Her Safe Place

She blinked in surprise but nodded. “Umm, yeah. Let me just say goodbye to Brennan.”

I got up and went to the elevator, while she slipped into his bedroom. I tried to listen to their quiet conversation, but it was too low for me to be successful. When she came back out of the room, I pressed the elevator button to call it up. After riding down silently, we made the short walk to the gate, where I hugged her again.

“Thank you, Ramira,” I said.

“For what?” She replied.

“For making it clear to me what I wasn’t seeing.”

“I’m glad I could help?” She responded hesitantly.

“Me too. Gotta go.”

I rushed away from her, heading back into Brennan’s office. I pressed the button to call for the elevator, but it didn’t come. I groaned before going over to the staircase to go back up to his office, where I bypassed his desk to walk straight into his room. I immediately walked across the room to climb into the bed behind him, wrapping my arms around his waist as I buried my face into his back. He stiffened with his muscles coiled as if he was preparing to run away from me.

“Why are you here, Phoenix?” He asked, and I didn’t miss the sadness in his voice. “I thought you were leaving me.”

“Because, Brennan, even after what happened, you are still my safe place, and I refuse to let fear rule me.”

He remained silent for a moment before linking our fingers together. “I’m sorry, Leah. For what I said. I shouldn’t have said it like that. I should have been gentler when I told you. I really wasn’t angry at you. I was angry at myself for my behavior. Hell, I still am. But I swear to you that I will never hurt you again. I can’t. I—I adore you too much.”

I sighed. “I know, Brennan. I am sorry too. You don’t have to apologize for how you felt. I won’t. I am only apologizing for how I reacted to them.”

He slowly rolled over to face me, wiggling his arm under my head. “How do you feel, Leah?”

“I feel scared because you admitted to intentionally hurting me in a sexual way. I feel anxious that my fear screams that I shouldn’t trust you, but my hope tells me that I can. I feel angry that you didn’t trust me enough to know how that call made you feel. I want you to trust me, Brennan. Like I trust you. If you don’t, then this won’t work. No matter how hurt, angry, or anxious you are about something, you need to talk to me. Right now, that’s what we need. Our relationship is so fresh that I know that we won’t make it unless we have really good communication.” I leaned forward to press a timid kiss to his lips. “And I really want to make it.”

He nodded as he tucked my hair behind my ear. “I do too, Leah.” He paused for a second before sighing. “I’ll be right back, okay?”

“Umm, alright.”

I waited anxiously in bed until he hurried back to me with his laptop in his hands. He sat down next to me before clicking on his computer. Moments later, a woman’s voice came out of the speakers, making me tense up. I frowned deeply as I listened to his conversation with Diana, growing angrier with every word she spouted. When the recording ended with him hanging up, I sat up to lay my head on his shoulder.

“She’s so mean-spirited, Brennan. I’m sorry that happened. You didn’t deserve that. You’re not an adulterer,” I told him softly.

He sighed as he put the computer on his bedside table before tugging me gently onto his lap. He wrapped his arms around my waist tightly before laying his head on my chest over my heart.

“I know that here,” he said, touching his temple. “But here”—he touched his chest—“is an entirely different story. I know logically that I’m single, but my heart is having a hard time accepting it after all of these years of telling myself that I was still married. It’s a hard concept to let go. I used her memory to push away every woman that ever showed an interest. But not you. You, I wanted to draw closer. You, I wanted to have. In whatever way you would let me have you.”

I melted inside as I wrapped my arms around his neck. “You’re not alone in this, Brennan. I want you any way you will let me have you too. It doesn’t matter what struggles we have to go through. As long as we go through them together, then we’ll be okay.”

“I know, baby.”

I tugged his head back by his hair to look into his eyes. “Do you want to go downstairs and look at the clouds with me?”

He searched my face for a moment before tightening his arms around my waist. “So, you’re not leaving me?”

“No. I’m choosing to stay and let you prove to me that you won’t ever hurt me again. I’m choosing to stay and fight for our relationship. So, how about it, Brennan? Do you want to lie on the ground with me and feel the Earth rotate?”

He chuckled as he nodded. “Yeah. I think we can do that.”

I lowered my mouth to his, kissing him passionately for a moment before getting off him, grinning at him.

“Or would you rather stay here in bed?” I giggled.

“No, let’s go watch clouds,” he told me softly. “There’s more to our relationship than just physicality, Leah.”

“I know. It’s just that you got hard when we were kissing,” I murmured, blushing.

He chuckled as he tugged at his pants. “I always get hard around you, baby. It doesn’t matter if I’m just looking at you, smelling you, or even thinking about you. My dick just stands straight up. It’s like a magnet that’s only used when you’re around. Physically or in my thoughts.”

I took his outstretched hand, smiling like the lovesick fool I was over him. “You are such a funny, horny man.”

“And you’re perfect, my beautiful little bird,” he uttered as the elevator doors shut while he pushed me back against the wall.

He caught my lips in a heated kiss on the ride down, only pulling back when the doors opened. He took my hand again, immediately bringing it to his mouth to kiss the back of it. I smiled softly as I followed him outside. Once we were both situated on the ground, I curled up on his chest, looking up at the sky. I pointed to a cloud.

“Look, that one looks like a whale,” I giggled.

“A whale? Not at all. It looks like a weird clown with a deflated nose,” he replied.

A whale!” I repeated.

“A clown!” He instantly argued.

I frowned down at him, wrinkling my nose. “It’s a whale.”

He rolled me over to glare playfully down at me. “No, it’s not. It’s a clown with a deflated nose.”

“It’s a wha—”

He silenced me with a kiss that quickly grew out of control. When I moaned into his mouth, he pulled away, cursing under his breath as he ground against my core.

“Fuck, Leah. I want you.”

I ran my fingers through his hair. “Then have me, Brennan.”

He cursed again before pushing my shorts down and kicking his pants off. He reached between us to stroke his fingers down my slit before nudging my legs apart so he could slide into me. My eyes drifted closed as my back arched. As he pulled out of me, I wrapped my legs around his waist, moaning softly as he slowly pushed back in. I lifted my hips to meet his thrust—

“Phoenix?”

My head whipped around immediately while Brennan pulled out of me. He handed me my shorts, and I quickly put them on before getting up to follow the retreating figure. I glanced at Brennan as he started to pull his pants back on. He nodded his head.

“Go on, baby.”

I rushed away from the building, catching up quickly. I reached out to touch his shoulder.

“Wait!”

He turned to look at me with sad eyes. “Leave me alone, Phoenix. I don’t want to see you again.”

He shrugged my hand off his shoulder and walked away from me, leaving me standing still, whispering softly, “Armadillo.”