It was perfect. Well, as perfect as any casual fling that was confined to late night rendezvous could be. We kept our distance from each other during the day, always amicable but nothing more in front of Abby. But once she was in bed, neither of us could keep our hands off each other. We fell into bed—or onto the sofa…the floor…in the shower…or anywhere else that suited our needs—within moments of tucking Abby in for the night.

Ryan had had to spend some of his daytime hours at his office in the city, and every once in a while he’d come in late. But I was ready for him the moment he returned, and he’d seemed only too eager to strip every bit of clothing off me—on the rare occasions I was still wearing clothing when he walked in the door—and bury himself deep inside me. It was always like that; we were too eager and too desperate for each other to take our time at first. But then, once that first orgasm had helped to take the edge off, it was different. I’d tasted every part of his body and felt his lips on every inch of mine. And while I wouldn’t exactly call myself an expert yet, he taught me exactly how to drive him wild—and I’d figured out how to drive him to the brink, only to hold him there, drawing out what should have been seconds to minutes and increasing the intensity of his orgasm tenfold.

It was one of those nights when he’d been stuck at the office late, and after waiting for a full hour after I’d tucked Abby into bed, I decided to go for a swim in the indoor pool. I’d deliberately skipped the swimsuit and was doing languid, naked laps, waiting for his inevitable return.

And I waited…and waited. Though I’d been taking it easy, my muscles had begun to grow tired and I’d left the pool, wrapping a towel around my body and wandering through the quiet house. But still, he hadn’t returned. I was just about to pass by his office door when I noticed light seeping through where it had been left open a crack.

“Ryan?” I called peeking inside, but not expecting an answer.

But there he was, sitting behind his desk with a stack of papers in front of him.

“Yeah?” he said without looking up.

“Sorry. I thought you were still out.”

“No. I got home a while ago, but I’ve got a lot of work to catch up on.”

“Oh, OK,” I said, closing the door and trying not to feel the sting of rejection. After all, the man was in charge of a multi-billion dollar corporation. He couldn’t be expected to have every night free.

So, I wandered back up to my room and sat down at the edge of the bed. It was silly, really. It made perfect sense. And yet, in that brief exchange, I’d gotten the impression something was very wrong. He wasn’t just busy—he was avoiding me. But that made no sense. I was probably just blowing an innocent situation out of proportion. Clinging to that explanation, I laid down and let my mind wander as sleep began to tug me down. Tomorrow night—I’d see that everything was just fine then.

But tomorrow night came, and it wasn’t fine, at least not in my opinion, nor the opinion of my body that had been newly awakened to the pleasures of sex with a man who was insatiable. Or, he had been. He came home an hour before Abby’s bedtime, and my body had begun to hum in anticipation of what was to come. But five minutes after we’d tucked her in, he was at the front door and on his way out for a business dinner. I tried to wait up for him, but hours passed and I fell asleep on the sofa and never heard him come in. I woke up there by myself the next morning.

Day after day, his evening had become occupied with work or other engagements. Was that it? He’d gone from being unable to keep his hands off me to keeping as much distance between us as possible. I’d known it had to come to an end eventually—neither one of us had talked about this being anything other than what it was—sex. And I knew he had no interest in romantic entanglements, so it should have come as no surprise, but I wasn’t done. I hadn’t come anywhere close to having my fill of Ryan Cade.

I figured I didn’t need to wonder where he was going when he left the house in the evenings. He hadn’t said it, but if he’d had his fill of me, that meant he’d moved on to greener pastures. “Out” likely meant he was out with another woman. I hated the flash of jealousy that grabbed hold of me at the thought. I had no right to it, I knew that, but I felt it nonetheless. And that it was time for me to do what he’d apparently done already—accept that this was never going to be anything more than a short-lived fling and move on.

I didn’t wait up for him that night, or the next, though I couldn’t stop thinking about him no matter how many times I told myself it was over. I was pathetic, that was the only way to explain it. Ryan had been able to enjoy sex without getting himself tangled into wanting to draw it out longer. Why hadn’t I been able to do the same? Because he’d been my first? I couldn’t refute the possibility, but I knew myself well enough to think it an unlikely probability.

The truth was, as much as I hated to admit it, that while I craved Ryan’s body constantly, I wanted more than just his body, too. And since that just wasn’t possible, it was a good thing I’d realized it before I’d let myself fall in too deep. Perhaps his backing off had been a good thing, even if it didn’t feel like it at the moment. I fell asleep clinging to that thought, but I woke up abruptly sometime later. I had no idea what had woken me, but since I was hot and slick to the touch, it wasn’t hard to figure out what kind of dream I’d been having.

I pushed off the covers and got up, pacing back and forth across the room to try to dispel the restlessness that had settled over me, but it wasn’t enough. I slipped on my silk robe and opened the bedroom door, intending to pace the long hall, or maybe even go for a swim if that wasn’t enough either.

But he was right there, standing in the hallway outside my room, bare-chested and with a look on his face that I couldn’t figure out if it was more aroused or tortured. I wasn’t left to wonder long though. A groan escaped his lips and he lunged for me, but he didn’t stop once he reached me. He wrapped his arms around me and continued to step further and further into my room, forcing me to take a step back for every step he took forward. He didn’t stop until the backs of my knees pressed up against the mattress.

“God damn it, Emma, I can’t stop wanting this, wanting you. I can’t get you out of my head,” he whispered in a ragged voice before he captured my lips beneath his in a kiss that took my breath away with its intensity.

I didn’t notice that he’d yanked off my robe until I felt the cool air wafting in from the window against my naked skin, but I didn’t have time to take notice of it for long. He pushed me down on the bed and unzipped his fly, his massive cock springing free and making my thighs clench together against a desperate ache.

But he pried my legs open and moved between them, pulling my ass toward the edge of the bed and plunging into the hilt in one, smooth thrust. He didn’t slow to let my body adjust to his girth like he usually did. Instead, he withdrew and drove back in, and I smothered the loud moan I couldn’t contain with the back of my arm.

I couldn’t move; I couldn’t draw him in deeper—not yet. I focused on making my body relax around him as he thrust in hard and fast, holding onto my hips to keep my body from sliding further up on the bed with his powerful thrusts.

As my body adjusted, it joined in, moving against him, its desperation just as potent as his own.

He released his hold on one hip after a few moments and moved between us. His fingers pressed against my clit and my hips nearly bucked off the bed in response. I was so close already, so when he started to rub back and forth, I rocketed to the precipice. I was right there.

“Come for me, Emma. I want to see you come with my cock in your pussy,” he ground out between clenched teeth.

I couldn’t have held back if I’d wanted to. All of a sudden, the heat splintered outward, jolting through every fiber of my body and making me scream in ecstasy. His hips bucked, driving him in once more, and he followed me almost instantly.

Though he was done, I never wanted to let him leave, and I remained as still as I could to savor the moment for as long as possible. Eventually, he withdrew, but instead of zipping up his fly and leaving—like I half-expected him to do—he laid down on the bed and pulled me with him. He gathered me in his arms and I laid my head against his chest, listening to the steady pound of his heartbeat and letting it lull me into a blissful sleep.