Ben shuddered, unable to answer her with words, but she would know... She had to know. She would be able to feel his thoughts, the same as he could feel hers. Her longing and her confusion and all her insecurities, and the way she'd found herself, and found him in the process.

Moving above her, within her, he gasped in echo to her cries, feeling the same spark of pleasure in tandem with her own.

"I know," he murmured, "I know." They knew one another. The ugly parts, which she'd tried to hide, and the good, which he'd tried to snuff out for so long.