“Every time she shut her eyes she saw herself wrapped in his arms in the middle of that beautiful bed just right for conceiving children.”

“She watched as Michael stripped and walked toward the bed, his erection standing proud. The bed dipped as he got in the other side. She rolled toward him, and he pulled her into his arms. His skin was cool against hers, making her nipples bead. She wrapped her arms around him and pressed herself against him, offering him her heat.Offering him everything.”

“[Morgan] raised her arms to protect herself, wincing in pain but keeping her eyes squeezed shut...Somewhere nearby, she could hear someone whimpering, and she suspected that she was hearing herself.”

“It was when she returned to him, chilled & clearheaded, that it happened. He sat against the tree, his knees bent & his head in his hands. His shoulders slumped. Tired, unhappy. Something tender caught in her breath at the sight of him. And then he raised his eyes and looked at her, and she saw what she had not seen before. She gasped.His eyes were beautiful. His face was beautiful to her in every way, and his shoulders and hands. And his arms that hung over his knees, and his chest that was not moving, because he held his breath as he watched her. And the heart in his chest. This friend. How had she not seen this before? How had she not seen him? She was blind. And then tears choked her eyes, for she had not asked for this. She had not asked for this beautiful man before her, with something hopeful in his eyes that she did not want.”

“His smoke eyes lighten as she closes the gap between them, and he slowly seals it wrapping his arms about her.”

“She closed her hands around his and shut her eyes, imagining their bed cut free of this strange prison, floating through space or on the surface of the ocean, just the two of them alone.”