Colt & Echo 8 Years Later

Colt & Echo

8 Years After Their Book

Echo’s POV

“I think we’re good, babe,” I say to Madison as I juggle my phone between my ear and my shoulder while also trying to tape up a box filled with Tupperware.

“Okay, well just let me know if you guys need help. I can watch the kids while you move stuff. Or I can do anything. Whatever you need.”

Colt and I are moving house in two days. And after living in this one for six years, we’ve accumulated some stuff. A whole lot of stuff we don’t need. Packing has been an effort for me, especially with four children and a husband who has been away on club runs a lot lately.

“Mum has the kids today and tonight, and Colt is on his way home. We’re going to knock this out tonight.” And if I have my way, he’s also going to knock me out with a million orgasms. Well, maybe a slight exaggeration there, but I plan to keep him going until I pass out.

The rumble of Colt’s bike fills my ears. “I’ve gotta go. I’ll yell out if we need you.”

We end the call and I walk out to the garage to greet my husband.

He’s been gone for three days on a run, and to say I’ve been counting down the minutes until his return is an understatement. The kids have been a handful this week. The house has been a handful this week. Life has been a handful this week. I just need my husband. He always rights my world when he comes home.

I run my eyes over him as he gets off his bike and walks my way.

His hair is a little longer than usual, so I make a mental note to book him a haircut. He also needs a new pair of jeans. The ones he’s wearing are looking old, and they remind me that most of his jeans are the same. I’ll buy him some new ones next week.

“You look like you’re planning a million things right now,” he says as he reaches his arm around my waist and pulls me in for a kiss.

I press my body to his and grasp the side of his neck, holding his mouth to mine when he ends the kiss. “No.”

Keeping his lips half-pressed to mine, he asks, “No, you’re not planning a million things?”

I grip him harder. “Yes, I am, and no, I need more, Five. I haven’t had this mouth for days.”

I feel his smile. I also feel his hand move to my ass. “How ‘bout we move this inside?”

I don’t let him go. “Are you going to give me what I want?”

More of that smile against my mouth. “What do you want?”

“I told you. I want more. You get to interpret that and surprise me.”

Before I know what’s happening, he’s got me over his shoulder and is carrying me inside. The garage door is barely closed behind us when he deposits me on the floor, takes hold of my face with both hands, and gives me what I want.

The kind of kiss that says he missed me just as much as I missed him.

Eight years with this man, and I still can’t get enough of him.

He backs me up against the wall, letting go of my face to move his hands down my body. Kissing his way from my mouth to my collarbone, he says, “You want me to fuck you first or get onto the packing?”

“Have you gained superpower skills yet? The kind where you can do two things at once?”

His lips move over my skin in the expert way eight years of doing that with someone allows. Colt knows all the ways I like to be kissed, touched, loved. “Can’t say I have.” He reaches a hand up under my top. “What’s it going to be?”

I move with him as he grinds against me. “We’re going with the fuck-first option, in the shower, but there are two things I need to go over with you before we get started.”

His hand finds my breast. “Beautiful, we’ve already started. And the concept of ‘first’ means before anything else, so what you’re really saying is we’re fucking third.”

Still with the grinding, I say, “Are you planning on getting all technical with me tonight, Mr Caveman?”

He chuckles. “No, I’m planning on getting filthy with you, so let’s get these two things done so we can get to the sex.” He lets me go and takes a step away. “What’s first?”

He’s not going to be happy about this first thing. Best to just blurt it out so we can deal with it and move on. “We have a hole in the wall that you’re going to have to fix.”

He frowns. “What happened?”

“Knox and Branson were playing in their bedroom yesterday and things got a little hectic and out of control. They fell against the wall and now we have a hole.”

“Fuck,” he mutters, not happy, but nowhere near as annoyed as I thought he’d be. “Did either of them get hurt?”

“They’ve got some bruises, but nothing major. I think Branson is going to give us many headaches as he gets older and stronger.”

“I’m more inclined to think Matthew is going to be our problem child.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, he’s taking in all the shit that Knox gets up to and leads Branson into. He’ll learn all that and fucking inflict it, and more, on us.”

“And then in will come Everlee, and really fuck you up.” It’s a running joke between Lilith and me as to whether Colt will end up with a head full of grey hairs or no hair thanks to his daughter.

He grins. “You’re wrong there, sweetheart. She’s got three older brothers. Between them and me, she’s got no hope of getting into any shit.”

He’s right. She’s also got her uncle Liam, Zane, and all the Storm guys who’ll look out for her. I often feel sorry for my daughter and what I know she’ll likely go through with all these men when she starts dating. But then I think about me, Mum, and Lilith, and know we’ve got her covered.

“What’s the other thing?” Colt asks.

“I need you to tell me what to do in the kitchen.”

“About what?”

“About the shit-fight of Tupperware, and bowls, and utensils, and pantry items in there.”

His brows pull together. “You’re gonna have to elaborate, Echo.”

“I’ll just show you. It’ll all make sense when you see,” I say, leading the way to the kitchen.

When we reach the kitchen, he says, “Fucking hell. Was all that in the cupboards?”

He’s eyeing our kitchen counters. The ones that can barely be seen due to how much stuff is on them.

“Yeah. And then there’s all the stuff I’ve already packed.” I look at him. “We need to face it now, Five; we’re hoarders.”

He laughs. “We’re not hoarders.”

“Our kitchen would argue with you. I need you to tell me what to keep, and what to get rid of.”

More of that brow pulling together. “Why do you need me to tell you that?”

I understand where his confusion comes from. I manage our house and our kids like I’m their leader. Colt helps a lot. More than many men I know. But I’m the one in charge when it comes to domestic stuff. And I do it with a clear vision, and never ask for his help on something like this. However, I’m feeling quite overwhelmed at the moment, and have struggled a little while packing up the house.

“I can’t decide what to get rid of. I’ve tried. I can’t do it. You need to do it.”

He takes all of this in before moving to me. Stepping into my space, he brushes my hair off my face and says, “What’s going on?”

My heart has been racing for days, something it does during times of stress. Colt always, always, settles it down without even trying. I think it’s his calm ways, or maybe the care I hear in his voice. Or maybe it’s just his presence. I don’t know what, but it’s something that only he does for me. And right now, he’s already started calming it just by being here.

He’ll fix this for me.

“I honestly don’t know, but it’s been going on for the last two days whatever it is.”

“Fuck,” he curses softly. “I’m sorry you’ve had to do the bulk of the packing by yourself. I’ll finish it all off while you rest.”

I shake my head. “I don’t think it’s that. I mean, sure, I’m exhausted, and the kids have been a handful and made it hard to pack, but I don’t think this feeling is coming from packing boxes.”

“When did it start?”

I can answer that without even thinking. “I was in here with Mum and the kids. It was rowdy as hell. Mum was being her usual off-with-the-fairies self. Knox was zooming around the counter with Branson in tow. Matthew was trying to climb up the stool like he always is. Everlee was crying. And I was over there.” I jab my finger at the wall next to the pantry where we’ve recorded our kids’ heights over the years. “And instead of trying to wrangle the kids into some kind of order, all I could do was stare at your handwriting on the wall. It was bedlam in here, and I just stood there allowing it while my heart went haywire.”

Colt eyes the wall I’m pointing at. He does this for a long time. To the point where I wonder if he’s forgotten our conversation.

“Colt?”

He turns back to me, and I skip a breath at the depth of emotions I see in his eyes. “We’re leaving a lot of memories behind.”

I take a minute, processing this.

He’s right.

So many memories.

I place my hands to his chest. “I love you.”

His hand goes to my ass. Exactly where it always goes if I’m anywhere within range. His eyes search mine. “Where’d that come from?”

I smile up at him. “You get me. And sometimes you get me before I get me. I didn’t put that together. The leaving memories behind and my overwhelm. I’ve been so excited for our new place, and so focused on getting there, that I haven’t stopped to think about what we’re leaving behind.”

“Yeah, I’m the same.”

I look at his handwriting on the wall again. “Do you remember the day you first wrote on that wall?”

His lips pull up into a sexy smirk as he recalls exactly what I’m remembering. He then takes hold of my ass with both hands and lifts me up onto the counter. It’s the only spare spot in the entire kitchen.

Resting his hands on my thighs, he leans in and brushes his lips over mine. He does this slowly, and without kissing me deeply. It’s like he’s teasing me. “I remember every fucking day I wrote on that wall.”

I loop my hands around his neck and my legs around his. “Do you?”

“Yeah, baby, how could I forget any of them when I had you and our kids right by my side?”

I cock my head. “Are you being sappy, Colton Creed? We’re by your side every day. There’s no way you can remember every minute you have us there.”

“I love it when my wife challenges me,” he says drily. Then, sliding his hands up my thighs and around to take hold of my ass, he clarifies, “What I should have said is that I can’t forget the moments when we stood there and recorded the kids’ heights because making those kids with you, and raising them with you, and loving them with you, is the best part of my life. So, marking those milestones rates high on my memory list.”

“I’m just going to repeat myself; I love you.”

He gives me his lips again before saying, “I love you too.”

Squeezing my legs around his tighter, I slide myself to the edge of the counter so my body is pressed hard to his. “Are you going to answer my question?”

“I already answered it.”

He’s right; he did. So, I reword my question. “Do you remember how you fucked me that night?”

He dips his face, kissing his way down to my throat while lifting my shirt. Once he’s got it off me, he trails kisses down to my breast. “I do,” he says with that deep, sexy tone of his that’s been all mine for eight years. “I remember”—he pulls one of my bra cups to the side to give him access to my breast—“putting Knox to bed and coming back down here to find you covered in flour.” He sucks my nipple into his mouth, treating me to his tongue for a few moments. “The air con was broken. You were hot and cranky. And fucking demanding.” He grins. It’s the sexiest kind of grin. The kind that does good things to every cell in my body. “You made me bend you over the kitchen table and fuck you like a savage.”

I grab his face with both hands and drag his mouth back to mine, kissing him deeply and roughly before practically begging, “You need to do it again.” And he needs to do it right now because all I can think about is how hard he fucked me that time. And how much I want that again.

“Fuck,” he growls, allowing me to direct us to the dining table. “What about the shower?” Colt knows I prefer he showers as soon as he gets home from a run. Especially if he wants to fuck me.

I madly shake my head. “No. I don’t care how dirty you are. Just fuck me.”

That’s all he needs to hear. A moment later, he’s got his hands to my shorts, my panties, my bra while I strip his clothes from him. Then he’s got me on the table, his hands to my breasts, his mouth too, and I feel everything he’s doing deep in my core.

“Fuck, I’ve missed you,” he rasps.

I move my hands to his shoulders and then his back. Colt is a powerhouse of muscle and I struggle to keep my hands off him at the best of times. When he’s naked with his hands and mouth on me, I have trouble deciding where to put my hands. I want them everywhere. At once. Just like I want Colt everywhere at once.

“I’ve missed you too. And you can never go away again,” I say as my hands continue trying to touch all of him at the same time. I’m feeling all kinds of desperate for him. I never tell him he can’t go away, and I don’t really mean it now, but if I could lock him up and keep him here, I think I would after this trip. I’ve missed him on a whole new level this time.

He lifts his head and meets my gaze, slowing us down. Curving his hand around my neck, he says, “You’re really feeling this move hard, aren’t you?”

And just like that, with just one question, I’m crying.

Ugly crying.

Tears stream down my face while my thoughts crash together.

I cling to Colt like he’s my shelter from all these emotions. “I didn’t realise I was until now.”

His eyes search mine, full of love. “We’re going to make a fuckload of new memories in our new place. And the ones we’ve made in this place are locked up tight in here,” he says, putting his finger to my chest. To my heart.

I nod, my cheeks still a puddle of tears. “I know. I’m excited for our new home. I just think the whole process of packing, of going through all our stuff at once, and deciding to get rid of some of it, has stirred up all these feelings.”

“What kind of feelings?”

I smile through my tears. “Feelings over us and what we’ve built, and what we’ll continue building in the future. I’m feeling grateful to have met you, and to have you as a husband and the father of my children. There’s not a man alive who would be a better father to my children.” I glance at the wall near the pantry where Colt’s etched our history into the paint. My tears fall harder as I run my gaze over the numbers. “This house is like a history record of us, of the kids, of what we’ve built, and while I want to move, I hate leaving our history behind.”

“We’re taking our history with us, sweetheart. Wherever you go, I go, and so does everything we’ve ever made together. And we’ve got a fuckton of photo albums with all our memories in them. We’re never forgetting a thing.”

His mention of our albums makes me both laugh and cry some more. Colt likes to joke about the extra room he’s going to have to build one day to house all my albums. I’m a memory keeper. I like to take photos of everything our family does. He’s just lucky I don’t want to put every photo I take in an album. He’d have to build extra houses, not just an extra room if I did.

“I know,” I say. “But there are just some things we can’t put in an album, you know?” My eyes go to that wall again.

Colt turns to follow my gaze and then looks back at me. “You wanna take that with us, baby?”

And there go my tears again. I’m a hot mess today. “We can’t take that, Colt. That’s the whole point. We can’t take everything.”

“We’re taking it,” he says, his voice full of determination, like he’ll go to his grave before he won’t take that history record with us.

I hook my legs around him and bring his face down to mine so I can kiss him. “I love you, Five, but I’m not sure how you think we can take that with us.”

“Did I not build you a house from scratch?”

The deep rumble in his voice combined with the emotion I’m hearing works its way through me. It weaves its way into my veins, into my bones, into my soul. Exactly like he’s woven into all those things.

He did build me a house. That’s where we’re moving. “Yes, you did.”

“Right, and now I’m going to move that height chart to a wall in our new place. You figure out where you want it, and I’ll make it happen.”

His promise, along with all the weaving he’s doing through me, works its way deep. It sparks a thousand more feelings for this man. Feelings I didn’t even know could still be sparked. I thought I already loved Colt as much as I could, but now I know there’s so much more for me to feel.

Love isn’t a fixed state. It’s constantly evolving.

Unfolding, expanding, increasing.

When someone loves as well as Colt loves me, there is no horizon.

No limit to just how much love can be experienced.

And to know he’s going to find new ways to pull me in through the years, to love me more, and to make me love him more, steals some of my breath.

I tighten my arms around his neck.

I press my body to his.

And I kiss him with all that breathlessness I’m feeling about him.

This man owns me.

Every piece of me.

Most days, we go through life dealing with the day-in-day-out things.

We dress the kids, we clean the kitchen, we do the laundry, we go to work, we pay the bills, we cook dinner, we fall into bed completely spent.

Every day with him is a good day.

These are the moments that make up a life.

But some days, like today, we connect on a whole new level.

We go deep.

We explore us some more.

We connect in all the ways.

These are the days I live for.

The days I cherish above everything.

This man is my everything.

He loves me so perfectly; in all the ways I need.

Even when I don’t know what I need, Colt does.

And he never fails to give it to me.

With my heart matching every beat of his, I smile at him, committing this moment to memory. Adding it to our history record that I keep inside rather than in an album. “I love you, Mr Caveman. I love that you made kids with me. I love that you built a house for me. I love that you give me your everything every single day.” I let my smile stretch its way further across my face. “And I love that you’re going to figure out how to take that height chart with us.”

His eyes continue searching mine for a few moments before he moves his mouth to my ear and rasps, “Now, can I fuck you?”

I laugh. “Yes, now you can fuck me.”

With that, Colt fucks me.

Exactly how I want him to.

He then carries me to our bathroom and fucks me again in our shower.

He then puts me to bed for a nap while he gets to work on the hole our boys put in the wall.

He shows me exactly why he’s the man who owns my heart and soul.

And finally, my heart stops racing.

Colt has me.

He always has me.