hide the fact that he'd just been part of a major takedown. His eyes found me immediately, scanning me for any sign of damage.
"You okay?" he asked, his voice a low rumble that felt like a physical touch in the quiet room.
I nodded, my voice still trapped somewhere in my throat. I managed a weak thumbs-up.
A slow, devastating smile spread across his face. He crossed the room in two strides and pulled me into a bone-crushing hug. I buried my face in his shoulder, breathing in the scent of him—clean cotton, adrenaline, and victory.
"You were magnificent," he murmured into my hair, his voice thick with emotion. "Cool, calm, brilliant. You mesmerized him. I've never seen anything like it."
I pulled back slightly, looking up at him. "I think I quoted one of his own papers back at him. I was so nervous I was just word-vomiting statistical theory."
He laughed, a real, full-bodied sound that echoed in the empty office. "It was perfect. You were perfect." He kissed me then, not a gentle kiss, but a hard, claiming, triumphant one that left me breathless and dizzy. When we broke apart, he kept his forehead pressed against mine. "Let's get out of this place."
The ride back to his apartment was a blur. I spent it leaning my head against the window, watching the normal world go by, feeling like I'd just returned from another planet. Clyde's hand was on my thigh, a warm, steadying weight.
When we walked through the door, the apartment was empty. Jin, Espinoza, and Cooper were already gone, doubtless off to begin the mountain of paperwork and processing that came with bagging a prize like Dr. Aris Thorne. The only evidence they'd been there was the spotless cleanliness and a single, forgotten protein bar wrapper on the counter that Clyde immediately picked up and threw away with a disapproving frown.
The tension of the day, the high of the success, began to ebb, leaving behind a deep, thrumming exhaustion. I sank onto the sofa, my legs finally giving out.
Clyde disappeared into the kitchen and returned with two glasses of water. He handed me one and sat down beside me, his body angled toward mine.
"So," he said, taking a long drink. "That happened."
A hysterical giggle escaped me. "Yeah. That happened." I looked at him, at this man who had walked into a grocery store and irrevocably changed my life. "You know, for a first date, this one sets a pretty high bar. Intellectually stimulating conversation, a shared takedown of a criminal mastermind…"
He grinned, that slow, heart-stopping smile that still made my stomach flip. "I aim to impress." He grew serious again. "It's really over this time, Troy. Thorne was the architect. With him and the key, his entire network will unravel. You're safe."
The words settled over me, warm and heavy and true. The constant, low-grade hum of anxiety that had been my soundtrack for weeks was just… gone. Silence. Beautiful, peaceful silence.
"I believe you," I said, and I did.
He studied me for a long moment, his gaze intense. "Good." He stood up and held out his hand. "Now, come on."
"Where are we going?"
"To bed."
"Clyde, it's 4 p.m."
"And your point is?" he asked, one eyebrow raised. "We just captured a dragon. I'm declaring a federal holiday. Now, come on. Those are orders."
I took his hand and let him pull me to my feet. He didn't lead me to the bedroom for passion, though the potential was certainly humming in the air between us. Instead, he pulled back the covers and nudged me in. Then he crawled in beside me, still fully clothed, and pulled me into his arms, spooning around me like a human fortress.
"What are we doing?" I mumbled, already feeling sleep pulling at me, soothed by his warmth and his solid presence at my back.
"Recalibrating," he murmured, his lips against my hair. "Recharging the asset. Now go to sleep."
I was out before I could even form a reply.
I woke hours later to darkness and the smell of pizza. Clyde was moving around the kitchen, opening a box. The digital clock on the nightstand glowed 8:17 p.m.
"I ordered dinner," he said, seeing I was awake. "I hope you like pepperoni. I assessed their online menu, and their crust-to-topping ratio was the most structurally sound."
I pushed myself up on my elbows, laughing. "Of course you did."
We ate the pizza on the floor, leaning against the sofa, because the table was still covered in the ghost of our previous mission. We didn't talk about Thorne, or the case, or the future. We just ate. And it was the best pizza I'd ever tasted.
After we'd finished, Clyde stacked the boxes neatly and turned to me. The playful glint was back in his eyes, but it was underscored by a new, profound tenderness.
"Now," he said, his voice a low, intimate rumble. "Where were we before we were so rudely interrupted by a multi-billion dollar criminal conspiracy?"
He didn't wait for an answer. He leaned in and kissed me, and this time, it was everything. It was slow and deep and sweet, full of the promise of a peace we'd fought for and won. It was a kiss that tasted of pepperoni and a future wide open with possibility.
Later, much later, as we lay tangled together in the dark, sated and breathless, I traced the lines of his face.
"So," I said. "The house with the porch. Is that still on the table?"
He captured my hand and brought it to his lips, kissing my palm. "It's more than on the table," he said, his voice sure and steady. "It's the next mission. And I have a feeling it's going to be our best one yet."
I smiled into the darkness, curling into his side. The numbers were quiet. The dragons were slayed. And my life, my wonderfully, unpredictably, perfectly balanced life, was just beginning. With him.
The morning after the dragon was truly, finally slayed, I woke to a sensation so novel it took me a moment to identify it: pure, unadulterated peace. Sunlight streamed through Clyde's blinds, painting warm stripes across the bed. I was curled on my side, and Clyde was wrapped around me like a particularly possessive octopus, one heavy arm slung across my waist, his face buried in the back of my neck, breathing slow and even.
I lay there for a long time, just soaking it in. The silence wasn't empty anymore; it was full of promise. The only sound was his breathing and the distant hum of a city that no longer felt like a threat.
Eventually, his breathing changed. He nuzzled my neck, his morning stubble scratchy against my skin. "You're thinking loud," he mumbled, his voice gravelly with sleep.
"I'm thinking about structural integrity," I said, smiling.
His arm tightened. "Of what?"
"Of this," I said, gesturing vaguely at us, at the room. "Of… everything. It feels solid."
He pressed a kiss to my shoulder blade. "Good. It is." He untangled himself and stretched, every muscle in his back and shoulders rippling in the morning light. It was a sight I would never, ever get tired of. "Now, for the most important mission of the day: pancakes. I'm thinking blueberry. The berries provide antioxidant support."
I laughed, rolling out of bed. "Of course they do."
The pancakes were, predictably, flawless. We ate them at the counter, our knees knocking together, making plans that didn't involve stakeouts or encrypted files.
"We need furniture," Clyde announced, pointing his fork at me. "For the house. Our current assets consist of one battle-tested skillet and a collection of towels of superior absorbency. It's a start, but it lacks… seating."
And that's how we found ourselves, a few hours later, wandering through a sprawling furniture store that smelled of lemon polish and new fabric. Clyde approached the task with the same focused intensity he applied to everything else.
He stopped in front of a large, overstuffed grey sofa. He sat down, bounced twice, then lay down on it, staring at the ceiling. "Sit," he commanded.
I sat on the other end. "Well?"
"The spring tension is adequate. The lumbar support is acceptable." He sat up and felt the fabric. "The durability of this microfiber, however, is questionable." He leaned closer to me, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "It would not survive a significant… spillage incident."
I bit my lip to keep from laughing. "Are you planning on having many spillage incidents?"
"One must be prepared for all contingencies," he said solemnly. He stood up and offered me his hand. "This one is tactically unsound. Next."
We rejected sofas for their poor defensive positioning, coffee tables for having "sharp corners conducive to injury," and a perfectly nice bookshelf because the particleboard was "a moral and structural failing." We finally settled on a ridiculously comfortable, deep blue sectional that Clyde deemed "defensible and inviting," and a solid oak dining table he approved of for its "heft and honest construction."
Exhausted but triumphant, we decided to celebrate. Clyde, in a shocking deviation from his usual tactical preferences, chose a restaurant. Not a quiet, out-of-the-way place, but a trendy, buzzing bistro in the heart of the city. "We're civilians tonight," he declared, holding the door open for me. "Civilians with a new sofa on order."
The place was packed and loud. We were shown to a small table near the back, and for a while, it was perfect. We clinked glasses of wine, argued good-naturedly about the merits of various throw pillows, and I felt a happiness so profound it was almost dizzying. We were just two guys on a date. It was miraculous.
And then I saw them.
A group of three men and two women were being seated a few tables over. I recognized them instantly. Mark, Steven, and their usual clique from my old life—the life before Clyde, before knives in grocery stores, before any of this. They were lawyers, financiers, professional gossips. They represented everything my life had been: polished, predictable, and painfully shallow.
My smile faltered. Clyde noticed immediately. His eyes flicked from my face to the group, his predator's instinct instantly engaged. "Problem?" he asked, his voice low.
"No," I said, too quickly. "Just… people I used to know. From before."
It was too late. Mark's gaze swept the room and landed on me. His eyebrows shot up. He said something to the others, and five pairs of eyes swiveled in our direction. The looks weren't friendly. They were a mixture of curiosity, disdain, and outright vitriol.
I shrunk in my seat, the old insecurities rushing back. I was the scandal. The one who'd gotten mixed up in "something messy." The one who'd fallen off the social map.
Clyde's posture didn't change, but I felt the energy around him shift. He went from relaxed companion to silent sentinel. He placed his hand over mine on the table, a simple, possessive gesture. "Ignore them," he murmured, his thumb stroking my knuckles.
We tried to go back to our conversation, but the air had been poisoned. I could feel their stares, hear their hissed whispers carrying over the din of the restaurant. I saw the sneers, the mocking smiles.
Then, Mark stood up. He smoothed down his expensive suit and started walking toward our table. My heart plummeted.
"Troy," Mark said, arriving at our table with a smarmy, condescending smile. "Long time no see. We were just wondering where you disappeared to." His eyes flicked to Clyde, taking in his simple henley, his powerful build, the quiet intensity that Mark would never understand. His smile widened, becoming nastier. "I see you've… moved on to greener pastures."
Clyde didn't move. He didn't even look at Mark. He kept his eyes on me, his hand still covering mine. "Is this person bothering you, Troy?" he asked, his voice calm, conversational.
Mark's smile tightened. He clearly wasn't used to being ignored. He focused his attention on Clyde, deciding to deal with the "help" first.
"Look, friend," Mark said, his tone dripping with faux concern. "I don't know what Troy has told you, but you might want to be careful. He's got a… history. Gets himself into situations. The kind of situations that can drag a person down. I'd hate to see you get… tangled up in his mess." He said the word "mess" like it was something contagious and vile.
The air at our table went cold. Clyde slowly, deliberately, turned his head to look at Mark. He didn't scowl. He didn't glare. He just looked at him, his pale blue eyes flat and utterly terrifying. It was the look he'd given the mercenaries in my living room.
Mark took an involuntary step back under the weight of that gaze.
"Let me be perfectly clear," Clyde said, his voice so low it was almost a whisper, but it cut through the restaurant noise like a knife. "You know nothing about him. You know nothing about me. The only 'mess' here is you, interrupting our dinner."
He leaned forward slightly, and even sitting down, he seemed to loom. "So you're going to turn around, walk back to your table, and you are never going to speak to him again. Are we understood?"
Mark's face was pale. He opened his mouth, then closed it. He looked from Clyde's implacable face to where Clyde's hand still covered mine, a gesture of protection and possession that was more threatening than any shout. He'd come to warn a simpleton about a troublesome queer and had instead stumbled into the lion's den.
"I… I was just…" he stammered.
"Understood?" Clyde repeated, the single word laced with icy finality.
Mark nodded, a quick, jerky motion, and practically fled back to his table. His friends were staring, their earlier smugness replaced by shock and confusion.
The silence at our table stretched for a beat. Then Clyde turned back to me, the terrifying coldness in his eyes melting away, replaced by warm concern. "You okay?"
I let out a breath I didn't realize I'd been holding. The old shame and anxiety had vanished, burned away by the sheer, glorious force of Clyde's defense. A slow smile spread across my face. "I am now."
He grinned, that quick, brilliant flash that transformed his face. "Good." He picked up his menu. "Now, where were we? I'm thinking the steak. I need to assess its structural integrity."
I laughed, the sound loud and genuine in the hushed aftermath of the confrontation. I glanced over at Mark's table. They were all pointedly not looking at us.
I looked back at Clyde, my lion, my protector, my ridiculous, wonderful man who judged furniture for its defensive capabilities and defended my honor without raising his voice.
"The steak sounds perfect," I said, reaching for my wine glass. My hand was steady. The past was past. And my future was sitting right across from me, and it was infinitely more solid than anything that had come before.
The air at our table, which had been frosty with Mark's unwelcome vitriol, had thawed back into a warm, private bubble. Clyde was meticulously dissecting his steak, offering a running commentary on its sear and marbling as if he were a food critic for a tactical journal. I was happily devouring my pasta, the confrontation already fading into a satisfying memory of seeing a bully put firmly in his place.
I felt a light, hesitant tap on my arm.
I turned, expecting another interruption from Mark's table, my smile tightening into a defensive line. But instead of a smirking financier, I found myself looking down into the wide, serious eyes of a little boy, no more than five or six years old. He had a smudge of chocolate on his cheek and was clutching a stuffed dinosaur.
"You're Nah-Nah," the little boy announced, as if stating an irrefutable fact of the universe.
I blinked. "I'm… sorry?"
Before I could process this, the boy turned and called over his shoulder, "Daddy! It's him! It's Nah-Nah!"
A man in his late thirties, looking slightly harried and holding two coats, hurried over. "Leo, I told you not to bother people…" His voice trailed off as his eyes landed on me. His expression shifted from apologetic to stunned disbelief. "Oh my god."
He stared at me, his mouth slightly agape. I stared back, completely bewildered. Clyde had gone very still beside me, his fork poised in mid-air, his body language shifting subtly into a protective assessment mode.
"I'm so sorry," the man stammered, pulling his son close. "He just… he took off. But… it is you. I can't believe it."
"I'm sorry," I said, utterly lost. "Do I… know you?"
"The accident," the man said, his voice thick with emotion. "On the Beltway, about three months ago? The multi-car pileup in the rain? You pulled us out."
A jolt of memory, sharp and clear, hit me. The screech of tires, the horrific crunch of metal. I'd been driving home from work, lost in my own thoughts. A truck had hydroplaned, causing a chain reaction. I'd pulled over, my hands shaking, and waded into the chaos. One car, a small sedan, had been crumpled like a soda can. A man was unconscious in the front seat. A little boy was screaming in the back, trapped in his car seat.
I didn't remember thinking. I just acted. I'd somehow pried the back door open, my suit jacket getting soaked and torn, and unbuckled the terrified little boy. I'd gotten him to the safety of the shoulder, then gone back for the father, helping to support him until the ambulances arrived. The whole thing was a blur of rain, sirens, and adrenaline. Once the professionals took over, I'd slipped away, cold, wet, and late for a dinner I'd forgotten about.
"Ryan," the man said, looking down at his son. "He couldn't say 'the man' after. He just called you 'Nah-Nah'. He's been talking about you ever since. We both have. We wanted to thank you, but you were gone before anyone could get your name. We didn't know how to find you."
Ryan looked up at me, his dinosaur held tightly. "You saved me and Daddy."
I was speechless. I looked from the little boy's earnest face to his father's tear-filled eyes. My own throat felt tight. "I… I just did what anyone would have done."
"No," the father said firmly, shaking his head. "They didn't. You did." He stuck out his hand. "I'm Dylan. This is Ryan. Thank you. Thank you for my son. Thank you for my life."
I shook his hand, a lump in my throat. "Troy. And it was… it was nothing, really."
"It was everything," Dylan insisted.
Throughout this entire exchange, I was acutely aware of the audience. Mark and his table had gone utterly silent, their earlier sneers replaced by looks of stunned confusion. Other diners nearby were watching the emotional scene with soft smiles. The narrative of the evening had been completely upended. I wasn't the scandalous "mess" anymore. I was "Nah-Nah," the mysterious hero.
Clyde finally moved. He stood up, not with any sense of threat, but with a quiet, respectful grace. He extended his hand to Dylan. "Clyde Adams," he said, his voice a low, respectful rumble. "It's a privilege to meet you."
Dylan shook his hand, looking slightly awed by Clyde's sheer presence. "You're with… Nah— with Troy?"
Clyde's smile was small but genuine. He slid his arm around my waist, pulling me firmly against his side. "I am," he said, his voice ringing with a pride that made my knees weak. "I'm with Troy."
The look on Mark's face was priceless. It was a beautiful cocktail of shock, shame, and dawning, horrifying realization. He hadn't just insulted a nobody; he'd insulted a hero. And that hero was dating a man who looked like he could break continents.
Dylan and Ryan chatted with us for a few more minutes, their gratitude a warm, glowing thing. Before they left to go back to their table, Ryan tugged on my pant leg. "Bye, Nah-Nah."
I crouched down to his level. "Bye, Ryan. Take care of your dad, okay?"
He nodded solemnly and then, to my surprise, launched himself forward and gave me a quick, sticky hug before running back to his father.
We sat back down. The restaurant had returned to its normal buzz, but the atmosphere around us was completely different. The vitriol was gone, replaced by curious, approving glances.
Clyde looked at me, his expression soft and full of a wonder I'd never seen before. "You never told me that story."
I shrugged, suddenly shy. "It wasn't a big deal. I just… did it."
"Troy," he said, reaching across the table and taking my hand. His grip was firm. "Pulling a child from a wrecked car? That's not 'nothing'. That's who you are. You see people in trouble, and you help. Whether it's with a spreadsheet or your bare hands." He shook his head, a slow smile spreading across his face. "You are… incredible."
The rest of our meal passed in a warm haze. The food tasted better. The wine was sweeter. When we left, Clyde's hand was a possessive, steadying weight on the small of my back. As we passed Mark's table, Clyde didn't even glance their way. He didn't need to. The victory was already complete.
Outside, in the cool night air, Clyde pulled me into a shadowy alcove and kissed me, deep and slow and full of a reverence that stole my breath.
"What was that for?" I asked when we finally broke apart.
"For being you," he murmured, his forehead resting against mine. "For being Nah-Nah. My Nah-Nah."
I laughed, the sound light and happy in the night. My past, with all its petty gossip and shallow judgments, felt a million miles away. My future was right here, in the arms of a man who saw the hero in me, even when I didn't. And it was better than anything I could have ever calculated.
The morning after the restaurant—after the vitriol, the vindication, the unexpected appearance of "Nah-Nah"—dawned bright and clear. The peace I'd woken up with the previous day was back, but it was deeper now, layered with a new, unshakable confidence. Clyde's words, "You are incredible," echoed in my mind, a warm shield against any lingering ghosts.
We were a tangle of limbs in his bed, the sheets knotted around us. I was half-lying on his chest, tracing the faint, white lines of scars on his skin—a map of a life I was only beginning to understand.
"You know," I mused, my finger following a particularly long line along his ribcage. "For a man who's been shot at, blown up, and who knows what else, your skin is surprisingly soft."
His chest rumbled with a silent laugh beneath me. "High-quality moisturizer is a critical part of operational readiness. Dry skin chafes under body armor. It's a tactical liability."
I snorted, lifting my head to look at him. "Of course it is." I kissed the scar I'd been tracing. "What's this one from?"
"Fell out of a tree when I was ten. Broke two ribs. My dad said it built character." He said it so matter-of-factly, as if discussing the weather.
I burst out laughing. "You are such a liar."
A slow, wicked grin spread across his face. "Maybe." He rolled, pinning me to the mattress and leaning down to kiss me. "Or maybe I just like the stories you make up for them."
We eventually untangled ourselves and migrated to the kitchen. Clyde, predictably, took charge of breakfast. Today's mission: French toast. He approached the bread, eggs, and cinnamon with the focus of a bomb disposal expert.
"The key," he intoned, whisking the eggs in a glass bowl, "is the soak time. Too little, and the interior remains a barren wasteland. Too long, and you have a soggy, tactical failure on your hands."
I leaned against the counter, sipping my coffee, watching him. "I'm learning so much about the art of warfare through breakfast foods."
"It's a foundational subject," he said, deadpan. He carefully dipped a slice of thick brioche into the egg mixture, counting silently in his head. "Three… two… one… and… deploy." He laid it gently in the sizzling buttered pan.
The result was, of course, golden-brown perfection. We ate at the counter, our knees touching, and it was better than any meal at any five-star restaurant.
"So," Clyde said, wiping a bit of syrup from the corner of his mouth. "The house. Our offer was accepted. We get the keys today."
The words sent a thrill through me. Our offer. Our keys. "Today?"
"Today." He stood and started clearing our plates. "No time like the present. We have furniture to accept delivery on."
A few hours later, we stood on the brick path leading up to the Craftsman house. The sun was shining, the giant oak tree in the yard casting a dappled shadow on the porch. It looked even better than I remembered. It looked like… a home.
Clyde unlocked the front door and pushed it open. The empty rooms echoed with our footsteps, full of light and potential.
"This is it," he said, his voice a little husky. He slid his arm around my waist. "Ours."
The word hung in the empty space, huge and wonderful.
Our moment of quiet reverence was shattered by the roar of a large truck pulling up to the curb. The furniture had arrived.
What followed was a ballet of controlled chaos directed by Clyde. He met the delivery crew at the door, a clipboard in hand (where did he get a clipboard?).
"The sectional goes in the living room, against the far wall. Mind the doorframe, it's a tight turn. The oak table and chairs in the dining room. The king-sized bed frame and mattress to the primary bedroom upstairs." He rattled off instructions with the ease of a general deploying troops.
The burly movers, who looked like they could bench-press the sofa, took one look at Clyde—standing there in a simple t-shirt that did nothing to hide the fact that he could probably bench-press the sofa and the movers—and just nodded. "Yes, sir."
I stood off to the side, feeling utterly useless and completely enthralled. Clyde didn't just direct; he helped. He effortlessly took one end of the heavy oak table, guiding it through the door with an easy strength that made the movers look like amateurs.
"You know," one of the movers muttered to me as they passed with the mattress, "your boyfriend is… intense."
"You have no idea," I said, grinning.
Once everything was inside, stacked in boxes and wrapped in plastic in the middle of the empty rooms, the movers left. Silence descended again, but now it was a different kind of quiet. It was a quiet waiting to be filled.
We stood in the living room, surrounded by the boxes that held our new life.
"Well," Clyde said, hands on his hips, surveying the cardboard kingdom. "Phase one complete."
"Now comes the hard part," I said. "Assembly."
A glint appeared in Clyde's eye. "Hard part? Nash, this is the fun part." He strode over to a large, flat box labeled 'HEMMNES BED FRAME' in cheerful, optimistic letters. He pulled out the instruction manual—a single sheet of paper covered in cryptic, wordless diagrams—and studied it for approximately three seconds.
"Flawless," he declared, tossing the manual aside. "The Swedes know their engineering." He produced a multi-tool from his back pocket—because of course he had a multi-tool—and began slicing open boxes with terrifying efficiency.
For the next few hours, our new home was filled with the sounds of power tools (he'd also produced a cordless drill from somewhere), the rustle of packing materials, and Clyde's running commentary.
"The cam lock is a superior fastening system… Ah, see, this dowel is slightly misaligned, a common manufacturing error… This particleboard is an affront to decent society, but the design is sound…"
I was put on "parts organization" duty, which mostly involved handing him screws and trying not to be distracted by the way his muscles flexed as he wielded the drill.
By late afternoon, the bed was assembled—a rock-solid monument to Swedish engineering and American determination. The sofa was in place, the table was set up. Boxes were broken down and neatly stacked for recycling.
We collapsed onto the new sofa, surrounded by the nest of packing foam and the satisfying smell of new furniture. The sun was setting, casting long shadows across our empty living room.
Clyde's arm was around me, my head on his shoulder. We were both dusty, sweaty, and tired. It was the most content I had ever been.
"We need a rug," I murmured into his shirt. "Something to tie the room together."
"I'll source one," he said, his voice drowsy. "Natural fibers. Good pile density. Strategically placed to define the space."
I smiled. "Of course."
We sat there in the quiet, watching the light change in our own living room. Our living room.
"I love you, you know," I said softly. The words felt natural, inevitable, like the final piece of a puzzle clicking into place.
He went very still for a second. Then he turned his head and looked down at me, his eyes serious and soft. "I know," he said, his voice rough. He cupped my face. "I love you too, Troy Nash. More than tactical moisture-wicking fabric. More than a perfectly seared steak."
I laughed, a happy, watery sound. "That's a lot."
"It is," he agreed, leaning down to kiss me. It was a slow, deep, promise-filled kiss that tasted of sweat, sawdust, and a future so bright it almost hurt.
When we broke apart, he rested his forehead against mine. "Welcome home," he whispered.
And as I sat there, in the arms of the man I loved, in the house we had built together, I knew that I was, finally, exactly where I was meant to be. Home.