“Nah,” he answers. No one would be able to look at Joyce and see anything but the beautiful woman she is.

Slowly, Hopper leans down onto the bed, one knee on the mattress between Joyce’s legs, the other on one side of her. Even right here, he can feel the heat coming off her body and when he plants his palm beside her shoulder and ducks his head, it isn’t immediately for another kiss. Instead he brushes her jaw with his mouth, then the line of her throat, kissing her soft skin and breathing her in.

Here they are, after so long.