Patrick woke Mary before dawn with kisses down her back that had her immediately ready for more of what she’d already had twice during the night. She’d be sore and achy after another sexual marathon with him, but she’d worry about that later, after he was gone. Right now, she had enough to think about with him kissing and touching her and starting the fire burning all over again.

“Sweet Mary,” he whispered. “I hate that I have to leave you today, even if it’s only for a couple of days.”

“I wish you didn’t have to go.”

“I do, too, but I’ve got meetings on top of meetings today.” He continued to ignite her body with kisses and soft caresses of her back and bottom that had her pressing back against him, looking for more. “This is the most important meeting I’ll have all day.”

Mary smiled and then moaned when he reached around her to grasp her breasts, dragging his thumbs over the tips. “Patrick…”

“What, love?”

“You’re making me crazy.”

“For what?”

“You know.”

“And still I want to hear you say it.”

“You love to embarrass me, don’t you?”

“I love everything with you. Especially this.” With his hands still on her breasts, he moved them so she was facedown and he was behind her, his cock nudging at her in teasing strokes that made her even crazier.

“Make love to me, Patrick. Please make love to me.”

“So polite and so sweet,” he said as he gave her what she wanted in one long, deep stroke that triggered the orgasm that had been forming since she first felt his lips on her back. “I want to start every day of the rest of my life just like this.”

The emotional punch of that statement had her heart expanding to the point of pain, the best kind of pain, the kind that demanded your full attention. God, she was in deep with him and getting in deeper every minute that she spent with him. When she accepted Patrick’s invitation to dance at Will and Cam’s wedding, she’d certainly never expected to be facedown in her bed having doggie-style sex with him.

That thought made her laugh.

“What the hell are you laughing at?” he asked on a low growl that made her laugh harder. “You’re doing a number on my ego, sweetheart.”

“Sorry,” Mary said weakly. “It’s not you.”

He withdrew from her, making her moan from the loss, and helped her turn over, brushing the hair back from her face. “What is so funny?”

“I was thinking that I never expected to be facedown in my bed doing it doggie style with you when you asked me to dance at the wedding.”

His smile lit up his face. “I certainly never expected any of this, but when Cam took me up to see her office, there you were.” He looked down at her naked body. “And here we are.” Taking himself in hand, he entered her again.

Mary arched her back and raised her hips, wanting to get as close to him as she could.

He reached below her to grasp her bottom and hold her open for his possession.

That was the only word that could accurately describe making love with Patrick. He possessed her, body and soul.

“God, Mary… It’s so good. I love making love to you. Tell me you love it, too.”

“I do, I love it.” She’d never loved anything more than she loved being with him this way, having him in her home and in her bed. It felt right, until she remembered the life he led far away from her little home in Vermont.

“What?” he asked, kissing the furrow between her brows. “What’re you thinking that made you frown?”

“About how far from me you live.”

“It’s just geography, sweetheart.” He nuzzled her neck, making her body tingle in anticipation of the orgasm that rolled through her in waves rather than the usual explosion. This one went on for what seemed like an hour, pleasure on top of more pleasure until she all but drowned in it.

She resurfaced to Patrick’s arms wrapped around her, his face buried in the curve of her neck and their bodies quaking with aftershocks.

“Mary,” he said, his warm breath setting off goose bumps on her arm. “I know you’re not ready to talk about where this is going, but you have to know I’m so in love with you, and I hate that I have to leave you again.”

“I love you, too, Patrick.”

His head came whipping up, the expression on his face priceless and one she wanted to remember forever. “You do? Really?”

“Yes, really.”

He smiled like a giddy little boy.

Mary curled her hand around his neck and brought him down for a kiss that started out soft and sweet but quickly took off from there.

Groaning, he turned his face to end the kiss. “I have to go.”

“And I have to let you.”

“This weekend, we’re going to talk about where this is going, you hear me? We’re not kids, Mary. If we both want this, and I sure as hell do, there has to be a way to make it work.”

“We’ll talk about it,” she said, even though the thought of upending her well-ordered life filled her with trepidation, even if the upheaval meant more time with him.

“Take a shower with me.”

“I thought you had to get going.”

“I do.”

“Showers together take more time than you have.”

He gave her hand a playful tug. “I own the company. They’ll wait for me.”

Mary let him help her up and followed him into the shower, where sure enough, they spent half an hour wrapped up in each other’s arms, kissing and touching and generally driving each other crazy with desire. “I feel like a teenager in the throes of first love or something,” she said as they dried off.

“I’m right there with you.” He leaned in to steal another kiss, making Mary wince from the contact against her swollen lips.

“The whole office will know what I’ve been doing.”

“Do you care if they know?”

“I’m not sure how to feel about that, especially because I work with your daughter and you haven’t said anything to her yet.”

“Only because we agreed we wanted to enjoy some time to ourselves before we went public.”

“I’d like to do that for a while longer, if it’s okay with you.”

“Whatever you want is fine with me, although at some point, I would like to tell Cam, even if she won’t approve.”

“Why do you say that?” Mary asked, genuinely shocked and slightly hurt. “I thought she liked me. I love her.”

Patrick flashed that irrepressible grin as he buttoned his shirt. “She adores you. It’s me she has the problem with.”

“I don’t follow.” Mary pulled on yoga pants and a fleece to drive him to meet his chopper.

“My track record with women since my wife died has been… How shall I put this? Less than stellar. Cameron will be afraid of me being cavalier with you, which she has every good reason to think based on what she’s seen over the years. But what I know that she doesn’t, is that this is different. It has been from the beginning.”

“How is it different?”

He came to her, put his hands on her hips and drew her in snug against him. “You want actual examples?”

Mary nodded.

He appeared to give that some considerable thought while his fingers slid under her fleece in search of skin. “The first time I ever saw you, that day in the office before the wedding, I thought, wow, she’s beautiful. I asked Cam about you, and she said I was to keep my hands and everything else far away from you. We all know that I never do what I’m told.” Nuzzling her neck again, he continued. “And then when we spent most of Cam’s wedding day together, I realized you were different because I didn’t want to stop talking to you. I still don’t. When we’re apart, I count the minutes until I can talk to you again. It’s never like that for me. Usually, I’m looking for a way out from the minute I get involved with someone.”

“Were you involved with someone when you met me?”

“Um, maybe?”

“Which is it? Yes or no?”

“Yes.”

“Who was she?”

“Lena, my housekeeper.”

“Your housekeeper? Does she still work for you?”

“Maybe?”

“Patrick! Does she live in your house?”

“Possibly? But I’m never there. You know that.”

“So your ex-girlfriend-slash-housekeeper still lives with you, and your current girlfriend, or whatever I am, is supposed to be fine with that?”

“Mary, sweetheart, Lena and I were a fling, and we both knew it. You and I are the real thing. There’s no comparison. Lena is very good at her job. She makes my life easier by taking care of a million little things that I’d never think to do, but if you want her gone, I’ll let her go today.”

“No! I don’t want someone to lose their job because of me.”

“I’d give her a very generous severance. She’d be fine.”

Mary shook her head, even as unease clawed at her. “Don’t fire her because of me.”

“How about I find her another place to live?”

“You would do that?”

“If it would make you more comfortable with me continuing to employ her, then yes, I’d happily do that.”

“I could live with that.”

“Then that’s what I’ll do.”

“Why are you grinning like a fool?”

“Because I absolutely adore jealous Mary.”

“I am not jealous! Tell me what woman in the world would put up with that arrangement and have nothing to say about it?”

“You are jealous,” he said with more of those intoxicating kisses to her neck, “and it’s very, very sexy.”

Mary tried and failed to push him away. The next thing she knew, they were falling back onto her bed in a tangle of arms and legs. Naturally, when they landed, his hard cock was pressed against the V of her legs. He was nothing if not insatiable. “I thought you had to go.”

“I do,” he said, gazing down at her with those gorgeous eyes that got to her every time he looked at her that way. “But I can’t leave you with any doubts about who I’m in love with and who I am not in love with and never was.”

“I believe you.”

“You’re sure?”

Mary nodded. “Are there other women who work for you that you’ve slept with?”

Seeming amused, he shook his head. “Lena is the only one.”

“And I won’t be running into her when I go to New York with you this weekend?”

“You won’t see her. I promise.”

“Then we’re good.”

“You’d tell me if we weren’t?”

“I’d tell you.”

“I want to get this right, Mary. Don’t let me screw it up. Okay?”

“If you got it any more right, I wouldn’t be able to walk, and I’d have to find a second house to keep all the presents you’ve given me.”

“I want you to be happy. I want to make you happy.”

“You do. You make me happy and silly and giddy and crazy and maybe just a tad bit jealous.”

“Ah-ha, I knew it!”

“Don’t gloat. It’s not attractive.”

He laughed—hard. “I do love you, but I have to go before they toss me out of my own company.”

“You’re the one who tackled me.”

“Because I want one more kiss, and make it a good one to last me until Friday.”

Mary wrapped her arms around his neck and gave him what he wanted, and just like always, they had to drag themselves up and off the bed and out of the house before they got carried away. She drove him to a location thirty minutes from Butler to meet the chopper that was already waiting in a big field. “How’d you find this place?”

“I have no idea. The pilots found it when I told them I needed them to pick me up outside of Butler, but somewhere drivable, so it wouldn’t be too far for you to go. You’ll meet me here on Friday afternoon?” When she nodded, he said, “I’ll let you know what time later in the week.”

“What do I do with my car?”

“You can leave it here. My people made an arrangement with the property owner.”

“You have people who take care of everything for you.”

“Well, yes, I guess I do. That frees me up to do what I do best.”

“Which is?”

“Make money.” His big smile softened the statement and made her smile along with him.

“You’re very cute when you’re being cocky.”

“It’s not cocky when it’s the truth. If you want me to have a look at your retirement accounts—”

“Go to work, Patrick.” She gave him a gentle push toward the chopper, where the pilots seemed to be making a point not to look at them.

“Kiss me good-bye.”

“I already did.”

“I can’t remember that kiss, so you’d better make this one memorable.”

“You do too remember that kiss, and all my kisses are memorable.”

“Damn straight they are, and I can never get enough of them.” With his arms around her waist and his overnight bag slung over his shoulder, he stared at her for the longest time.

“What?”

“I haven’t left you yet and I already miss you.”

“I already miss you, too.” She went up on tiptoes to kiss him, taking pains to make it memorable, and loved the dazzled look in his eyes when she finally released him.

“You’ll be here Friday, right?” he asked with an endearing hint of vulnerability in his tone.

“I’ll be here.”

“Tell me again. What you said earlier… I want to hear it again.”

She crooked her finger to bring him down to her. “I love you, Patrick.”

“I love you, too.”

“You’re not going to get yourself killed in that thing, are you?” she asked, eyeing the chopper with trepidation.

“Nah, it’s perfectly safe.”

“Email me when you land?”

“Yeah, baby, I’ll do that.” He stole another quick kiss and took off toward the chopper, leaving her bereft without him, which made her feel ridiculous. They’d had hours together. She’d see him again in a few days, and yet she had a giant pit in her stomach watching him climb aboard the helicopter. The pit only deepened when the engines fired up and the big blade on top began to spin.

As the chopper lifted off, Patrick waved to her through a small window.

With her heart in her mouth, Mary returned his wave and watched the chopper until it was out of sight, leaving behind a startling quiet that served as a metaphor for life without Patrick. It was as if he’d taken all the sparkle and color with him when he left. She thought about that on the way back home, where she got ready for work, made her lunch and went through her usual routine with a growing awareness that life as she knew it was over, and a new life with Patrick had begun.

She just wished she knew how they were going to manage that new life.

After watching Mary disappear from view, Patrick sat back in his seat and closed his eyes. It got harder to leave her every time he had to do it. To say his feelings for her had been unexpected would be the understatement of the decade. He’d been bowled over by her from the first time he laid eyes on her in the office, the day Cam took him up to see where she worked.

He’d only ever had that reaction to one other woman, and right when he’d accepted that he’d never fully recover from losing his wife so suddenly and tragically, along came Mary to show him he was still capable of truly loving a woman. Running his hands over his face, he tried to shake off the cobwebs of the mostly sleepless night and shift his focus to the meetings that awaited him in New York.

But he found his thoughts returning to her over and over, thinking and rethinking the dilemma of her living in Vermont while he resided in New York. In truth, it wasn’t much of a dilemma. They were both adults and could do anything they wanted, but he already knew her well enough to know that she’d never go for being dependent upon him financially.

Unless he married her.

Maybe then she’d consent to letting him take care of her.

The thought had him riveted to his chair, every cell in his body on high alert. After he lost Ali, he’d vowed to himself that he would never marry again out of respect to her memory and the love they’d shared. He’d made that vow thirty years ago, before he knew just how lonely he’d be without her.

A parade of women had marched through his life—and Cameron’s—a fact he wasn’t at all proud of. After meeting Mary and falling in love with her, he realized he’d been stumbling through one meaningless encounter after another, looking for something he couldn’t have described until he found it.

Her.

He’d been looking for his sweet, sweet Mary.

But was he prepared to marry her to have her in his life every day? Yes, absolutely. Awareness of what he’d just acknowledged swept through him like a tsunami, filling every part of him with excitement and anticipation and relief. He was so damned relieved to have her in his life, to feel that connection he’d had only one other time and to know that she felt the same way about him.

It was far too soon for his skittish Mary for talk of engagements or weddings, so he’d spend the next few months showing her she could count on him, that what they’d found together would last the rest of their lives and that he couldn’t wait to have her with him every day as his wife, his lover, his best friend, his travel companion and as a stepmother to his beloved daughter.

He hoped that once Cam realized that he truly loved Mary, she would be thrilled to welcome Mary into their family. She adored Mary, and she’d always hoped he’d find someone who could make him happy while calming the restless energy that had driven him to the heights of his profession even if his personal life had been somewhat of a mess.

As the New York skyline came into view, he decided he’d take it slow and convince Mary one day at a time, one weekend at a time, one minute at a time that they belonged together. And when the time was right, he’d ask her to spend the rest of her life with him. In the meantime, he needed to see about a one-of-a-kind ring for the one-of-a-kind woman who would wear it.

By the time the chopper touched down on the roof of the PME headquarters building in Midtown Manhattan, Patrick had a plan.