“Sir?” The driver’s voice stirs me out of my thoughts, and I realize we’ve stopped in front of my building. I look up at the tall grey structure. Home never looked so good. It’s a pleasure to unfold my long body and step out of the car.

I draw in a deep breath. New York. It smells of traffic, food carts, the crush of 27,000 people per square mile, the garbage they produce, and naked ambition. It’s not a good smell but it’s honest. Yes, I appreciate this city in a way I can never appreciate LA.

The lobby staff is gracious as always as I stride through. I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirrored walls of the elevator, and notice the worry lines around my normally clear, blue eyes. They seem soulless and cynical. Is there really nothing more than just this? Have I hit the peak and not realized?

I put my key in my door. I need to be alone for a little while. Recharge my batteries. There hasn’t been a day created yet that couldn’t be amended by opening my front door and knowing that everything is just the way I left it, just the way I like it. I look around at the grand space. Maybe there is nothing more, but maybe this is enough.

“Home.” I take in a deep breath.

This is my sanctuary. My haven. My solitude and peace in a fast moving, uncaring world. My first stop is the bar along one side of the living room. The bottles are gleaming, which tells me the cleaner has been around and gone. Good thing, since I’d hate to walk in on her and take great pains to make sure I don’t. Privacy is sacred in my world. Maybe because I got so little of it for so much of my life.

I pour out a small measure of Scotch. I know better than to overindulge. I know what that can do and never want it to happen to me. One of the overarching themes of my life: refraining from overindulgence. I take a sip of the drink made from a half-a-century old barrel of whiskey, and savor the smooth, mellow burn. Carrying the glass, I move through my home.

The apartment looks good. Whoever cleaned it did a solid job. Everything looks better than normal, I realize. The floors shine brighter than usual. The windows seem cleaner. The scent of lemon oil fills the air.

Is it a new girl?

There’s one way to know. I jog upstairs to one of the two guest bedrooms. I pull up the corner of the mattress. What I find surprises me. Yup. It’s a new girl. None of the others have ever bothered to change the sheets.

My discovery is enough to make me take a good look around the room, then around the second floor. I’ll have to ask Sarah to call the service and offer my approval and order that they never assign another cleaner, ever. This one is perfect, whoever she is.

Now, I’m softly humming to myself as I loosen my tie and walk down the hall to my bedroom. A hot shower is what today calls for.

No, a hard workout, then a shower.

I step through the doorway and the sight on my bed makes me stop short, almost sloshing Scotch out of the glass and onto the freshly-polished floor. No, scratch that. The floor hasn’t been polished yet. It doesn’t have the same gleam as the floor in the hall.

What the fuck? The cleaner is fast asleep on my bed!

She stopped and took a goddamned nap on my bed.

No commendation for this one.

Who the hell does she think she is? Curled up like a sleeping cat on my bedspread. I hope she doesn’t think I’m paying her to take a fucking nap. How long has she been staying here? Has she done this before? I’m already striding over to the bed and ready to give her the wakeup she deserves when she rolls onto her back, revealing her face for the first time.

I freeze with shock.

Is it her? Could it be? Jesus Christ, how long has it been since I last saw her? At least ten years. No, more like eleven or twelve. People change a lot over that long a stretch of time, especially when it’s the stretch between childhood and adulthood.

Even so, it’s her. I’m as sure of it as I am of my birthday. It has to be her. The color of her hair escaping from her shower cap. Her full mouth and brows. Her high cheekbones and slightly dimpled chin. The tiny mole beside her right eye, almost unnoticeable until a person looks close enough.

Yes. It’s Dani. Dani Saber.

If I believed in God or a Higher Power, I’d swear the girl was dropped into my bed by such power. It’s enough to make a person believe in fate, if nothing else. Because this is the girl I’ve never been able to forget, not after all these years, and all the willing women.

Wherever her life has taken her it has thrown her right back into my path. Forget path. In my goddamn bed! It’s the most incredible, unbelievable, impossible thing. I couldn’t have predicted this in my wildest dreams. I’m not the one who gets thrown off my game. Not me. But, I can feel my wild excitement racing through my blood.

I can’t lose my cool.

I need to think about this. How should I handle the situation? It’s strange for me, not knowing immediately what to do. I trust my instincts implicitly, always have. Nobody knows what’s better for me than me. But this? This is a whole other ballgame.

She doesn’t budge or even flutter her eyelids.

She’s obviously exhausted. Because of me? I hate the idea of her working herself to that level of exhaustion. She’s grown up well. Full in the hips, the ass, the tits. Slim waist and legs. I feel my cock stir for all her delectable curves. Hell, I want to exhaust her in other ways. So many other ways.

I step quickly and quietly out of the room and walk in a daze thought my vast apartment.

I go into the kitchen and stand, staring down at the breathtaking view of the city below me, but I can’t stop picturing the woman in my bed. Imagining her on the counter, legs around my waist.

It was so many years ago. Yet, it is fresh in mind as if it were only yesterday. I try to superimpose the image of the woman upstairs over the image of that scared, brave little girl in the schoolyard.

The one selling kisses…