She leans down a little, making her still-wet pu**y rub against my stomach. The door swings open and presents the master bedroom. I walk her over to the bed and then ease her down gently, straddling her hips as her body settles into the soft down comforter. “Nothing’s hopeless, Harp. But this is an area I forbid you to go. You’re not in charge of finding our future, I am.”

“But what if you need help? I’m not allowed to help?”

“No. And we haven’t properly talked about what happened this morning with that—” Shit, what do I call it?

“Murder?” she finishes with the word I was trying my best to avoid.

I scoot down until my c**k is nudging towards her entrance, pushing against her clit. She tries to open her legs, but my knees have her locked together. She whimpers as I thrust the head of my dick into her crease. Her folds are so wet, I have no problem sliding right inside her.

Fuck, she feels so damn good.

I ease out slowly, making her breath all ragged with panting and little moans slipping between her perfect lips. “Harper,” I say as I cup her face once again. “Look at me, Harper.” She opens her eyes, just enough to be legitimately open, but with my next thrust they close again. “If I tell you to stay put, what do you do?”

“Stay where I am,” she answers dutifully.

But I’m not convinced she means it. Hell, she looks like she might come at any second. She’s cunning. And she’s got moves. I need to hammer this home. “Tell me why.”

“What?” She opens her eyes now because I’ve stopped moving inside her. “Jesus, James, I’ll listen, OK?”

“No, that’s not enough. Tell me why you’ll listen.”

“Because you said so.”

I shake my head at her. “Wrong answer. If I tell you to do something and you do it, the reason you do it is because you trust me. You understand?”

“I trust you.”

“Why do you trust me?”

“James—”

I lean down and kiss her softly. “Tell me why,” I whisper into her mouth. “Tell me, Lionfish. Why do you trust me?” My hips grind against her, moving my c**k deeper inside her. She buckles her back and moans as her body protests the depth of penetration. I pull back and she groans, thrusting her hips towards me now, asking for more. “You trust me because I love you.”

She opens her eyes and smiles.

“You understand now? You trust me because I would never”—I cup her face harder as my movements inside her gentle—“ever hurt you. Do you understand that? If I tell you to walk through fire, it’s because I know beyond a doubt that you are fireproof. If I tell you to take a bullet, it’s because I know that you are bulletproof. If I tell you to walk away from me, it’s because you know I will come back for you. No matter what I tell you to do, you will do it, and you will be safe because I said so. Because I love you. Because you trust my love.”

I stare at her and she holds the moment with me, but then my pace quickens and the gentle lovemaking becomes more urgent. I can feel her body writhe beneath me, and even though we’ve only had sex a few times, this is her signal. “You will follow orders, soldier,” I say as I unlock her legs from between my knees. I hike her ankles up onto my shoulders and pump hard. She gasps and squeals with each penetration. “Say yes, sir, captain. Say yes, sir.”

She explodes under me, murmuring something close to a, “Yes, sir, I will, yes, sir, I’m yours.”

And that’s all my c**k needs. I come inside her, spilling my seed into her, hoping against hope that we are creating a future together. Creating more than just me, more than just her. Making us. It’s every kind of love I’ve ever felt. It’s a gushing of emotion. It’s a promise and a conclusion at the same time. This chorus of long, satisfying moans wipes away all the blood years, all the contracts, and all my sins. It cleanses me in a way the desert never could. It doesn’t dry me out, it fills me up.

If death is a deal, then love is a promise.

“You fill me up,” I growl, biting into the soft flesh of her neck until her back buckles and her fingernails claw into my back. “You fill me up and make me realize—”

“Realize what?” she breathlessly prods when I don’t finish. Our hearts are still racing, pounding against each other, feeding off each other as they pump life through our veins. Pump life back into us. Take us away from the past and towards the future.

I don’t even know how to convey what it is I’m trying to say, but words just pour out of my mouth like water. “You take away the dark emptiness, Harper. You take away all the years of indifference and dissociation and right now”—I cup her face again—“right now, this is more real than anything I’ve felt in years. Maybe ever. This feels like something new. Something apart from what I was and a way forward into what I can be. This feels like hope, baby.”

She stares up at me, her expression solemn, her eyes searching, her brow worried. “I’m afraid to hope, James. I’m afraid to hope because I just think hope is a trap. Hope makes you want things that won’t come. Hope breaks your heart.”

“Not my brand of hope, Harper. This isn’t about luck, baby. This isn’t about circumstances or fate or coincidence. It’s about construction. Building, from the bottom up. It’s layer upon layer of secrets and debt. It’s level after level of subtle calculation and overt completion.”

She tisks her tongue as I collapse on top of her, and then pushes on my body until I fall off to the side and wrap her in my arms. “All those words are meaningless unless I know what you’re doing. And you’re not telling me anything specific. And you know I’m not on any kind of birth control, right?”

My eyes get heavy from the perfect combination of exhaustion and satisfaction. “Jesus Christ, woman. You did not hear a word I said. Just f**king trust me already.” I lean in and kiss her, this time with tongue and lingering, and we exchange breaths like lovers.

I’m all talked out. Completely wiped out. But just before we drift off I feel her gentle touch as she moves my unruly hair away from my forehead. And then the press of her sweet lips as she whispers into my ear. “I trust you, Six. But you need to trust me too.”

Chapter Twenty-One - James

“…you need to trust me too,” she whispers. I don’t answer. I can’t answer and besides, we’re too tired to talk about it now.