“I appreciate the concern, darling, but I make my own decisions. Where you go, I go. All I want is to keep you safe.”
“But why?”
“Because you’re my wife. And I love you.”
Willow blinks at me, surprised. “Y-you do?”
I take a step toward her, taking her hands in mine. I make it my new mission to warm her frigid fingers between my palms. “I know it’s crazy and probably too fast but fuck it. God, Willow... I can’t explain it. It feels like I’ve known you a lifetime. It doesn’t make sense when I try to rationalize it, so I won’t. All I know is that I love you and you’re my wife—accidental or not—and I’m going to take care of you.”
She closes the remaining space between us and hops up on her toes, crashing her lips against mine. Willow clings to me, pulling away long enough to rasp, “I love you, too.”
I kiss her like my life depends on it. For some reason, it feels like it does. Like if I can’t hold her, I might come apart at the seams. If I can’t taste her, I’ll forget myself. If I can’t look upon her sweet smile and hear her laugh, I might as well be hollow inside. Everything about Willow—from the moment she pulled a gun on me to this very instant—has awakened something inside me. A purpose. A reason to fight off the rest of the world with my bare hands so long as she has a chance of being happy.
Screw morals. Fuck being right or wrong.
I’d raze it all to the ground if she asked me to.
Willow deepens the kiss, the tip of her tongue sliding out to bribe my lips apart. I step forward, guiding her away from the water’s edge until I have her back firmly pressed against the wide trunk of a tree. Her breath hitches when I dip my hand beneath the fabric of her shirt, tracing my fingers over the curve of her lovely hips.
“Here?” she breathes.
“Here,” I confirm.
She grins devilishly. “You, sir, are a wild, wild man.”
“You haven’t seen anything yet.”
There’s no eloquence in our haste to remove our clothes, just a general fumbling for our belts and the undoing of our zippers. I turn Willow around so her hands brace against the tree, brushing her hair aside to hungrily suck marks against the crook of her neck. I greedily drag her jeans down, exposing her round ass and lean thighs, my cock throbbing at the sight of her bent over and waiting for me.
She’s so wet and ready that I’m able to bury myself deep inside her with next to no resistance. Her walls clench around me, welcoming me in. Willow’s soft moan is mine alone to hear, the way her body moves against me utterly divine. She’s braced against the tree, and I’m slowly thrusting in and out of her, one hand wrapped around to slip between her legs and tease her swollen clit. She throws her head back against my shoulder, her mouth falling open as pleasure takes hold.
“Look at all these bruises,” I grumble, caressing her skin as tenderly as possible. “I’m going to have a word with Natalia.”
“It’s just a part of training.”
“Nobody hurts you, darling. Not on my watch.”
“Z-Zane—”
“Fuck, you’re so nice and tight. I don’t think I’m going to last.”
“That’s okay,” she moans. “I want you to feel good.”
“Come with me, darling. Come on, that’s it. That’s—”
Release hits us both, hard and fast and overwhelming. Willow shudders against me, jolts of pleasure zapping through her. My own ecstasy whites my mind, nothing but pure satiation left in its wake.
Willow giggles as she turns toward me, her cheeks rosy and her hair a wild mess. “Well, damn. Sex in the great outdoors is surprisingly fun. We should do it more often.”
“I could arrange that.”
“Oh?”
“Sure. I could buy a plot of land somewhere. Build a house for us. We could fuck on every inch of our property.”
Her smile stretches wide, the corners of her eyes crinkling. “You’d build a house for us? Do you even have any construction experience?”
“I’d figure it out. Or we’d live in a tent.”