Page 110 of Outlier

Most women wanted flowers and diamonds, and maybe Paris, not being pinned to a bed in a wood cabin in the middle of the forest by some big lout andtoldthey were going to get married, not asked.

“I’ll do this properly,” I muttered, kissing the corner of her mouth.

“Properly?” she breathed, moving against me as her legs fell open on either side of my hips.

“Propose,” I said against her neck as I kissed my way to her collarbone. “I’ll propose properly.”

“Mike,” she called, and I lifted my head to look up at her. “That was the best possible way you could have proposed to me. Clear, concise, with no room for interpretation.”

“Vicky, I?—”

“Am I yours?”

“Damn right, you are,” I growled.

“And you’re mine?”

“Always.”

“Well, that’s all I need,” she said through a smile.

Vicky

I woke up with the sun streaming in from between the wooden beams. When I stretched out on the bed, I felt aches everywhere, and I smiled.

The first time last night with Mike had been hard and fast, as if both of us were too desperate to take it slow, both too scarred from our time apart.

Mike pinned me down, taking me with an urgency that met my own. We went over the edge together, stars exploding behind my eyes as Mike roared with his release.

Then Mike made us sandwiches from the ingredients I’d stocked the fridge with yesterday, and we ate them in bed. It was the first time I’d ever eatenanythingin bed. I still wasn’t quite at peace with the crumb aspect. This was before he chucked the plates on the floor and made love to me, slowly and excruciatingly gently until we both lost control again.

He gathered me into his arms afterwards and spoke into my hair.

“Christ, I missed you so much it scared me.” His voice cracked at the end of that sentence, and I was shocked to see actual tears in his eyes when I pushed up on his chest to look at his face.

“You’re my favourite human being,” I told him firmly, the best compliment I could think of.

He scanned my face for a long moment, then levered us both up and carried me to the shower. Once under the warm water, he made me put my hands on the tiles and told me not to move them, then called me hisgood girlwhen I did as he asked.

Shower sex was amazing. It combined cleanliness, being told I was a good girl and no fewer than two orgasms—three of my favourite things.

When I felt for Mike, his side of the bed was cold, and my eyes flew open. I pushed up to sit and turned to look at the kitchen from over the balcony, breathing a sigh of relief when I saw a gloriously muscled, bare-chested Mike putting some bread in the toaster.

When I saw him set his timer on his phone, I smiled.

Of course, he was going to make me my breakfast just the way I wanted.

His gaze met mine when I made it down the spiral staircase, a possessive look coming over his expression when he saw I was wearing his shirt from yesterday and nothing else. He opened his arms, and I went straight into them, pushing up onto my tiptoes to give him a kiss.

“Hi,” I whispered when I broke the kiss.

“Hi,” he said back, his arms giving me a squeeze. “Vicky, is that a new van in the drive?”

I looked to the side and out of the window to where the van was parked. “Yes.”

Mike scowled at me. “Why did you buy a van?”

I shrugged. “You needed a van.”