The rest of the day was mostly silent. Rora hadn’t told anyone exactly where Leandra was, and she was deliberately giving evasive directions because she just didn’t want to give away the location yet.

There was a lively debate about stopping for the night. Some voted for. Some against. Then there was a lively debate about rooms, one, two, or three, how many did they need?

Rora should’ve known that doing this with two such strong-minded men would be difficult. But now that they’d made some progress, she voted to stop. If they didn’t address some of their issues and have some time to reorient themselves, someone would die before daybreak. It was just too close quarters in the car.

It was decided that they should get one room with two beds. Neither of the guys wanted her to be alone, for “safety” reasons apparently, but neither trusted the other to bunk in with her. So it was decided that because no one trusted anyone else, they could keep an eye on each other if they were all in the same room.

They took their things from the truck and traipsed inside to the motel room that had two double beds, and a couch. Perfect.

Deciding not to leave anything of theirs in the truck, just in case, the guys took the heavy things inside, leaving her to carry Opal, who’d become something of a security blanket.

Going to the furthest away of the beds, Rora climbed onto it on her hands and knees, ready to flop down, but she noticed something missing. “Where’s my pillow?” she asked, looking left and right.

“Pillow?” Strike asked. “There’s a pillow right there beside you.”

“Not that pillow, my pillow,” she said and smiled when Junker held it up.

She clapped and opened her arms to receive it, so Junker tossed it in her direction, but Strike lunged over and snagged it before it got to her.

He came to her, holding it up. “What the hell is this?”

“My pillow,” she said, trying to take it from him. “Junker got it for me because my neck has been sore.”

Strike scoffed and threw the pillow away over his shoulder. “Sore, huh?”

When he grabbed her shoulders, Rora gasped and tried to pull away, but he held her tight, squeezing and massaging the muscles at the sides of her neck.

“Get your hands off me,” she exclaimed, trying to wriggle away. “Don’t touch me! I don’t want—oh, God…”

Her gusto vanished when he squeezed the sore spot and it immediately relaxed.

“There?”

“Right there,” she breathed out. Closing her eyes, she let her head fall to one side. “Mmm.”

“Feel good, baby?” Strike asked.

All she could do was nod. He squeezed tighter and she felt his fingers all the way down through her body to her core.

A moan slipped from her lips. “Higher, Ex,” she said. “Harder.”

“Harder?”

“Yes, harder. I want it to hurt,” she said, thinking that overwhelming the ache might erase it.

“You like it hard, don’t you, baby?”

She actually started to agree with a nod and then realized what he’d just done. Opening her eyes, she straightened and grabbed his hands away from her body to spin and glare at him.

“You’re evil, you know that?”

“You’ve told me before… How’s the neck?” he asked, but the smirk on his face told her that he knew he’d worked out the knot.

“Trust you,” she muttered, knowing nothing came for free with him. Of their own accord, her eyes dropped to his fly. “What do you want?”

Leaning over, he scooped a hand around to the back of her head, giving her the slightest tug toward him. “I was thinking tech time, but if you’re thinking that…”

“I wasn’t thinking anything,” she said, but he curled his fingers, catching her hair in his fist at the back of her head. Just like he’d hold her if her mouth was open and filled with his—

“Why do you always want to hurt her?” Junker asked.

When Rora registered the tension in Junker’s expression as he marched toward them, she drew Strike’s arm down, taking his fingers from her hair.

“He’s not hurting me,” she said. “And my neck does feel better.”

Though not completely appeased, Junker did stop his advance. “Do you want me to draw you a bath?”

“Thank you,” she said, not that she really wanted to get into the tub, but she’d let Strike help her, so she figured it would be right to let Junker do the same.

He disappeared to the back of the room and into the bathroom. As soon as he pushed the door over, she wiped her smile and sagged.

Flopping onto her back, Rora planted her hands on her face. “Oh, Strike,” she exhaled.

“What do you see in that guy?”

When she felt him moving onto the bed, her hands fell. But her next breath was so sharp, it was almost a gasp. Strike had no shame about parting her legs and resting his hips between her thighs. She couldn’t believe he’d be so brazen, but he compounded that act by stealing her wrists and pushing them into the bed so he could loom over her.

“What are you doing?”

“We’re alone,” he murmured, a sinister purr in his voice.

“It takes two seconds to turn the water on,” she hissed and tried to struggle. “Get off me.”

“I thought about getting you off first.”

“Strike,” she objected, but didn’t want to raise her voice, if Junker thought Strike was forcing himself on her, there would be all out war. “You have to stop this. We have to stop.”

“Why?” he asked, brushing his lips over hers. “Because it’s wrong? Because it’s bad?”

Both would only serve to turn him on more. “Because we’re over,” she said. “You were right to resist this. You didn’t want us to be together and I pushed. I shouldn’t have.”

“Why not?” he asked. “What the hell’s changed? The square? Tell me you want him and—”

“You’ll leave me alone?”

“I was going to say I’d kill him,” Strike said, his head tilting, but she wasn’t sure he was joking.

Though he grumbled, he did get up off her. He’d just stood up when Junker came out of the bathroom. “There’s bubble bath in there,” Junker said.

“Party time,” Strike mumbled.

“Thank you,” she said.

Rora wanted to issue instructions for them to get along but thought that was likely to be inflammatory. So, instead, she gathered her nightwear and her toiletries, and slipped into the bathroom.

Tying her hair up on top of her head, she wiped steam from the mirror and washed her face.

When the bath was so full it was ready to overflow, she turned off the water, and slid into the soothing bubbles. With her eyes closed and her head propped on the back of the tub, Rora had to admit it did feel nice to be submerged in the warm water that was making her skin tingle.

“What did you want to talk about?”

Fright made her gasp. Opening her eyes, she sat up so fast that water sloshed from the tub. Strike took a single step backwards to avoid the water hitting his boots, managing, in his usual nonchalant way, to be so cool in avoiding disaster.

“Can I help you?” she asked, glancing down to see her breasts were exposed.

Sliding down in the water, she scooped some of the bubbles upward to conceal her chest. But this was Strike, he had no shame. He just sat on the toilet lid and propped his elbows on his knees.

“You said you wanted to talk.”

“I’m naked, Strike.”

“So?” he asked, his fingertips skimming the water to move some of the bubbles around, probably giving himself a view beneath the water. “You said you wanted to talk, whatever it is, we’re alone, there’s no clock, so talk.”

“The point of lying in the tub is to help me relax, having you in here doesn’t help me relax.” Grabbing the neck of his tee-shirt, he pulled it off over his head. “What are you doing?”

“Lean forward, I’ll give you a neck rub.”

“You are not getting in this tub with me,” she said, eyeing the door that was open a crack. “Junker is right out there.”

“I say again, I’ll take him out if—”

“It’s disrespectful. Anyway, how many times do I have to say that we’re not together?”

“It’s a neck rub, not a ring,” he said and stood up to slide the leather of his belt from its buckle.

Panic made her cling for the edges of the tub. It wasn’t just a neck rub, it was a naked neck rub, and after how good his talented fingers had felt working her flesh out there in the room, she didn’t trust herself not to get confused if he touched her.

“Stop it,” she hissed. “Do not take your pants off.”

“Talk or I’m getting in there,” he said, “and I’ll make sure your little buddy out there knows exactly what’s going on in here… and what we did the other night.”

Narrowing her eyes, she resented how easily he could push her buttons. “Fine, I’ll talk,” she said. Strike sat on the toilet lid again. But before she got underway, she had to check something. “Are you armed?”

That intrigued him. “No,” he said. “Do I need to be?”

“I’m just thinking that after we start talking you might want to kill me.”

He shrugged. “Then I’ll drown you.”

The water. She eyed the tub that she’d just been enjoying a few seconds ago, realizing it could be her coffin if Strike decided it should be.

“Ok, now I’m feeling vulnerable and thinking we should do this later… Take your pants off.”

The side of his mouth lifted, and he got closer. “Now I’m too intrigued to fuck you… What did you do, naughty girl? Tell me and after I’ll make you come so hard, your scream will melt the foundations.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” she muttered and rubbed the side of her neck. “Strike, I… I want to be honest because I figure that if I just tell you, it will be better than you finding out on your own. But… this really isn’t a good setup for me. I’m naked and slippery and you’re stronger than me and—”

He breathed out a kind of laugh. “You’re actually worried about this? Geez, Cupcake, I’m not gonna kill you. Why would I dispose of your body? Playing with it is too much fun.”

“You say that now, but…”

Her eyes wandered away from him. “This is about the Point,” he said.

Her attention leaped back to him. “How did you know that?”

“It is, isn’t it?”

Could he know? No. He’d said he was working on it. For a minute, she let her jaw move, but resisted telling the truth. But she couldn’t resist forever. “I lied to you. That… What you took from me at the resort wasn’t the Point.”

“I know,” he said, so calm and collected while she was the one left stunned. “It was a test.”

“You… you know?” she asked almost not recognizing the man sitting with her. “Why are you not mad?”

“The day you left me… I put the device into Opal, you walked out the door, and… something happened that’s never happened before.”

“What?” she asked, twisting to hook her hands on the side of the tub closest to him. “What happened?”

“I felt guilty,” he said. “Took me a minute to figure out what it was, but I actually cared that I’d hurt you.” He shivered, like the very idea of guilt made him feel sick. “I was on autopilot when I left you tied to that bed and as soon as I started driving, I knew something wasn’t right… it was like there was this weight in me… I didn’t get it.”

“That’s why you went back to Buddy’s? You hoped I’d come to you and we’d make up?”

He shifted an elbow onto the side of the bath. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I told you that you fuck with my head… When you showed up, I saw what I was doing to you, but I wanted to win. That’s what I always do. I do what suits me and I win… I’m used to toxic, like with Bella.” He’d told her. “I didn’t think you’d really go, I figured it was some kind of game, but you did go. I thought I was prepared to lose you, but when you walked out, I didn’t feel like I’d won.”

“You should’ve talked to me,” she said, sliding down the edge of the tub to get closer to him. “Told me what you were thinking. I thought you’d played me all along, that telling me you loved me, that our whole relationship had been a con for you to get your hands on the Point.”

“I saw a chance and I took it. It’s a way of life for me, baby. It’s the way my mind works, I wanted the Point and I saw a way to get it… Whatever you do to me, baby, no other woman’s ever done it… I guess I couldn’t figure out how to handle it… how to handle you.”

“So you pushed me away?”

Scooping her hand from the enamel, he laid it between his two hands, his chest resting on the back of his own hand when he hunkered down. “I didn’t understand why you were so mad, I didn’t get it. But it was my fault, I didn’t tell you what I wanted…”

“From us?”

“From the Point,” he said and sneered at himself. “It was never about taking over the world. I hate people, you know that, and as long as we have enough money to live, I don’t give a damn about dough. Hell, you’ve seen the kind of place I setup camp. I could reserve rooms in the Plaza and not pay a dime, but I pick a secluded, dingy hole because I like it.”

The loft wasn’t dingy. It wasn’t water-tight, but there was something appealing about its earthiness; something beautiful about finding love in an abandoned place. The loft was an embodiment of each of them. They’d each known what it was to be built up and then condemned and forgotten.

“I don’t understand,” she said. “If it wasn’t about the money or power… then what was—”

“The tech,” he said, his thumb brushing across her knuckles. “Tech turns me on, Cupcake… I had to see it.”

Sincere, yet hard, she doubted he expected her to swoon, but she did a little. “You’re a big kid, Stryker,” she whispered and boosted herself closer to kiss his shoulder. “You wanted to play with a shiny new toy.”

Slipping a hand out from between his chest and her hand, he cupped her face and tried to draw her mouth up to his. Rora parted her lips, her heart pounding; doubt, confusion, love, all of it bounced off each other in her chest. Before their lips could meet, she lay back, taking her head from his hand.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. “I’m sorry, baby. Ok? I’m stubborn. I’m impulsive… This won’t be the last time I’ll hurt you. But the way I feel about you hasn’t changed. It won’t ever change. And my loyalty to you won’t change either.”

“I don’t want you to hurt me, Strike. I wanted you to love me… more than you loved the tech.”

“And I warned you… I’m weak.”

In so many ways, he was the strongest man she knew. That was part of the reason it wrenched at her heart to hear that the only thing he couldn’t be strong for, was her.

Rora tried to put it into perspective for him. He saw it as wanting to experiment with a new toy, but she saw it as a betrayal, and he had to understand her point of view.

“And what if next time it’s not tech, it’s another woman?”

Startled, he recoiled at the suggestion. “A woman?” he asked and sat upright. “Shit, baby, you don’t have to worry about that. My dick’s easier to control than my intellect. You remember the blonde? You served her up to me and I didn’t follow through.”

“Says you.”

“I don’t lie to you.” Her brows rose because she couldn’t contain her incredulity. “Ok, so I don’t lie to you about that kind of stuff. Being faithful, I can handle, women never really interested me anyway. You have your obvious uses but…”

“It’s those obvious uses that worry me.”

“Bella put it on a plate. She offered me both of you, together, didn’t take it, did I?”

“Because you can’t stand her,” she said, rolling to her back and folding her arms beneath her breasts. But Rora breathed out to confess. “I’m not really worried about you sleeping around, it took me long enough to get you into bed, but… I’m trying to make you see why I was hurt. Prioritizing something else over me when I’ve told you the opposite is important to me… You broke my heart, Strike. I don’t know what to believe. I don’t know if I can take the risk that you might do it again.”

“We both know that you love me,” he said, in a quote from their first night together.

Being led by her heart would be easy, but she still needed answers. “Why did you let me think you were working on the Point?”

“Wanted to see if you’d tell me the truth,” he said. “You didn’t.”

She stuttered. “I was shocked. I thought you’d want to kill me for misleading you like I did. I really thought that you’d have accessed the Point, seen it wasn’t what you thought, and come on the hunt for my blood.”

He hunkered down. “After you walked out of Buddy’s, I sat forever just looking at that front door.”

She knew what that was like and a burst of satisfaction curled her lips. “I sat staring at that door in the weeks after you walked out on me. I was staring at that door when I decided to go bust up all those cars to get your attention.”

“If I thought it would’ve worked, I’d have put a hole in the Earth to bring you back to me. Playing with a piece of tech wasn’t worth losing you… but I didn’t know that until it happened. Seconds after you left, I took the USB out of Opal and waited. I was sure you’d come back. When you didn’t, I went on a binge, got myself good and drunk. I didn’t know how to pursue you, I’d never cared about chasing a woman down for anything except business before. I thought you’d come back to me… you didn’t.”

“In my defense, Bella had me locked up.”

“I know that now,” he said, leaning closer to pick her hand out of the water to press it on the edge of the tub again. “And I’m sorry I let her hold you. I wanted to be the one to come for you, but if she’d found us both in that room together, she’d have locked the door and made us do things to each other, and to her that—”

“If you’d walked into that room, I’d have thought my nightmare was coming to life,” she said, but he didn’t respond to her attempt to joke.

Probably because it wasn’t much of a joke. Bella would’ve used their love to play them off each other and Rora’s nightmare probably would’ve come true because if it meant saving her life, Strike would’ve had sex with Bella in front of her, and he wouldn’t have had a choice.

“I’m still sorry, Cupcake.”

Something dawned on her. “If you took the USB out of Opal without using it, how did you know that it wasn’t the Point?”

“Because I tried to do what you asked me to do. After the first week, it struck me that maybe if I destroyed the Point, you’d be happy. You’d know I was for real and didn’t give a fuck about it. So, I did. Except it took no time at all to wipe the USB and that was when I knew you’d conned me. Something as powerful as the Point wouldn’t have slipped away in seconds. I’d used an atom bomb to destroy a grain of rice… I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me when you were telling me at the resort what you’d done to Benjamin. You did the same thing to me. Suddenly, I don’t know, everything fell into place. You took me to the same place you took Benjamin when he thought he was hiding the Point with you?” She nodded. The corner of his mouth lifted. “Damn, you’re good, baby.”

The last thing she’d expected was to see him relaxed about it. “You… you’re not mad?”

“Proud,” he said. “You proved something to both of us… You said in the loft that I had to trust myself. I would never have been able to do that if you hadn’t given me temptation like that. And yeah, I failed at the first hurdle, but ultimately… I chose you, baby. I chose you over the tech… That’s how I know this is different. That’s how I know you can trust me… because finally I can trust myself… when it comes to you anyway.”

Rora still wasn’t a hundred percent sure that the story was true, he could be trying to manipulate her into giving up the real Point or Leandra’s location. But she’d never seen him like this. There was a new kind of optimism in his eyes when he looked at her, like he really could see his redemption in her.

While she was still trying to figure out how to respond. There was a noise from beyond the bathroom.

Sitting up straight, she listened to the scuffle and the mumbled voices. “Strike,” she said.

Up on his feet, he went to the door to try to peek out, but the angle wouldn’t give him a great view.

“Stay in here, Cupcake,” he said, and opened the door to slip out.