Over the past week, I have been falling more and more for my girl. In many wonderful ways, she continues to impress me.

Clara is fearless, yet thoughtful.

Assertive, yet kind.

And the sexiest sweetheart I have ever met!

Clara is naturally sexy. The fact that she doesn't quite realise just how sexy she really is, only makes her even more sexy.

Whether she is naked, in her onesie or just wearing an oversized sweater—she's sexy.

Being who I am, I am often surrounded by beautiful women. Women who try too hard and couldn't care less. But Clara is like no woman I have ever met. She oozes charming qualities and emits a beautiful presence. She's real. She's attractively authentic. She's completely mine. And you know what, I am hers.

Heart and soul, it's all beginning to belong to Clara Thorn.

In just seven sweet days, we have made so much love and so many memories. We have talked, like really talked. We have opened our hearts and opened up so many possibilities for the two of us.

I needed this time with Clara, I really did need it.

With her by my side, I feel refreshed and balanced. I feel like I can withstand all the shitty drama that often gets thrown in my direction.

And it will get thrown, it always does. But because of Clara, I am different. A good and stronger different.

I like how she makes me feel. I like the Rhys Ryan I am becoming because of her. I just don't like the thought of letting her go.

How can I?

How can I let her return to England?

How can I make her stay?

How can I convince Clara that I am enough to always make her happy?

Most people don't know what's around the corner of life, but I do...I know that Clara is going to fill my life with all that she beautifully is.

Which is why I need to try to do whatever it takes to keep her here with me.

Maybe I am rushing things? 

Maybe I am expecting too much too soon?

But I'm running with my heart here. I'm running with it, because it only takes a moment to know when something feels right. And as we snuggle up together on the decking of the cabin, enjoying the lake view as the sun slowly starts to go down, I know that Clara is my right...my perfectly sweet right. 

"You cold?" I ask, feeling her body just tremble a little in my arms.

"No, just thinking." She says, vaguely and quietly.

Chuckling softly as I playfully squeeze her, I can't help but throw a joke into the early evening air. "Uh oh, that's gotta be bad news for me."

Smirking a little, Clara tilts her head towards me. "Funnily enough, that is exactly what Dex says to me."

Sensing that she's thinking of work, home and England, I need to know what's putting the frown lines across my girls forehead. "What's really on your mind, Clara?"

Reluctant to say what's really on her mind, she almost squirms in my lap, looking all coy and timid all of a sudden. "I'm okay, I was just thinking about how many days we have left, that's all." Although slightly smiling, Clara wears her worry like an intrusive mask.

Placing a comforting kiss to the top of her head, I quietly ask. "And?" Relieved to know that my girl is feeling just as anxious about her leaving as I am.

Her eyes quickly fill with an impending loss. "It's going to be really hard to say goodbye to you again." She then looks away, not wanting me to see the sadness that spreads slowly across her irises.

Taking her chin, I make her look at me. "It doesn't matter where either one of us is anymore, Clara. All that matters is that we feel each other inside of here." I place her hand onto my chest, wanting her to feel my beating heart beneath her palm. "Oceans, land, mountains and time, can no longer separate what we have."

Tears begin to swell in Clara's eyes. I want to say so much more. I even want to ask her to stay, but she's so overcome at the moment, I decide against it. She's crying, laughing through them with the sweetest of embarrassment. "You've turned me into such a girl!" She laughs again, sniffing hard and wiping away those taunting tears of hers.

My arms aren't comforting her enough, so I bring my sympathetic lips tenderly just against hers. "But you're my girl, so it doesn't matter." Then I kiss her firmly, wanting my mouth to confirm what I'd just said.

Clara is mine.

Now and always.

Mine.

Doing that satisfied little sigh, the one that always makes me want to high five the heavens because my mouth can make her do that, Clara then smiles with complete contentment as she teasingly strokes my waist. She knows it tickles me like hell, so I smirk as my determined hooded eyes softly scold her. Clara gorgeously grins, now staring at me in a sexy, kittenish way as she continues to tease my shuddering waist with her offending fingers. "It's like that, is it?" My brow is arousingly arched, poised to play. Shit, she's biting her lip, nodding seductively slow. Erotically charged thoughts electrify my brain, sending shockwaves straight to my dick. "You know we've already done it out here, right?" My voice is low, my arousal now throbbingly high.

"Have we? Really?" Clara's reply is playful, dripping with it.

Laughing as I keep her hips exactly where I want them, I retort with a daring. "Twice."

Clara comes back, even more daring. "Third time lucky?" She confidently asks, purposely sinking herself deeper into my lap.

My hooded eyes gravitate towards her mouth—her sexy, kissable mouth. If a mouth could ever ruin me, it would be hers.

So I seize it. My lewd, unforgiving lips, punish that sinful mouth of hers with a dirty, rough and possessive kiss before gravelly declaring. "Hell yeah."

Hell yeah, for a third time on the shadowed decking.

Hell yeah, for rough and unrefined kissing.

Hell yeah, for running with my heart.