Page 244 of Silent Target

“About your team.”

“My brother.”

“And me?”

His eyes meet mine.

“Especially you.”

The truth moves through me like warmth.

I step closer.

“I don’t need you to promise nothing dangerous will ever happen.”

“Good. I couldn’t.”

“I need you to promise you won’t decide for me that leaving is safer.”

His jaw tightens.

The instinct to protect me is written across his face.

“So if you become afraid, you don’t disappear,” I say. “If you think I’m in danger, you tell me. If you want me⁠—”

“I do.”

The words stop me.

Caleb closes the distance.

“I want you.”

His hand cups my face.

“More than I know how to explain.”

“You don’t have to explain.”

I rise onto my toes and kiss him.

The restraint he showed earlier lasts for one heartbeat.

Then his arm closes around my waist.

He pulls me against him.

Heat replaces the cold night air.

His mouth moves over mine with all the hunger he held back in the recovery room.

I feel it in the hand at my back.

In the tremor that passes through him when my fingers slide into his hair.

In the care he takes even while kissing me as though stopping might break him.

He draws away first.