I wake up to the sound of my generic ringtone, and as I grope the table next to my bed for my phone, I squint at the light of the sun shining through the window.

For a second, I wonder where the heck I am and why my skull feels as if it’s being pried apart by a crowbar. Then I remember.

Fancy hotel.

Martinis.

Barfing.

Humiliation hits me full force as I recall the fool I made of myself.

Connor Kenyon’s gorgeous blue eyes flash across those vague memories and I groan, fumble with my phone, and get a grip on it. My head is fuzzy, and I can’t recall everything perfectly—it’s more of a haze. I just know that I drank way too much at the bar and ended up here, alone in the hotel room that was supposed to be my sexual Shangri-La.

Great.

The number on the phone screen isn’t familiar, but I answer anyway, sitting up in bed, my mouth drier than ever, the beautiful room tilting.

“Hello?”

“Ms. Allyson Barnes?” asks a woman’s voice. She has a British accent, posh and smooth.

“This is she.” I stand from the bed, my head aching even worse. I pull the hotel’s plush robe around myself. Wasn’t Connor watching TV in the other room as I fell asleep? But as I wander out of the bedroom, I see that the suite is now empty.

“Ms. Barnes,” the woman says. “I’m calling on behalf of Highest Bidder in regards to your contract with Mr. Connor Kenyon.”

Nausea drags me down, forcing me to put my back against the wall and slide to the floor. The woman continues.

“As of last night, your agreement with him has been terminated at the bidder’s request.”

Now it feels as if I’m going to puke again. “But he bought me for a week.”

“You’ve been freed from any obligation. Mr. Kenyon is a top-tier client with our service, and his cancellation of the contract is due to your non-performance and disruptive behavior. Furthermore, Ms. Barnes, Highest Bidder isn’t willing to work with you again.”

It’s as if I’ve been smacked across the face. This isn’t even a punch so much as a sting, because all my life, I’ve never let anyone down. I’ve never even gotten into trouble at school, and this woman sounds as disappointed in me as Connor must’ve been—or as I am in myself.

“I’m so sorry,” I say. “Truly. It’s all a misunderstanding…”

Even as I say it, I cringe.

“Ms. Barnes.” Her voice is crisp. “Your contract is now complete.”

Click.

Mortification makes my throat clog up and my eyes go blurry. That girl who obviously drank way too much last night wasn’t me. It couldn’t have been. But I’m the one with a hangover, the one who’s on the edge of tears because, more than anything, I let myself down with this big adventure that was supposed to redefine me and bring clarity to my situation with Robbie.

I had no interest in anything but a purely physical encounter to see if I could figure out what I wanted in life. I wasn’t going to find true love. It was supposed to be so simple, and I blew it. And I made a total ass out of myself in the process.

I sit there with my head against the wall, swallowing back tears. I think about Connor—at least what I remember of him before my drunken nightmare really started—and my pulse thuds in my chest. Desire trickles from my chest down into my belly, heating me up, but it’s my heart that cries out more than anything as I think about Connor’s deep, soulful, mysterious, and somewhat haunted eyes.

Even in my hazy recollection, I know without a doubt that there were so many things I saw in his gaze that did something to me that I’ve never felt before, and I screwed up the chance to experience all of it.

I even messed up the opportunity with the website to have an experience with another bidder, and now I’ll have to go back home with my tail between my legs to a guy who betrayed my trust.

Disgusted with myself, I keep sitting there, wallowing in all the what-ifs and the I-wishes. I picture an alternate reality where I chose ginger ale instead of martinis and Connor took me up to this room, peeled off my dress, and seduced me with his hands and mouth. In that scenario, he’d still be here, teaching me all about sex and excitement for a full week, and I wouldn’t be a rejected, remorseful heap of rags on the floor.

I sit there some more, and it gets to the point where my mouth is so dry that I need to get up. I go to the bedroom to drink the water I remember Connor leaving for me. He left aspirin, too, and I down some of that. I eat the tasteless crackers on the nightstand as well while memories ease their way back to me—Connor watching me in the bar with a sexy grin on his mouth. The first time I looked into Connor’s breathtakingly blue eyes…

I take my shower, running my fingers over my breasts, wishing it were him. I touch myself between the legs, but I end up stopping because, with every passing minute, I get more frustrated with myself. The entire reason for this trip has now been ruined, but what bugs me even more is that Connor Kenyon thinks I’m a boozy idiot, and that’s not me.

I can’t stand that this is how he’ll remember me.

I put on a dark pink butterfly print sundress that I made with ruffled tank sleeves and a sweetheart neckline, a dress I made with my own two hands.

If only I hadn’t been drunk, and I had instead been sophisticated, spoken about my ambitions with design and fashion.

I feel horrible. I screwed up and now I just wish he was here so I could tell him that.

But what’s stopping me from apologizing to him? If I showed him how sorry I really am, would he maybe consider putting in a forgiving word for me with Highest Bidder so I can get a second shot at finding myself before I go back home?

Before I can change my mind, I put on my makeup, dry my hair until it bounces to my shoulders, then get ready to face Connor Kenyon.

* * *

Connor’s corporate headquarters for Kenyon Motors is a thing of modern beauty. The downtown design is as sleek, powerful, and magically futuristic as the high-end, technologically innovative cars he makes.

The outside of the building dominates the skyline with its sheer size and scope, and the inside is like a contemporary art museum, with a combination of stone gardens, fountains, and abstract sculptures.

I’m floored by all of it as I wait outside Connor’s office, thinking that his headquarters reflects the man himself. But I also can’t help thinking that there’s also a cryptic side to this building with its tinted windows that look over the city. I’ve seen the same enigmatic coolness from Connor.

The perfectly groomed receptionist sends me another look from behind her counter, and I smile at her, letting her know that, even though I’ve been waiting for Connor to see me for a half hour now, I’m not going anywhere. She turns away from me in her chair and murmurs something into her wireless headset, then resumes her work.

I get the feeling Connor doesn’t have time for me, but I’ve got to make this right. Only a coward wouldn’t apologize for the mess they made, and I am not that.

After another ten minutes, the receptionist stands and makes her way over to the buttery leather sofa I’ve been waiting on.

“Mr. Kenyon will see you for no more than five minutes.”

I spring out of my seat and smooth down my dress. “Five minutes would be fantastic. Thank you.”

She sends me a look that brings back memories of Connor’s irritation with me last night.

Am I sure I want to do this?

With a deep, fortifying breath to calm my stomach, I follow Ms. Roboto to a door. She doesn’t even deign to glance at me as she opens it, letting me through.

I barely hear her close it behind me as I’m swallowed by Connor’s office, which is decorated in all white: white desk, white circular ottoman in the middle, white light fixtures and tile. It’s amazingly plush while being as slick as the rest of the building, but even with the rich fabrics, there’s a starkness to it.

As my gaze flicks to Connor leaning against the wall by the floor-to-ceiling window with his hands in his pockets, my pulse jars to a stop. In his slate blue suit, he stands out, darker than anything in here.

My nerves twist, and suddenly I’m as speechless and anxious as I was last night. It’s as if no time has passed since I saw him.

“I didn’t intend to interrupt your day,” I say, “but I wanted you to know that I’m genuinely sorry for—”

He holds up a hand, and I clamp my mouth shut. He doesn’t give a thing away with his expression, merely easing his gaze over my sandaled feet, up my legs, over my sundress, then finally to my face.

A trail of sharp heat gnaws at my skin, turning me on all over again. I haven’t forgotten that part of last night. Or maybe I should say my body hasn’t forgotten, because every bit of me starts beating for him. Beating hard and wet and fast.

As I wait for him to say something, my nerves scream, and I can’t take it anymore.

“Highest Bidder told me that they won’t consider having me on the site again,” I say. “I didn’t mean to mess up so badly, and I tried to explain, but—”

This time it’s his cool expression that shuts me up. Then he turns away and moves toward his desk. “I’ll contact Highest Bidder to clear things up so that you can work with them again in the future.”

Oh. Wow. That was easy. Maybe he just wants to get rid of me.

He uses his free hand to type something on his computer keyboard, negligently keeping his other hand in his pocket, and when he looks up again, he seems annoyed that I’m still standing there.

“You can leave now, Ms. Barnes.”

He goes back to work as if I don’t exist, and I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but his dismissive attitude makes my belly do a flip. Lust pumps down between my legs, coating me there with heat. Is it because of his blue eyes, his hard body under the armor of that suit, his too-good-for-you bearing?

All I know with a shocking certainty is that I don’t want anyone else. I don’t want a new auction and a new bidder.

I don’t want to pursue some other lame one-night-stand.

I want Connor to be my first, and that was really the only reason I came to his office. It wasn’t for forgiveness or another shot with Highest Bidder at all.

A tremble of excitement—or maybe it’s fear—stimulates me. Suddenly I have no shame. Maybe I never did.

“Mr. Kenyon,” I say. “Connor?”

He doesn’t look up, just keeps typing whatever it is into his computer.

My jaw quivers as I take in those wide shoulders under the suit, the powerful chest, the tie I want to grab so I can yank on it, forcing him to look at me.

“I don’t want to leave,” I say. “And I don’t want another bidder to—”

“Fuck you for the first time?” The edged smile I remember from last night is tilting his lips as he continues working on his computer.

I swallow. My heart is pistoning, my breathing cut short. “Okay. Yes, if you want to put it that way.”

“Then tell me that directly. Tell me you want me to be the first to fuck you.”

His fingers have gone still on the keyboard, and it’s almost like he’s a predator poised nearby, waiting. Listening.

Wanting?

My clit pounds in anticipation, in pure need. “Mr. Kenyon…Connor, I want you to be the first to…” I can’t say it.

He looks at me with those hungry eyes, daring me to go on, and a tiny, wet explosion needles my pussy. That’s what he would want me to tell him.

I think he would want me to say that I need him to fuck my wet pussy.

I want this so badly that I force myself to do what he demanded. “I want you to be the first to…fuck me.”

He continues watching me as my heart throbs. He still hasn’t given an answer.

“Please,” I say. “Give me another chance.”

I’m pleading now, and just as I think he’s about to laugh at the stupid sexual beggar who won’t leave his office, his grin becomes a little cruel.

It gets me even hotter.

“Please,” I whisper yet again. I really am begging now, and somehow the act of groveling at his feet gets me even hotter.

He closes his laptop, and my breathing comes to a complete stop.

“Good,” he says. “You did such a good job of that, Goldilocks, that I’m going to give you another chance at a contract with me. But under only one condition.”

My chest rises, falls. I’m going to do anything he asks as long as he starts doing it now. I’ve been waiting for it ever since I first saw him last night.

But then his gaze goes dark.

“The condition is this,” he says, his voice low and rough. “You will listen to everything I tell you. And you will do exactly what I want, when I want, no questions asked.” His cruel smile fades and is replaced by a look of pure hunger. “Do you understand that, sweet Allyson?”