“Kyler, oh my God, I love you too,” she replied.
Fuck, she always got me. Looking into those soulful eyes of hers then, I knew. I knew that she was stronger than I’d ever been. She’d pulled herself together after I’d torn her apart, and I’d been the one to crumble. She’d come back for me, even when I didn’t deserve it. She had strength she didn’t even know she had. But I saw it. Right there staring back at me.
My everything.
I reeled back, plunged in again, and fisted at her breast, so hard it left red marks, before I leaned down and bit under the curve of her breast as my other hand trailed to her throat. I bit. I bruised. I didn’t draw blood, but I had blood pooling under the skin, a red welt to mark her, a tiny love bruise where only she and I would ever see.
She pulsed around me. Waves crashed through her body as she whimpered and moaned while I rode my orgasm inside of her. I swallowed the lump in my throat as I gazed at her beautiful skin. I bent over, ran a hand through her long strands, and fisted in her hair. Pressing my lips to hers in a searing, take-no-prisoners kiss, and then slowly, I finally pulled out of her.
“I love you, Mad. Now, forever, always.”
Epilogue 2
Madison - ten years later
“Happy anniversary, Mrs. Sinclair,” Kyler said, wrapping his arms around me. Fifteen years later and I still loved nothing more than his arms around my body. Well, maybe our two children. I definitely loved our kids more, but only slightly. We’d settled into domestic life eight years ago, getting married right before Kyler passed the bar and started working at the District Attorney’s office. He helped put bad guys away and I worked as a social worker helping those they harmed along the way. Our jobs had helped heal us in a way and created our sense of purpose.
“Dad, can you tell Michael to stop bugging me?” Clair, our oldest, said, her small fists at her sides as she trembled in anger. I stifled a small laugh as Michael came out after her, holding a Barbie with a very interesting hair cut in his hand. “He cut her hair, Daddy.”
Kyler walked to her, lifting her tiny frame in his arms and twirling her around. “We can go to the store and buy you a whole new Barbie this Sunday after brunch?” Since Clair had been three and Michael one, Kyler and the kids had gone to brunch every Sunday like clockwork. No matter what, he’d never missed the date. It was the kind of man he was. Nothing and no one came between him and his commitments to our children and me. He’d come a long way from the man I’d first met all those years ago.
“You promise, Daddy?”
“Pinky swear,” he said, lifting his baby finger to hers as they shook.
“What about me?” Michael asked, a cute pout forming on his lips. Kyler put Clair down gently and bent to look our son in his vibrant blue eyes, the matching ones like his father.
“We’ll get you something too. Whatever you want. Now you two go get ready, Aunt Tammy will be here any moment for your sleepover.”
“Where are you and mommy going tonight?” Michael asked.
“Mommy and I have a special date,” Kyler said, looking at me, before our kids scampered off to their own room.
“I owe you the world,” he said, moving his blue eyes to me. “I’m never going to be able to do or say anything to show you how much you and our kids mean to me.” He cradled my face in his strong hands. “I love you, baby. I love you more every single moment I know you. You hang the moon and set the sun. You’re everything.”
Also by Mila Crawford
Jameson
“Hey!” The old man’s voice interrupted the last slash of red on brick. “I’m calling the police this time, you little punk!”
I let off the trigger of the spray, drips of paint bleeding between the cracks of the brick in angry rivulets.
Not perfect, but it’d have to be, for tonight anyway.
I shot one last look at the shop owner, who was thrusting the phone in his hand my way as he yelled at the top of his lungs. I shot off around the corner of Fifth Avenue at a full jog, crossing the street—nearly empty of traffic at this time of night.
and lost myself in the overgrowth of Central Park.
I could still hear his angry voice shouting from the corner as his eyes scanned the darkness in search of me.
I didn’t blame him.
I’d been working that piece for the last three nights. I was surprised he hadn’t painted over the current work in progress, a fist wrapped in barbed wire with splashes of red, meant to be a symbol of consumer oppression.
I hovered at the path just inside the treeline and just outside of the nearest streetlamp. The truth was, I liked watching the angry man spit nails as much as I liked making the art on his brand-new brick wall.
Graffiti on the corner of 59th and 5th, the heart of uptown shopping, was never looked kindly upon.
And then I heard the siren.
A vicious grin twisted on my face as I launched the spray cans I had on me into the garbage can at my side before, head down, hustling the other way along the path deeper into the park.
“Shit…” A hot beverage soaked my shirt as my eyes cast up. “I’m so, so sorry. I wasn’t watching where I was going. I’ve had the worst fucking day. I shouldn’t even be around people right now.”
Her hand launched out to wipe my black shirt with a
