Buying a dog because your assistant had always wanted one was possibly one of the more stupid things I’d ever done. Good thing Brown was cute, and what was even more adorable was watching Katrina and the pup together. With her reliable efficiency, Katrina had signed up to some online puppy training course complete with videos. She’d drawn up a set of rules which both the pup and I were inclined to ignore, but Brown was certainly behaving better now that he had boundaries and a routine.

In a strange way, Katrina had created the same effect for me. Either that, or I’d completely lost my mojo. My phone was blowing up with texts from girls offering all kinds of outrageous acts just to get some one-on-one time with my cock. But their photos and promises left me ambivalent. The idea of a night of mindless sex didn’t appeal right now, but any time Katrina showed up in the tower wanting to talk about a social media idea or the fact that I’d neglected to take the puppy out before bed and he’d pooped behind the sofa, I’d get this desire to sit her on my desk, slowly undress her, attending to every inch of skin I bared with my mouth, and then licking that sweet, virtuous pussy to a deep and prolonged orgasm.

I wanted to completely shatter her, then reconstruct her as someone more comfortable with her sexuality. What a fucking ego I have. But the idea of some fumbling idiot getting his hands down her pants brought out my competitive streak.

I wanted to be the master of her pleasure, own it, and give it to her with a frequency that would render her incapable of doing little more than rest in the tower armchair while I worked between displays of my sexual prowess. That was some sort of heaven right there.

The effect she had on me was getting so bad that I could scarcely hear her voice or catch her scent without having to talk down a raging hard-on. I didn’t even believe it was possible to go this long without sex while in a constant state of arousal. Perhaps I should tell her that with all the blood flow heading toward my cock, my brain was too starved to work. If she wanted to be a top-class assistant, she could help me out in that respect.

I’d never used manipulation to get a woman in my bed. They came willingly, in every sense of the word.

Lily had tried to contact me a couple of times since she’d turned up. Seemed like the human condition was to obsess over something you couldn’t have. I’d been in a perpetual cycle of hooking up with the hottest girls, the ones the other guys couldn’t get. But it was too easy. The thrill of the chase didn’t exist when you made your pick from an inbox filled with photos and what amounted to sexual résumés. And in a club that was wall-to-wall with preening beauties, the thrill of the choice had become hollow.

I was spoiled by beauty when I wanted something real.

The more successful my book series became, the easier it was to have the sexiest girl. The one with the longest legs, the biggest breasts, the cutest ass. Nationality, color, shape and size—it was like too much free ice cream for a kid. You simply end up with an ache in your belly and a need for something wholesome.

I’d settled down for Lily, and for a while, I’d enjoyed the sense of calm it brought to my life. But we weren’t good for each other because what hovered beneath the surface was the way we made each other a bit crazy. We never wanted the same thing at the same time, and we became like two prisoners tethered by a chain, trying to escape over opposing walls. I think the real reason Lily came after me was an inner desire to shake her congenial child-star image and be a bad girl by adding some grit to her shiny exterior. A sort of reverse-halo effect.

She’d probably been in love with David all along. We were alike. Our reasons might be different, but we both found love frightening. I simply didn’t believe in it. What I did believe in was vulnerability and how addictive it was to adore and destroy another person you were enthralled by. That endless fucking cycle I’d watched from the grandstand seat of my childhood.

But Lily didn’t have it in her to be the bad girl she wanted to be. Even under the dim light of my dirty halo, she still shone brightly. Funny how I couldn’t rise and shine to her level at her side. Darkness trumps light, gossip trumps goodness, because the world wants the dirt.

Lily was better off with David. She’d see that soon enough. My heart wasn’t broken—you can’t crush something that hard—and I’m sure Lily’s wasn’t, either. You don’t take out a restraining order on someone you want to get back with. Fair enough. I shouldn’t have punched David, but Lily was playing a silly game, pitting us against each other. In the end, David appeared to be a good enough guy, even if he fought like a pussy.

I was thinking too hard, looking too deep, but Lily’s surprise visit unsettled me in the sense that it made me see what I didn’t have. I wondered if I simply needed to get down to the city and get laid, but those ideas vanished once I thought about Katrina’s blush.

I picked up my phone and scrolled through the latest messages. When I got into a relationship with Lily, I thought it would have killed off the fandom, but if anything, it just made the women more competitive.

Something caught my eye as the phone messages rushed up the screen. I swiped back. Yes. Finally, a message interested me. I hit the callback button, a plan already formulating in my mind.

* * *

I found Katrina in the back yard with Brown. He immediately abandoned the lesson he was having to run full-speed at me and hurl himself to his back at my feet. He adored having his tummy rubbed, and as I crouched down to do that, Katrina approached, phone at the ready to take some photos.

“I think you should call him Buster. Buster Brown. He likes Buster.”

“Do you, Brown? Is Buster Brown a good name for you? Is it? Buster, Buster, Buster.” I kept rubbing his stomach, and I swear, if a dog could giggle, that’s what he was doing as he writhed on his back.

Katrina caught the whole performance on her phone.

“Gonna change your name to Pap, Poppins,” I warned.

“You could use my real name. That would work.”

“Would it stop you taking this endless stream of photos?”

“This is a video, so don’t say anything rude,” she said, stalking me, the phone held at arm’s length from her face.

“Last video I was in was shopped around the TV stations and entertainment sites for a lot of money. And that was very rude. You’re losing the potential to make payday if you’re set on leaving any rude stuff out.” Brown was using my hand as a chew toy.

“Shut up and play with the dog.”

Katrina dropped to her knees, down at puppy level, resting her forearms on the ground. It gave me an excellent view down the front of her shirt so that all I could think of was my hands on her soft breasts. Instant crotch strain, but I couldn’t stop looking.

Katrina caught me and straightened up. “You’re supposed to be playing with the dog,” she said.

I was going to say something about the two puppies she had that I’d rather be playing with, but even I wasn’t that crass. “Come into the house and I’ll make you a smoked salmon, caviar and truffle pizza for lunch.”

She stopped videoing and pushed to her feet. “To be honest, that sounds absolutely gross.”

“Wait till you see what I do with it,” I suggested. “I had something similar in Italy last year.”

“You never did. No self-respecting Italian would do that to a pizza.”

“Come on, Poppins, get with the game. I’m trying to impress you here, and that food’s going to go bad, or in the dog, if we don’t finish it.”

Now she blushed about food. This was getting out of hand. I headed for the kitchen with Buster leaping excitedly at my side. He’d caught onto the meaning of caviar faster than ‘sit’. I’d already explained to Katrina that all she needed to do was say ‘caviar’ and Buster would behave like a qualifier for the world dog obedience champs. Could be something to do with the fact that I’d danced about the kitchen singing Caviar at the dog for way too much time last night, feeding him dollops of fish eggs every time he responded with his own crazy dance.

I really had bought too much of the stuff, and even though Katrina had expressed on one of her vision boards a desire to try the wild sturgeon delicacy, along with truffles, oysters, and a list of other exotic foods, she didn’t seem too taken with the taste. I’d bought the excellent non-pasteurized variety so it wasn’t going to last.

“I might just have a ham sandwich,” Katrina muttered, following me with some reluctance into the kitchen.

“Poppins, you’re being lame. You’ve got to try new things.”

“I tried it, remember? It choked me.”

There was only one image capable of entering my head when she said that. “Sometimes, the good things take practice. You need to hold it on your tongue a bit, get used to the taste. It can be a bit salty at first.”

“Fishy,” she said, screwing up her nose.

Nope, what I was thinking about had never been described as fishy. “Sit there, and I’ll make you something delicious.” She rolled her eyes. “Edible. And I’ll show you the caviar dance I taught Brown, I mean, Buster.”

We got through lunch. I made Katrina a salmon and dill pizza, which wasn’t too fishy for her, before I informed her of my next plan.

“No returning to the apartment this weekend, Poppins. I need you with me.” Naturally, her lovely cheeks turned pink.

“What for?”

“We’re going to Rhode Island. I’ve got some research to do, and I’ll need your help.”

“What about Buster?”

Her sense of responsibility was predictable. “Mason and June are going to take him.”

“Oh.” She looked reluctant. “Um, so, can you give me more details?”

“Rhode Island, research, bring a bikini.”

“I have something planned this weekend.”

“Cancel it. Say you’re working. I’ve booked the Lighthouse Suite at Castle Hill.”

“It’s a family thing.”

“Unless it’s a funeral, promise them you’ll turn up to the next one. Your family won’t mind.”

“You haven’t met my mother.”

I recalled the phone call I’d overheard and suddenly understood her reluctance. “When is it, this family thing?”

“Lunch, Sunday.”

“I’ll get you back for it. This is the only weekend I can do this research. It’s for the precious book.”

“I’m not sure about...”

I tried to read her face and guess what the stalling point was. “Newport? Fun? A weekend? Oh, the suite?”

She nodded, picking at a burned piece of pizza crust.

“Separate rooms, okay? Or I can book you a different suite.” I couldn’t believe what I was saying. I couldn’t even believe what I was doing. Sure, catching up with Rip would be a blast, and he was hardly ever up this way these days, but what was it I was trying to achieve with Katrina? Maybe I was sick. Maybe I did just need to get laid, get her out of my system with a top-class blow job from someone who practiced her deep-throat skills daily on an English cucumber.

I glanced at Katrina, who was sort of chewing the inside of her lip so that her mouth was all puckered up and glossy and just-there available for a little afternoon delight.

Fuck, I was sick. One look at her, and I couldn’t even think in my usual terms. Afternoon delight—what the fucking fuck? Blow job. Cock sucking. Never afternoon delight. That sounded like something my grandmother would have served on a delicately patterned china plate, along with her crust-off, diagonally-cut sandwiches.

Rip would pull me out of this state I was in. I should go alone.

“I’ll see,” Katrina finally said.

My excitement soared. I grabbed the caviar and did the dance with Buster until Katrina giggled so hard, I thought she’d wet herself. When she recovered, she started clearing up and sent me off to write.

I contacted the hotel and asked for two suites, but they said they had nothing else available. Good. By the end of the weekend, I’d be able to cross ‘encounter with an apex predator’ off Katrina’s list.