The moment her lips touch mine, I’m lost. To myself, to her, to any memory of what is right or true or necessary.

Ecstasy. That’s what it’s called when saints experience spiritual euphoria, and I’m no saint, that’s for fucking sure, but this…this is ecstasy. The small whimper she makes when I slide my hand to the small of her back and jerk our bodies close together. The hesitant flicker of her tongue against my lips. The clean, sweet taste of her, the rose smell of her skin, the satin submission of her soft mouth under mine.

The trusting way her hands lace and hang around my neck.

And the tiny noise she lets out as I make her mouth fully mine—her tongue, her teeth, her lips—I hold nothing back. I turn so she’s the one backed against the stove, and I cage her in everywhere—my arms, my feet on either side of her feet—and I give in to every dirty urge pounding through me. I press my cock against her, my hands find her ass under the cheap fabric of her jumper, and I bite her lower lip until she moans. I keep it trapped between my teeth as I pick her up and deposit her on the counter next to the stove, and she parts her legs for me to step between as if we’ve done this a thousand times before.

The moment our bodies touch again, the moment the wide ridge of my erection brushes against the place between her legs, she lets out a gasp so sweetly surprised, so endearingly amazed, that I have to fist my hands in the skirt of her jumper to avoid doing something truly filthy, like playing with the edge of her panties. Like sliding my fingers under the elastic and finding out for myself if she’s shaved smooth or fuzzed with hair, if she’s wet and slick, if her clit is big and needy for rubs and kisses.

And then she grabs the lapels of my suit jacket and rocks her hips against me, seeking out the pleasurable friction again. And again. And again.

“Zenny,” I mumble against her lips, some valiant part of me recognizing that this is far, far beyond the kiss she asked for, and also recognizing that I’m going to come all over the inside of my Hugo Boss suit pants if she keeps it up. Even through the clothes, I can feel her heat, her shameless rolls hinting at where she goes soft and wet between her legs.

Fuck, I want to see it. I want to see her pussy. It’s suddenly all I can think about, all I can want or crave, just one glimpse, just a peek.

“I want to see your cunt,” I say hoarsely, lifting my head.

“My…cunt?” She says the word like she’s never said it out loud before.

“Yeah.” My voice is so ragged right now, so desperate, and fuck, I’ve never felt this frantic before. Like I’ll actually combust if I don’t get this one thing, this one small sight of her secret place.

She lets out a shaky breath, her hand dropping from my lapel to her skirt, which she slowly rucks up to her waist as I devour her lips once more, as I bury my face in her neck and kiss every sliver of skin exposed above her collar. I bite at her ear, at her jaw, my hand finding hers as it pulls her skirt up, so that I’m helping her do it, that we’re doing it together, this forbidden act, this forbidden revelation.

Her forbidden body.

That word, forbidden, spikes through my mind, bringing with it equal spikes of lust and fear. Because yes, it’s fucking hot that I shouldn’t be kissing her, I shouldn’t be begging to see her most secret place, my hand shouldn’t be covering hers as it slides up her thigh—but it’s also bad. Bad even for Sean Bell.

Bad, bad, bad.

Elijah’s disappointed face flashes through my thoughts, and I break our embrace, stumbling back a step. Zenny freezes, her mouth still wet and open from our kiss and her hand full of skirt fabric, hovering at the middle of her thigh. The long expanse of silky, dark leg gleams in the sunlight, and before she drops her skirt, I see a flash of snow-white cotton between her legs.

I swallow down a noise. I routinely fuck women who wear La Perla or Agent Provocateur, but somehow the sight of those simple cotton panties have my cock flaring and leaking all over the inside of my pants. I have to turn away from her to get a fucking grip on myself.

“Sean…?” she asks hesitantly, and when I turn back to her, there’s real worry on her face, worry that’s quickly turning into embarrassment.

What the fuck have I done?

“I’m sorry,” I mumble. “I’m so fucking sorry. I got—I have to go.”

And I leave as quickly as I can, forcing myself not to look back at the thoroughly kissed nun still perched on the counter.

* * *

Fuck.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

I kissed Elijah’s baby sister. The one who’s a nun—sorry, postulant—the one with the parents that my parents still refuse to speak with. The one who is currently causing my firm a giant PR headache, and to cap it off, I didn’t even manage to talk to her about the deal at all.

Not even once.

Valdman’s going to be pissed.

And Elijah’s going to be pissed.

And now probably Zenny is going to be pissed too, and with good fucking reason.

What is wrong with me? Sean Bell doesn’t do shit like this! He gets what he wants, he fucks whom he wants, and then he lives like he wants—no guilt, no ties, all the success in the world.

I run an agitated hand through my hair as I throw open the door to the Audi and get inside. I’ve barely even got the car started before my phone lights up.

Elijah.

Fuck. Okay. You know what? This is good, actually. This is fine. There’s no need to be scared; Sean Bell doesn’t get scared.

“Hey, man,” I say as I answer the phone. “What’s up?”

“What’s up with you?” Elijah asks dryly. “You’re the one who called.”

“Right,” I say.

Right.

“So, um…” I pull the car off the curb and into the street, trying to order my thoughts and trying to ignore the way my still-straining cock chafes against my zipper. “Your sister. Zenobia.”

“Did you see her last night? I brought her with me to the thing—I meant to have you come over and say hi to her. I don’t think you’ve seen each other in a while.”

I resist the urge to bash my head against the steering wheel. “Yep. It’s been a while. And I saw her.”

And nearly kissed her. And then I did kiss her today and almost made her flash her pussy to me while another nun was down the hall.

“Good, I’m glad you got to see her.” Elijah does sound genuinely happy, and an unfamiliar feeling of guilt crawls through me.

“Yeah, so…she’s a nun now?”

“She’s wanted to be a nun since she was a teenager. I never talked to you about this?”

“Sure didn’t,” I reply, navigating the car back to the firm. “Has it been hard with…you know? Your parents? And them wanting grandchildren and stuff?”

“Jumping right past the small talk today, I see,” Elijah says, amused. “Yes, it’s been hard, but it’s fine now. At some point they have to understand Zenny and me are allowed our own lives. We probably should have made it easier on them by rebelling in high school instead of waiting until after we graduated, but there you are. Why are we talking about this again?”

“Uh. Well. Zenny and I are sort of working together now. Or against each other, depending on how you look at it.”

Elijah is immediately wary. “What do you mean?”

I explain to him about the building deal and the Good Shepherd sisters going to the press about their upcoming eviction. And I’m about to tell him about the kiss, I really am, when he cuts in.

“Look, you know I don’t see anything wrong with what you do or how you make your money, but if you do anything to hurt Zenny or her sisters, there’s going to be hell to pay.”

“Whoa, man, I’m not planning on hurting anyone—”

“I mean it,” Elijah warns. “Zenny has wanted this for almost ten years, she’s had to put up with our parents and her friends all giving her a rough time about it, she’s worked her ass off to meet her obligations as a postulant while she’s getting her nursing degree. Do not ruin this for her.”

“I’m not going to!”

“Sean.”

“Elijah.”

“I know you, and I know what you do to people who get in your way, but I’m asking you for the sake of our friendship to keep her safe. Do not crush her to make more money, and do not fuck this up for her.”

The guilt has teeth now, chewing industriously at something inside of my chest. “I’ll keep her safe,” I promise, and I say it to atone for the ways in which I already haven’t kept her safe.

“Good. Because I’ll kill you if you don’t.”

I sigh. This is bad.

“And you are fine with her becoming a nun?” I ask. “Giving up a normal life?”

“Who gets to say what a normal life is?” Elijah asks. “The important thing is having a life with meaning. She seems to find that with the Catholic Church.”

“But the Catholic Church is terrible,” I counter, pulling into the Valdman and Associates parking garage. “Their meanings are all about homophobia and protecting predators and treating women like second-class citizens. How can you be okay with that? How can she be okay with that?”

Elijah’s voice is dry again. “Because I’m gay, you mean?”

“Well. Yes.”

“I get where you’re coming from, and trust me, I have an entire dossier of complicated thoughts and opinions on the Catholic Church after my childhood, but watching Zenny go through this journey has reminded me that there’s a lot of good people in the Church. People who believe in equal rights. People who are dedicated to helping the poor. Gay people and feminists and activists working for racial and economic and judicial justice. So maybe the Church isn’t perfect, but the answer isn’t shitting on it. And for Zenny, the answer is supporting what’s good about it and working to change the rest.”

I think about this for a moment. “Does this mean you’ll be heading back to Mass?”

“Fuck no. But it’s why I’m okay with my little sister becoming a nun. Nuns can do great things and Zenny is going to do great things, and I have no doubt in my mind that she is going to help a lot of people this way. Besides, it’s what she wants. That’s the most important thing.”

“Okay, okay.” I park my car and get out. “I hear what you’re saying. I still think the Church is bullshit though.”

“I know you do,” Elijah says. And then, his voice getting kinder, “No one’s forgotten about Lizzy, Sean. No one’s forgotten what you’ve gone through.”

“She wanted to be a nun too, you know.” There’s a stupid ball in my throat as I say the words out loud. “It’s all she talked about.”

“I know. I like to think that she and Zenny would have been really good friends.”

“Yeah. Me too.”

“I meant what I said though. Keep her safe or I’ll kill you.”

“Elijah.”

“Seriously. I know you’ve got a job to do, but do it without fucking her over.”

“Elijah. I already promised.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t trust you.” And then he hangs up.

Sigh.

I drop my phone into my pocket and rub at my face with both hands while I wait for the elevator. Okay, so things are not ideal right now—I’ve lied to Elijah (by omission though, that’s not so bad, right?) and promised to take care of Zenny, and now I have to go upstairs and explain to my boss why there’s not a plan in place to fix all this yet.

Sorry, Mr. Valdman, sir, it’s just that she has a really pretty mouth and a way of asking for things like kisses that I can’t resist.

Yeah, no. That’s not going to work.

The elevator doors ding open and I go inside, thinking. Clearly, I can’t trust myself around Zenny, that much is clear. And I just promised Elijah that I’d keep her safe, which almost certainly means not kissing her again.

Not begging to see her pussy like a thirsty man just craving the sight of water.

I’m a responsible human, and while I recognize that I’m what some people might call sinful and others might call an asshole, I would never force myself on a woman. I am more than capable of keeping my hands and eyes and words to myself; I’m more than capable of being around someone I desire and still acting ethically and professionally. But that’s not the problem—the problem is that Zenny asks for things and once she asks, I can’t trust myself to say no.

Because if she asks for another kiss, there’s no way in hell I’ll be able to stop myself. Definitely not now, not after I’ve felt how soft and eager her mouth is, not after I’ve felt the pliant mold of her compact curves against my body. If she asked for another kiss, I’d be on her before I could even catalogue all the reasons I should refuse.

And that’s bad.

Badddddd.

By the time I get to Valdman’s office, I more or less have a plan in place. Trent the Secretary waves me inside, and I give a cursory knock on the door before I step in.

“Ah, Sean,” Valdman says. He’s in a chair by the window, flipping through a file in a manner so desultory that I’m sure he’s not actually reading anything inside, he just wanted to have something to look at while he drinks more morning scotch.

“Hi, sir.”

“How’d it go with the nuns?”

I clear my throat, trying to muster the confidence and charm that normally come so easily to me. “Nothing’s decided yet, but I saw the shelter and I think I’ve got a pretty good idea of how to handle this.”

Valdman closes the file and picks up his scotch glass. “I’m listening.”

I take a seat in the creaky leather armchair next to his. “We need to find them a new shelter. Bigger and better and at no extra cost. I don’t know if we can make it happen fast enough to get in front of the story, but it will still do a lot toward repairing the image of the firm.”

My boss nods. “And you’ve already talked with them about this?”

“No, sir. I wanted to run it by you first. But the space they are using now is cramped and shabby. If we can find them someplace bigger, nicer, someplace that photographs well and will look good on the news, then we’ll be able to salvage this.”

“I like it,” Valdman says. “So long as it doesn’t cost us any money.”

“We might need to make a small donation to grease the wheels, but I’m hoping we can find an existing property that’s suited to their needs and comes at no cost to us. I’m sure we can find a client of ours who needs the tax break and who already has a property that would work.”

“Okay, fine,” he says. “Make it happen.”

I pause. This is the tricky part. “So, sir, I was wondering if it would be possible for someone else to take point on this project. At least when it comes to interfacing with the nuns.”

Valdman looks at me. And doesn’t answer.

“I’ll still do everything else—scout the new property and liaise with Keegan and Ealey and all that. But I don’t think I’m the right person to work with the nuns themselves.”

My boss continues to study me, and I resist the urge to shift in my seat. Don’t show any weakness, I remind myself. Look confident. Look like you’re ready for another victory lap.

“You know, this is the first time in ten years that you’ve ever asked to be taken off a job,” Valdman says. “You’ve handled senators, athletes, and international beer conglomerates for me, but all of a sudden you’re losing your nerve? You’re too soft to handle a bunch of nuns?”

“I’m not too soft,” I say defensively.

“Then what is it?”

I decide on a slice of the truth that doesn’t involve Zenny. “My sister killed herself because of a predatory priest. I’m sorry, but I’ve got too much baggage with the Church to handle the sisters directly. I’d be better off behind the scenes.”

Valdman takes a drink and smacks his lips. “Well, I can’t say that I’m not a little disappointed—I still think you’re the best man to be in the middle of it—but I can’t deny that’s a damn good reason to want to avoid the nuns.”

“So you’ll find someone else to work with them?”

“Yes.”

Thank fuck. “Thank you, sir. I promise I’ll do all I can to get this taken care of from my end.”

Valdman waves a hand. “I know you will. You’re a good employee, Sean, and I have total faith you’ll get this fixed.”

I’m glad someone does, I think.

* * *

That night, after checking on Mom at the hospital, I go to the club to let off some steam and to finish the victory lap I never got to take last night. I know strip clubs are generally considered seamy places, and there’s probably something so inherently dirty about transactional nudity that no amount of money can fix it, but this place comes close, because there’s a lot of money here. It’s exclusive, invitation-only, only open to members (yes, men and women) that clear a million a year. And besides, I like that it’s inherently dirty.

I’m inherently dirty and I have no plans to change that any time soon.

I get myself some Macallan and wander out of the bar area. The club is on the top floor of a downtown skyscraper, and while the lounge and dance areas are walled off from the windows, there’s a wide corridor along the perimeter of the club for members to take phone calls or simply look out over the city, which is what I do now. I cradle my glass in my hands and pick out the sharp lines of my own building a few blocks away. The lights are on in my penthouse, and I check my home app on my phone to see who the fuck is inside my penthouse, because the cleaning company should be long done for the day.

I pull up the kitchen camera feed and see the unmistakable lines of Aiden’s muscled, shirtless back as he digs through my fridge. Even in the slightly grainy feed of the camera, I see sweat gleaming on his skin.

I call him and he answers with a grunt.

“Stop dripping sweat all over my clean floor,” I say irritably.

“It’s not like you clean it yourself,” Aiden says. I hear the fridge door shutting and the clatter of a plate on the counter.

“And stop eating my food,” I tell him. “It’s fucking annoying to get home and have my fridge emptied out by a Neanderthal.”

“But you also don’t do your own shopping,” Aiden points out.

“Don’t you have your own place? With your own food and your own floors that you can get dirty any time you’d like?”

“I like the gym here,” Aiden mumbles over the beep of a microwave. “Plus it’s closer to Mom and Dad’s and the hospital.”

I don’t answer, and I don’t have to. Any mention of Mom is automatic ceasefire, and anyway, he’s right—on one of his trademark Aiden impulses, he bought some giant old farmhouse out in the country, and it’s a decent drive from the city.

“Don’t know why you bought that place,” I say, walking to another window so I can see in the direction of the hospital. It’s impossible to pick out from here, but it makes me feel marginally better to look at it, as if I’m still keeping an eye on Mom. “It’s huge and it’s not like you need that much room.”

“I like it,” Aiden says. “It’s quiet out there. You can see the stars.”

“You mean you like it until you want a decent gym or until you’re hungry.”

“That too.”

“I’m at the club. Why don’t you shower and come over?”

Aiden hesitates. “I think I’m going to head home tonight. I’ve got a busy day tomorrow.”

I frown. Aiden hasn’t turned down a chance to visit the club since he got his own invite a few years back, and while I typically avoid noticing these things about my own brothers, it’d be impossible not to know that his physical appetites are as strong as mine.

“You sure?” I ask. “Might be nice to blow off some steam.”

“Another time,” Aiden says vaguely. “Have fun though.”

“Yeah. Will do.”

I hang up the phone and lean my head against the glass, deciding to put Aiden’s weird behavior in a box in my mind and close the lid. I simply do not have the time or the energy right now to deal with whatever’s got him acting strange. And it’s probably just Mom stuff anyway. All of us brothers are handling Mom’s cancer in various unhealthy ways, and I guess there are worse ways to cope than random acts of celibacy.

“Hey, Sean,” a low voice says from behind me. I turn to see Scarlett, a pale-skinned, befreckled dancer that I like very much. Her hair matches her name, by the way. Everywhere.

I give her a slow smile. “Hey yourself.”

She’s wearing a silk robe, but she lets the middle gape open as she walks toward me and presses her hands flat to my chest.

“How about a private dance for my big boy?” she purrs.

The city lights twinkling in from outside make her look quite pretty; even so, I can’t help the way my mind wanders to this morning, to Zenny in the sunlight, to Zenny perched on the edge of the counter. To Zenny’s lush mouth and copper-ringed eyes and tiny little nose piercing. To the intoxicating mix of boldness and shyness that Zenny betrays every time she speaks.

I can’t help the way my body follows my mind, my cock reminding me rather churlishly that it’s had no relief since my episode with Zenny this morning, that it’s had nothing but my own hand for the past two weeks.

“How about more than a private dance?” I say, taking Scarlett’s elbow and leading her back to the hallway that leads to the private rooms. “I need to relieve some tension.”

“It’s extra,” Scarlett tells me, looking pleased. “But for you, I’ll throw in a discount.”

We go inside the private room, and Scarlett pushes me onto a small couch, crawling into my lap and tugging at my tie, and I breathe a sigh of relief that has nothing to do with the fact that my neglected cock will soon be getting the attention it needs. (Well, almost nothing to do with it.)

No, I’m relieved because things are back to normal now, after this crazy day. I’ve figured out a way to avoid Zenny, to keep Valdman happy, to keep my promise to Elijah, and now I’m exactly where I should be—relaxing with a glass of scotch and waiting for a warm mouth to make me feel better.

I’m a fixer. I fixed the problem, and now I’m done and I can stop thinking about it.

About her.