The smile shrank slightly. “I don’t think either of us is good at anything more.”

“Well,” I admitted, “we certainly are good at what we do. Speaking of which, I discussed you with Will,” I told her, letting the vibrating heat of her irritation focus on the side of my face for just a moment. She was fun to rile, this one. “Without names, Petal. Settle down.”

I waited for her to ask what I said.

And waited.

Finally, I looked over at her to find her still watching me carefully. We were stopped at a red light and everything in the cab felt completely still.

“So?” she said, giving me a slow, wicked smile when we accelerated forward. “You told Will you found a woman who likes to have sex in public?”

“Not in my cab!” the cabbie yelled so loud we both jumped and then broke into laughter. He pumped the brakes, jolting us. “Not in my cab!”

“Don’t worry, mate,” I told him. I turned to her and murmured, “She doesn’t let me f**k her in cars. Or on Tuesdays.”

“She doesn’t,” she whispered, though she did let me kiss her again.

“Shame,” I said into her mouth. “I’m good in cars. And especially good on Tuesdays.”

“So this conversation with Will,” she said, reaching across and shoving her hand beneath the suit jacket I’d laid across my lap. “If you didn’t tell him my name, what did you tell him?” She pressed her palm against my cock, squeezing.

Was she going to give me a wank in the cab?

Fucking brilliant.

“Sixty-fifth and Madison,” I told the driver. “Take the long way round.”

He shot me a look, most likely at the prospect of driving through Columbus Circle at rush hour, but nodded, taking Fifty-seventh toward Broadway.

“No sex in cab,” he said, quieter this time.

I turned to Sara. “I mentioned I’d met a woman, whom I was f**king quite happily. I may have also mentioned this woman was unlike other women I know.”

Sara tugged at my zipper, deftly pulled my c**k out, and gave me a rough squeeze. A strange warmth spread up my spine as I registered at the same time as I hardened that she was learning how to touch me quite familiarly.

“How am I different?” Leaning into me, she sucked on my ear and then whispered, “Other women don’t get you off in cabs?”

I stared at her, wondering who this woman really was; this fresh, innocent, and highly f**kable woman who barely needed anything from me other than a good shag. Was she playing me? Was this real?

Or would she break after a few orgasms, admit she didn’t like the arrangement anymore, tell me she wanted more?

Most likely. But as I looked at her—at her red pout and giant brown eyes so playful and filthy—no way was I going to give her up before she made me.

“I didn’t tell him much actually. Serious conversations with Will always devolve into insults about penis size.”

“Well, then I’m sure you went easy on him. ‘I refuse to enter a battle of wits with an unarmed man,’ ” she said, giggling into my neck and beginning to stroke me.

“Truly,” I whispered, turning to kiss her. “Though I’ll be honest: I have no idea how big his dick really is.”

“Well, if you want to know, I’m happy to find out and tell you all about it.”

I laughed, growling into her mouth, “It’s refreshing to have a chat with a woman who doesn’t feel the need to show off her intelligence all the time.”

“No sex,” the cabbie growled, glaring at us in the rearview mirror.

I raised my hands and grinned at him. “I’m not touching her, mate.”

He seemed to decide to ignore us, turning up the talk radio and rolling down the window to let in the late afternoon breeze and the incessant city noises. Sara’s hand began to slowly stroke up, twisting at the top, and back down.

“I’d suck you off if I didn’t think he’d notice,” she whispered. “I mean, you deserve the best. At least you’re beautiful on the inside, Max. Right where it counts.”

I burst into laughter, pressing my face into her neck to stifle the groan that followed when she focused her efforts on my tip. “Fuck, that feels good. A little faster, love. Can you?”

She faltered at the term of endearment, and then turned her face to suck on my jaw, her fist tight and fast over my cock. She glanced at the cabdriver but he was absorbed in the radio program and yelling at the traffic in front of us.

“Yeah? Like that?” she asked.

I nodded, smiling against her cheek. “I never would have guessed you’d be so good at this.”

Her laughter vibrated along my neck and beneath my skin. I’d never heard her make such a goofy, indelicate sound. Another one of her walls I’d penetrated. Victory surged warm and sharp in my chest, and for a brief pulse I wanted to yell out the window that she was letting me in.

She licked up the side of my neck, nibbled my lower lip. “You have the most perfect cock,” she told me. “You’re making me want you on a Tuesday.”

“Fuck,” I groaned. And as I came, jaw clenched, fists tight at my sides, I realized that Sara, too, had made me forget to act like a bloody arse about the whole thing and stop worrying about whether she was f**king with my head.

Sara reached into her bag, fished out a tissue, and wiped off her hand while it was still inside her purse, giving me a goofy grin and hiding the evidence from our cabbie. And then she leaned forward, and kissed me so sweetly it made me want to throw her down on the car seat and make her come against my tongue just to hear her little hoarse cries.

“Feeling better?” she asked quietly, eyes searching.

I learned something else about Sara in that expression: her first instinct—and the one she continually battled—was to please me.

But then we pulled up a block away from my apartment and she sat back, smiling pleasantly. “Is this where you’re getting out?”

I hesitated, wondering if she’d want to come with me. “I suppose, unless you’d like—”

Her voice was quiet, which I realized was her attempt at easing the harshness of her words: “I’ll see you Friday, Max.”

We were done. I was excused.

Nine

“Are we going to talk about it today?”

I turned from where I stood on the ladder and looked at Chloe. She held a paintbrush at her hip, and leveled her stare at me.

“About . . . ?”