I’m making French toast when she enters the kitchen the next morning.

She’s not exactly shy, but she has trouble meeting my eyes. I hope it’s just morning-after awkwardness, not regret. Last night was the best sex of my life. One of the best nights of my life period, even though there were tears and pain and it was hard.

It was her.

It was my chance to unwind the labyrinth that has been Avery all these years. To understand her and get a glimpse of what’s beneath all that control. It’s beautiful. So beautiful that now I’m addicted to her honesty and her vulnerability and her boldness and her brand of brokenness. If last night was my only hit, she’s a high I might chase the rest of my life.

“Morning.” I glance up from the toast sizzling in the pan.

“Morning.” She toys with the belt of my silk robe she’s wearing. The hem trails the floor behind her because there’s more material than her much shorter body knows what to do with. It still looks really good on her, gaping in front, hinting at two high, perfectly round breasts and copper-toned skin stretched over a taut plane of feminine muscle in her stomach. Her hair, tousled around her shoulders, rests dark against the maroon-colored silk. She runs a self-conscious hand over the tangled strands, combing her fingers through and pushing them behind her ear.

“You look beautiful,” I reassure her.

Her fingers freeze in the process of setting her hair to whatever rights she’s attempting. She climbs up onto the high stool, leaning her elbows on the counter.

“Breakfast?” she asks unnecessarily.

I turn the toast with a laugh. “Looks that way.”

She grimaces over my answer before surrendering a grateful smile when I pass her a cup of coffee.

“Sorry it’s not your cold brew.”

“It’s fine.” She takes a long sip. “Oh, God. Thank you.”

She clears her throat, shifting a little uneasily on the stool.

“And thanks for the ibuprofen you left.” She rims the lip of the mug with her finger, not looking up. “That was very thoughtful.”

“You had a good bit to drink last night.” I turn off the toast and start scrambling eggs in a second pan. “Thought you might be a little hungover.”

A wicked smile starts in her eyes and then creeps its way to her lips.

“It’s not my head that’s sore.”

I pause in the preparations, processing what she is saying. My laugh bounces off the kitchen walls and I walk over to her, notching my hips between her knees. My hands stroke her back through the silk. She’s soft and warm and smells fresh.

“You showered?” I whisper kisses behind her ear.

“Yeah.” Her answer is breathy. “Hope that’s okay.”

“I only hate that I missed it,” I rasp at the fragrant, silky skin of her neck where my teeth marked her. “Sorry about this.”

“My neck isn’t sore either.” She laughs, a liberated sound I want her to keep making.

“Oh.” My hand wanders over her nipple and it beads under the silk. “Here?”

The slightest hitch of her breath is the only indication she’s feeling this.

“No, not there.”

“Hmmm.” I pucker my eyebrows into a frown. “I’m running out of options.”

I step deeper into the vee of her thighs until the robe splits and falls away, baring the toned length of her legs.

“Maybe it’s here.” I run one exploring finger from her calf, over her knee and inside her thigh, just shy of her pussy.

“You are getting so close,” she says, eyes not leaving my face.

I slide a finger along either side of her clit, trapping it between the digits and then stroking it with my thumb.

“Shit,” she mutters, her hips moving in the rhythm my fingers set. “That’s it. Right there. Not a hangover. A fuckover.”

I chuckle and stop my fingers, move my hand away.

“Oh, I’m sorry. If you’re sore, maybe I shouldn’t—”

“You should,” she cuts in, returning my hand to her center. “Believe me you should.”

And while our breakfast gets cold, I do.

* * *

Stretched out naked on my pillows, Avery licks sticky vestiges of syrup from her fingers, an empty plate in her lap and a sheet haphazardly covering her.

“That was good,” she says, purring like a contented cat.

“Breakfast or . . .” I let my words trail off and I glance at the well-used bed where she writhed under me not too long ago.

“Both. Breakfast. Last night. This morning. All of it.” She bites into the grin that graces her kiss-swollen lips until it fades with the careful look she angles up at me. “Thank you for everything. It was perfect.”

We spent last night together, and half of today since breakfast became brunch the more we kissed and touched. And fucked.

Man, did we fuck.

And after just a day having her, it has been more intimate and more perfect than anything I experienced in years of marriage to Tara.

So the finality in Avery’s voice wears on my nerves.

“You sound really grateful.” I leave the bed, pulling on a pair of gray sweats from the floor and tying them at the waist. “What? You gonna send me a fruit basket or some shit?”

I meet her eyes head on, silently challenging her to tell me she regrets last night, this morning. That we won’t pursue more. That it . . . that we . . .won’t happen again.

“Decker,” she starts softly, staring at her fingers toying with the sheets bunched at her waist. “We talked about this, about—”

“That was before,” I butt in. “Before everything happened. Before we made love and we talked and we . . .”

I claw frustrated fingers through my hair. “Dammit, Ave, that was before and you know it.”

“Nothing’s changed.” She scoots up to sit straighter against the headboard, gathering the sheet around her like forgotten armor. “I’m still as emotionally unavailable as I was at that party last night.”

“Liar.” The one word blasts into the chilling air separating us. “You were more available to me last night than any woman I’ve ever been with.”

“I’m not talking about sexually, Deck.”

“Neither the hell am I, Avery.”

We glare at one another, our breath coming quicker with our mutual frustration. It’s not totally unexpected, her withdrawal, but I thought I would have a little more time to convince her that we should try.

“I’m moving to California,” I say abruptly. Her eyes widen before she catches the reaction and controls it.

“Oh, I thought . . .” She stops the nervous tugging of the sheets. “Oh.”

“I told you my ex moved there. She keeps making it harder for me to see Kiera.” I sigh wearily and scrub a hand over my face. “She’s just pissed because she didn’t get more out of the divorce.”

“They say it’s cheaper to keep her,” Avery says with a cynical twist of her lips.

“Then ‘they’ don’t have my lawyer or my pre-nup.” We share a smile that comes a little easier to us both. “At the last minute, she pulled some crap so I have to go to LA to see my baby girl for Christmas, when she was supposed to come here for two weeks.”

“I’m sorry, Deck.”

“Yeah. So am I. It’ll just be simpler for me to live out there.” I hesitate for a moment before sitting on the edge of the bed, within touching distance if she decides to touch me. “I’ve been offered a front office position with that new expansion team the San Diego Waves. President of Basketball Operations, with the possibility of partial ownership eventually.”

Ever the journalist, curiosity and questions stack up in Avery’s wide eyes.

“And we are off the record, by the way,” I remind her. “This isn’t public yet.”

“All right, all right. I get it.” She pulls her legs up to her chest, resting her chin on sheet-covered knees. “Congratulations.”

“Thanks. It works for me personally, so I can be closer to my daughter, and professionally because it’s the kind of opportunity I’ve wanted, but didn’t think I’d get for at least another five years.”

“That’s great, Deck.” Her face has become the mask she showed me when we first started hosting her show together three weeks ago. “I’m happy for you.”

“I don’t want you to be happy for me, Avery. I want you to tell me that what we had the last twenty-four hours is enough to build on. That when I go away, we can try to build more.”

“You saw me last night.” Her mouth is the only thing wavering in her obstinate expression. “You know I’m a mess.”

“We’re all a mess.” I scoot closer, palm her jaw and press my forehead to hers. “We’ll figure it out.”

She shakes her head against mine, not breaking the contact between our skin.

“There are some things I need to figure out on my own. Questions not just about Will, but about myself that I need to answer.” She mirrors my touch, her hand cupping my jaw. “As much as I enjoyed last night, as much as I . . .”

She swallows, shutting her eyes.

“Deck, deep down you know I’m not ready.”

I glance up to find her cheeks wet again, tears leaking from under her closed eyelids. I want to deny it. As much as I want to convince her that she is ready; that I’ll make her ready, or be ready enough for both of us, I know it doesn’t work that way. I still hear her sobs and feel her shaking in my arms, recounting the horror of finding Will in their apartment. I still hear her agony over his last words to her.

“Okay. I accept that you’re not ready. I have to go to California, and I know you have to stay here in New York.”

I dip my head to kiss her, coaxing her lips open for a languorous dueling of tongues that quickly ignites fire in me. In Avery, too, if her nails digging into my back are any indication.

I give her hair a gentle tug until she’s looking directly into my eyes.

“The time may not be right, but we feel right, Ave. Tell me you see how right we feel together.”

Her nod is the only answer she offers, sniffing at the fresh tears I know aren’t all for Will. Aren’t all for her. I know that some of them are for me. I bend to kiss her cheeks, darting my tongue out to gather the salt of her tears.

“Hey, look at me.” I gently angle her face up so we have no choice but to see one another. “Promise me that when you have the answers you’re looking for, that when you’re ready, you’ll find me.”

She leans deeper into me, uncaring that the sheet drops, baring her stubble-burned breasts. She takes my mouth in a kiss that is part consolation, part declaration. She eases away, licking her lips like she can taste me there.

“That’s a promise I plan to keep.”