I’m not the kind of girl that bad boys want to screw.

I’m the kind of girl that nice guys want to take home to meet their overprotective Catholic mamas.

This was a fact of my existence that was never going to change. I’d reconciled myself to it a long time ago.

In high school and college, none of the athletes or cool rebel types looked at me twice. It was the quiet, nerdy guys who would work their courage up and ask me out to dances or the movies. My social life improved when I started law school, but it was still only the nice ones that would show me any interest.

I’m sure men never processed it consciously, but they’d take one look at my smooth, shiny hair and my clear, pale skin and my childbearing hips, and something would click in their brains. They could introduce me to their parents, but they wouldn’t proposition me for a one-night stand.

I wasn’t hot-fling material.

All this is to explain why it was so bizarre and unusual for me to be getting off an elevator in an expensive hotel and walking toward a corner room.

For sex.

I was here for sex.

I’d never done anything like it before.

I glanced in an ornate mirror halfway down the hall and paused, momentarily feeling like Jamie Lee Curtis in that old movie that still gets played on cable channels where she’s married to a spy and realizes she needs to sexify herself before entering a hotel room. I’d come here straight from work. All the women in my law firm wore stylish pantsuits in subdued colors, so that was what I wore too. I had a closet full of them. Mine was charcoal gray today, and I’d paired it with a pale lavender top. I’d spent a whole month’s paycheck on my designer heels, but they were barely visible under the hem of my trousers. I looked fine, appropriate for the hotel and almost any professional occasion.

I didn’t look sexy though.

Sean Doyle wasn’t waiting in that room to take me home to meet his mother. He was waiting to take me to bed.

I tried to tousle my hair like Jamie Lee Curtis, but my hair was long and straight and strawberry blond, and it simply would not tousle. I couldn’t unbutton my top more—since there weren’t any buttons—and my neckline was too high to get any sort of cleavage action. I started to take off my jacket so at least my arms would be bare, but I decided against it.

This was me. Pretty in a boring, good-girl way. Always on time for appointments and never causing a scene.

Vanilla all the way through.

Even so, Sean had wanted to fuck me last week. He’d had me against a wall in the back hallway of a bar, dry humping me, his tongue in my mouth. We’d both had way too much to drink that night, but he’d wanted me for real. If someone hadn’t come back to use the restroom, we probably would have gone all the way, right there against the wall.

He’d wanted me then, and he’d asked me to meet him here tonight—well, he’d discreetly handed me a business card at yesterday’s meeting with the place and time scrawled on the back—so he must still want me tonight.

Sean might not be the man from my romantic daydreams. That man had a very clear face, and that face would never be Sean’s. But it didn’t matter.

I was here now, and I was going to do this. I moved away from the mirror, walked the rest of the way down the hall to room 1212, and I knocked on the door before I chickened out.

The door swung open after about thirty seconds, and Sean Doyle stood in front of me.

He was wearing a suit too—a much more expensive suit than mine. He had a Damien Lewis thing going for him (without the red hair). He was intensely attractive in a way you couldn’t really figure out. His features weren’t traditionally handsome, but his eyes were deep green, heavy-lidded, and intelligent, and his mouth was interesting, mobile, and undeniably sexy. His hair was brown, and he didn’t always shave.

He arched his eyebrows with a little quirk of a smile. “Hi, Ash. I wasn’t sure you’d come.”

My name is Ashley, and no one calls me anything else. But he’d called me Ash last week at the bar as well. I wasn’t sure if he had my name wrong or if he’d shortened it on purpose, but I didn’t correct him. I liked how the name sounded in his slightly husky voice. “I wasn’t sure myself.” When he just stood there looking at me, I felt self-conscious, so I added tartly, “Am I allowed in?”

“Oh. Yeah. Of course.” He stepped aside to let me into the big, fancy room.

The only details I noticed were the lovely king-size bed and the huge windows looking out onto downtown Boston.

“Do you want some wine?” he asked after we both stood for a minute in silence.

“Yes. Please.” Last Thursday I’d had several drinks before I’d made a move on him. Maybe a couple of glasses of wine would help tonight.

There was a bottle of expensive merlot on the table near the window with two glasses. Sean went to pour it out. When I saw a file folder next to the wine, I went over to see what it was.

I was about to open the folder when Sean’s hand closed down on it. His fingers were long and strong and slender, and his fingernails were clean and trimmed but not perfect. He obviously didn’t get manicures. I wasn’t sure why I noticed it, but I did.

“What is that?” I demanded, lifting my eyes from the file folder to his face.

“That’s for after.”

“After what?”

His eyebrows arched again, and his green eyes took on that hot look I remembered from last Thursday.

I felt my cheeks flushing. I knew exactly what he wanted to happen before we looked in that file folder.

Despite the complete lack of seduction or romance between us, I felt a little clench between my legs. Sean might not be the man I loved, but there was something so tangible and intense about him—like there was an energy radiating from his lean body that I could feel down to my core.

That I wanted to feel even more.

But I was curious now, so I waited until Sean lifted his hand to pick up his wineglass.

Then I reached over and snatched up the file folder.

“Hey!” he objected, trying to grab it from me.

I’d already taken three steps away and was starting to read the papers inside the file.

It was a contract.

A contract.

I stared down at the top sheet, my eyes wide with amazement.

“I told you that was for after.” He slanted an almost sheepish look at me and glanced away when I met his eyes.

“You want me to sign a contract for our one-night stand?” I asked when I could finally speak.

“If it’s a one-night stand, no. If you want it to continue, then yes. That’s why I said it was for after.”

I stared at him for a minute. Then I stared at the contract. Then I stared back at him.

He had the grace to look slightly embarrassed, but there was an ironic amusement glinting at the back of his eyes.

“I do what my lawyer tells me,” he added. “You’re a lawyer. You know what they’re like.”

I couldn’t help it. I burst into laughter.

Sean narrowed his eyes. “You don’t have to sign it. It’s just if you—”

“Want it to continue,” I finished for him, still giggling a little. I was scanning the pages of the contract one by one. “So if I want more than this one night, we’d meet here every other Wednesday night. No contact of any kind between our evenings together—no calls, texts, emails, meetings, nothing. We can’t tell anyone else about us. And we can end it at any point without explanation.” I paused, looking up from the pages. “If we don’t keep in touch between Wednesday nights, what happens if we can’t make it one Wednesday but we don’t want to call the whole thing off?”

Sean stepped over so he was beside me. He reached over to flip a page and point to a clause halfway down the page. “We leave a message at the front desk of the hotel.” He studied my face with narrowed eyes. “I know it probably sounds ridiculous to you, but I have to be careful.”

I believed him. I was just a normal person. I’d never even imagine signing contracts for sex. Sean, however, was incredibly rich, incredibly successful, and incredibly well known—at least in the Boston area. A local boy made good. Instead of becoming a cop like the rest of his family, he’d gone to college and then gotten an MBA and started a real estate development business that had taken off beyond all expectations. If the news got out that he was dating—or even meeting some random woman for sex—it would be hot gossip all over town. I could understand why he’d want to avoid that, especially for a relationship that was obviously intended to be no strings attached.

I was still trying to suppress a smile. “How many times have you signed this particular contract?”

His fiancée had died two years ago, so he could have had any number of contracted liaisons since then.

He flipped another page and pointed toward a paragraph I hadn’t yet read.

I giggled. “No personal questions about our sexual pasts. Got it.”

When I looked back up at him, I realized something else, something new.

He might realize how crazy it seemed to someone else, but he was serious about the contract. And it wasn’t just to protect him from stalkers and the gossip columns.

It was to protect him emotionally.

He’d loved a woman once, and he’d lost her. He was the only man I’d ever met who had a tragic origin story like Batman. No one knew who had done it—if it was a targeted hit or a mugging gone wrong—but both he and his fiancée had been shot walking home from a play two years ago. She’d been killed, and he’d been in the hospital for almost a month. The story had been front-page news for weeks, so I knew all about him, even though I’d only met him for the first time last month when I was part of the legal team representing the other party in a huge property deal he was working on.

I’d only finished law school four years ago. I’d been the junior member of the team from my firm, and so I hadn’t said a word to him. I hadn’t even realized he’d noticed me at all until he came up to me at the bar last week and offered to buy me a second drink.

Sean was thirty-eight—ten years older than me. His heart might have been forever crushed when his fiancée died, but he was still a healthy, virile man, and he would want to keep having sex.

So this contract allowed him to have sex without any emotional complications, without ever putting his heart at risk.

I’d been correct from the beginning—when I’d first seen him across the conference room in his fancy downtown offices. He was completely unavailable to me, and he always would be. His body was all he was offering.

It was fine. My body was all I had to offer too.

After all, I was in love with someone else.

I closed the file folder. “Okay. I wouldn’t be opposed to signing this, assuming the sex is good enough for us to want to do it again.”

Sean’s expression changed, became hot. His eyebrows arched again in that slightly smug way. “You really doubt it’s going to be good?”

I gave him a playful little shrug. “Well, all you’ve done so far is give me a glass of wine and review a contract, so I’m not sure why I’m supposed to believe you’re some sort of sex god or—”

I couldn’t finish my sentence because Sean had grabbed me and pulled me into a hard kiss.

The sudden move was startling, so I was motionless for a moment, letting him kiss me.

I don’t know if you’ve ever kissed a stranger, but it’s weird. Very weird. Without alcohol to cloud your brain, it feels almost unnatural, like your body is doing something that doesn’t match your reality.

That was how it felt then. I’d only had a few sips of wine. It wasn’t nearly enough to throw off inhibitions. Sean was a good kisser. His mouth was skillful, agile, and his body was warm and hard against mine. He must have brushed his teeth after work like I had since he tasted slightly of toothpaste. And he smelled good—really good—a faint mingling of natural and expensive, which was exactly what I liked.

But still. It was so incredibly strange to be kissing him in this hotel room at six forty-five on a Wednesday evening.

He pulled back after a minute, his eyes searching my face. “No?” he asked softly.

I was nervous and uncomfortable and a little dizzy, so I did what I always did. I covered it with tartness. “Not no. But I’m not half-drunk today. You’re going to have to try a little harder.”

His mouth made that sexy little twist of amusement, and he pulled me toward him again. This time he went a little slower, his tongue tracing the line of my lips as his hand stroked down my hair to my back and then even lower.

It felt good. I started to respond. My tongue slid out to meet his, and I reached out to feel his firm back, his thick hair. And before I knew it, we were walking over toward the bed, still tangled in an embrace.

I started to pull off my jacket as he kept kissing me. I couldn’t help but be a little thrilled that he didn’t seem to want to let go of me. His body was getting tenser by the second, so I figured he must be getting turned on.

When I got stuck in the sleeves of my jacket, he helped me pull it off. Then he tugged off my top, his eyes moving with a hot urgency over my bare skin and pretty bra.

I’d worn my best underwear set—lavender satin and lace—and Sean seemed to like what he saw as he stared at me.

When I began to feel self-conscious, I leaned over to slide off my shoes and then my trousers.

Sean reached over like he was going to take off my bra, but I distracted him by grabbing the lapels of his jacket and working it off over his shoulders.

I wasn’t going to be completely naked while he had all his clothes on. No way that was going to happen.

We got rid of his jacket, tie, shirt, belt and shoes, and then he seemed to get impatient all of a sudden. He sank into another kiss, and it was so enthusiastic that we ended up tumbling onto the bed.

He rolled us over so he was on top of me and gave me a little smile. “What do you like?” His green eyes were still raking over my face and body. I was always trying to lose the same ten pounds, and I’d never gotten a tan in my life. My skin was pale and smooth and tight, and my breasts were full and rounded, but I’d never been comfortable showing off my body. Even in bed. Even with men who weren’t strangers.

“What do you mean, what do I like?”

“I mean, what works for you?” He raised his eyes to meet mine.

“Normal things.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means I like normal things. What do you think it means? I’m not into chains and whips, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

He chuckled, and the sound shook his body deliciously. “That’s not what I was asking. I’m trying to be a nice guy here and find out what works for you.”

I’d been with four other men in my life—all of them relationships that had lasted at least six months—and no man had ever come right out and demanded I tell them what I liked in bed.

I had absolutely no idea what to say.

“I like foreplay,” I finally responded, trying to sound confident, which I wasn’t at all feeling. “But nothing too weird.”

His eyes glinted as he lowered his head toward mine again. “Foreplay it is. And nothing weird.”

I almost laughed. I really did. But then he was kissing me again and I forgot about laughing. He kissed me for a long time before he started to trail kisses down my neck. He teased me over my bra for a while until I was tense and gasping. When his face moved down to my belly, my whole body clenched.

“And I don’t really like a guy’s head between my legs until I know him better,” I said, panting slightly.

He glanced up at my face and gave me a small nod as if he understood.

He was probably relieved. I mean, surely he hadn’t been too excited about going down on me, although it was nice he’d been willing.

Raising his body again, he reached around to take off my bra. I could see the reaction in his face and body when he looked at my bare breasts. It was like something inside him had jumped in excitement.

He was hard in his trousers now. His whole body was tight. But he’d been serious about doing what I liked first, and he hadn’t yet made a move to take off his pants.

We kissed again, and I could feel desire clenching between my legs. I still felt kind of self-conscious and uncomfortable though, and I was a little afraid I wasn’t going to be able to come, even with Sean’s purposeful attention.

“You could say something, you know.” I wasn’t sure why I’d spoken. Just that I needed to break the tension I was feeling.

He lifted his head to meet my eyes. “Dirty talk?”

I giggled. “Not really. I just meant we can talk. Unless you’re not a talker.”

“I think you know I’m a talker.”

He was. He was incredibly smart and incredibly verbal. That much had been clear from the meetings I’d attended in his offices over the past few weeks. He wasn’t the strong, silent type—despite his tragic history. He was charming and clever and articulate, and that was one of the things I liked about him.

“So talk,” I said.

He frowned. “Now you’ve put me on the spot.”

I laughed again, almost forgetting that I was lying beneath him wearing nothing but my panties.

He gazed down at me, his expression softening as if he liked what he saw on my face. “I noticed you the first time I saw you,” he murmured.

“You did not. You were in full business mode. You barely knew I existed.”

He’d started kissing my neck, teasing and nibbling in a way that made me shiver, but he replied against my skin, “I knew you existed. I saw you there, sitting so quietly, trying to fade into the background like you were afraid someone would notice you and realize you weren’t supposed to be there.”

That was exactly how I’d felt in the first couple of meetings. It was a real coup that I’d been asked to work on the team—it was the first big job I’d been given since joining the firm three years ago—and I’d been terrified I was going to blow it.

He’d moved down to my breasts now, nuzzling slightly before he teased one nipple with his tongue.

I gasped as the jolt of pleasure took me by surprise because I’d been distracted by the conversation.

“I wasn’t that bad,” I managed to say, shifting beneath him to ease the tightening pressure of arousal. “I acted just like everyone else.”

“I know you did. But I still noticed you. All that red hair and sexy lips and that gorgeous body you were trying to hide with those boring suits. I knew you had a fire inside you that you’d never let out before.”

“That’s…” I couldn’t finish the sentence because he was suckling my nipple in a way that made me want to moan. I closed my eyes and tossed my head and managed to try again. “That’s presumptuous. I’ll have you know I’ve always had a great sex life.”

It wasn’t entirely true, but it was partially true. I’d had good sex before, and there was no reason for him to assume I hadn’t.

“I believe you. That’s not what I meant.”

I wanted to know what he meant, if it wasn’t that he didn’t think I’d had hot sex before, but he didn’t explain himself further. His hands had moved down to part my legs, and his fingers slipped beneath my underwear until he was touching me intimately.

He would feel how hot and wet I was. He couldn’t help but feel it.

I groaned helplessly as he stroked me there and kept teasing my nipple with his tongue. The pleasure tugged between the two parts of my body until I couldn’t tell where it was coming from.

“I saw you sitting there every day, and every day I wondered what was going on in your mind. And what your body would feel like in bed with me.”

Two of his fingers were inside me now, and I felt myself clenching down around the penetration.

“There it is,” he murmured thickly, lifting his head as if he wanted to see my face. “Is it the talk or the foreplay that’s working for you?”

“I don’t know,” I gasped, rocking my hips against his fingers. The pleasure had taken form now, momentum, and I needed it to get where it was going. “Just don’t stop.”

He kept pumping his fingers and lowered his face to my other breast. He sucked on the nipple, making me writhe and clench my fingers into the bedding beneath me.

“I saw you go into the bar last Thursday,” he murmured, releasing my breast for long enough to talk. “And so I went in after you.”

“You did?” My voice squeaked just a little.

“Of course. You didn’t think my finding you there was an accident, did you?” He flicked my tight nipple with his tongue until I let out a shameless moan. Then he added, “I wasn’t following you or anything. I just happened to see you go into the bar. And I wanted to see what you were really like beneath the surface.”

“And now you know,” I gasped. I was so close to coming I could feel it. I was chasing it with my hips, my whole body.

“Now I know.” He gave my nipple one hard little nip.

I came apart at the sudden jolt of pain, the orgasm clamping down and then releasing in waves of pleasure. I made a loud embarrassing sound that was half groan and half sob as my body shook and tried to ride his fingers until the spasms finally faded.

He was smiling when I finally opened my eyes, as if he were very pleased with himself.

For no good reason his expression embarrassed me. It made me feel strangely young and inexperienced.

So my tone was tarter than it should have been as I said, “You don’t have to look quite so proud of yourself. It wasn’t that good.”

His smile widened. “Yes, it was. And I bet that jackass you’re in love with wouldn’t take the time to get you off first the way I did.”

I gasped, this time in indignation. “Yes, he would! And he’s not a jackass!”

“Yes, he is.”

“You don’t even know him.”

“I know everything I need to know about him. I sized him up in about a minute when he first walked into my conference room. I’ve known plenty of guys like him before.”

That’s the other thing to know about me. The man I was in love with was also a lawyer in my firm. He also specialized in property law. I saw him in the hall and in the break room every day, and he was always nice to me in a light, playful way. He’d led the team that had been negotiating the contract with Sean over the past month.

If I hadn’t gotten drunk last week, I never would have admitted to Sean—to anyone—that I’d been in love with John Cooper from the first time I’d laid eyes on him, from my very first day at work in the firm. It was true, but it wasn’t something I ever told anyone.

He wasn’t in love with me. He’d never even tried to get to know me outside the context of work. It was one of those hopeless unrequited loves that eat away at you and never come to fruition, and I knew it.

If I hadn’t known it, I never would have ended up in bed with Sean Doyle.

“Admit it,” Sean said, still smiling in that smugly pleased way. “Your jackass would have been in and out in about five minutes, and you’d have had to finish yourself off after he left.”

I scowled at him. “That’s not true at all. You don’t know him. Now shut up and take your pants off.”

He was chuckling low in his throat as he did as I said, and I couldn’t help but watch with interest as he bared himself. His body was strong and lean and natural—he wasn’t unusually hairy, but he obviously didn’t believe in manscaping—and his erection was thick and heavy.

I really liked the looks of him, and I liked how real he seemed.

He wasn’t the love of my life—stepping out of my daydreams or a sexy fantasy. He was a real, human man, slanting me a look of ironic inquiry.

And now he was sliding off my panties, reaching over for a condom, and then positioning himself between my legs.

I still couldn’t believe I was doing this.

We didn’t talk as he rolled on the condom and then lined himself up at my entrance. I was still very wet, very aroused, so there wouldn’t be any worry about discomfort. He held himself up on one arm, and I bent my knees, and then he was starting to push himself in.

I had another one of those moments of strangeness—that this guy I barely knew was putting his penis inside me—but it didn’t feel bad. It felt full and stretched and intense. Sean let out a low groan as he finished the thrust.

“How is it?” he asked hoarsely. He’d turned his head slightly, and his eyes were focused on the pillow on the other side of the bed.

“Fine. Good. It’s good.” I rolled my hips, trying to relax my muscles even more.

Sean groaned again. His jaw must have been clenched because I saw a muscle flickering on the side of his face.

When he just held himself still, I finally asked, “So are you going to move or what?”

He turned his head back to meet my eyes. “Kind of impatient, aren’t you?”

“I don’t think so. When a guy is inside me, I expect him to do something. Unless you’re thinking I’m going to do all the work.”

He gave a huff of amusement, and then he seemed to lose control for a minute, making a few fast, short pushes into me.

It felt so good I gasped and arched up.

After that, we didn’t talk anymore. His focus had narrowed down to a hot, urgent motion, and that was clearly the only thing filling his mind. He held on to one of my legs, pushing my knee toward my chest and spreading me open for him. He moved in fast, steady thrusts, his eyes moving hungrily from my face to my breasts to where he was pumping into me.

The look on his face, as much as his motion inside me, was causing pleasure to tighten again at my center.

I occasionally came during intercourse, but it wasn’t a regular thing. So I was surprised when I felt another orgasm rising up inside me.

“Fuck,” he muttered. “Fuck, you feel so good.”

No girl didn’t want to hear that, especially when he obviously meant it. He was totally into this, all his attention and energy channeled into the way he was fucking me right now.

Sean’s thrusting was getting harder and faster as he was starting to lose control. “Fuck. You’re getting tighter. Oh fuck!”

I was panting just as much as he was now, and my fingers were digging into the back of his neck. He’d pushed my knee back even farther until it almost met my shoulder. The bed was rocking shamelessly, and in another situation, I would have been embarrassed, afraid the people in the next room would be able to hear how hard he was taking me. But I didn’t even care. I wanted it, wanted even more of it.

“Fuck, Ash,” he gasped, his face twisting dramatically, clearly right on the cusp of coming. “How do you feel this good?”

It was his words as much as the stimulation that pushed me over the edge again. I gave a soft, breathless sob as I shook helplessly through an orgasm.

He wasn’t holding back anymore. He was pushing into me hard, with a clumsy kind of roughness. It didn’t hurt. It just felt raw and urgent and nakedly real, like he wasn’t putting on any kind of show—and neither was I.

When he came, I could see the rush of pleasure on his face, and he let out a loud, uncontrolled sound.

We were both breathless as we came down, sweating and gasping and limp. It took him a minute to catch his breath before he pulled out of me and rolled over, his eyes closed and still holding on to the condom.

I felt sore and tingling between my legs, and I was suddenly a little embarrassed again. So I said, “I’ll take care of that if you want.”

He opened his eyes and looked a bit surprised, but he tied off the condom, and let me take it.

I threw it away in the bathroom and then washed my hands. I stared at myself in the mirror, flushed cheeks, wild look in my blue eyes.

I couldn’t believe I’d just done that.

I’d had sex with Sean Doyle—a man I barely knew—and it had been odd but still really good.

I wouldn’t mind doing it again.

I decided to use the bathroom since I was in here, so I peed and then I cleaned myself up a bit. Feeling better, I grabbed a bathrobe from a hook and put it on as I returned to the bed.

Now that sex was over, I didn’t want him peering at my body.

He was still lying on top of the sheets, completely naked, his eyes closed. He looked relaxed, sated—and it made me just a little bit proud.

He’d had a really good time. With me. And now he was satisfied.

I went to get my glass of wine from the table.

“Grab mine too, if you don’t mind,” he said.

When I handed him his wine, he took my hand and pulled me back into the bed with him. I propped myself up on the pillows and smiled at him.

“So what do you think?” he asked.

“About what?”

He frowned. “You know what. Should we sign the contract or not?”

“I wouldn’t be opposed to it.” I didn’t want to sound too excited, after all. I couldn’t let him think that I was already looking forward to the Wednesday after next.

“Yeah?” His eyes were searching my face, as if trying to read my mind.

“Yeah. What about you?”

“I would have signed it even before we had sex,” he admitted.

“What? You had no idea whether we’d even be good together or not.”

“I was pretty sure we’d be good.”

I shook my head at him, not sure whether he was telling the truth or just being cocky in that teasing way he had.

“And you’d really be okay with the… the limitations?” He was still looking for something in my face.

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Well, this works out perfectly for me. I’m never going to fall in love again, and I’d rather not deal with the complications of dating since it will never lead anywhere. But you want to fall in love, so this can’t be what you’re really looking for. I don’t want to take advantage of you.”

I rolled my eyes. “That’s patronizing. I can make informed decisions about my own sex life, and if I agree to it, it’s not going to be because I’m secretly longing for you to fall for me.”

His eyebrows shot up. “I never thought you were.”

“Good. Because I’m in love with someone else, and right now I can’t have him. Good sex is good sex, and it’s better than nothing.”

He chuckled wryly. “Very flattering. Thanks.” Despite his words, he looked almost relieved.

And I realized something else then. Sean might be rich and powerful and accustomed to getting what he wanted, but at heart he was a really decent guy. He wanted a situation where he could have sex with absolutely no strings, but he didn’t want to hurt me in the process.

I liked that about him.

And I knew I wasn’t going to get hurt.

My heart belonged to someone else, so there was no danger of my ever giving it to Sean.

I finished my wine and set the glass on the bedside table. Then I got up and walked over to pick up the contract and the pen.

I scrawled my name on the signature line.

Sean was smiling as I brought it over to him. He signed it too.

“So I’ll see you two weeks from tonight,” I said.

“You’re leaving already?” He was still completely naked, but he didn’t look the least bit self-conscious about it.

“Yeah. I think so.” I was feeling pretty good right now—like it had been a very good evening—but I was afraid if I stayed much longer, it would begin to get awkward.

I leaned over to pick up my clothes. “I had a good time though.”

“Me too.” His smile was real and companionable, but it was clearly not mushy or romantic.

He was never going to want anything but sex from me, and that was just fine with me. He was a good guy, and he was good in bed.

That was all I needed.

He wasn’t my first choice for sex, and I obviously wasn’t his. It didn’t matter.

Second best was better than nothing.