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It wasn't a question. I nodded anyway.

“I'm scared for you,” I whispered. “All of you. But mostly you.”

Graham stretched out beside me, pulling me into his arms. “Nothing’s going to happen to me.”

“You don't know that.” I pressed my face against his chest, breathing in his familiar scent. “This is my mess, Graham. My stalker. Maybe I should be the one taking the risks. Maybe Simon’s right and we should use me as bait.”

“Like hell.” His arms tightened around me. “You're not expendable. You're everything.”

The emotion in his voice made my chest ache. I pulled back to look at him in the dim light filtering through the blinds. His jaw was tight, a muscle jumping beneath the skin. Dark circles shadowed his eyes.

“You're exhausted.”

“I'm fine.”

“You're not.” I traced the line of tension between his eyebrows. “When was the last time you really slept?”

He caught my hand, pressing it flat against his chest. “Hard to sleep when someone's threatening the woman I love.”

The simple words shattered something inside me. All the fear, all the worry, all the desperate need to show him how much he meant to me bubbled to the surface.

I kissed him.

It started soft, tentative, but when he responded, when his hand fisted in my hair and pulled me closer, something ignited between us. This wasn't about desire or need. This was about claiming each other, about proving we were alive and together and nothing could tear us apart.

“Joy.” My name was a prayer on his lips.

“I need you,” I whispered against his mouth. “I need to feel you, to know you're here with me.”

His response was immediate and overwhelming. He rolled me beneath him, his weight settling between my thighs as his mouth found the sensitive spot below my ear. I arched into him, pushing my hands under his shirt to map the familiar landscape of his back. The scars that told the story of battles fought and survived.

His teeth grazed my earlobe, sending fire straight through my core. “You have no idea what you do to me.”

“Show me.” The words slipped out before I could stop them.

His hands trembled as they found the hem of my stolen t-shirt. Graham Wallace, the man who'd faced down terrorists and survived explosions, was shaking because of me. Because of what we meant to each other.

He lifted the shirt over my head with reverent care, his eyes drinking in every inch of exposed skin. When his thumb traced the scar below my breast, I tensed for just a moment before melting into his touch.

“You're so damn beautiful.” His voice was rough with want.

I pulled his shirt over his head, needing the contact of skin against skin. My fingers traced the hard planes of his chest, the ridges of muscle that flexed under my touch. When I found his nipple and scraped my nail across it, he groaned low in his throat.

“That's not fair.” He captured my wrists, pinning them above my head with one large hand.

“What are you going to do about it?”

His answer was to lower his head and capture my breast in his mouth, his tongue circling the sensitive peak until I was writhing beneath him. The wet heat of his mouth contrasted with the cool air against my skin, making me gasp and arch into him.

“Graham.” His name came out breathless. Needy.

He switched to my other breast, lavishing the same attention while his free hand skimmed down my ribs, over my hip, to the waistband of my panties. His fingers dipped beneath the lace, finding me already slick with want.

“God, you're wet.” He lifted his head to look at me, his pupils blown wide with desire. “Is this for me?”

I could only nod, lost in the sensation of his fingers stroking through my folds, teasing but not quite giving me what I needed.

“I want to hear you say it.” His thumb found my clit, then circled with just enough pressure to make me crazy.