Two weeks later, I knocked on the door to the same hotel room with a strange twisting below my belly.

I was nervous, and I had no idea why.

I’d done this same thing six times before—come to this hotel after work to meet Sean on every other Wednesday—and I knew what to expect now. There was nothing new or different about this evening.

I was still talking myself into this piece of common sense when the door opened and Sean stood in front of me.

He wore an expensive suit and a red-and-gray tie. His five-o’clock shadow was thicker than normal, and his hair was slightly damp at the edges—like he’d been sweating or he’d splashed water onto his face.

I wondered which one it was.

When I just stood there staring, he arched his eyebrows. “Are you debating whether to come in or not?”

“No, no.” I felt silly—for both my nerves and for my momentary distraction—so I smiled at him self-deprecatingly. “Just admiring your manly physique.”

I’d thought the ironic compliment would make him chuckle, but he didn’t even smile. He stepped aside to let me in, his eyes focused on me but not even a trace of his lip quirk in his expression.

Something was different.

Something was wrong.

“What?” he demanded softly when I studied him, trying to figure out his mood.

“Nothing.” I gave him a blithe smile and walked over to the wine, mostly for something to do. I poured some into each of the two glasses and handed one to him.

He took it and then sipped, his green eyes still resting on my face. He still hadn’t smiled.

He hadn’t smiled.

It felt deeply significant, and it made my stomach twist even more. I sat down in one of the chairs at the table and drank my wine, trying to figure out Sean’s mood from the posture of his back and the tension of his jaw.

I simply couldn’t read his mind, so the only way for me to find out was to ask. “Did you have a bad day?” I asked lightly, hoping it would come off as casual conversation.

Sean had walked over to the big window and was staring out at downtown Boston. But at my question, he lowered his glass from his lips and glanced over at me. “No. Why?”

An edge to his tone made me wish I hadn’t voiced the question. “I don’t know. Just asking.”

I sat in silence, searching my mind for something that would explain his strange, tense mood.

I’d been a little uncomfortable emotionally after the last time we were together. There was no rational explanation for it, but that previous evening had left me feeling… jittery. Maybe just because we’d fallen asleep together, and we’d never done that before.

Maybe Sean felt something similar. He’d come up with this whole sex contract on purpose to avoid any sort of intimacy or emotional entanglements. Maybe he thought lines had been crossed last time, and so he was taking a dramatic step backward tonight.

Maybe.

That didn’t feel right though.

When the silence had stretched out longer than I was comfortable with, I put down my glass. This was ridiculous. I wasn’t going to sit here and feel awkward and uncertain. That wasn’t what our relationship was supposed to be about. “Do you want to do this tonight?”

His eyebrows went up again as he turned to look at me. Still no trace of a smile. “What?”

I stood up. “I asked if you’re up to this tonight. Because if you’re not, it’s really fine. I can just—”

He moved over so he was in front of me. “You want to leave?”

“I don’t want to leave. I was asking if you wanted me to. You seem…” I made a vague gesture with my hand, hoping it would encompass all the tension I was sensing in him.

“I seem what?” he asked in that same soft, hoarse voice. His expression was almost a challenge, as if he were daring me to insult him.

I didn’t want to insult him. I didn’t want to do anything like that. I gave a little shrug. “I don’t know. You seem like… you’ve had a bad day.”

I’d circled back to the only explanation that made sense to me.

Everyone had bad days now and then. Even Sean Doyle.

“My day has been fine,” he gritted out.

“All right then.”

“Are you going to leave?”

“No, I’m not going to leave if you don’t want me to.”

“Good.”

“Good.”

We stared at each other for a moment. Then Sean put down his wineglass and took my head in his hand, pulling me into a hard kiss.

After that, things went the way you’d expect them to go. We kissed for a minute or two before it got too intense to stay on our feet. Then we ended up on the bed together. Sean rolled over on top of me, his hands busy as he continued to kiss me.

I was wearing a pantsuit today—I’d bought a few skirts in the past couple of months, but I hadn’t had enough energy to wear one that morning. (I wasn’t sure why, but wearing a skirt always took more energy than wearing pants did for me.) Sean got rid of my jacket quickly and unbuttoned my vintage-looking blouse without even breaking the kiss.

He was good at multitasking.

I kicked off my shoes and unbuttoned and unzipped my trousers, and then Sean was able to push them off over my legs. Then his kissing moved down from my mouth.

His hands slid up to my shoulders and then along the lines of my arms, his fingers wrapping around my wrists. He moved my hands up above my head and held them in place for a moment, as if he wanted me to keep them there.

The move stretched out my body, and he lifted his head to stare down at me, breathing raggedly.

I stayed in the position he’d put me, desire coiled tight between my legs but my heart beating erratically. Despite his transition into sex, Sean was still in that strange mood. There was more than just arousal in his face right now.

It was hunger but also something deeper, something conflicted, something aching.

I had no idea what it was, so there was no way for me to answer it.

I wrapped my arms around his neck, wanting to respond to the need I felt in him in any way I could. But Sean just moved my arms back to where he’d put them before, stretching my body out beneath him.

He stared at me for a long time before he lowered his face to my neck. He kissed and licked his way from my neck to my breasts, and I was gasping and arching up into his mouth when he reached around to unhook my bra.

I was nearly naked now except my little white lace panties, and he was still wearing all his clothes except his shoes, which he’d taken off before I’d even gotten there. I normally wasn’t too fond of his arrangement—me being the only one naked—but I was too distracted by everything else to have a problem with it tonight.

My body was already torturously aroused, and I still didn’t understand Sean’s mood.

His eyes were raking over my body. When I shifted with the need to ease the throbbing of my arousal, he slid his hands up and down my arms, like he was making sure I stayed in position.

Then he finally lowered his mouth to my breasts. He kissed and nipped and suckled until I was whimpering helplessly. Then his mouth moved even lower, skimming over my belly. He got so close to the top of my panties that my hips bucked up involuntarily, instinctively seeking his mouth.

He’d never gone down on me—just like I’d never done it to him. I’d told him that first evening I wasn’t comfortable with it until I got to know someone better.

I knew him better now. I wouldn’t have had any complaints if he’d moved his mouth between my legs. He didn’t though. He just slowly slid off my underwear, his eyes devouring the sight of the skin he bared.

Then he lifted his body up, repositioned, and lowered his head back to my breasts. He kissed and caressed me until I couldn’t lie still. Once, my hands flew up to grab at his hair, trying to hold him in place, but he moved them back above my head so I had to clutch at the bedding instead. The whole time, he didn’t say anything.

That was one of the things that was so unusual about tonight. Sean was so silent.

He was a talker—in bed and out of it. He was never so wordless, never so quiet. The thought distracted me for a minute until he spread open my legs and stroked me with his fingers.

I was wet. Very wet. Embarrassingly wet.

My body wanted him so much it was out of my control.

He usually smiled when he discovered this proof of my desire, but he didn’t tonight. He fondled me until I was on the edge of orgasm, gasping and fisting my hands in the bedding. Then he pulled his hand away.

I gave a frustrated sob and tried to grind myself against him, but I’d lost the momentum of climax now and was still achingly aroused. I was writhing beneath him as he returned to my breasts, and after a few minutes I discovered I was begging him in broken gasps. “Please… please… I need… Oh God! Sean, please!”

Finally—finally—he lifted his head, and my skin broke out in goose bumps as he stared down at me again for a long time. I have no idea how I must have looked, stretched out in the position he’d placed me, my spine arching involuntarily, my hips impossible to hold still, my hair messy and occasionally sticking to my damp face.

I felt sexy and helpless and deep and needy and so incredibly vulnerable.

And I still had no idea what Sean was feeling right now.

“Sean, please,” I whispered. “I need you to fuck me now.”

My words must have broken through his emotional tension because his features twisted slightly and he reached over to the nightstand for a condom. He was still fully dressed in his suit and tie, but he undid his trousers, freed his erection, and rolled the condom on.

Then, very slowly, he moved into position, parting my thighs wide and bending up one leg and the other so my knees were almost reaching my chest. He seemed to like that position the best.

He slid inside me with aching slowness, and when he started to thrust, it was just as slow. He built up a rhythm, rocking my body with his motion and staring down at me with those haunted eyes.

It felt so good and so torturous and so exactly what I wanted that I was mumbling out breathless pleas for him to take me, fuck me, make me come hard. At one point, I reached up to tug at his suit jacket, but he just moved my arms back to their former position. So I clung to the bedding and wondered why I loved it so much, needed it so much—letting him do this to me.

It took a long time because he kept his rhythm slow and even, but eventually my body couldn’t hold back anymore. I shook and sobbed through a long, deep orgasm, and he didn’t stop or slow down as my body clamp down ruthlessly around him. He fucked me until I came a second time—just as powerful, just as long-lasting.

I was hoarse at the end of it, tears streaming from my eyes.

He’d been watching me the whole time—ravenously gazing down at my urgent responses to him—but something must have struck him about my tears because he paused and asked thickly, “You okay?”

“Yeah,” I gasped, my fingers still fisted in the sheet above me. “Yeah, I’m good.”

I was more than good, but I wasn’t sure how to express that he’d just given me the two best orgasms I could remember.

“You want more?” he asked, sweat beaded on his forehead and the bridge of his nose.

“Yeah. More. So much more.”

He pulled out of me, and I was about to object until I realized he was just repositioning us. He lifted my legs so my ankles were on his shoulders and he leaned forward, bending my body in half as he entered me again.

I made a strangled sound as I felt him sinking farther inside me.

“Okay?” he asked breathlessly.

“Yeah. Good. Good.”

He was deep. So deep. Much deeper than usual.

Despite his rigid control, I didn’t think he could last long in this position.

I was right. His breathing had become thick and fast, and when he started to thrust, it was in short, choppy strokes.

He was too deep for me to come again, but it didn’t hurt. It all felt incredibly good. Deep and raw and slightly uncomfortable and like he was so far inside me he was fucking my soul.

I’d never experienced anything like it before.

I couldn’t move my hips, folded in half like this, so all our motion was his. He pushed into me fast and hard and kept grunting like an animal each time he did.

It took me a minute to realize that his grunts were actually my name. “Ash… Ash… Ash…” He said it over and over as he built up toward climax.

Soon there was no way I could keep my hands above my head, so I reached up to tangle my fingers into his hair. I held on to him that way, and this time he didn’t try to move them back. His face was contorted with pleasure and tension and effort and something else as he reached the peak.

He let out a loud bellow as he came—uninhibited, totally out of control—and he jerked his hips a long time as he worked through the spasms of his release.

It took him longer to come down than normal, and I stroked his hair and back as he did, feeling so strange, so helpless, so confused.

When his muscles finally relaxed and his expression softened, he rolled off me with a long groan.

I carefully untangled myself and straightened my legs.

They hurt. All of me hurt.

And all of me felt good at the same time.

I had to lie still for a minute before I was able to stand up. I was completely naked and stiff and sore, and I gasped when my back caught as I rose.

“Okay?” Sean asked, opening his eyes at the sound I made.

“Yeah. I’m fine.” I was pleased that I sounded almost normal. “You want me to take care of that?” I gestured to indicate the condom he was still holding.

He nodded and I took it from him, throwing it away in the bathroom.

I had no idea what to do or say, so I was pleased when I thought of a reasonable activity. I grabbed my bag and told him, “I’m going to take a shower.”

He nodded, acknowledging my words. He still hadn’t moved from where he was sprawled out. It was like he’d collapsed at the release of tension.

I gave him one last look before I went into the bathroom.

I closed the door and stood there for a long time, thinking.

Sean hadn’t smiled. Not once since he’d opened the door for me.

And that sex had been amazing, but it had also been…

Something was wrong with him, and I didn’t know what.

I turned on the shower, waited for the water to get hot, and then stepped under the spray. I stayed in the shower for a long time, letting the hot water clean and then soothe me.

But I was thinking the whole time, and when I finally got out, I had an idea.

With a towel wrapped around me, I reached for my phone from my bag. I pulled up a browser and entered a few words.

Then I read the first news article that was brought up, looking specifically for the date.

I’d been right.

The idea that had come to me in the shower had been correct, and I now understood what was wrong with Sean, what explained everything about how he was behaving tonight.

Tonight was the anniversary of his fiancée’s death.

Two years ago tonight, she’d been shot on a downtown sidewalk as they’d been walking home. He’d been shot too.

Tonight was the night.

No wonder he was acting like he was hiding a wound.

My throat hurt so much I could barely breathe, and I had no idea what to do about what I’d just discovered. Instead of putting on the pretty pajama set I’d brought with me, I put on a bathrobe.

My clothes were still on the floor of the bedroom.

When I came out, Sean was still sprawled out on the bed. He hadn’t moved at all.

“Are you all right?” I asked softly.

He opened his eyes. “Yeah.”

I stared at him for a minute, and then I made up my mind. I reached down for my panties and then looked until I found my bra on the side of the bed.

Evidently, this caught his attention. “What are you doing?” he asked.

“Getting dressed,” I murmured. “I’m going to leave.”

He shouldn’t have to try to act normal and entertain me tonight. He shouldn’t have to hide what he was feeling. He needed to grieve. I was going to let him do that.

This made him sit up and swing his legs over the side of the bed. “What? Why?”

I met his eyes. Hesitated.

Something new twisted on his face. “Did I… hurt you? Did I hurt you before?”

“No. No. Not at all.”

“Then why are you leaving?”

I sighed. “I know what tonight is, Sean. I’m going to leave so you can be alone.”

His expression changed again as he processed this. And I was reaching for my trousers near his feet when I felt his hand on my arm.

I looked over at him, waiting for him to speak.

“Don’t leave,” he rasped at last.

My heart jumped very strangely. “But, Sean, you shouldn’t have to worry about socializing with me tonight. I think it would be better if—”

“I want you to stay.” The words seemed torn out of him. “Don’t leave.”

I let out a breath, blowing out tension I hadn’t known was making my body tight. Then I sat on the edge of the bed beside him. “Okay.”

He’d turned his head to study my expression. “I didn’t hurt you? I know I was… I felt like I might have been rough.”

“No! Sean, of course not. I would have told you if you’d been hurting me. I… It was really good for me.” I sighed. “I really liked it.”

“Okay.”

We sat in silence for a full minute. Then I reached over and put my hand on his knee. “I’m really sorry about Lara,” I murmured, my voice breaking on the last word.

I wasn’t looking at his face, so I don’t know what his expression reflected. But his voice was as soft as mine had been when he said, “Thank you.”

***

We didn’t eat steak that evening.

The restaurant downstairs had a specialty of lobster pasta in a wine cream sauce, so we both ordered that. It just felt like a night to do something different.

After he’d called down our order, Sean went to take a shower. He was in there much longer than normal. In fact, the shower had just turned off when I heard the knock on the door. I went to let our room service in and sign the bill (hoping I’d left the size tip that Sean would have done since this was being charged to him), and the courteous server was just leaving when the bathroom door finally opened.

Sean came out with wet hair, wearing the same kind of sleep pants he’d always worn—a solid color in a soft material. His chest and feet were bare.

I didn’t know what to say as he paused in the middle of the floor, so I finally just gestured toward the table where the server had left the tray. “You hungry?”

“Yeah.”

I poured myself another glass of wine and topped off Sean’s half-empty one. I felt nervous, strangely jittery, as I stared down at the plate.

It looked delicious.

I had no idea what I should say.

To distract myself, I sipped my wine. “I think I’m getting spoiled with this wine,” I said at last.

Sean had just taken a bite, so he swallowed before he replied. “Spoiled?”

“Yeah. I used to just drink whatever someone gave me, but ever since I’ve been drinking the wine you have here…” I shook my head and smiled down at my glass. “I was at a friend’s house over the weekend, and she had a bottle of merlot. It was regular grocery store wine—not the bottom shelf but probably no more than fifteen dollars for the bottle. The kind I used to always drink. And I…”

“Could tell the difference?” he prompted. For the first time all night, he gave a hint of his normal smile.

I chuckled. “Yeah. I could. It’s a very strange thing to happen to me. I’ve never cared about wine at all.”

He’d relaxed a little as I talked, and I realized he wanted the distraction. It wouldn’t be insensitive for me to talk about light, easy things as we ate. In fact, it might be exactly what he needed.

So I kept talking. Not incessantly but enough to fill the silences between us. I told him a couple of stories about clients I’d met within the past week. I told him about new developments with my sister’s wedding. She’d found out she was pregnant, and she wanted to move up the date for the wedding so she wouldn’t be showing when she got married. So all their ambitious wedding plans were being condensed to less than three months, which to me seemed like a recipe for disaster.

Sean drank all his wine and poured himself another glass. Then he finished his lobster and pasta.

He didn’t add a lot to the conversation, but his eyes were on me and he responded enough to sustain the conversation.

He looked a lot better when we were finished, and I was foolishly proud of myself for helping him—even in such a small way.

“That was really good,” I said when I took my last bite. I hadn’t finished everything, but I’d done pretty well for myself. “I don’t even regret not getting the steak.”

“Yeah. Me either.” He swallowed the last of his wine. He’d had almost three glasses, which was twice as much as he normally drank.

I didn’t blame him for wanting to dull his senses a bit tonight though. I would have done the same thing.

We sat and stared at each other across the table for another minute. Then I had to break the tension I could feel building again in the air. With a smile, I got up and went to use the bathroom.

I didn’t really have to go. I just wanted to do something.

When I came out again, Sean had gotten up from the table and moved to stretch out on the bed, his head turned away from me so he could look out the window.

I crawled onto the bed beside him. I wanted to touch him, stroke him, since he seemed sad again, but I didn’t think it was my place.

When I straightened my legs, I felt a twinge of soreness and sucked in a quick breath.

Sean turned to look. “You okay?”

“Yeah. Just a little sore. From before.” I paused, then had to admit the truth. “That might be all the sex I’m up for tonight.”

He nodded. Didn’t look surprised or disappointed. “You would have told me if it was too much for you?” His eyes were very sober.

My lips parted at the question. “Of course. Of course I would have told you. I’m not the kind of girl to suffer in silence.”

He gave another little hint of a smile, so I felt better.

“And I don’t let guys do things to me that I don’t want,” I added.

He nodded and murmured, “Good.”

He was such a decent guy. Even wounded and grieving tonight, he still worried about me. And I knew he meant it when he’d said it was good I wouldn’t let a guy do something to me I didn’t want.

Some guys wouldn’t even think to ask. Some guys were too focused on putting their dicks wherever they wanted them, no matter what the other person needed.

Sean wasn’t like that. At all.

“So any new developments with the jackass?” he asked after a minute.

He asked me about John every time we got together. I’d always thought it was because he liked to tease me—and I was still sure he did—but he wasn’t in a teasing mood now. That meant he must genuinely be interested.

“Well, uh, not really, I guess.”

His mouth turned down slightly. “What does that mean?”

“It just means that nothing significant has really happened, although he’s talking to me more now than he ever did before.”

“But he hasn’t asked you out?” I couldn’t understand the expression in his eyes when he voiced the question.

“No. Although we did eat lunch together on Monday. Just accidentally. In the break room. But…” I trailed off. It was starting to sound a bit silly that I was so excited about eating lunch with a guy.

Maybe I was kind of silly.

“But what?” Sean prompted.

I was still wearing the white hotel bathrobe, and I had to pull one side back up over my shoulder since it was slipping down. “But it was something. Or it would have been if I hadn’t embarrassed myself.”

I’d been planning to tell Sean about this for the past two days. In fact, I’d worked out the story in my mind several times, planning it out in a way that made it as funny as possible. I’d actually been looking forward to Sean laughing about it.

He wasn’t laughing now though, so I wasn’t sure I should go into it. It didn’t match the feeling between us right now.

“What was embarrassing?” His eyes were still focused on my face, and it seemed like he really wanted to hear the story. So I told him.

“I was eating lunch in the break room,” I began. “And then he comes to sit down with me since he was eating lunch too. He was asking me all these questions about myself, and I was happy about it. I don’t know if you’ve ever felt this way, but there’s this strange sort of excitement when you’ve wanted something to happen for a long time, and then it seems like it’s happening. And you’re in the moment, but it also feels like someone else is in your skin. And the whole world seems to be… shuddering—like it’s a film, but someone isn’t holding the camera still.” I sighed and gave him an ironic smile. “I guess you’ve probably never felt that way.”

“I have. I know what you’re talking about.”

My heart gave a little flip at this, for no good reason, and I had to force myself to focus on my story. I went on, telling him about the conversation and how I was so distracted that I’d taken a breath when I shouldn’t have as I was eating my sandwich, and the bite of food went down the wrong way.

So I’d started to choke. My airway wasn’t completely blocked, so it wasn’t a crisis, but I couldn’t stop coughing and I’d had to stand up as I tried to get control of myself, tears streaming down my face, smearing my mascara.

And poor John hadn’t known what to do, so he’d gotten up and kept hitting my back like that would help until I could finally stop.

I played up the story as well as I could, making sure it was as funny as I could make it. It hadn’t felt funny at the time. It had been genuinely embarrassing. But it had ended all right. John had seemed sincerely concerned, and he’d kept his hand on my back, sliding it down to just above my bottom in a gesture that felt more than supportive.

I didn’t tell that part to Sean.

That part felt personal.

Sean enjoyed the story though. And he even chuckled as I reached the end, the only laughter I’d heard from him all evening. It wasn’t his normal laugh. It was soft and hoarse and slightly poignant, but it was real.

And I saw exactly what happened after that.

He was laughing, his face almost relaxed, when suddenly it froze. His expression went completely still, and something pained and haunted filled his eyes.

I watched as it happened, and I knew exactly what it meant, how he felt.

For a moment he’d forgotten what had happened to Lara, and then he’d remembered all of a sudden.

Things always seemed to hurt more when you’d forgotten them for a little while.

He let out a rough breath and turned his face away from me, staring out toward the window again.

I had to do something. I had to comfort him in any way I could.

It had been two years. He would probably always miss her. But he was allowed to relax and enjoy himself. He didn’t have to still feel guilty about it.

I reached over to stroke his bare chest. He didn’t jerk away from my touch, so I kept it up, rubbing my hand over his collarbone, his flat nipples, the scattering of coarse hair, his firm abs.

Quite unintentionally, my hand moved over to his side to the scar from the bullet wound. It was pale and puckered and would always look damaged.

It was so wrong that his flesh had been ripped apart that way.

It was so wrong that his heart had been ripped apart too.

After a few minutes, he turned his head back to look at me. I was still lightly caressing his chest. It was the only thing I could think of to do.

My hand had strayed down to his belly and was idly playing with the line of dark hair above his waistband. Because my hand was low on his body, my eyes were too, so I saw when he started to get hard.

He was only partially erect, but it was noticeable under the thin fabric of his pants.

“Sorry,” he said lightly. “I’ve been telling him there’s no more sex tonight, but he doesn’t always listen.”

I giggled softly and moved my hand down to his shaft, holding it through the fabric.

He sucked in a breath. “If you keep touching him like that, he’s never going to get the right idea.”

I smiled then, suddenly thinking of something I could do.

Sitting up, I moved so I could have easy access to his body. “We can do something,” I murmured.

“What?” His eyes were slightly narrowed from the way I was touching him, but he clearly had no idea what I was referring to.

“I can do something for you.” I lowered my upper body so my face was very close to his groin.

He got it then. I could see quite clearly that he got it because his penis grew suddenly, visibly harder.

“Are you sure?” he breathed.

“Yeah.” I smiled down at him, filled with pleasure at having thought of something I could do for him, something to address the way I was feeling, something that might make him feel a little better—if only for a few minutes.

I carefully stretched out his waistband and pulled down his pants, his erection bouncing slightly as it was freed.

Then I took him in my hands again, stroking him for a minute before I lowered my mouth.

Blow jobs had never been my thing. I’d given them to a couple of guys before—but only guys I was in serious relationships with. It had just never been something I enjoyed. In fact, one of my boyfriends had been generally a nice guy, but whenever I got his dick in my mouth, he’d start calling me all these dirty names, as if the position somehow called for the crude language.

Maybe some women got turned on by that sort of thing—which was totally fine—but it had felt demeaning to me. I hadn’t liked it. At all. So I’d always disliked going down on him, and I’d been hesitant about it ever since then.

Tonight felt different though.

This was something I was giving to Sean. He wasn’t taking it from me.

I was a little nervous, and my throat was aching with emotion, but I was also excited and tender, and I wanted to do this.

He hissed when I slid my tongue up and down his shaft, and his hips moved restlessly when I licked circles around the head. His hand had moved to the back of my head, combing through my loose hair and curling around the back of my skull.

He wasn’t holding me there by force. It felt more like a caress.

I took him fully in my mouth and sucked a few times, and he moaned low in his throat. I sucked again, and his fingers tightened in my hair as he breathed. “Oh God. Oh God, Ash!”

My back was stretched uncomfortably, so I let him slip out of my mouth so I could rearrange my body. As I did, he reached over and untied my robe, slowly pulling the sides apart so he could see my breasts.

He was staring at me hungrily now.

I leaned over and took him in my mouth again. My blood was pulsing intensely, and I was filled with emotional tension I’d never experienced before.

As I sucked, I took his balls in one of my hands and squeezed them gently.

Soon—very soon—Sean was grunting low and soft, rocking his hips up toward me. I adjusted my rhythm and depth to accommodate the thrusts of his hips and breathed raggedly through my nose as the muscles of his thighs and stomach grew tighter and tighter.

“Oh fuck!” he gasped, reaching out to claw at the bedding with one of his hands. The other was fisted in my hair now. “Oh fuck. I’m… I’m…”

He was close to coming already. I could feel it, see it in his body. I kept sucking and squeezing as my own arousal throbbed achingly.

He was totally gone now, and I experienced a sudden flare of panic about what to do when he came. Should I let him come in my mouth—or should I move and let him come on my chest or something? What would he prefer? What would he expect?

These are the kinds of questions that always come to me at the worst possible times, even when I should be caught up in a moment. Maybe some women are completely confident about such things, but I have never been one of them.

As it happened, I didn’t have time to make a decision. He was already coming, his body shaking with it and a long, unrestrained moan releasing from his throat. His shaft pulsed with his climax, and he ejaculated into my mouth. He’d come earlier though, so fortunately there wasn’t that much semen for me to deal with.

I was panting as I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and finally raised my head from his groin. I kept stroking him as he softened in my hand.

When my eyes moved to his face, I grew suddenly still.

His eyes were closed, and his features were relaxed. More relaxed than I’d seen them all evening.

But I could see a streak from a tear running from one eye down into his hair.

It stilled me. Filled me with too much. Far more emotions than I knew how to deal with.

I felt like I might burst into tears myself, so I did the only reasonable thing a person could do in my situation.

I got off the bed and went into the bathroom to clean up and rinse out my mouth.

I was aroused myself, but my emotions were a lot more powerful, and I didn’t really feel like coming right now.

I had no idea what to do.

I stood in front of the mirror and breathed until I felt mostly calm again. Then I went back into the room. He was still sprawled out on the bed, his pants pushed down, his eyes closed, his body completely relaxed.

I walked around to his side of the bed to pick up the jacket to my suit. As I leaned over, he reached out to grab my hand.

I turned to look at him.

“Thank you,” he rasped, holding my hand in his.

I swallowed hard. “You’re welcome. I enjoyed it.”

“I didn’t just mean the blow job.”

I gulped again, touched and emotional and so incredibly confused.

“Are you leaving?” he asked in a different voice.

“I… I don’t know.”

“Don’t leave.”

I let out a breath, those two words answering my lingering questions. “Okay. I won’t.”

So instead of picking up my jacket and getting dressed, I went back over to my side of the bed and crawled under the covers. Sean moved so he was under them too.

He’d rolled over on his side so his back was to me, but I still sensed a profound neediness to him, even in his silence.

So I did something very brave. An act of courage I didn’t know I possessed. I scooted over and put my arms around him, spooning him from behind.

He raised one hand and rubbed my forearm, which made me think he liked that I was holding him this way.

He would never say so, but I was sure he did, so my nerves relaxed.

I didn’t say anything else. We just lay together like that until his body softened completely and his breathing slowed down.

It wasn’t that long before he was asleep in my arms.

It was a lot longer before I fell asleep myself.

Sean was sexy, handsome, funny, charming, ruthlessly intelligent. He was a success in every venture he’d ever tried.

In the past two years, he’d built barriers around his heart that would never come down.

He was strong and uniquely brilliant—making sure the world never thought he was weak.

But he would always be human.

And someone he loved had died.

***

We both slept through the night the way we had two weeks earlier, but I wasn’t confused and disoriented when I woke up in the morning.

I felt heavy. Heavy and still emotional and absolutely terrified.

Sean was still asleep—his body warm and relaxed and irresistibly close to me—but it was almost six, and I had to get moving right away.

I got up quietly and got dressed in the dark, being careful not to wake him up.

I wanted him to sleep as long as he could.

I was slipping on my shoes when I heard him mumble, “Ash.”

I turned to look and saw he’d reached a hand out for me, the way he had the evening before. I took his hand in mine, and he pulled me closer to the bed.

He’d opened his eyes to look up at me with a heavy, sleep-clouded gaze. “See you in two weeks?”

From the upward lilt of his voice, it sounded more like a question than a statement.

Could he actually be wondering if I wanted to meet up with him again?

“Yeah,” I said. “I’ll be here.” Without thinking, I leaned down and pressed a soft kiss on his lips before I let his hand slip out of mine.

I shouldn’t have done that.

It reflected something I shouldn’t be feeling.

I had to get out of this room. Fast.

I grabbed my bag and left without another word. When I got into the elevator, I leaned against the wall, closing my eyes and telling myself to get a grip.

I was just feeling different because he’d been so sad and vulnerable last night. I’d feel this way about anyone I liked who needed comforting.

It wasn’t anything more than that.

It couldn’t be anything more.

Sean wasn’t a man I was allowed to love—even if I’d wanted to. And I didn’t.

John had always been the one I loved, and nothing about that had changed. Things were going well with him, and I had every reason to hope that they’d keep getting better.

I just felt close to Sean right now because he’d needed comforting last night.

I felt things for other people. It was normal and natural.

There was nothing for me to be terrified about.

If I couldn’t stop thinking about Sean’s face after he’d come, if I couldn’t stop thinking about that single tear that had leaked out of his eye, if it made me want to run back to the room and hold him in my arms again—have him hold me too—then that was just a temporary response to the empathy.

It didn’t mean anything.

And it certainly didn’t mean that Sean’s place in my life was changing.

After all, the world was what was, and Sean Doyle would always be Sean Doyle.

He’d always been my second best.