When Gray left, I sat down at my desk and stared at the chair, he’d occupied only seconds before. I stared for twenty minutes.

Everything he had told me was impossible, right?

I wanted to believe him. But my rational brain was fighting me every step of the way.

I lifted a stack of paperwork and dragged my laptop out from underneath. What did I search for? Super-hot immortal billionaire? I dreaded seeing what those search results would turn up.

I opened the laptop and pulled up a search bar. With an exaggerated sigh, I typed in Dorian Gray. Not a single result for my Dorian Gray, almost all of them involved Oscar Wilde. This was never going to work.

I snapped the laptop closed and shoved it back under the paperwork it had been so newly liberated from.

My phone was back at my apartment. A casualty of Gray’s early morning kidnapping and brain mauling.

I plucked at the edge of Jake’s shirt, not liking an idea as it began to take root. Too late, already sprouting leaves and tiny acorns.

I walked back to my apartment as the sun began to filter through the avenues. The early morning crowd shuffling about stared at me as I passed. Like they’d never seen a girl in her pajamas before. I’m sure these Paris streets had seen a lot worse than my worn-in leggings.

When I got to my door, a box sat propped against the frame.

“Damn it, Gray.” I whispered. “This isn’t giving me space.”

I snatched the box from the floor and grumbled all the way to the kitchen for a knife. The box opened smoothly with a quick slice and I stared down at a leather book.

The Picture of Dorian Gray.

I opened the cover carefully and a slip of paper fluttered to my white granite countertop.

Izzy, I marked the important parts. I’m free to talk whenever you want.

I didn’t open the book to the tagged pages. Instead, I sat it on the counter and went for my cell phone by the bed. One missed text from Mr. ‘I can’t let it go’ but I ignored it and dialed the number my brother gave me when he’d left for unknown destinations eight months ago.

Once I gave the passcode, I hung up and waited. Five minutes passed, and I got a call back from an unregistered number.

“Hello, Dear Sister,” his voice cut through the line.

I sagged into my bed and lay back on the mussed covers. Hearing my brother safe and sound always gave me a renewed sense of peace. Like I could breathe a little longer. During the time that passed between our talks, my lungs slowly constricted until we spoke again.

“You sound safe,” I said.

He chuckled. “I am safe. What’s up?”

I threaded the edge of my blanket through my fingers and let out a sigh. “I need a favor.”

“Anything.”

“There’s this guy.”

“Do you need me to kill him and make it look like an accident?”

I rolled my eyes even though he couldn’t see it. “No, I don’t need anyone murdered.”

“Offer stands. Especially if he hurt you.”

“He didn’t hurt me. I just need to know more about him.”

Shuffling came through the earpiece. “Ok give me the details.”

“Dorian Gray.”

More shuffling. “Is that a code word I’m not familiar with?”

I wished it was. “Nope. That’s his name. Claims to be that Dorian Gray.”

“Really, Iz?”

“I know how it sounds, alright? Just look into it please. He claimed he was taken by a secret government agency monitoring people with weird genes like his.”

“I’ll send you what I find. Are you alright?”

No. “Yes, just great.”

“You’re not fooling anyone here.”

A hot tear slid from the corner of my eye, and I swiped it away. “Gotta go, Jake. Time for work. Let me know what you find out. Love you.”

“Love you too, Iz. Talk soon.”

The phone went dead, and I let my arm fall to the bed. It slid from my hand into the sheets. More tears threatened to fall, but I held them back and sat up.

Shower. Clothes. Adulting for now. Wallowing later.

Once I shuffled into the bathroom, I stared at myself in the mirror and decided to skip the shower. I brushed my teeth, wet and brushed my hair flat, and swiped on some mascara.

I had a troupe of actors to calm down, a billionaire on my case, and a studio director showing up at my office any minute.

I pulled on my big girl pants, threw a few necessities in my bag, and headed back to the office.

Every step through the back halls had me peering around corners for him. I was torn between wanting to see him and not wanting to see him. At lunch, I grabbed a complimentary sandwich and then went back to my desk in case he was around.

But the joy of free food from my favorite shop was tempered by the cloud hanging over my head.

I figured I had two choices. Believe him or don’t. My phone vibrated across my desk, and I snapped it up to check the email my brother sent. All his contacts were on multiple notifications.

A .pdf attachment. I hovered my thumb on top of the icon. Did I open it now? Later? Did I open it at all? Gray had told me the truth, or at least his version of it.

I let out a sigh. Why was I stressing so much about this? He was a guy I’d had one—barely one—night with. More than that, he was my boss and someone I didn’t need to be messing around with in the first place.

I inhaled and exhaled, and then scrolled up and hovered over the delete button. It took a second of fortitude, but then I clicked it and dropped my phone to the desk.

I had work to do and no time for games.

Instead of spending more time on it, I grabbed the stack of scripts from a drawer and headed downstairs.

It was quiet in the auditorium in a comforting way. I sat on the edge of the stage and swung my legs into the pit.

The first script was a classic and one I’d read a thousand times. Great but not appropriate immediately after Romeo and Juliet.

The next script didn’t strike me as the right one either. None of the next five did anything for me.

I stared at the stacks of paper. It wasn’t the poor scripts’ fault. It was mine. I couldn’t focus on them. My mind kept shifted back to Gray and his goddamn perfect face. Perfect body. Perfect everything.

It appeared my little pep talk earlier had no effect on my libido, at least.

I stacked the scripts neatly and headed straight for Gray’s office. His secretary Mina sat behind her desk.

“Is he in there?”

She jolted and dropped the pen she’d been holding. “Oh yes, go ahead.”

I walked into Gray’s office to find him sitting behind his desk, feet propped up, a book open in his lap.

“Is that what you get paid to do?”

He glanced up and closed the book. “I didn’t expect to see you so soon.”

I shrugged and sat the stack of paper on the nearby shelf of books. “I didn’t expect to see you so soon either.”

He lifted his feet up and over the desk to stand. “Did you need something? Or have a question?”

I locked the office door and skirted the desk to stand in front of him. “Yes actually, I did need something.”

His eyes lifted an increment, and he buried his hands into his pockets. Waiting. Did I have the balls to take what I wanted?

When he swiped his tongue over his full bottom lip and pulled it between his teeth, my insides went molten. “You owe me.”

The look he shot me was worth the moment of uncertainty. So worth the tiny dip in my belly for coming here after all. I didn’t say anything else while he watched me shimmy up onto the desk and hike my black pencil skirt around my waist. Thankfully, the man could take a hint.

He locked eyes with me as he shrugged out of his jacket and laid it over the back of his chair. Then he loosened his tie and popped his collar button. My mouth watered just looking at him, knowing what all that toned skin felt like under his clothes. It was almost as good as having him naked. Almost.

He got down to his knees, gripped my lower thighs hard, and shoved my legs apart. It could have been his way of tricking himself that he was in control here. I’d let him think that if it helped.

I lifted my hips so he could get my panties off and scooted to the edge of the desk. He stared at my wet pussy like it was oxygen he needed to maintain life. A vital necessity. And when his mouth took over and he delved his lips and tongue between my legs, I realized it all had very well been worth it.

His hands came around to cup my ass, so I was barely situated on the desk anymore. He shoved his face into my core, all the while driving my hips forward to take more. I reached out and took the edge of the desk, holding on while he licked and sucked and fucked me with his tongue.

Oh, this was exactly what I needed. Every bit of my body ignited at the touch of his lips. My nipples pebbled hard under my blouse, and I cupped one of my breasts to try and stop the ache there. But the press of his tongue was beginning a new rhythm which sent that pressure exactly against my clit. I dropped the hand from my boob and into his hair, trying to rub myself faster, harder, deeper. Then he sucked my swollen bud into his mouth, and it almost shattered me. I lay back on top of his desk in hopes I could get closer, increase the pressure, anything. So close. So fucking close.

My body began to quake as my orgasm surged up, breaking in his mouth, and I let go, almost screaming, catching a hand across my mouth as he sucked my clit and shoved two fingers into my already squeezing tunnel. He fucked me like that, with his tongue, his teeth, his fingers, his whole damn face. When I started to come back to myself, he eased off carefully, releasing the pressure on my clit slowly like the dial on a pressure cooker until the heat of him was gone and I was left empty and aching for more.

I opened my eyes and spots danced across his white ceiling. Other sensations filtered in like the tilt of my hips at a strange angle and the paper cut I had on my ass cheek from a stack of papers underneath me. Now that I’d gotten off, I believed I’d be able to think more rationally about the situation. But sitting up to see Gray come back with a warm wet washrag and clean me up only made me want to roll over and present my ass so he could fuck me as he should have last night.

He wiped me gently and put my panties back on. All the while, I watched him carefully. Looking for a sign, maybe proof that I could see that he was telling the truth about being a 150-year-old immortal.

“You’re staring at me funny.”

“Where did you learn to do that?”

He ducked his head, rubbed his neck, and grinned one of those sexy playboy grins. Not the empty mask one, but the one I could feel in my toes. “A brothel in London.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle as his cheeks took on a telling shade of pink. “Are you blushing? How old were you?”

He shrugged. “In my thirties, I think. I wanted to know how to please a woman. Most of my life, I’d been learning about my own pleasure, never how to make a woman come. I wanted that power too.”

And he wielded it well. I let out a sigh and hopped off the desk. Once my skirt was back in place and I’d shoved his paperwork into a pile, I grabbed my scripts and stopped at the door. “Thank you.”

“Thank you?”

I tipped my chin to the desk and walked out. If I stayed any longer, I’d see what else those prostitutes had taught him.