Page 16 of Huck Frasier (Seals on Fraiser Mountain #5)

Marley

H e didn’t kiss me right away.

Not even after I curled into his chest like someone trying to memorize the shape of safety.

Frasier just held me.

Strong. Steady. Warm.

The kind of quiet that didn’t ask questions. It just stayed.

When I finally pulled back and looked up at him, I expected judgment. Pity. Something cold.

But all I got was him.

Soft eyes. Bruised knuckles. A man who would have torn down mountains to get to me—but still stood still until I chose to reach for him.

So I did.

I rose up on my toes.

Fisted his shirt in my hands.

And kissed him like I hadn’t stopped thinking about it since Tunisia.

He responded instantly—his mouth crashing into mine, rough and hungry, like he’d waited too long and wasn’t going to waste another second.

Clothes hit the floor in a blur.

My top. His shirt. His hands found skin like he’d been memorizing it in dreams.

And when he lifted me, my legs wrapping around his waist, I wasn’t scared anymore.

I wanted to be close.

I wanted him.

He laid me down on the motel bed like I was fragile and furious all at once.

His hand slid up my thigh. His mouth traced the line of my collarbone. And when his fingers tangled with mine above my head, something inside me broke open.

“Say it,” he whispered against my skin.

“Say what?”

“That you want this. That you want me. ”

I looked up at him—every wall gone, every fear trembling, every nerve alive.

“I don’t want to run anymore,” I whispered.

He kissed me slow. Deep. His hand trailed between my thighs, he drove me wild, until I was crying his name, and demanding more.

No rush. No guilt. Just mouths and skin and every breath shared between us.

My name never sounded sweeter than the way he groaned it into my neck.

And when we both fell apart—together—it felt less like breaking…

And more like coming home.