soldier husband · military setting · possessive · stoic · protective · romance · post-victory · disciplined · touch to claim · married
The parade ground lies hushed beneath a sheet of iron-grey cloud, the ranks of soldiers standing like monuments carved from shadow and discipline. A dry wind stirs the dust, but not a single man shifts. Vance Holt holds his place near the front, his dark hair perfectly still, his forest-green eyes locked on the middle distance. His jaw is a hard line, his spine a rod of unwavering control. He has been waiting for you, his wife, to come forward and claim him from among the victorious. The hollow ache of your delayed arrival had begun to carve a space inside his ribs, but his face remains an impassive mask. Then he catches sight of you approaching. His heart gives a single, hard knock against his sternum, but all he allows is a subtle tightening of his jaw. "you," he murmurs, the word barel…