My hand is on her door. She invited me.

I can’t say no.

If she wants to know who’s in control, it’s not me.

She stood on her terrace and stripped in front of her window like an invitation. I could see it, even from the beach, in her movements. The hesitation and the determination. She’s more afraid of me than ever . . . but she wants me anyway. Or because of it.

If her door is locked, I won’t go in. But if it’s not . . .

The knob turns in my hand and the door opens.

Invitation accepted.

Excitement shoots through my veins, and I’m hard before I even enter her condo. It’s tinged with a bitterness though. She only wants me for the thrill I give her, not for me. But if that’s how she’ll have me, then that’s what I’ll give her.

It’s dark inside, not a single light is on.

Except for the moonlight lying across her dining room table—the first place I fucked her. I take off my flip-flops and step silently through her condo. Her bedroom door is open, and she lies on the bed.

It’s too dark for me to see if her eyes are open, but the moonlight outlines her body. I pause to listen for her breathing. To hear if she’s asleep.

Her inhales come slow, but not slow enough. She’s awake. She’s waiting for me, hoping I’ll come to her.

Her back is to me. She doesn’t know.

I’m already here.

I wait, standing, hearing her breathe. I want her so relaxed that she’s forgotten I’m coming, that she’s given up on me. Before I come to her.

I envision, I plan, what I want to do to her. How best to give her what she likes and how she likes me to make her feel.

I shouldn’t be here. I should leave.

If Blake knew I was here, he’d have me thrown in prison.

Or he’d try.

I walk closer, stripping out of my clothes on the way.

Naked, I kneel onto the bed so gradually that the dip in the mattress doesn’t disturb her. I ease closer and run my hands an inch above her, past the swell of her hip, the curve of her waist, around her shoulder and the crown of her head.

I pause, counting her inhales. One. Two. Three.

I cover her mouth and yank her against me. “You fell asleep. Did you forget I was coming?”

She relaxes against me and moans a sound of pleasure.

“Don’t think this is going to be easy. You taunt me like it’s a game. Are you sure you want to play it my way, sweetheart?” Her body tightens against me, but not in a trying-to-get-away-from-me movement, an arching into me.

Her fingers claw at mine, and she mumbles something against my hand. I loosen my hand on her mouth so she can speak. “Yes.” The word is musical in longing and sends straight shots of blood to my cock, hard and pulsing against her back.

“Yes what?”

“Play with me.”

Her sheet pulled down, I find her naked and run my hands across her skin, gorging myself on her softness. “You missed me. You want me to fuck you. Fuck you until I’ve had my fill.”

She shudders and nods against my chest.

I flip her on her stomach and press her into the mattress with my weight, trapping her arms by her head. “You like it.”

“Did you do it?” she blurts and it catches me unaware.

“What?” I don’t want her to be asking. This is about sex, truth of the physical, not of the past.

“Did you kill him?”

“Do you think I could?”

She swallows and breathes, “Yes.”

I don’t know if I’m relieved or angry that she believes it. Without real evidence or a confession from me, she believes what her brother and friends tell her. It makes me want revenge on her, for not trusting me.

It’s what she wants.

I hook her knee and fold it up beside her hip, spreading her, opening her, my chest still heavy against her back. I bite her ear, and she squirms beneath me.

I test her. “Do you think I could kill you?”

“No.” Her breath stops, then she squeezes out, “I don’t want to lose you.”

My forehead falls to her neck and I’m helpless to do anything but inhale against her. She’s in love with me.

The feeling is strange. It’s like power bleeding into my muscles, but it’s like a ripping open, too. To hear her say it.

It shouldn’t be that way. She should live without me, uncursed by the pain and scars that are me and all that I will ever be. “Wrong answer.” Angry at her for letting me get to her this way, angry at myself for allowing this to happen, I probe between her legs.

She’s ready, swollen and wet.

I take her arm and hook it beneath her raised knee, “Hold.” I pull back, not wanting to, but I have to put on a condom.

Sheathed, I notch into her, letting her swallow me in her warmth.

My aim is to tease her, my goal to make her wait for not just her orgasm but for mine too. She tries to hide it, but she likes it too much when I come. But with her leg raised high, I thrust in, and she’s like a fist around me. My emotions run too high for control.

I give her everything. Not only the dregs of my anger and hurt, but also my fear for her and how I wish she had better than me.

I weigh her down with my chest, wishing I could sear myself into her. I suck her neck, wishing I could take her life and make it mine. Then maybe the insatiable things in me, the cries of pain and the endless sorrow I’ve spent my life running from, will finally let go.

She comes, her body gripping me in the way that makes me come too fast to control it.

But it’s not enough.

I flip her over. I kneel, resting on my heels, and pull her into my lap, spreading her thighs around my hips. Her back arches, her body pliant to whatever I want, and I start again, back at the bottom of the pit that is the endless well of overwhelming things living in my chest.

I lose track of me.

But I don’t lose track of her.

I feel her, her softness, how she tenses and moves, moans and writhes. How she comes. I could happily listen to and feel her do that every minute of every day until I die.

Unable to face it. Whether she still wants me or never wants to see me again, I never want to see myself again the way I am with her.

The things that she awakens in me, the unstoppable things, they’re too much for me and too much for her.

But I can’t leave.

When I’m spent, when she is spent, I can’t let go. I wrap myself around her wishing I could be her blanket of protection against the world—against everything that could harm her. Including myself.