As soon as I’d agreed to have sex with Travis, that was all the motivation either of us needed to finish painting the wall.

Flash-forward to over an hour later, to my bedroom where we were standing fully clothed and kissing. Needing to feel the warmth of Travis’s skin, I slipped my fingertips past the hem of his T-shirt and explored the valleys and ridges of his abs.

I wasn’t the only one hungry to explore. Travis’s hand skimmed up my side and cupped a breast. Even with the fabric of my bra and T-shirt between us, I could feel the heat of his palm soak through.

His thumb brushed against my nipple. It sighed in satisfaction. Satisfaction and the desperate need for more. Fortunately, Travis seemed perfectly happy to give it just that. He slipped his hand under the hem of my T-shirt, and a moment later my girls were free of the confining bra. Impressive.

He palmed the flesh, his hand hot against my skin. But it wasn’t enough. I leaned into him, thirsty for more of this, more of him, more of everything. I was rewarded with a pinch to my nipple. Hot need rushed to my core and I moaned.

But his teasing still wasn’t enough. I craved to feel his skin against mine. I pushed his T-shirt up, exposing his abs. Yes—they were as glorious as I had imagined.

I didn’t have to waste a moment wondering what his chest looked like. His T-shirt was on the floor faster than you could say Magic Mike. Was the fundraiser audience in for a treat? You had better believe it—especially if the other guys looked half as good as this.

But only I would know how it felt to touch him—thanks to the rules his team had imposed. Luckily for me, those rules didn’t extend to girlfriends—fake or otherwise.

Travis had stopped kissing me long enough to remove our T-shirts and take in the sight of me. For a second I longed to cover my breasts with my hands—but not out of modesty.

His eyes were dark with lust and a thrill trembled through me. “Christ, I want you so bad,” he murmured, voice matching the need in his hazel eyes. His hands moved to the waistband of my shorts, and with the same deft skill he had exercised with my bra, he slipped the button through the hole.

He slowly unzipped them, giving me time to change my mind—as if that was even a consideration. Was I nervous, especially because it had been awhile since the last time I’d had sex? I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t. But I wasn’t nervous enough to want him to stop. Just the opposite. I was nervous that he would stop before I was ready.

I mentally shoved the fear aside—which wasn’t too hard given what his fingers were now doing. He slipped my shorts down past my hips, and his fingers shifted to between my legs. He brushed a digit against my aching core. A whimper escaped my lips.

The ache thanked its lucky stars that I had finally come to my senses and retired Alejandro for the time being. As fine as my dear friend was, nothing came close to having Travis touch me there.

“You’re so fucking wet for me,” he said. “Just like I figured you’d be.” It looked like he was about to say something else, but then his gaze settled on the one thing I had hoped he wouldn’t notice on my right boob. The three small, round puckered scars—burn marks. “What’s this?”

“It’s nothing, really. Cupid’s tiny dragon created them. Okay, let’s get back to the part where I’m wet for you.…” I reached up on my tiptoes and nibbled on his earlobe.

Was it enough to distract him?

I wish.

Frowning, he pulled away. “What happened?”

“It’s not a big deal, Travis.” No—at this particular moment, sex with him was a much bigger deal.

“Did someone do this to you?”

I heaved a put-out sigh—echoed by the ache between my legs. “If I promise to talk about it afterward, can we get back to the part where we’re about to have sex?” Because if I had to wait any longer, I was likely to explode—and not in a good way.

He gave the scars another long look, then nodded. “Fine. But you’re not getting out of telling me.”

Once I’d nodded my agreement, he returned to his goal of removing the rest of my clothes. Although from the way I was feeling, I would have agreed to anything just to have Travis go back to touching me the way my body craved.

Impatient to get going, I shimmied my shorts and panties down my legs before he could stop me. That was enough to distract him.

Okay—that, along with me cupping my hand against his crotch was enough to distract him from my old owies.

And oh my, may I point out he had quite the package?

With a heated look in his eyes, Travis practically ripped off his shorts. He then stood there in his almost naked glory, his firm cock straining against the cotton of his boxer briefs. I took a mental picture so I would have something to remember when it was back to just Alejandro and me.

Travis removed his underwear. “See anything you like?” His voice held an edge of a smirk. I had no idea if there was a smirk on his face—that wasn’t where my eyes were focused.

All I could do was nod—and wonder what it would feel like to take him into my mouth.

“Sit on the edge of the bed,” he directed, his tone commanding, and my body went all tingly.

Curiosity spiked in me as to what he planned to do. It was answered a second later when he moved one of my feet and then the other onto the mattress, opening me up for him to see.

His heated look burned even brighter as he studied me. Not just my girlie parts laid out for him to clearly see. But also the rest of me, leaning back on my elbows. Seeing him like this pushed away any and all nervousness that I’d had up till now. It gave me confidence.

Wow, he was good.

“You okay?” he asked with a tone opposite the one he had just used.

I flashed him a genuine smile. “Definitely.”

He bent down and removed a square wrapper from his shorts, but instead of opening it and sliding the condom on, he set it on the bed.

He then ran his fingers along the inside of my thighs. Fortunately, they were scar-free. No need for him to stop again because he felt compelled to know where I’d gotten them.

Sex—the only thing that was on my agenda for the next while.

Travis knelt between my legs. “You don’t know how long I’ve waited to do this.”

Oh, I could guarantee nowhere near as long as I had…considering he didn’t even remember me from high school.

Before I realized what he was going to do, his mouth was on the ache between my legs, making it very very happy. I might have let out a moan to that effect.

Clueless what I was supposed to do with my hands, I grabbed the bedding. Except as I got closer to the peak, I wasn’t sure if that would be enough. Even with Alejandro, it had never been like this.

The ache between my legs would have said, “Told you so,” but it was otherwise preoccupied.

“I’m going to come very soon,” I said, in case Travis hadn’t guessed it from all the withering and moaning.

“Good.” He went back to what he was doing with his extremely talented tongue.

“I mean, if you want to be inside me, you should do that now.”

He chuckled against my clit, eliciting a louder moan from me. “Don’t worry about me. After I get you off, I’ll sink deep inside you.” The way he said the last part was like pushing the detonation button. Kaboom.

An orgasm to rival any that poor Alejandro had ever given blasted off inside me. I wouldn’t be half-surprised if I went up in flames.

By the time I returned to earth, Travis had the condom on and was standing.

After checking if I was still alive—very considerate, if you ask me—he lifted my legs onto his shoulders, positioned himself against my entrance, and pushed inside. He didn’t thrust into me right away. He just stood still, with only his tip inside me, allowing my heat to adjust to his width. Then he slowly entered me until he was fully seated.

And holy fuck, did it ever feel good.

But that was nothing compared to what came a moment later. He started moving his hips in circles, hitting places inside me I wasn’t aware existed.

“Oh. God. Oh. God. Oh, God.” That was as far as I got before another orgasm hit, equally intense as the last one.

Yes—it was official. I had died and gone to heaven.

It wasn’t long before Travis joined me in sated land with a final grunt and thrust of his hips. He leaned down, gave me a long, satisfying kiss, then removed himself and disposed of the condom.

I had no idea what to expect next. While I didn’t have any personal experience with one-night stands, I knew there tended not to be sleepovers. Not unless you enjoyed the awkwardness of getting rid of the person the next day.

What about the guys who had made it to date #3? All right, I’ll admit it—I usually gave them an excuse why I couldn’t stay the night and they never tried to persuade me to stay. There was never a date #4 after that—my choice.

And thanks to the woman in the paint store, I now understood why.

To be honest, I expected Travis to do the same thing.

Which was why you could’ve knocked me over with a chocolate bar when he walked past his clothes and joined me on the bed.

He climbed under the covers and turned to face me. His fingers traced over the round scars on my chest. “So, you gonna tell me how you got these?”

“Is that your way of saying you don’t believe Cupid has a tiny dragon friend?” I asked. “You’ve hurt his little dragon feelings. Hope you’re proud of yourself.”

“I’m sure both he and I will live. Now spill it. Did this happen in foster care?”

I glanced away.

“The reason I don’t want a girlfriend,” Travis said after a beat, “is because I had one while I was playing in Dallas. We weren’t serious. At least I didn’t think we were. I play professional hockey, which means I can easily be traded at any time. So I figured we’d have fun while we were together, and if I was traded then there’d be no expectations.

“Only she didn’t feel the same way. When I got traded to the Rock, she thought she was coming with me. It didn’t go down too well when I told her I didn’t want that.”

“What happened?” I asked, awed that he was opening up a bit of himself, even if it was to get the truth out of me about the scars.

“She started telling everyone we were engaged. Then she showed up here, somehow managed to track down where I lived, and broke into my apartment. In a wedding gown.”

The giggle? It just kind of popped out. “Sorry, I had an image of a woman in a white gown and tons of tulle, trying to scale your building. Was she arrested?”

The corner of his mouth tilted up to one side. “Now that would have been more entertaining. She would’ve had a harder time explaining her way out of that. Yes, she was arrested for breaking and entering, and I got a restraining order.”

I sat up and removed the small Cupid statue from my nightstand. In my best announcer voice I said, “And the nominees for being in the worst possible relationship are…Emma Lovejoy and Travis Hamilton.” I pretended to open an envelope. “And the winner of the dubious award is…Travis.” That got a laugh out of him.

With a faked fanfare, I handed him the statue. “Congratulations, Travis. Do you have any parting remarks for the audience?”

He threw his head back in laughter. “I guess we do make quite the pair.” He traced his fingers over the scars on my chest again.

I swallowed and pulled up my lacy big-girl panties. “They’re cigarette burns. It happened when I was fifteen. I made the mistake of getting mad at my foster father at the time and told him he smelled like a flatulent cow. Needless to say, he didn’t have a great sense of humor and punished me with the burning end of his cigarette.”

“Did you report him?”

I choked back a laugh. “Right. That wasn’t how it worked. And other than the one time, the family wasn’t all that bad. I could have ended up with someone worse.” Which I did—the home where I’d gotten the scar on my chin.

He ran his fingertip across said scar. “Did you really get this one from tripping on a crack in the sidewalk?”

I shook my head. “It was a gift from one of my foster mothers. She falsely accused me of seducing her husband.” I screwed up my nose to show what I thought of that preposterous idea. “She jabbed me in the face with a broken beer bottle.…Anyway, don’t scars build character?”

Anger flickered on his face, quickly replaced by tenderness. He cupped my cheek with his hand and his thumb traced my lower lip. “You’re something, you know that?”

I grinned. “Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

“Definitely a good thing.” He leaned in and showed me how much of a good thing it was with a gentle kiss.

Which progressed to a deeper, all-consuming kiss—because life was just that good.

Eventually he pulled away, allowing us to regain our breaths. He rolled onto his back and dragged me against him. I rested my head against his heart. The steady thump-thump-thump was soothing. Another point for the real deal versus poor Alejandro.

“When I first came into your store the day I had to pick up my grandmother,” he said after a few minutes, “you acted like you would rather have your eyeballs dunked in hot sauce and barbecued in a fire pit than have me there. At first I thought it was because I had fucked you at some point and couldn’t remember you, so you were pissed.”

“What made you realize it wasn’t that?”

“Because I knew I could never fuck you and not remember you.”

Only he didn’t remember. At all.

Maybe if you’d had sex with him in high school, the practical voice said, he would remember you from back then.

I shifted off him and rested my head on my hand, my elbow bent on the bed. “You really don’t remember me from our junior year in high school, do you?”