STILL MINE, NARA. STILL YOURS, CHARLIE. · CHAPTER 5 OF 6
Shanara had been wearing me out these days. Since we’d progressed to oral, she couldn’t get enough of my mouth, and I couldn’t get enough of hers.
Tonight, though, I had something special planned for her. After that, I intended to bring her right back home and do it all over again.
Getting her out the door had been a challenge, especially after we ended up pleasing each other at the same time, in a position we’d never tried before but were both damn glad to discover now.
By the time she stepped out of the bedroom, I damn near forgot every plan I’d made.
She wore a soft cream dress that moved with her body. Her hair framed her face in loose waves, her lips had that glossy shine I loved too much, and the perfume she wore wrapped around me before she even crossed the room.
My Nara.
A year and a half had passed since we decided to make Draegonland our home, and not a day went by that I wasn’t grateful for what this place had given us.
But nothing made me more grateful than watching Shanara move through it with more healing and fulfillment.
“You’re staring, Charlie.”
“Isn’t that what my eyes are made for? Staring at you.”
She smiled, smoothing her hands down the front of her dress. “You said we were going on a date.”
“We are.”
“In Pyraethis?”
“That is what I said.”
Her brows furrowed. “Why are you looking nervous then?”
“Because I’m taking the prettiest woman in Draegonland out tonight, and I don’t want to embarrass myself.”
She laughed.
“You’ve known me too long to start lying now.”
I crossed the room and took her hand, kissing it quickly. “I’m not lying about you being the prettiest woman in Draegonland.”
“And the nervous part?”
I kissed the back of her hand again. “Maybe I just want tonight to be perfect.”
Something softened in her face. “Charlie.”
“Come on, Nara Belle. Let me show you off.”
That seemed to satisfy her enough, though I could tell she still suspected something. Shanara had always been too sharp for her own good. Even before everything, she could read me from across a room. Now, with all the changes to her senses, I figured I was one deep breath away from her smelling the proposal on me.
So I did the only thing I could.
I kept touching her. Kept kissing her hand and telling her how beautiful she was until her suspicion melted into that shy smile she still tried to hide from me.
We left our condo and stepped into the evening air of Pyraethis.
The city seemed to come to life at night.
I still wasn’t used to it. Maybe I never would be. It all still seemed impossible. Beautiful too, though I still preferred a front porch, a hot plate, and a little Chicago breeze when I could get it.
Shanara loved this place, marveling at an entire empire hidden from humans.
That alone made all of this worth it.
“You sure you’re not taking me somewhere too fancy?” she asked.
“I thought you liked fancy now.”
“I said I didn’t mind living in luxury with you. That doesn’t mean I’m trying to sit through a dinner where the fork got three cousins.”
I laughed. “No confusing forks tonight.”
“Good. Because I’m still a Mississippi woman. I need to know what I’m eating with.”
“You’ll know.”
She glanced at me again. “You’re being vague.”
“I’m being romantic.”
“You’re being suspicious.”
I leaned down and brushed my mouth near her ear. “Maybe I’m trying to build anticipation.”
Her steps slowed.
That worked.
Even after all these years, I knew exactly where to press.
“Nara,” I warned, though I was the one who started it.
She smiled without looking at me. “What?”
“You keep looking like that, and we won’t make it to dinner.”
“Then maybe you should stop being suspicious.”
I chuckled and guided her forward before I forgot the plan entirely.
The location Xavian had helped me secure sat near the center of Pyraethis, inside a private garden built into the upper level of some kind of architectural wonder I still couldn’t properly explain. It wasn’t a restaurant, not exactly. More like an open-air courtyard wrapped in glass, vines, water, and floating lights that hovered like fireflies.
Joya had told me it was beautiful.
Laikea had said it was romantic enough to make a woman “act a fool.”
I hoped they were right.
The place wasn’t too far from where we lived, and these days, we loved walking around this city with all the extra energy running through our bodies now.
When we reached the entrance, Shanara looked up at the carved archway and frowned.
“This doesn’t look like a restaurant.”
“It’s private.”
“Private how?”
I squeezed her hand. “Trust me.”
She looked at me then and I saw the old fear try to rise. Just a flicker.
I stopped to face her.
“We can turn around. Right now. No questions.”
“Charlie, no. I’m overreacting and nervous. I feel like I did when you took me to Chicago for the first time. Just green and didn’t know anything about city life.”
“You’re sure? Because I mean it.”
“I know you do.” She reached up and touched my cheek. “That’s why I’m walking in.”
I smiled.
She chose me again in little ways every day. Still, each time felt like a miracle.
I opened the door.
And the moment we stepped inside, the garden lit up with lights and voices.
“Surprise!”
Shanara froze.
Her hand squeezed around mine as she took in the room.
Joya stood near the center, already crying and trying badly to pretend she wasn’t. Xavian was beside her, one arm around her waist, looking proud enough to burst. Laikea stood near Dee and Cel, grinning like she’d personally planned every dramatic detail. Ginger was there too, with her three grizzlies behind her, smiling in that knowing way of hers. A few of our closest people filled the space, not too many, just enough to make it feel full without making it overwhelming.
There were flowers everywhere. Purple, cream, and gold, with little sparks of dragonfire floating above them in glass bowls that somehow didn’t burn a thing.
On one table sat framed photos.
Joya as a baby.
Joya walking for the first time.
Joya at graduation.
Me and Shanara in one of the first pictures we ever took together, sitting on her grandma’s porch with her perched in my lap.
And in the center, one empty frame waited.
For tonight.
Shanara gasped.
I leaned close. “It’s just family and a few who helped us get here. Nothing too big.”
She looked at me, tears already on their way down. “Charlie, what is this?”
That was my cue.
My heart started beating like I was young again, hopping off the back of my uncle’s pickup truck to chase a barefoot woman down a country road.
I took Shanara’s hand.
“Nara.”
She turned toward me, still crying. “Charlie…”
“I told you I was taking you on a date.”
“You lied.”
“I prefer ‘I told a story.’”
She laughed through her tears.
I held both of her hands in mine. “But only because I needed to get you here.”
Her eyes moved over my face, then dropped to my hand when I reached into my pocket.
The room went quiet.
Shanara sucked in a breath.
I lowered myself to one knee.
The sound she made nearly took me out.
“Oh, Charlie.”
I had practiced this speech. Several times. In the mirror. In the shower. In front of Xavian, who stood there looking serious like a man reviewing battle strategy. In front of Joya, who cried every single time and made me start over because she said I wasn’t allowed to “half do” her mama’s proposal.
But with Shanara standing in front of me, all that practice left my head.
So I spoke from the only place I had ever truly known how to speak to her.
My heart.
“The first time I saw you, you were walking down that road, I knew my life had just changed. I didn’t know your name. Didn’t even know where you were going. Didn’t know if you had the good sense not to climb on the back of a stranger.”
A small laugh moved through the room, and Shanara shook her head, crying harder now.
“But I knew you were mine to love if you let me. And by the grace of God, you did.”
Her hands trembled in mine.
“We built a life. We had a daughter. We laughed. We fussed. We loved each other in all the ordinary ways that make a marriage sacred. Then that man stole years from us. He stole birthdays, holidays, quiet mornings, and all the little moments we should’ve had.”
My voice roughened, but I kept going.
“But he didn’t steal my love for you or the way your name still lived in my heart. He couldn’t take the part of me that knew, even when I was angry and hurting, that my soul had already chosen its wife.”
Shanara covered her mouth with one hand.
“I know we were married before,” I said. “And I know, on paper, that ended. But in here?” I pressed her hand against my chest. “Nara, you never left.”
A tear slipped down her cheek.
“I’m not asking you to go backward. I’m not asking you to be the woman you were before. I love the woman standing in front of me right now. The woman who fought her way back to herself. The woman who wakes up and chooses love and happiness even after everything tried to bury it. The woman who loves our daughter so fiercely that even the years she missed could not erase the mother in her.”
Joya sobbed somewhere behind her.
I smiled through my own tears.
“I am asking for the future. The new memories. The new laughter. The new history we said we would make. I am asking for every morning you want to give me, every night you want to share, every piece of forever we still get to have.”
I pulled the ring free.
It wasn’t subtle.
Not even a little bit.
The diamond sitting in the center was big enough to make Shanara fuss at me before she ever put it on, and I already knew she’d tell me I’d done too much.
But I hadn’t. Not for my wife.
Besides, my son-in-law had gone and gotten me a job teaching at a school here in Draegonland, and apparently teaching what dragons called “foundational Earth science” came with a check big enough to make a man throw away modesty.
The ring was yellow gold, polished warm and bright, with a fat elongated cushion-cut diamond raised at the center and pavé stones running along the band like the whole thing had been made to catch every bit of light in the room. It was elegant, but it wasn’t quiet.
And I didn’t want quiet.
She’d had enough small. Enough hidden. Enough stolen.
This time, I wanted her hand to announce she was loved before I ever opened my mouth.
Shanara stared at it, her whole body shaking.
“So I’m asking you again, Shanara Jackson.” I was in tears now, but I didn’t care. “Will you make me the happiest man alive for the second time and become Shanara Martin again?”
For half a second, my heart stopped.
Then she dropped to her knees in front of me.
The whole room let out plenty of “awws” around us.
She took my face in her hands. “You didn’t have to ask.”
“Yes, I did,” I whispered. “This choice had to be yours.”
Her eyes squeezed shut, and when she opened them again, they were full of the woman I loved. Not old Nara. Not new Nara. Just Nara. All of her.
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, Charlie. I’ll marry you again.”
The room released a round of applause.
Joya cried out, Laikea hollered “Auntie got that good good,” and somebody whistled so loud I figured it had to be one of the dragons.
But I barely heard any of it.
I slid the ring onto Shanara’s finger and said a silent prayer of thanks.
We celebrated with everyone for a while, but there was only one thing on both our minds. By the time we made it to the bedroom, we were already pulling at each other’s clothes, too hungry to be patient.
“I need my Charlie Horse inside me now,” she moaned.
“Not before my dessert,” I said, sinking between her legs.
I had to thank these dragons for one more thing: my sense of taste had gotten stronger too, and Lord, my Nara tasted exquisite. What she had between her thighs was enough to give a man the itis, tinnitus, and laryngitis. Full, ears ringing, voice gone, and drunk off his woman. I didn’t even know what I was talking about anymore. That was how delirious she made me.
“Give it to me, Nara,” I said between licks. “You want my dick, don’t you?”
“Mmhmm,” she moaned.
“Then quench this thirst first.”
And she did. Her legs wrapped around my head as she came, giving me everything I asked for.
When her thighs finally loosened, I moved over her.
It was time, and all I could do was pray these supernatural gifts helped a brother last longer than I would’ve without them.
I eased inside her slowly, nudging gently at her opening. She tensed, but I kissed the anxiety from her mouth as I moved deeper, giving her every second she needed to remember this was me.
When I was fully seated, we both released a long breath and paused there, wrapped in the weight of what this reconnection truly was.
Home.
When she wiggled beneath me, urging me to move, I did. The first slow slide out and back in made me yell, “good God woman!”
My forehead dropped to hers as I maintained slow movements, letting us both feel every inch of being together again. This wasn’t a honey pot. This was the whole hive, golden and dripping and made to ruin a man’s sense. And if I had to go the way of a drone bee after making love to the Queen, then Lord, what a glorious death.
“Ooh, Charlie. I missed you so much. I missed this.”
“I promise you, baby,” I whispered, brushing my mouth over hers. “Ain’t no more missing this. Not a day, not a night, not another moment I’m blessed enough to spend beside you will pass without me inside you.”
I moved in and out of her, and the wider she spread her legs, the harder it became to keep a slow stroke.
“Still mine, Nara?” I murmured against her ear.
She threw her head back, grabbed the back of my neck, and pressed her lips hard to mine. We kissed until we were sweating, panting, and clinging to each other like the years had finally lost their hold.
When she finally pulled back, her eyes locked on mine.
“Still yours, Charlie.”
A rough groan came out of me.
Then I felt her release rush through her. She cried out my full name, birthdate, horoscope, Social Security number, and a few other things I couldn’t even catch.
But I wasn’t ready to let go yet.
I flipped us over and brought her on top of me.
“Ride your Charlie Horse, baby,” I grunted. “He’s been waiting on you to take the reins and run him straight home.”
And she did.
She rode me hard, bouncing and dropping down on me fast enough to make my hands grasp her hips and my sanity slip. When she nutted again, her whole body shook above me.
And more was still to come.
I turned her over onto her stomach and spread her out beneath me, her arms above her head and her legs open wide. Then I laid myself over her in the same shape, my arms and legs covering hers completely as I drove into her from behind.
Her face was pressed down into the pillow, and I kissed the side of her face, her temple, the curve of her shoulder. Every place my mouth touched, she gave my dick a tight squeeze.
She was remembering everything about how only I could make love to her like this.
It was me. Charlie. Her husband.
The man who had loved her before the world split open and kept loving her after.
“Nara. You with me?”
She turned her face just enough for her lips to brush mine. “I’m with you always.”
Those three words made my heart stop and jump start it again.
I closed my eyes, breathing through the force of what those words meant as I moved through her warm cavern. She rolled back into me, and I pushed forward, deeper, meeting her right where she needed me.
I laced our fingers together, and I held on as she came apart beneath me again, her essence flowing down her legs. And then I finally followed her, burying my face against her neck as pleasure and grief and love crashed through me all at once. For a second, I couldn’t tell if I was shaking from release or relief.
Maybe both.
When it was over, I didn’t move away from her right away.
I stayed there, careful not to crush her, my forehead pressed to her shoulder, my breathing ragged against her skin.
“You good, baby?” I asked.
She turned beneath me slowly, bringing herself onto her back. Her eyes were wet, but there was only fire and desire in them.
“You tell me.”
I looked down at her and smirked. “Good can’t possibly describe what you got between your legs, Nara Belle.”
She wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed me, and I swore I saw stars, molecules, and whatever else was used to build the universe rearrange themselves around her.
“I love you, Nara.”
“I love you, Charlie.”
For a long moment, we just looked at each other. Two people who’d lost too much time and somehow still found our way back to the same place.
Then she laughed softly, wiping at the corner of her eye.
“What?” I asked.
She shook her head. “I was just thinking.”
“About the good loving I just gave you.”
“Yes.” Her smile turned soft and shy. “And thinking that if this is what supernatural healing did for you, I might need to send Xavian and Joya a thank-you card.”
A laugh burst out of me, full and loud enough to make her laugh again.
“There she is,” I whispered, brushing my nose against hers.
“Who?”
“My Nara.”
Her eyes softened.
I kissed her and slid back inside. “Yeah, it definitely upped my game. You think you can handle it?”
She gave me that look, that old Shanara fire. “My name is Shanara Sheila Martin, isn’t it?”
“It is,” I chuckled, kissing her again as I made love to her more.
The next morning, when she was up blasting Tyrone Davis’ “Sure Wasn’t Me,” and adlibbing how Tyrone was lying and it was in fact his drawls, I knew my baby had truly found her way back to peace.
And I was just grateful to walk beside her in it.
