Cayce heard Richard come in, but she was half asleep. She could see that the room had some light coming in around the curtains and realized what a long night he’d had. When he slid into her bed and wrapped his arms around her, she murmured something to him, but his warm voice against her ear whispered, “Sleep.” And she drifted back under.
When she awoke a second time, she saw him beside her, crashed, dark rings under his eyes, and she realized what a terrible toll the last several days had taken on him. As she tried to sneak out of bed and not disturb him, his arm slid over her, tucked her up against him, and nudged her closer.
She immediately turned over, slid her arm across his chest, and whispered, “I didn’t want to wake you. You’re exhausted.”
He smiled, but his eyes remained closed. “I am,” he said, “but it’s over. We’re here. We’re together, and there’s an awful lot we have to be thankful for.”
She lay her head on his shoulder and whispered, “Thank you for that.”
“I didn’t do anything,” he said, “nothing more than my job.”
She gently pinched his skin.
“Ouch,” he said. “What was that for?”
“Just wondering if that means, whenever someone is threatened, you’ll feel the need to move into their beds.”
He chuckled, the sound bubbling up through his chest. “Okay, so maybe it wasn’t just my job.”
“I should hope not.”
He rolled over, suddenly pinning her beneath him on the bed. His eyes were open and a deep, deep blazing blue as he stared down into hers. “That we have shared a bed over these recent days,” he said, “you have no idea how grateful I am that you’re still alive and here with me now.”
She smiled up at him cheerily. “Oh, I think I do,” she said. “I’m pretty grateful about it myself.” She reached up and kissed him gently. “Do you think it could be our time now?”
“Absolutely,” he said, kissing her gently. “We’ve had a pretty rough go of it.”
“Yes, we have,” she said, as she kissed him again. “Do you have to be anywhere?”
“No,” he said, “not right now. What time is it?”
Just then her phone rang. She quickly snagged her phone, took a look, and gasped.
He looked at the phone with her and said, “What am I looking at?”
She scrolled down to read a text.
I’m terrified to send this, but Bellamy said I had to.
It was a picture of a room with multiple paintings.
She zoomed in and looked closer. “Amazing.”
“I don’t get it,” Richard said, curious at her reaction.
“It’s Frankie’s work,” she said gently. At that, her heart warmed as she thought about him. “He used to paint very differently from this, and then he had a car accident and ended up with a brain injury, and he could never quite get it again. So he’s been very frustrated and angry.”
“What is this then?”
“He finally tried to do something different. He let his hand take care of his heart, and this is the result.”
“Wow,” he said.
Awkwardly holding the phone, she quickly sent back a text. Amazing, Frankie. So proud of you. I’ll be happy to take a closer look, but it won’t be today. She sent it, tossed her phone on the night table. With a happy sigh she returned her attention to Richard. “Now that is something that really makes me happy.”
“You’re close to him, aren’t you?”
“Absolutely,” she said. “He’s been a confidant for a couple years now.”
Richard gently kissed her on the cheek and nose. “A lot of people are in your life, aren’t there?”
She slid her hands to his cheekbones, gently stroking the strong bones under his eyes. “That doesn’t mean my life is full,” she said. “There’s plenty of room for one more, right here beside me.”
He smiled down at her, and she was entranced by the insecurities she could see peeking through his gaze. She asked him, “Don’t you ever feel that you aren’t good enough or that you don’t belong.”
“How did you know that’s what I was thinking?” he joked.
She slipped her finger down to his mouth to stop him from talking. “Because I can see it,” she said. “Remember that one thing that I do as I paint? When I paint, I see other people. I see inside people.”
“I need to ask you a few questions,” he admitted.
“I know. There will be lots of questions for all of us for a long time,” she said.
“The luminescence, the light.”
“It took me a long time to perfect that,” she said, “but the answer is so damn simple.” She slid her arm up around his neck. “We can talk about that later too.”
He lowered his head and kissed her deeply, her body completely melting underneath him. She wrapped her arms around him and held him close, feeling tears welling up in her eyes. She was just so grateful to be alive and to have him in her life.
His hand stroked her breast, and he lowered his head to take the nipple into his mouth, suckling, and she cried out, her body arching under his attentions. When he did the same for the second one, she was already shuddering and quaking at his touch. After all, these past several days had seemed like one long foreplay session. Plus it had been a long time for her. And the fact that being with Richard was so special and so new, just made it all that more poignant.
Her skin was supersensitive, her heart already melting, and her belly, well, everything south of her navel was more than ready for his attention.
He slid a hand over her hip, down her thigh, across her knee, to her calf, only to slide up the inside of her calf and thigh. But to completely miss the tiny triangle of curls that she left there.
When he wouldn’t go there, she whispered, “You’re a tease.”
He chuckled. “Maybe,” he said. “But I want to make sure that you’re ready for me.”
“Are you kidding?” she said. “I’ve been ready for days.”
“I know,” he said, “and I’m sorry. I didn’t want to drag it out, but I also didn’t want to cross a line that would compromise the case.”
She reached out, pulling him up to her, and said, “I knew that, and I understood.”
He kissed her again and again. “Not many would,” he whispered.
“I do,” she said.
“You have the parameters of your work, and I have the parameters of my work,” he said. “It is what it is on both counts.”
“Got it,” she said, kissing him on his lips, on his neck, on those incredible cheekbones. “It feels so damn special to be here with you right now,” she said. “I just feel so thankful to be alive.”
He kissed her again. “You have no idea how I felt when Frankie called and said you had disappeared.”
She placed a finger across his lips. “Stop,” she said. “We got through it, and we’ll get through the rest too.”
“Just some questions. There won’t be a trial. The suspect is dead.”
She winced at that, and Richard immediately kissed her, as if that would heal the wound. She had to admit it went a long way toward making it easier. She slid her leg up his calf, up his buttocks, and noted he had no boxers on. She stopped and stared at him. “Did you sleep in the buff?”
He chuckled. “I sure did,” he said, “but then so did you.”
She shrugged. “I did, but I’m not sure that it was deliberate. I was so exhausted.”
“Well, in my case, it was deliberate,” he said. “I’ve been sleeping this way the last couple nights in your bed next to you.”
She stared at him in shock.
He chuckled. “And I’m kind of disappointed you didn’t notice.”
Her laughter rang out. “You know what? I can understand that.” The surety that she was right where she needed to be overwhelmed her. The knowledge that he was hers and that she was his. She couldn’t even begin to plan for all eternity, but she was damn happy to take it one day at a time, just as they had been. She tugged him to her and said, “Now, please. I want you inside me now.”
He settled back ever-so-slightly and whispered, “I don’t think you’re quite ready.” And he lowered his head to kiss her across her cheek and on her earlobe and down her neck, across to her collarbone. Meanwhile his hand slid across her hip, between her thighs, and just his thumb played with the little nub between the soft folds.
Her hips arched up, and she cried out. “No. That’s not true,” she said, her head twisting from side to side. “I was ready days ago.”
“I know,” he said. “I just want to make sure this is all about you.”
Her eyes opened, and she stared at him. “This isn’t about me or you,” she said. “This is about us. This is about us being the best that we can be together.”
He aligned his body with hers, sliding in between her thighs. She wrapped her legs around him, high up on his hips, and he stared at her in surprise. “I’ve never even thought of it in that way before,” he said, “about being an us in bed.”
She slid her arms around his neck, pulled him to her, and said, “Good, that’s just between us then.”
He lowered his head, kissed her, his tongue plunging deep, even as his hips surged until he was seated right in the heart of her.
She stilled. He lifted his head, looked down at her in worry. She took several slow deep breaths. “I’m fine,” she said. “It’s just been a while.”
He shuffled ever-so-slightly, and she lifted her hips and wiggled. He closed his eyes, reaching for control.
And then she whispered, “Don’t worry. I’m good.”
He kissed her hard and said, “Are you sure?”
“I said it’s been a while,” she said. “And that was a little more than I bargained for, if you know what I mean.”
He chuckled and said, “As long as you’re okay.” And he lifted his hips and gently started to ride. Moments later, she hung on, giving as good as she got, and soon wasn’t capable of anything but responding blindly to the power, the presence of the moment, and the heat that surged through the two of them.
When she came apart in his arms, she cried out for joy. As she collapsed, he roared above her, and she could feel his own orgasm ripping through her, and her body exploded again. She lay shuddering in shock.
When he finally collapsed beside her, he said, “Good thing we’ve got a lifetime ahead of us because that went way too quickly.”
She placed a finger on his lips. “Shh. It was perfect,” she said. “And, as you said, we have a lifetime for more.”
“But, a lifetime aside, we can do it again in a minute, right?” And he waggled his eyebrows.
She laughed in delight.
Her phone rang, and she eyed it distrustfully.
“If it’ll bother you,” he said, “why don’t you turn it off?”
She lifted the phone and saw it was a message from Frankie. And as she scrolled down, a photo loaded. Then another and another. Close-ups of his paintings. She gasped in shock at the scenery, the soft pastel rivers, almost European settings. She stared at them in delight.
“What are they?” he asked.
She twisted her cell slightly so he could see, and he nodded. “Those are amazing.”
She quickly texted him back. Absolutely wonderful. These are fantastic. She included a heart emoji to go along with it.
“And that was for what?”
She looked up at him, smiled, and said, “Validation. We all need it.”
He nodded in comprehension. “And going back to that question I asked you earlier.”
“About my painting?”
“What makes them glow?” he asked. “What is that luminescence that makes them come alive?”
She smiled and said, “It won’t make a whole lot of sense to you, unless you understand the energy of things and the colors of energy.”
“I’m slowly learning,” he said, “particularly after Stefan gave me a few lessons.” On that note, he looked down and checked out her ankles, realizing they were completely free of the black bonds. He reached down, pulled her right knee up so that he could stroke the ankle. “The chains, the black energy, was wrapped around both of your ankles.”
“Which is interesting,” she said, “because both my ankles were broken by my ex-fiancé,” she said. “So I guess it makes sense. He liked to tie his victims by the ankle.” Her tone turned sad as she remembered it.
He leaned over and whispered, “We’ll leave that sadness behind now. But you still haven’t answered the question.”
She laughed in delight, threw her arms around him, and said, “It’s the simplest answer in the world. I use energy, but I use good energy. I use what would heal the entire world, if people would stop and accept some into their heart.”
He stared at her, and she could see the confusion in his gaze.
“I infuse all my paintings with love.”