Page 138 of Beneath the Surface

Nathan grinned, wide and genuine. “Your grandmother would be so proud. Your father too.”

Quinn felt tears prick her eyes, but these were good tears. Happy tears.

“Yeah,” she said softly. “They would be.”

The drive back to Quinn’s house took twenty minutes through streets that looked different somehow—brighter, clearer, as if the world had come back into focus after being blurry for years.

Nathan dropped them off with a knowing look and a muttered comment about giving them “some privacy to celebrate” that made Quinn blush and Dax smirk despite his injuries.

Inside, the house was quiet and warm. Quinn had left the heat on, left lights on in the living room and kitchen so it wouldn’t feel empty when they returned.

Home. It felt like home.

“Are you hungry?” Quinn asked, moving toward the kitchen. “I could make dinner, or we could order—”

Dax’s good arm caught her waist, pulling her back against his chest.

“Not hungry,” he said, his voice low and warm against her ear. “Not for food anyway.”

Quinn turned in his embrace, careful not to jostle his injured shoulder. “Dax Mercer, are you propositioning me?”

“I’m celebrating with you.” His hand came up to cup her face, his thumb stroking across her cheekbone. “We won, Quinn. After everything. All the fear and pain and near-death experiences, we actually won.”

“We did.” Quinn’s hands found his waist, slipping under his shirt to feel the warm skin beneath. “Wheeler’s going to prison. My father’s story is going to be published.The New York Timesis running a feature. Everything we fought for—”

“Is real,” Dax finished. “And we’re alive. Together. Against all odds.”

He kissed her then, slow and deep and full of promise. Not the desperate, fear-driven kisses they’d shared in the hospital or during his recovery when they were both still raw and traumatized.

This was different. This was joy. Celebration. The kiss of two people who’d fought through hell and come out the other side.

Quinn melted into it, her body pressing against his, careful of his injuries but unable to maintain any real distance. She’d almost lost him. Had watched him bleed out on a concrete floor. Had sat beside his hospital bed for hours wondering if he’d survive.

But he had. They both had.

And now they were here, in her house, with a future stretching out before them that actually felt possible.

“Bedroom,” Quinn murmured against his lips. “Now.”

Dax didn’t argue.

They made their way down the hall—slower than Quinn wanted because Dax was still healing, still weaker than he’d admit. But they made it, and then they were in her bedroom with the door closed and the world locked out.

Quinn helped Dax out of his button-down shirt, her fingers gentle as she worked around the sling, as she eased the fabric over his injured shoulder. The bandages were smaller now—the wound healing, the stitches removed. But the scar would be massive. A permanent reminder of the night he’d saved her life.

“Does it hurt?” she asked, her fingers ghosting over the edge of the bandage.

“Not as much as it did.” Dax’s good hand was working on the buttons of her blouse, his fingers surprisingly dexterous for someone operating one-handed. “And right now, I don’t care. All I care about is you.”

Her blouse fell away. Then her bra. Dax’s hand—calloused and warm and real—slid up her ribs to cup her breast, his thumb circling her nipple until she gasped.

“Bed,” Quinn said again, more urgently this time.

They fell onto it together. Careful, always careful of Dax’s shoulder. He ended up on his back with Quinn straddling him, her hands braced on either side of his head.

“This okay?” she asked, breathless. “Your shoulder—”

“Perfect.” Dax’s hand slid up her thigh, under her skirt. “You’re perfect.”