It doesn’t take fifteen minutes for me to realize that I’ve screwed up royally.

What clues me in is the raw, throbbing pain that settles in my chest when Cate walks out the door, her back perfectly straight, her chin up, her breathing even. The only thing that gives away her devastation is a single tear that clings to the edge of her eyelashes. A younger version of myself would have found something cynical to say about it, something biting, something caustic—women, and all their emotions—but I feel gutted, and I shouldn’t.

It was supposed to be sex. Orgasms. Never this. Never this hook-line-and-sinker feeling that blooms outward from my gut. She wasn’t supposed to have such power over me.

But she does. She does.

The look in her eyes when she walked in told me that she saw the pictures from last night. I don’t know how she could have missed them. It was New York City news on one of the internet’s biggest gossip sites, and those assholes run ads on every social media feed in the nation. She had to have known, had to have seen it. It was online before Peter parked the car outside of my building.

She knew, and she came anyway.

She bent her earth-shattering legs and got down on her knees, ready to beg for another chance at our deal.

That’s when I knew.

I couldn’t go through with it.

The phone call with my mother had been hard enough. She had worked herself up into an uncontrollable agitation, and the nursing home staff’s last resort is to get me on the phone.

I hate it.

I hate hearing her voice, so confused, filled with so much pain. I hate having to explain to her that my piece of shit father can’t come pick her up, won’t be visiting, can’t come to the phone. I’ve long since given up trying to explain that he’s in prison, for god’s sake, for stealing other people’s money like a common thief. My mother doesn’t remember.

Alzheimer’s has ravaged her brain, chewed it up and spit it out.

It’s terrible to say it, but things are better when she’s not aware enough to know that she’s not at home, that my father isn’t with her, that I grew up and left home a decade ago.

For me, anyway. I’m not sure that things will ever be better for her.

So when I looked at Cate kneeling on the floor, all I could think was that this is wrong.

No woman who wanted sex, wanted my money, would do what she was doing. Not with that look in her eyes. Not after the pictures she had to have seen. Cate is nothing like Vivian. If she was, she would have thrown herself at me the moment she found out who I was.

There’s something wild and sexual between us, and neither of us can deny it…but underneath it all there’s a current of something deeper than that, and it pisses me off that I can’t explain it. Can’t control it.

What the hell is it? The way she looks? The way she’s so confident in the office, but has moments of such breathtaking vulnerability? The way she never flinches when Sarzó hands down another list of things for her to do?

The way she’s breaking from the pressure, but doesn’t realize it?

The way she folds so gracefully?

I don’t know.

All I know is that I’ve been kidding myself. I need so much more from her than a few thirty-minute sessions. If I have to spend the rest of my life without her, I…

My mind recoils from the thought of being pinned down, trapped under the influence of a woman who might turn on me. Can I afford to be blinded by love?

What are you thinking, Hunter?

If I could scream out loud without attracting attention, I would.

Going to the window, I run my fingers through my hair and force myself to take five long, deep breaths.

Control yourself.

Think through this logically, carefully.

Set the emotions aside.

The only problem is that I can’t set my emotions aside. They’ve embedded themselves so deep that I can’t get away from them.

All I can do is hold them at arm’s length.

When I do, all I can see is how real they are.

How the hold Cate has on me will never break.

I know it’s true. I know it is. I know this a kind of raw aching love that already has its claws fixed so deep into my life that I will never get free. I’m the same as my mother, who loved my father so completely that even though her mind has deserted her, she still wants him. For her, he is still the charming, handsome devil she married all those years ago.

I’m out by the street before I realize I’ve called Peter to bring the car around. I open the door and fall heavily into the seat as soon as he pulls to a stop.

“Where to, sir?” he says over his shoulder.

I stare straight ahead.

“Drive, Peter.” There are no other words. “Drive.”

* * *

While he circles the city streets, making careful turns and doubling back, again and again, my mind turns over and over. What do I do? What do I do?

Find her. Take her. Have her.

It’s the only answer that makes sense.

Energy surges through me and I snap forward, Cate’s address on my lips.

“As fast as you can, Peter. As fast as you can.”

* * *

The heat hangs thickly over the city while Peter does his best to navigate the Friday night traffic. Now that I’ve made up my mind, it seems unbearable to wait for other cars to stop and go, to make ill-advised turns, to be in my way.

Finally, finally Peter pulls up into an illegal spot in front of Cate’s building. I scramble out of the car, stopping only to straighten my shirt, which is wrinkled from sitting slumped in the car.

The doorman behind the desk sits up when I come in, rushing for the elevators.

“Sir? Sir.”

I don’t have time for this shit.

The heels of my shoes drag on the ground as I abruptly change course. His eyes widen and he reaches for something near his waistband, but I pull my hand out of my pocket and hold it out to him.

“I need to see my girlfriend. Catherine Schaffer. I’m not going to do anything crazy,” I say in my calmest voice, smiling broadly at him.

He takes the $500 I press into his hand.

“If you’re not down in ten minutes, you have her call me,” he says in a deadly serious tone, looking me straight in the eye.

“I will.”

Another long moment passes, and then he gives me a sharp nod.

The elevator deposits me on Cate’s floor. There are four apartments, and it’s only when I’m standing in the hallway that I realize I don’t have her apartment number. I can’t call down to the desk and ask, because that guy already thinks I’m a psycho. It would be highly inconvenient to waste time right now dealing with the police.

So I choose a door.

Knock gently but firmly.

A guy about my size answers, a beer in his hand, his work shirt untucked. This is a nice building and he looks like he has some money, but he’s obviously not happy to see me.

“Sorry to bother you,” I say, keeping my face neutral. “I’m here to see Catherine Schaffer. Do you know which apartment is hers?”

He raises the beer and points down the hall—last one on the right.

“Thanks.”

He closes the door without a word.

Outside Cate’s door, I take a deep breath and force myself to hold it for a moment before I let it out. Energy zings all the way from my spine to my fingertips.

It’s now or never.

I raise my hand and knock three times on the door.

True to form, Cate opens it only a moment after I finish knocking.

She’s wearing a loose pair of linen pants and a white tank that hugs the curves of her breasts, and her eyes are red and puffy. When she sees me, she presses her lips into a thin line—but she can’t stop the flicker of hope from showing on her face.

All the words I’d practiced fly out of my mind.

“Cate,” I say, and even to me it sounds agonized, begging, pleading.

She looks into my eyes for one crystal second and then launches herself forward, fisting my shirt and yanking me inside. It’s a glorious, violent movement and we crash into each other, our lips fitting together so hard and fast that I know this was meant to be.

Cate’s the one pulling and I let her, tasting her deeply as she moves us back into her apartment, back to her simple, classy living room setup, an armchair and a sofa, and then, when we reach the coffee table, she does something that takes my breath away.

She pulls her face away from mine, her grip still locked on my collar, and looks at me, her hazel eyes burning into my soul. Through gritted teeth, she gives me a simple command: “Punish me.”

My cock throbs painfully at her words and as soon as they’re out of her mouth I’m in action, tearing her clothes from her body, manhandling her breasts, her waist, covering her mouth with kisses that have only one message: she is mine.

When she’s naked before me, I take one greedy look at her flawless skin, the curves of her ass, the waves of her dark hair falling over her collarbone, and then I turn her over and press her down so she’s kneeling on the coffee table.

“Hands and knees,” I bark, and she instantly snaps into the perfect position, her back arched, ass in the air, begging for it.

I bring my hand down on one ass cheek, not holding back, and she gasps, cries out, relief in her voice, and when I slip my fingers between her legs she’s already wet.

I bring my hand down five more times on her ass, the pink handprints blooming under my palm, wetness running down between her legs, before I can’t wait any longer.

Belt undone, pants falling, I free my cock from the prison of my briefs and turn her, shift her so she’s facing away from me, and drive all my thickness into her in one hard thrust, reaching around and clasping my hand over her mouth in time to catch her scream of pleasure.

Here is the edge, here she is trembling before it, and I fuck her until she goes over, her body spent, quaking, gripping me, loving me, mine.