I don’t know how the hell she does it, but even in a tank top and a pair of lounge shorts, Juliet looks like she’s ready to walk a runway at New York Fashion Week.

“I’m not crazy.” She’s still standing in the doorway, with her hand on the door. “I know it probably seems that way.”

“Can I come in?”

A pink blush rises to her cheeks. “Of course.” She steps back into an apartment smaller than my master bedroom, and her eyes dart over the furnishings as I enter, ending up in the middle of the tiniest kitchen the world has ever seen. Juliet’s father’s space at Overbrook is bigger than this. “I wasn’t expecting you to…you know, come over.”

“I just assumed you wanted to talk in person.”

“Most people would have called.”

I grin at her again, and she moves behind me to shut the door, flipping the lock. “I’m not most people.”

“Don’t I know it?”

She comes back past me into the apartment and moves toward the living area. Half of it is taken over by an immaculately made full-sized bed, throw pillows arranged just so, and the other half features a loveseat and a small flat-screen TV. At the foot of her bed is a desk that I’ve seen in at least a hundred TV shows, neatly stacked with books. There are more books on a low shelf underneath the desk.

Juliet takes a deep breath. “I wanted to talk because….” Her eyes lock on mine, and a familiar thrum goes through my body. “I’m not used to men like you.”

“I get that distinct impression, Juliet James.”

“I don’t know what to do with you.”

“It seems like you do know.” There’s nowhere else to stand but a couple of feet in front of her, but the discussion is seeming more intimate by the second. “I get that you want to be independent, but it’s all right to accept a gift or two in one’s lifetime.”

She squares her shoulders. “I don’t want to be independent. I am independent. And I do things this way because it’s the only way.”

There’s a fire in her eyes that warns me not to argue, so I don’t, even though I know it’s not the only way. “All right.”

“But there’s something about you….” Juliet’s voice drops, and I realize I’m looking at her with no filter, no walls up. Her shoulders are tense, and her back is ramrod straight, but the vulnerability in her eyes takes my breath away. “There’s something about you, Weston, that makes me want to break all of my rules. But it would be a mistake.”

“Would it?” I step closer. Her hair is down, freed from its flawless arrangement for our date at the Skyline, and I run my fingers through it. Juliet leans her head into my hand, closing her eyes. “Why would it be such a mistake?”

She opens her eyes and looks up at me, her gaze a deep pool of uncertainty. “Because you can never depend on anyone else. Don’t you know that already?”

“I don’t know that I do.” I keep my voice low. I don’t want to startle her, force her to raise her defenses. “I haven’t had to depend on other people in a long, long time.”

Her mouth quirks in a smile. “I guess you wouldn’t need to.” Then her expression turns deadly serious. “But I don’t need to, either. That’s why I want to pay you back for what you did for my father. It’s the only right thing to do. I can’t take money from—from a man like you.”

I shrug. “I think there’s more than one right answer. There always is.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I mean that you can be attracted to me, Juliet James.” She sucks in a breath, and I sweep my fingers through her hair a second time. “You can want me as much as I want you.” I bring my other hand up to her waist, and she doesn’t flinch away, doesn’t stiffen. I pull her in closer, bending so that I can whisper directly into her ear. “And I want you. I want you because you’re so damn strong, so damn infuriatingly strong, that nothing in the world can convince you to do anything that’s not already what you want.” I stroke two fingers down the side of her neck, curling them underneath the strap of her tank top. “But I think—and you can tell me that I’m wrong, you can tell me that all night if you want to—but I think that you want me, too. I think you wouldn’t mind a little bit of a break from holding your head up so damn high. And I’m the one who can give that to you.”

I slide my hand back up her neck, my fingers curving around her chin, under the delicate hollow underneath her jaw, and Juliet tips her head back, for once letting me have control. Her breathing is fast and light, and she’s got a pink in her cheeks that makes her look like a fucking angel in the dim lamplight of her apartment.

“I could be making a terrible mistake.” The words are barely above a whisper, so light they take a few extra moments to register.

I press my lips against the side of her neck, then again a fraction of an inch lower, and then lower still. “You could be making an excellent decision.”

“That’s why I’m so torn.” She lifts her hands, wrapping them around my wrists, holding on without exerting the slightest pressure.

“Let me help,” I murmur into her ear, her body pressed against the entire length of me. I want so badly to lift her onto the bed, to have my way with her right now, but we’re on a high wire and one false move will have us both plummeting back to earth. Even as my cock pulses painfully in my pants, I hold back, hold back…. “Be mine. Two weeks. And at the end of that two weeks, no matter what happens between us, your debts will be paid. You’ll be free from the things that keep you up at night. No strings attached.”

Juliet gasps, leaning into my grip, and that’s when I see behind the carefully constructed wall she’s built around herself. That’s when I see what a pipe dream it is for her to imagine a life like that, standing here in her too-small apartment. She’s like a woman in the desert who has been denying herself a drink from a cool, refreshing spring for months and years, and now that I’m here, right in front of her, ready for the taking, she’s hesitating. This could all be a mirage.

I feel the same way about her.

The tension thickens in the air, her skin hot under mine, and my heart beats slowly, powerfully, a thud deep in my chest. One. Two. Three.

“Yes.”

I pull back a little bit, because I’m not entirely sure that I just heard Juliet James agree to be mine.

For two entire weeks.

“What was that, angel?”

“Yes.” She takes in another breath, her breasts pressing against my ribs. “I’ll give in. I’ll be yours.”