Mal gasps, a sweet little hiccup of a sound that Rowan’s going to remember for the rest of his life. He pulls Rowan down for a kiss that’s mind-blowingly tender, and feels more than hears Mal whisper, “I love you too.”

Rowan shudders into the kiss, eyes squeezed tightly closed as his chest constricts and his breath leaves his lungs in a whoosh. He wants to breathe in the residual oxygen from Mal’s exhalations so he can say that a part of him has been inside every single one of his cells.

It doesn’t take much after that. A handful of hard, deep thrusts has Rowan’s belly coiling tight and Mal clenching around him, and with mutual gasps they come together, shuddering in each other’s arms. It’s easily the best orgasm Rowan’s ever had in his life, and if the keening moan that Mal lets out as he comes across his chest is any indication, the same can be said for him.

They lie together, silent and sated, softly stroking whatever part of the other’s skin they can reach. Planting kisses here and there, on shoulders and foreheads and lips and hands because they can now. Rowan can feel the warmth seeping out of every one of his pores.

“I’m so glad I met you,” Rowan sighs.

Mal hums, curling into Rowan and snuggling into his chest. The casual display of intimacy is almost more than Rowan’s heart can bear.

“Me too, Red.” He’s quiet for a moment, breath coming down into soft little puffs out his nose. “You ever think we’d end up here, back at the gangbang?”

Rowan laughs softly. “I wanted it. From the start. But I didn’t want to get my hopes up, you know?”

“Yeah,” Mal agrees with a nod of his head against Rowan’s chest. “I know exactly what you mean.”

It feels like they’ve done this whole thing backward, to be honest. Started with impersonal sex and ended with love, or something a hell of a lot like it. Rowan’s never been in love before, but he can’t imagine it feels like anything but filling his entire being with Mal.

They don’t talk about what they are. Rowan, at least, doesn’t feel the need to label anything when what they have is still so new, so tender and raw.

But Rowan knows in his fucking soul that what they have is real. Solid and sure and so damn right that no matter what happens, they’re going to make it work. They’ve been through so much together the past few months that it feels like they can take on anything that comes their way. And they’ll do it with the other at their side.

In his wildest dreams, Rowan never would have thought that a routine call to save someone’s life would end up saving his life. Never thought that it would lead him here, in Mal’s bed and Mal’s arms. But he wouldn’t change a thing.