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“You already know the answer to that, but I’ll tell you again if you need to hear it. I want you to move in with me because your world can’t start and end with us if some of you is stillclinging to a separate life. I want all of you and you want to give me all of you, and secretly, you want to belong to me so fully that everything you have is entwined with everything I have. Literally. I want your clothes in my closet, your soap in my shower, your sheets on our bed. I want everything, and until I have every inch, every molecule of you, it won’t ever be enough.”

“And how do you know that I want to give you all of me?” he asks.

Scanning his face, I search for any hint of uncertainty, but I don’t find any. He’s not begging me to convince him that this is what he wants. He just likes it when I remind him how perfect we are for each other.

“I know because you wait for me to pick your clothes in the morning. I know because when I’m at work you text me the moment you open your eyes, just to give me a chance to ask you what you’re having for breakfast and if you’re wearing the underwear I like. I know that you want to give me every inch of you, because even when I know exactly what your plans are for the day, you still call me to tell me what you’re doing. I know because even though you can rarely stop yourself from coming when you’re excited, you still beg me to give you permission. I know that you want to give me all of you, because you gave me you the first time we met and even when I hurt you. Even when I was an asshole, you never took you back.” Breathing fast, I cup his cheek and lean in until our foreheads are rested together. “And the main reason I know that you live here with me now, is because even though I’ve never heard you say the words, I know that you love me, just as much as I love you.”

Blinking slowly, Henry looks up at me from beneath thick lashes as his tongue dips out of his mouth and runs a glistening path over his full bottom lip. The silence of his unsaid words stretches, lingering until the very air between us seems to thicken.

“You’re right,” he whispers. “I was so scared the day we met. You were beautiful and older and so out of my league. But I think I slid my heart into your pocket right there in the diner, and you’ve had it ever since. I need you so much, Anders. I need you to care about me. I need you to worry and coddle and smother me, because I didn’t know that one person could be the center of another person’s world, but now that I do, I know I want to be your everything.”

“You are my everything,” I say on a shaky exhale.

“Good.” He chuckles softly. “Because I love you, Anders. I love everything about you, and I always have.”

EPILOGUE

Henry

I’m notsure I ever actually agreed to move in with Anders, but just like he said, he emptied my apartment while I was at work and handed the key back to Bay without another word.

Now for the first time in twenty-two years, I have a home. Not a house or a safe place to hide from the world, but a home filled with love and happiness.

Anders’s need for control has both changed and intensified when it comes to me. He is a dominant person, and I’m sure he’ll always be in charge when it comes to sex, but in our everyday life he doesn’t need to control me, he just wants to love me and take care of me.

When we first met, he threatened to take over my life if I let him, but even though I’ve handed him me on a platter, he’s never lost control in the way he worried he would.

That’s probably because we’re rarely apart. We eat, sleep, bathe, and socialize together. When he’s not on shift, he drivesme to work and picks me up. He makes me lunch every day or has food delivered to me on the days he can’t.

He shops for me and spoils me with everything I could ever need and all the things he thinks I might want. He dresses me, follows me into the bathroom, and tracks my phone—even though he thinks I don’t know.

Before him, I was alone, hiding from any connection that could force me out of the shell I was cowering inside of. But he’s given me the confidence to be brave and bold. Now I have a life, I have friends, I have people, and best of all, I have him. I didn’t think I was deserving of love, because my entire life before him was a series of rejections and dismissals. But he’s taught me that love doesn’t have to be scary, it doesn’t have to be conditional. He’s taught me that I’m worthy of happiness.

Anders is my world, he’s controlling, dominant, bossy, and…perfect.

The day we met, our desire burned bright and wild, an inferno fraught with uncertainties and misconceptions. But now the flames have died down to a blissful glow that keeps us both warm and surrounds us with the knowledge that we’re perfect for each other.

I’ve spent most of my life alone, but I’ll never be lonely again, because I fell in love with a Montana Mountain Protector, and it’s the best choice I ever made.