37

That seems fitting somehow. Its light sprawls over the sparkling snow lumps that will melt into fence posts and bushes in the spring sunshine. Pastures that I’m sure house cows in warmer months, spread over the hills where he lives. I bet in a few months there will be flowers here, wild grasses, deer in the paths he described to me on the phone.

The door opens before I even make it to the driveway. Gogo races out, jumps over a few snow piles, spins a few circles, squats down and pees, her tail penduluming back and forth like mad.

As always, my breath hitches at my first glimpse of him. He folds his arms across his chest, nothing but a Henley from the cold, but he looks like he could stand there all day.

The corners of his eyes crinkle. His lips spread, white teeth, dimples, smile lines. I never had a chance anyway.

I slide the gear shift forward into park, open my door, step out. Gogo prances up and dances around me, her tail wagging so hard her butt moves with it. I squat down and stroke her ears, hum to her until she loses interest in me and darts off into the snow after something only she can hear.

When I rise, Stranger’s still there. Waiting. I can read it on his face. Your move, Reed.

I had a long time to think about what I’d say to him. He meets me at the edge of the front steps that lead up to the porch. I stop, one step below him, stare up into those warm hazel eyes. There’s a touch of orangy-gold in there, mixed with the green and gray flecks.

His brows lift and his mouth quirks. “The whole drive to think about it, and that’s your line.”

I look out over the white fields, at Gogo, nose to the ground now, tracking something with her tail down, a girl on a mission. “Not as well as I thought. But I’d like to.”

“No lies.” He whistles for Gogo, and she races back to us, her tongue lolling. We dry her off in the entryway together, checking between her toes to make sure there’s no ice there.

I turn happily to say hi to him and freeze, my mouth hanging open like a sitcom star. He’s standing in the kitchen. And I mean standing.

I can’t see them, because he has on jeans and a pair of sneakers, but clearly his prostheses arrived.

I hug him. Unlike with Stranger, it’s an easy and uncomplicated hug, like hugging Danny. “You look good.” I glance back and forth between him and Stranger. I point at James. “You’re taller than Stranger.”

For some reason that makes them laugh, and like that, I feel like I’ve come home. James makes an excuse a few minutes later, pegs me with a glare that makes me promise not to go anytime soon, and leaves us alone.

His shoulders lift momentarily, I can see his brain working, itching to tease me for sounding like a kid in her parents’ house. But all he says is, “Want to come with me to my bedroom?”

He steps closer, and finally, those big hands settle on my waist, burning hot through my sweater.

“First, I’ve got to be honest with you about something.” He backs me up a step toward his room.

He backs me up another step, and our bodies are closer now. Close enough that his hips bump against my belly as we move.

He blows out an exaggeratedly relieved sigh. “I’m also not an alien. Or a warrior. Or a shifter.”

I grin and let him guide me backward into his room. “Ah. I see what you did there.”

“I don’t have a thirteen-inch minotaur cock, or a magic stone, or any superpowers.” He kicks the door shut behind him and keeps on walking me backward until my legs bump against his bed. One hand slides down to cup my ass, the other rising up my back, to cradle my head. He leans in closer. “And I can’t cum buckets.”

My breath hitches and everything inside me goes all melty and dumb like it always does, and when I talk it comes out all silly and breathless and pathetic. I’m so far gone it’s not even funny. “So, you’re saying you aren’t a hero in a romance novel? Then what are you?”

I screw up my face like that’s not quite enough, even though it is. And he’s not kinda hot. He’s a super hot ex-hitman hobby writer guy. It’s the ex part I needed to know most, that it was over, no more killing. “Hmmm...”

“Okay, I’ve got one thing that might tip the balance.” He lowers his lips to mine.

A slight pause while he swallows, and his thumb strokes my cheek. “I love you.”

I close the distance between us, touch our lips, taste his perfect, special Stranger taste, make that same stupid whimper he always pulls out of me, and I just melt into him.

I love you too.” I slide a hand under his shirt, touch hard, hot skin. “But you’re done with killing now, right?”

I need the words though. Out loud. “You’re not going to kill anyone else are you? It’s really over?”

“You were my last hit.” His breath feathers along my cheek as he presses kisses there, moving toward my temple, sliding past my ear.

I shiver, helping as he pulls my shirt over my head. “So what do we do now?”

My shirt pops free, and he stares at my bra, and groans. “Recycling bin blue.”

“Whatever.” He tugs open the button on my jeans. “I’m starting a business with James and an old friend named Lex who you’ll love. Revin, Inc.” He slides down my jeans and groans. “Sprite label green. Perfect.”

He pauses, half crouched as he tugs my jeans down my thighs. “Personal defense contractor. And I bought the land next door.”

I nearly fall over when he yanks my jeans off one foot and they get stuck on my boot, but I catch myself on the bed, rise up on my elbows. “Why?”

I must make a face at that, because he stops tugging on my clothes and glares at me. “Not right away. But eventually. I want to do this. With you.”

There’s a part of me that wants to push it away, skirt the subject, brush it off for another time, but that was the old me. This one says what she wants and doesn’t lie, especially not to herself.

“I want that too.” I kick off my other boot, and laugh when Stranger yanks off the jeans and crawls up the bed on top of me, his big body all prowly and hard, my mind skips to the moment I saw him in the woods and I knew, deep down in my bones, in the fibers of my soul, that I was safe because I wasn’t alone anymore, my Stranger was there, a stranger no longer.

His lips are soft, but his beard stubble is rough, and so are his calloused palms as they move up my bare skin. My heart skips in my chest, and for once my brain’s not focused on sex so much, but on hope, because our future looks so bright and shiny I can’t even wait for it. I want it all, a man I can laugh with about crackers, share my every horrible thought with, plan with, feel safe with.

“I’ll move in when the house is ready.” My fingers glide over the smooth, bunched muscles of his back.

He freezes for a second, and then his whole body relaxes into me, he wraps his arms around me in the biggest, warmest bear hug of my life.

Book 2 is Lex’s super sexy story about a trip to Iceland, a cabin in the snow, and a mysterious stranger without a name. More secrets, more lies, a secret billionaire badass and way more dirty talk.

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Immy is the award-winning author of Talk Dirty to Me, which took first place in Writer's Digest 2020 Romance Indie Category, of the sheer-escapist Tribe Warrior Series, and of the spell-binding Plague Saga.

Her stories are a shade too bright to be called dark, and a tinge too dark to be called light. They're passionate and humorous, sexy and adventurous, and always dangerous and suspenseful. And no locked doors ever.

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