I’d had the last several days to consider what and who I wanted to be going forward. I’d always thought I could only be one or the other, but Seth had made me realize I didn’t have to choose. I hadn’t just been Ronan, the doctor before losing Trace and I hadn’t been just Ronan, the killer afterwards…I’d been a little bit of both with one just taking a more prominent role than the other. Seth had been right. I saved people. It was all I’d ever wanted to do.
While my organization would go on doing what it did best, I had no plans to pick up a gun again unless I absolutely had to. Mav had agreed to help me make decisions on the best way to handle all the incoming cases and my plan was to ask Hawke to deal with assigning the right man to the right job and pulling in new recruits who needed what Mace and I had needed so long ago.
I hadn’t heard from Hawke since he’d left New York and while that had me worried, I knew it wasn’t unusual. I’d been the same way, only now I had people who cared if I didn’t pick up the phone or return a text. Hawke would get there someday too.
Seth had thrived once he’d returned to the office a few days after getting back from New York. He’d known he still had a lot of work ahead of him to regain his employees’ trust and to get the company back on solid ground, but instead of trying to figure out how his father would have handled it, he focused on what he could bring to the table that would finally make the company his.
I hadn’t been as certain as I’d wrangled with the idea of giving up the life I’d been living. The idea of returning to medicine was intimidating, but I also knew it was something that ran in my blood. I wasn’t rushing into anything, but I had already started the process of figuring out what I needed to do to update my training.
“What are you thinking?” Seth murmured as he slid up my body and rested his chin on his folded arms.
“I’m thinking I want another new memory,” I said. “A good one,” I added. Seth understood what I meant and he traced his fingers over my lips.
“Tell me what you need,” he said softly.
“You,” I responded. “Every part of you.”
It took a moment for Seth to understand what I was asking, but instead of resisting, he said, “Are you sure?”
I reached down to draw him up so his lips were hovering over mine. “Make me yours, Seth. In every way.”
Seth ghosted a kiss over my lips and then settled his hands on the side of my face so he could hold me still for his next kiss. But it was so much more than that. It was him telling me what I needed to hear. That no matter what happened next, everything we had was perfect just as it was.
I’d toyed with the idea of asking Seth to make love to me after I’d come so close to losing him. The physical damage to my body hadn’t been permanent, but I’d given up on the idea of ever letting anyone inside of me again because I simply knew I wouldn’t be able to give someone that level of power over me. But Seth wasn’t someone.
He was the only one.
And I knew he could take the pain of what had happened to me out in the desert and replace it with something beautiful.
Seth kissed me for a long time before he began working my body into a simmering pool of need. He and I had fucked in so many different ways, positions and locations, that I couldn’t keep track of them all, but this would always be my favorite. This slow burn as we worshipped each other, as we healed each other.
I managed to hold it together as Seth took me into his mouth, but just as I was about to come, he pulled off of me and kissed his way back up my body. He took his time kissing me some more and then he started the process all over again. When he swallowed me down a second time, I begged and pleaded with him to let me come. But he was ruthless and pulled off of me with a pop. The lube was already sitting on the nightstand so when he grabbed it, I forced back the tension that shot through me. But Seth felt it anyway. I dragged him down before he could speak and I rolled him onto his back.
“I know you’ll stop if I ask you to, Seth. I’m not going to keep quiet if I can’t do this. I swear.” Seth nodded.