A week and a half later, as I was walking down the aisle in my bridesmaid dress, I was regretting inviting Sean.

Just a little.

Not that he’d done anything wrong. In fact, he’d done everything right. But I kept worrying that he was having a bad time or feeling awkward or that he might never want to hang out with me again.

After all, this family wedding couldn’t possibly be fun for him.

I’d told him I could just meet him here since I had to arrive early as part of the wedding party. But he’d insisted on picking me up and looked a bit annoyed when I kept arguing, so I’d eventually just let it go. After we arrived, I was busy with getting dressed and helping my sister, so Sean had to sit for a long time on his own.

He was on his own for the wedding ceremony too since I had to be part of the proceedings.

What guy in the world would enjoy being dragged along and then having to sit by himself doing nothing for so long, in the middle of a bunch of strangers?

So I kept worrying—mostly about him.

The wedding was taking place outside at an orchard and farmhouse that was now hired out for events. White chairs had been placed in neat rows in front of the arbor, and I was walking down the aisle in the middle, trying to slow myself down since my habitual walking pace is fast.

I caught Sean’s eye as I walked, and he gave me a little half smile, looking interested and amused and not at all bored or annoyed.

His expression made me feel better, and I had to fight not to grin at him in response.

I wished my dress were a little more attractive though.

It wasn’t a terrible bridesmaid dress. I’d seen far worse many, many times. But bridesmaid dresses have to fit women of varying body shapes and coloring, so inevitably they’re not perfectly flattering on everyone.

I would have gone with something less formal for an outdoor wedding at four in the afternoon, but my sister had always had visions of long, fancy dresses—for herself and for her bridesmaids. So I was wearing a satin dress with a full-length, A-line skirt, a fitted bodice, and cap sleeves.

Rose pink.

The dress was rose pink.

A very pretty color but very bad with my red hair.

But it was my sister’s wedding. Not mine. She could have anything she wanted.

I hoped Sean didn’t think I looked too unattractive.

The wedding ceremony itself was thankfully short—lasting not even twenty minutes—and then we processed back up the aisle and had to take all the photos.

The whole time, I was thinking about Sean, sitting alone at the reception, waiting for me to finally join him.

I vowed that if I ever got married, I was going to do the photos before the ceremony. I could live with my husband-to-be seeing me before the ceremony if it meant my poor guests didn’t have to wait an hour killing time at the reception before we finally arrived.

Eventually I was able to escape and make it into the big beautifully decorated barn where all the food was set up.

It was all heavy hors d’oeuvres rather than plated meals, which was another relief. I looked around and didn’t seen Sean in the barn, although I did notice that the tray of smoked salmon was mostly gone since we had taken so long with the pictures and that also there were no more chocolate-dipped strawberries.

Typical.

Cursing the extended photo session, I wandered outside to the patio where little tables had been set up for guests to sit.

I found Sean at a table in the corner under the shade of a tree. He’d managed to snag the best seat.

That too was typical.

“Sorry,” I said, sitting down at the empty chair next to him. “Sorry it took so long.”

“That’s the way it always goes when pictures are afterward.” He looked relaxed and like he was in a good mood, so he must not have gotten too impatient waiting.

He slid a plate over to me, on which was a very good variety of the best food, including smoked salmon and dipped strawberries.

I stared down the plate speechlessly.

“It was going quickly,” he explained, as if responding to my expression. “So I went to get you some.”

I lifted my eyes to his face and whispered, “Thank you.”

His eyebrows lowered. “You okay?”

I shook off my strange reaction. “Yeah. Sorry. It’s just the whole thing has been pretty stressful, and it all took so long, and you’ve been waiting here for ages…”

“Don’t worry about me. I’ve been fine. I know how weddings go.”

“Have people been staring at you?”

He chuckled. “A few.”

“They recognized you, I guess.”

“Yeah. At least some of them did. One old man came over and pitched me a real estate deal.”

I’d been munching on my food, but at this my mouth almost fell open. “You’re kidding! Who was that?”

Sean nodded over toward an elderly man dozing on a bench by himself.

I giggled. “That’s my great-uncle Larry. I can just imagine his pitch.” I peered at Sean’s face but saw nothing except amusement, so he really must have meant it when he said he wasn’t bored or annoyed.

“It was something. Then he got angry because I said I wasn’t sure it would work out for me, and he snapped that he expected more from Ashley’s fella.”

I paused, a cracker halfway to my mouth. “Sorry. I told you that’s what everyone would think if you came with me.”

“Stop saying sorry,” Sean said, standing up with his empty champagne glass. “I can think of worse things than being called your fella.”

I couldn’t think of a response to that, so I just sat there, my mind whirling, and watched Sean walk over to get more champagne and also a glass for me.

He brought them over, and I accepted mine gratefully.

I really wished I knew what Sean was thinking, but his face was as composed and clever and unreadable as ever.

***

The reception was the best part of the wedding, as far as I was concerned.

We did have to put up with curious people coming over and asking needling questions of us, but Sean was clearly a master at that sort of thing and managed to end the interrogations before they really started, without ever seeming rude. He always just changed the subject without the other person realizing what was happening.

My sister and her new husband came over, but my sister was in too much of a tizzy to really focus enough to be curious about Sean and me. I told her we’d met because we both worked in real estate, and that seemed to satisfy her.

When my mother came over, it was more awkward since she kept talking like Sean and I were a couple. I tried to gently set her straight, but I wasn’t sure she got it.

That meant I’d have some work to do with her after this was over so she wouldn’t start planning my wedding.

But all in all, it wasn’t as uncomfortable as I’d feared, and Sean didn’t even appear in a hurry to leave.

When the cake was cut, he made a point of getting a piece of the wedding cake to save for his grandmother. He said he always saved her a piece whenever he attended weddings. It was some sort of tradition they’d had since he’d been a kid.

I thought it was kind of sweet.

When all the other traditions were completed, my sister and her husband did their first dance on the part of the patio set off as a dance floor. Then she tried to get other people to dance too.

No one really wanted to.

Some settings lend themselves to dancing, and some do not. This was an outdoor wedding in the afternoon, and it was now just after six o’clock. It was getting a little chilly, and everyone had eaten a lot. No one wanted to get up and look stupid on a makeshift dance floor.

I shook my head. “She’s always had these daydreams about one of those big festive occasions where people stay and dance through the night. Sort of like those big parties in Sabrina.”

Sean must be familiar with the movie because he nodded. “It never turns out that way, does it?”

“Nope.” I sighed when I saw my sister gesturing toward me urgently. “Shit. She wants me to dance.”

Sean chuckled. “Well, you better be a good sister then.” He stood up and extended a hand toward me.

I took his hand as I rose, but I stood still as I murmured, “You don’t mind?”

“What? Doing a cheesy dance with you at a wedding reception? I think I can tough it out.”

So Sean and I walked to the dance floor. He was still holding my hand. An over-the-top rock ballad was playing through the speakers—one of my sister’s favorite songs as a teenager—and Sean put his arms around me and pulled me toward him.

I’d never been much of a dancer, but it really didn’t matter in this context. Sean got us moving to the right rhythm, and the song was slow enough that we could just sort of rock together.

I’d have enjoyed it more if everyone hadn’t been staring at us, but I did like the look in Sean’s eyes. Amused. Teasing. But also almost… fond.

He seemed to be enjoying himself as much as anyone could in such a situation.

I wasn’t going to fool myself though. Not again.

Sean might have been the perfect date to my sister’s wedding, but that didn’t mean we’re anything more to each other than we’d ever been.

We still had a contract.

After today was over, we were likely to go right back to where we’d been before.

Meeting every other Wednesday night.

Nothing more.

I was wanting more. No point in denying it. But that look in Sean’s eyes wasn’t a promise of a future.

It was just Sean Doyle being himself.

***

I was quiet on the way home.

It was dark by the time we were finally able to leave, and I was exhausted. I also felt a bit rattled, and it worried me. I didn’t want my emotions to be confused where Sean was concerned. It was simply too dangerous. But I wasn’t sure how to help it.

We had to drive almost an hour to get back to the city, and my place was in a suburb on the other side. I’d changed into leggings and a long top, so I was comfortable physically.

But only physically.

I felt bad about Sean having to drive so far, but he was the one who’d insisted.

We were approaching the city when Sean murmured into the silence, “You okay?”

I straightened up and looked over at him in the dim light of the dashboard. His eyes had been on me, but now they turned back to the road. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. Just a little tired.”

“You’re quiet.”

I was quiet. I knew I was. “Yeah.”

“Anything you want to tell me?”

I sucked in a breath. “What do you mean?”

“About why you’re quiet,” he explained, his voice as soft as before.

I had no idea what he was getting at, but I wasn’t about to tell him how I was feeling. Soft and confused and excited and a lot of other things that would be mortifying to admit.

So instead of telling him the truth, I said lightly, “I think it’s just the letdown. After months of stress and planning over the wedding, it’s finally over. You know what I mean?”

Something flickered briefly on his face—something akin to disappointment—but it was gone before I could register it or read it accurately. “Yeah. I know what you mean.” He cleared his throat. “Do you mind if we make a stop on the way to your apartment?”

“Sure. Where did you want to go?”

“My grandmother’s. I wanted to give her the piece of cake. It’s right on the way.”

“Of course. No problem at all.”

Now I was even more flustered. Surely he didn’t mean he was going to take me in to meet his grandmother. That would be… unbelievable.

Maybe he was just going to have me wait in the car while he ran in to give her the cake.

That would be fine.

That would be no problem.

That wouldn’t make me feel like my head was about to explode.

Sean had been telling the truth. His grandmother lived in an established neighborhood of old row houses in what once would have been the edge of the city, before Boston had grown up past it. It wasn’t much out of our way, and it didn’t take very long to get there at this time on a Saturday night.

He parked the car in the narrow driveway and unbuckled his seat belt to reach back and get the little box in which he’d put the cake. He drove an expensive dark blue SUV, far nicer than anything I’d ridden in before.

When I just sat there, he frowned at me. “Are you coming?”

My heart jumped into my throat. “Uh. Yeah.”

I guess he was expecting me to come inside after all.

***

Sean’s grandmother was a tiny woman with salt-and-pepper hair. Her accent wasn’t quite as exaggerated as the Irish brogue Sean had used when he was describing her to me, but it was close.

She was wearing a heavy bathrobe that zipped up the front, but she’d obviously not been asleep because the television in the kitchen was blaring.

She appeared delighted to see us as she hugged and kissed Sean and then hugged and kissed me.

She kept up a nonstop running commentary as she told us to come in and split the piece of wedding cake with a cup of tea.

When we went into the warm kitchen with a big table crowded into one corner, she muted the television and put water in the kettle.

“So you’re Ashley,” she said with a smile at me.

My shoulders stiffened, and I darted a look over at Sean, but he wasn’t looking in my direction, and there was no way to tell from his face whether this was just something his grandmother said or if she’d actually heard my name before in conversation with her grandson.

Surely he wouldn’t have told her that he got together with me every other Wednesday for sex.

That wasn’t appropriate grandmother conversation.

“Tell me about your people,” she said, pulling mugs off a shelf above the counter. “With that lovely red hair, you must have some good roots.”

Good roots to her probably meant having Irish in the family. Since I did, I explained to her that my grandfather on my father’s side came from an Irish family, but the rest of me was German and French.

I was afraid she might be disappointed in my watered-down bloodline, but she just smiled and nodded in interest.

She poured hot water into the mugs and brought them over to the table with a box of tea and the cream and sugar. I started to take care of my own cup, but Sean put a hand on my knee under the table.

Meeting my eyes, he gave the slightest gesture of his head toward his grandmother, clearly indicating that she was supposed to prepare the tea herself.

She fixed our tea, asking if I wanted cream and sugar in a tone that made it clear she expected me to drink it like that. I said yes, of course, and happily drank what she prepared for me.

Then she cut the small square of wedding cake into three pieces and passed them around.

“So Sean always brings you wedding cake?” I asked when the conversation had hit a lull.

“Oh yes, he does. Ever since he was thirteen years old.”

Sean was smiling at his grandmother, but I thought he looked just slightly tense. I wondered why.

“How did that start? I asked, genuinely curious.

“When he was thirteen, he had to go to a second cousin’s wedding, and he was in a kerfuffle about it.”

“I wasn’t in a kerfuffle,” Sean muttered dryly.

“Yes, you were. You didn’t want to go. You thought it would be dumb and boring and you’d be the only boy your age there. You’d been told you’d have to dance with a pretty little cousin, and you were dreading it. You complained about it for weeks. You were in a kerfuffle.” She gave her grandson a chiding look as she spoke.

Sean let out a huff of amusement. “All right. I was in a kerfuffle.”

“I’d broken a hip, so I wasn’t going to be able to go. So I told him he was responsible for bringing me a piece of wedding cake. That gave him a mission, see?” She patted Sean’s hand fondly. “Sean has always needed a mission to feel comfortable.”

Intrigued by this, I studied his face. He was staring down at his teacup, not looking at me at all. I thought he appeared a bit self-conscious, although I’d almost never seen Sean look that way before. “A mission?”

“Yes, a mission. Something to accomplish. A structure and purpose to the way he approaches the world. Otherwise, he gets very upset by all the different things he feels.”

“Grandmother,” he muttered under his breath, slanting her a look.

The old lady was completely unaffected by the warning in his expression. She laughed and reached over to pat his hand on the table. “Don’t be embarrassed by it, boy. You feel very deeply. You always have. There’s nothing wrong with feeling a lot and occasionally being scared because of it.”

For some reason I was feeling a lot too, and it had something to do with seeing Sean in this new context. He wasn’t the master of the room here. He wasn’t completely confident and in control.

He was a grandson. A regular person.

Not all that different from me.

“Ever since that wedding, he’s always brought me a piece of cake. He’s never forgotten his old grandmother.” She smiled at Sean affectionately. “He’s a good boy.”

“I’m thirty-eight years old now, you know,” Sean murmured. He didn’t sound bad-tempered, but he did sound a little stiff.

“What does that have to do with anything?” His grandmother turned to give me a very speaking look. “He’s a good boy. He never forgets me, no matter how big he’s gotten to the rest of the world. He doesn’t always know how to talk about it, but he does know how to love.”

I froze, my mug halfway up to my lips.

For a moment I literally couldn’t move.

It felt so much like she was trying to tell me something, but it couldn’t be what I was thinking.

Surely she couldn’t think that Sean…

Surely she wasn’t assuming that he…

Maybe she was assuming that. After all, he’d brought me in to meet her. She wouldn’t know that our relationship was bound on all sides by an ironclad contract Sean had no interest in revoking.

I wasn’t going to be an idiot.

Not twice in one year.

It was so easy—too easy—to read what you wanted into a relationship, into what felt like clues and undercurrents that were all pointing the way you wanted them to. And then you ended up with a broken heart or broken pride or both.

I’d done it with John. I wasn’t going to do it again.

“Okay,” Sean said, firm authority in his tone that broke through my muddled thoughts. “We should probably get going.”

I didn’t really want to leave. I wanted to hear more about what his grandmother had to say about Sean.

But she was getting up and pulling Sean into a big hug, so it was clear our time here was over.

His grandmother said something into Sean’s ear after she hugged him, but I couldn’t hear what it was.

As we were walking back to the car, Sean murmured dryly, “Sorry about that.”

“Sorry about what?” I asked, pleased that my voice was composed and natural. “That your grandmother acted like a grandmother? You don’t have to apologize for that. You put up with my family today, so it’s only right that I reciprocate. Anyway, I liked her.”

Sean’s shoulders relaxed, and he smiled at me, so I must have said the right thing.

***

When we got to my apartment complex, a car was backing out of one of the few guest spots, so Sean waited for the other car to pull out and then took the space. Without speaking, he got out of the car and walked me to my door.

I had my keys in my hand as I turned to face him, feeling shy and a bit uncertain. “Thanks for coming with me today.”

The corners of his mouth twitched up. “Of course.”

He stood about eight inches from me, and I wondered what he was thinking. His eyes had taken on a certain heat that I recognized very well, but there was more in his expression, more that felt too deep, too complex.

Not nearly as simple as lust.

I asked, “Do you… do you want to come in?”

“Do you want me to?” He was studying my face now, like he was trying to read my expression in the same way I was trying to read his.

“Y-yes.”

He must have heard my slight hesitation because he didn’t move. “We can just meet on Wednesday like normal, if you’d rather.”

I shook my head. “No. I do want you to come in. It just seems… different. Since this isn’t a hotel.”

“No,” he said, leaning forward and brushing his lips against mine before pulling back. “It isn’t.”

The kiss was all it took for me to decide what I wanted.

Of course I wanted him.

I reached out for him as soon as he’d pulled away, and I’m really not sure of the exact steps that happened after that. I must have unlocked my front door, and we must have gone inside my small one-bedroom apartment (which was fortunately neat since I’d straightened up a little that morning). We must have made our way to my bedroom and then taken off our clothes. And we must have lowered ourselves onto the bed.

I don’t remember doing any of that. Emotion and need and knowledge had exploded in my heart, in my mind, leaving a thick cloud of desire and feeling that blurred all the edges, blurred everything except him.

Sean. Kissing me. Touching me. Being with me.

Being Sean.

In my home and not some impersonal hotel room.

Before I knew what was happening—or how it had happened—we were under the sheets together, kissing and moving against each other, both of us completely naked.

With my nightstand and little brass lamp to the right of us and my favorite painting hanging on the opposite wall.

This was me. Fully me.

And I wasn’t with a pale, fluffy fantasy of a man. I was with Sean Doyle.

The real Sean Doyle. A real, living, breathing man. With family and wounds and insecurities and needs.

My heart was racing from far more than desire as he kissed his way down my body.

I was terrified as much as I was yearning for him.

We hadn’t turned on the bedroom lights, but light came flooding in from the hallway. I could see his face clearly when I lifted my head from the pillow and saw him raise his head from my belly.

He was panting as fast as I was, and his hair was slightly mussed. We held the gaze across my body.

Then he asked in a soft, hoarse voice, “Can I do you tonight?”

The words were vague and not particularly sophisticated. They felt raw, naked, rather than sexy.

I knew what he was asking. I’d never let him go down on me before.

And he wanted to. He wanted to please me that way. Even though I could feel the hard tension of arousal all through his body.

I heard myself saying, “Yes, please,” before another part of my mind could rear up in fear. His expression changed, softened, at my response, and he leaned down to press a soft kiss just below my belly button.

Then he kissed his way down.

I squirmed slightly, my arousal throbbing as his mouth got closer and closer. I didn’t understand why I felt so completely vulnerable, but I did. I was shaking slightly as he nuzzled between my legs.

“Sean.” I gasped, clutching at his hair. My legs were wide apart, bent up at the knees. He’d parted my outer lips and extended his tongue to give me a quick lick.

He glanced up again at my face. I can only imagine how I must have looked. But there was that same heat in his eyes that was made up of so much more than lust—possessiveness and need and affection and other things.

So many other things.

“Ash,” he murmured, his eyes holding mine. “Let me make you feel good.”

I nodded, my fingers tightening in his hair as he lowered his face again. I couldn’t speak, and I couldn’t hold my hips still, and I made a wordless sound of pleasure when his tongue got going again.

He’d always been good with his mouth, and there was no exception with this activity. He teased and played until I was whimpering helplessly, and then he slid two fingers inside me, curling them up, and he gave my clit more focused attention.

I’d hooked my legs over his shoulders, having to fight not to squeeze his head between my thighs, and I was still grabbing at his head, his hair, rocking my hips shamelessly into his mouth.

I could feel my orgasm rising, but it wasn’t coming in one of those quick flashes. It was slower, deeper. I knew it was going to be good, and it felt totally out of my control.

Sean was making little sounds in his throat as he worked, and I knew he was enjoying my responsiveness, my complete lack of inhibitions. He had a handful of my bottom, holding me in place. With his other hand, he was still fucking me with his fingers, and then he started to suck hard on my clit.

All the tension in my body suddenly shattered, and nothing could contain my loud cry of pleasure as I rode out the orgasm against his fingers and mouth. My channel was squeezing hard around his fingers, and he pushed against the spasms. My clit was so sensitized it almost hurt as he gave it a few last flicks with his tongue.

I was boneless and gasping when he finally lowered my body and straightened up. His fingers and his mouth were both wet, proof of how much I’d enjoyed what he’d done to me.

For me.

I shook helplessly in the aftermath, naked on the bed, until Sean wiped his face with the back of his hand and moved up over me again.

I thought he would kiss me, but he didn’t. Instead, he pulled me into a hug. I clung to him, needing his strength and support as much as I’d needed the orgasm earlier.

“You okay?” he murmured into my ear after a few minutes. He was still aroused. I could feel his erection against my body.

“Yeah.” I took a deep breath and released it. “I’m good. That was… amazing. Thank you.”

He lifted his head and wiped away one little tear that had leaked out of my eye. I hadn’t even been aware of it. Then he leaned down to kiss me. “You’re welcome, baby,” he murmured against my mouth.

I wrapped my arms around him and kissed him back, and soon he was rocking his erection against me. We had to briefly separate so I could find a condom in my nightstand drawer and put it on him, but then we were kissing again, and he was easing himself inside me.

It felt so good, so familiar, and so new at the same time. Since this was my bed, my room, my home.

“Wrap your legs around me, baby,” he said, gazing down at my face as he gave a little thrust.

I did as he said, loving how it changed the angle of penetration and got him even closer to me. I pulled his head down so I could kiss him again as we started to move together.

It went on for a long time, just kissing and rocking together, and every part of it felt so good that my mind could barely process it.

I couldn’t stop. Kissing him. Holding him with my arms and my legs. Lifting my hips to meet his thrusts.

“That’s right,” Sean rasped, breaking the kiss at last as his motion grew faster. “I can feel you getting tighter. Can you come again?”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” I huffed out the words on each taken breath. My fingers were now digging into the skin of his back.

Sean was staring down at me as I tossed my head restlessly with the rising of my climax. “I want to feel you come. I want you to let go. Don’t hold anything back. Not from me. I want everything from you.”

His words as much as his motion pushed me over the edge, and I arched up, my mouth opened with a silent scream as the sensations pulsed through me.

He groaned as my body clamped down around him, but he managed to hold on to his fast, steady rhythm.

I squeezed my legs around him as I came down from my orgasm. I tightened my fingers in his hair.

Sean was panting now, his features twisting as he was reaching the edge himself. “That’s right, baby. Hold on to me. Don’t let me go. This is… this is what I want.”

I didn’t know if he was even aware of what he was saying, but the words sent my heart into a tailspin. I was almost sobbing as he fell over the edge, as I watched his face transform with pleasure, with satisfaction, as his body shook helplessly, as he jerked against me with a series of hard pushes.

We were both groaning and panting as he collapsed into my arms afterward. His body was hot and relaxed and heavy, and I didn’t want to let him go, even though my legs were stiff, even though I knew he needed to take care of the condom.

I finally lowered my legs reluctantly as he pulled off me.

I could barely move, so I just stayed where I was, naked on the bed, as he got up to throw away the condom.

He returned to the bed without a word, moving beside me and then taking me into his arms.

I breathed against his chest, listening to his fast heartbeat.

My heart was beating quickly too.

Sean stroked my hair.

I pressed a few kisses against his shoulder.

Neither of us said anything.

Eventually I fell asleep.

***

I woke up when Sean was trying to get out of my bed.

I’d slept hard—really hard. I hadn’t moved or woken up at all until I was vaguely aware of Sean trying to move me off him. I didn’t want him to get up. My body really liked how it felt to sleep against him. So I clung to him, resisting the change in position.

I was vaguely aware that Sean made a strange sound, and I woke up as I tried to figure out what it was.

“Sorry,” I mumbled as I realized what I was doing. I was clutching at him, trying to keep him from getting up. I rolled onto my back and relaxed my arms. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Sean said. He straightened up so he was sitting on the edge of the bed. I could hear him breathing deeply, but I couldn’t think clearly enough yet to figure out what he was doing.

I turned on my side and tried to see his face. He seemed to be staring down at the floor.

Then I looked at the clock and discovered it was three-thirty in the morning.

It was a Sunday morning. The bed was so comfortable. It would be even more comfortable with Sean in it. “You can stay,” I said. “You don’t have to leave yet.”

He didn’t move, except for his head, which turned to dart a glance at me.

“Unless you want,” I added, suddenly feeling terrified for no good reason.

He didn’t reply with words. For a while he didn’t even move. Then he stood up with a soft groan and went into my bathroom, closing the door behind him.

While he was in there, I woke up completely. I got up to find a big T-shirt and a pair of panties to pull on since I’d been sleeping completely naked. Then I sat on the bed and waited for Sean to return.

When he did, he didn’t get back into the bed. He reached down for his underwear and trousers on the floor.

He was going to leave.

I don’t know why it bothered me, but it did.

A knot clenched in my gut that got tighter and tighter as I watched him dress in silence.

Surely there wasn’t anything he had to do first thing on a Sunday morning.

He just wanted to leave.

Of course he did.

Why wouldn’t he?

We’d never been in a relationship.

We just met every other Wednesday for sex.

Yesterday had been an aberration, but it hadn’t changed our situation.

Sean was leaving.

He was a really good guy at heart, but he didn’t want anything but sex from me. He might like me—I knew he did—and occasionally he let even more feeling leak through the edges of his behavior.

But he’d never let himself feel anything more. Even if he was tempted, he would stop himself so his heart would never get ripped out of his chest again.

Every day, he made conscious choices not to change his mind.

Something had changed for me though. I knew now that I wanted so much more.

I wanted everything.

Not just in theory. Not in some flimsy daydream.

I wanted everything from Sean.

When he was dressed, Sean leaned over to give me a kiss. “See you on Wednesday night?” he asked lightly.

The casual question was like the stab of a knife in my heart.

It wasn’t his fault. It was mine. He was being who he’d always been, assuming nothing was different.

When everything was different for me.

I wanted Sean badly but not enough to damage myself trying to keep even the little parts of him I currently possessed. I knew exactly what I needed to do.

If he wasn’t going to let himself love me, then I couldn’t hurt myself making do with the little he would give me.

“I… I don’t think so,” I said.

I saw Sean’s body jerk slightly. He was silent for a beat. Then asked, very softly, “You won’t be there?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

Despite the clause in our contract that claimed we didn’t owe each other an explanation for ending our affair, I knew I did owe Sean an explanation.

I just wasn’t sure what I should say.

I took a ragged breath and shifted slightly from where I was sitting on the bed. “It’s… It’s just not enough for me anymore. I know I was totally wrong about John. I know I was stupid. But I still think that what I wanted from him—what I wanted from a relationship—was valid. I want someone to love me. I want someone to love. And what I have with you is… is great. It’s really… great. But it’s not love.”

I don’t remember ever baring my soul so completely to another person. The words stripped me bare and hung in the air for a long time after I spoke them.

I knew what I wanted to happen.

I wanted Sean to come over and take my hands in his. I wanted him to kneel down and admit that he did love me, that he wanted me to love him. I wanted him to say the Wednesday night meetings weren’t nearly enough for him either.

I wanted him to want everything too.

It was a long shot. Obviously. But after what had happened between us the night before, I thought it could be possible.

He’d seemed to be feeling more for me than just lust and companionship.

Or maybe I was just imagining it. Making it up in my head—like I’d always done before.

Because Sean didn’t come any closer. And he didn’t reach out to take my hand or touch me in any way.

He stared at me for a long time. Then he finally murmured, “All right. I understand.”

It was the worst thing he could have possibly said to me, proof that he didn’t even feel enough for me to argue, to get upset.

He was just going to let me go.

I pulled one of my knees to my chest and hugged it. I had to swallow a few times before I could speak through the lump in my throat. “Okay. Thanks. I… I’ve loved the time we spent together.”

It was the closest I could come to telling him that I loved him.

Because I did.

I loved Sean Doyle.

More than I’d ever loved another man in my whole life.

“Me too,” Sean murmured, his voice just slightly thick. He leaned over again and gave me one more, very light kiss.

Then he was leaving.

Walking out of my life.

Walking out of my life for good.

It didn’t feel right.

It wasn’t the way the universe should have turned.

But there wasn’t anything I could do to stop it.

I’d known from the beginning that Sean had loved a woman once, and he was never going to let himself do it again.

In a different world, he and I could have been happy together.

But that wasn’t this world.

In this world, he was who he was.

When I heard my front door close, I curled up in my bed and cried.

It was terrible. Absolutely terrible. To lose Sean the way I had.

But even in my grief, I knew I’d done the right thing.

Sean would never be second best to me. Not anymore.

And it would be a lie—an absolute lie, to him, to myself, and to the world—if I continued to act like he was.