"I was in a hurry," he explained, with a tinge of amusement. "And I got dressed in the dark."

He stepped out of his shoes, which he'd never bothered to tie, and crawled over her, breathing slowly, unsteadily through his nose as his bulk loomed over her. On a whim, he ducked his face to the crook of her neck, breathing in the scent of her, for the first time. She was real, in a way she had perhaps never been. Breathing beneath him, stronger than it should've been possible for one person to be.

Two people, his mind supplied, but he was inclined to believe that their strength was mostly because of her.