Page 102 of Fierce-Baker

Her head went back, her body went limp, but Baker had her.

He was holding her tight. He was coming right with her. Clutching, twitching, prolonging each pulse her body was releasing.

Then he was whispering, “I love you.”

And she was shedding tears.

The tears of love.

The tears of finally finding the one.

30

OUT OF HIS HANDS

“Give me a kiss,” Tasha said the next morning as she handed him his travel coffee mug and pushed him out the door.

“I’ll talk to you later,” he said.

She waved her fingers at him, then turned to the couch. “Micah, say bye to Baker.”

“Bakeeeerrrrr,” Micah said, standing on the couch and leaning over, his arm waving. It just lit him up how every few times Micah stretched his name out as if he was just learning to say it again.

But then he’d burst into a fit of giggles.

He walked out the front door, climbed into his SUV and started it up. Tasha would leave almost an hour after him. He was used to getting in around seven to start his day.

He thought they might be in the other’s way getting ready, but they weren’t.

He was up first, in the shower, then she followed, he had breakfast ready for them when she got out, then she woke Micah and took care of her son.

He would have gotten Micah up for her, but she’d never asked once and the last thing he wanted to do was break her routine.

What a night they’d had.

Not the sex. That was always wonderful.

Not even her saying she was on the pill giving them that added freedom there.

It was the words expressed.

That she loved him as much as he loved her.

That she knew he was struggling and took it out of his hands.

That maybe she had him as much as he professed to have her.

And all it did was remind him how fucked up a marriage his parents had and that his mother was just full of shit to call that love.

That was control in his eyes.

When his sister’s name lit up on the screen, he hit the button to answer. “This is an early morning call.”

“Yeah,” Brittany said. “I know you’re up and probably on the way to work.”

“Leaving now. Let me guess. You talked to Mom and she told you what an asshole I was.”

Brittany laughed. Emme was in the background and he assumed his sister’s girlfriend heard the comment. “We talked. She didn’t say you were an asshole.”