“I want you,” he said, in his direct way, voice mild yet as strong as marble. His tone indicated he’d have her, too.

            “Good,” Tina said. “I want you, too, Nick, but there’s something I need to say…”

            He interrupted her with his mouth, his lips hot and insistent. Tina failed to resist and she softened, melting against him as he took her mouth and made it his. Without speaking, she climbed behind him on the motorcycle and rode back to the house. Inside neither needed words as they came together, clothes stripped away and discarded like a snake’s skin onto the floor.

            Nick teased her body with his lips, his mouth seeking her nipples as if each offered life-giving water to a thirsty man. He used his tongue to bring them hard, to make each bud blossom with delight. Tina’s hands caressed his lean body, fondled his old scars, and her nails raked his back with just enough force to tantalize.  He maneuvered her to the worn couch and lowered her. Without any additional words of love or touch, Nick slid into her, impacting her with the wild fury and force of a warm front meeting a cold front. The resulting storm shuddered through her with ripples of amazing delight, erotic pleasures strong enough she bucked against him begging for more. She grasped his shoulders hard enough to leave the marks of her fingernails, but he didn’t complain just rocked harder and made noises she liked it.

            Afterward he cradled her, whispering to her in soft Albanian, words she couldn’t understand and didn’t need to hear because she knew the meaning. Her heart supped them each and savored the bittersweet taste of them.  They remained together, limbs touching, hands holding for a very long time then she roused because he moved, shifted position, and she knew.

            “Are you going?” she asked, grief cutting through her body with the terrible hurt of a sword.

            Nick nodded, but he looked across the room to where two bags, hers and his, sat near the door. Tina read the knowledge in his eyes and asked, “Are you sure, Nick? Do you really want me?”

            “I can’t leave you,” he said. “So I must take you along. I can’t bear to break what shouldn’t ever be broken between us so you’ll go, too.”

            “To Kosovo?” she asked, her breath short and chest tight.

            “Where else? It’ll be terrible, conditions horrible, and you won’t be safe,” Nick said with calm. “But you’ll be with me. I’ll probably come to regret it and you may, too. Living conditions will be rougher than you’ve ever known. I may die; you might, too. Still, you’re the one woman I know who could face danger without flinching, so will you go?”

            Her broken heart healed as she nodded, scrambled for her clothing and changed her life—and his—forever.