Old Flame︱Brennan Sorrengail

when we were young

THREE+ YEARS AGO...

I FOLDED A PAIR OF PANTS. A shirt. This one was Brennan's. And—as if somehow my doing his laundry gave him an opportunity to talk to me, he strode up, arms crossed. I shifted away from him, lifting my chin. He let out a long sigh. A long, sarcastic sigh. "I'm sorry," he whispered, hanging his head. He hid a smile. Tried to anyway.

I let out a small hmphf.

"You'll have to talk to me eventually, Mil."

My frown deepened. "I'm not talking to you until you fix my shirt."

He wrapped my arms around me, rocking us. His lips found my neck. "There is no fixing that, baby."

I pouted like a sassy child. His laugh made everything so much worse. "Then I'm still mad at you."

"In my defence, I was too distracted trying to get it off you to realise it was your favourite shirt."

"You ripped my shirt," I repeated the same words I had been for the last hour. I'd only talk to him to remind him of his atrocious misdeed. "I can't salvage it, so you have to."

Brennan clicked his tongue, moving to the crook of my neck. His warm breaths almost made me forget why I was mad.

Almost.

"You didn't have a problem with it when I was kissing you." To prove a point, he did just that. My knees wobbled as he shifted to my ear—and bit it.

Oh, he was not winning this.

"That's beside the point." I folded my arms to my chest, squirming away. Brennan spun me back into his chest before I could get far. Bastard. "You. Ripped. My. Shirt."

"I think I found a way to atone for my inhuman crime. " He guided me onto his bed, pinning me with his weight. My lips fought against my desperation to frown. A full-blown smile found its way onto my face instead.

"And how will you do that, Brennan Sorrengail?" I asked, gazing up at him. His fingers tangled in my hair as he brushed his thumb over my bottom lip.

"I'll have to please my soon-to-be wife." He left a trail of kisses up to my ear. "You know, satisfy her in every possible way."

"You seem confident you can do just that." I hummed, licking my lips and egging him into kissing me. "But I don't believe you. You'll have to show me—" A string of giggles fled my lips after Brennan sucked on my neck.

"I think so, too," he breathed out, moving to my ear. "Does now work for you, future wife?"

I shrugged, clicking my tongue. "Later. I have to go and check on JJ."

Brennan smirked wide as a river. "Ah. Then you have to let me have you to myself for a few more minutes."

"Only a few," I scooted up on the bed. His eyes studied mine. "Then I go."

"Then we go." Brennan lay beside me. "I want to know..." he trailed off, laying his head on my pillow, facing me.

"You want to know what?" I asked and ran my hand through his wavy hair.

"I want to know when you think you fell in love with me," he whispered. "I want to know what made you think you wanted to be with me."

I hummed, wrinkling my eyebrows in concentration. "I think I fell in love with you when you walked me home all those years ago. Specifically when you said this can't be all life is. That there had to be more out there." I paused. "Yeah. I fell then. I love you because you are that something more for me. And...I knew I wanted to be with you that night when I asked you why you hadn't looked at me in an hour straight, and you said you were naming the stars in the sky after me."