Page 109 of Revealing Mark

His lips brushed my forehead in a feathered kiss. “I don’t deserve you.”

“Yes, you do,” I breathed. “You’re a remarkably brave man and I’ll be here to remind you.”

He looked down at me. “I’m going to hold you to that.”

His lips brushed softly against mine and I was lost in the touch of his mouth on mine. Nothing other than the two of us mattered in that moment.

For the first time in what felt like ages, we had nothing standing in the way of us and it felt so good. He deepened the kiss, making my toes curl.

“Remember all those things I wanted to do to you?” I whispered against his lips.

“I’m game.” He took my hand and led me to his bedroom.

I smiled knowingly at him when he closed the door and began to unbutton his shirt. I had never been so happy. I wanted to stay in the moment and savor every second of it.

It had been a couple of weeks of bliss, when I overheard Mark speaking to my brother on the phone.

“How long is the assignment?” he murmured, moving to another room to get more privacy. I knew they weren’t really allowed to talk about their jobs, but I wanted to hear more. Our relationship was stronger since I found out about Haven and Ethan. I understood him more and I believed it helped me navigate the initial teething issues of our union.

Although I had worked as usual, Mark had been happy to tag along to spend time with me. This was the first time his work had been mentioned and an anxious knot settled in my stomach.

I had never been completely on board with his or my brother’s profession, but it had been easier to accept when it hadn’t really been happening. But he was in the room next door, talking about taking an assignment.

Knowing he was good at his job didn’t lessen the worry that something could happen to him. Look at what had happened to Matthew? He had been shot protecting Sarah. Just thinking of something like that happening to Mark stole the breath from my lungs and it was impossible to breathe.

Stop it,I admonished myself.Get a grip. He’ll be fine.

None of those words directed at myself stopped me from allowing it to play havoc with my mind or emotions.

It was about ten minutes before he reappeared in the living room where I had been anxiously waiting for him.

“Erm, what was that about?” I asked, trying not to sound as worried as I felt as I paged through the magazine I had been reading before, but none of the pages registered as all I could think about was what had been going on in his conversation with my brother.

“I have an assignment starting tomorrow,” he said, dropping to sit beside me.

“Tomorrow is Sunday,” I argued. We usually spent it with my parents.

“It’s only for a week.”

Seven days. That wasn’t that long.

He studied me, but when I wouldn’t look at him, he tucked a piece of hair behind my ear. “Are you going to be okay with this?”

I had to be. I put my best attempted smile on and looked up at him. “Yes.”

“You sure?” he questioned, studying me more closely.

I nodded. “It’s only a week. It’ll be fine.”

The first day he was away I went to my parents and tried to keep myself busy so I wouldn’t think about where he was and what he was doing.

Sarah picked up on my underlying anxiousness, perhaps because she had been in the same boat as me.

“He’ll be okay,” she assured me. “He’s so good at what he does.”

But nothing she said made me feel any better even though she had been one of his assignments at one stage and they had spent a lot of time together.

It was the first time I was faced with the reality of what my life would be like while he worked.