At work the next day, all I can think about is Chaucer. That seems to be a theme with me lately. Everything reminds me of him. Every time I see a tall stranger with his same hair color and build walking down the street, I peer expectantly, hoping to it’s him. I’m completely under his spell.

Megan finds me huddled at my desk on my lunch break.

“What are you doing here sulking all by yourself?” she says, sitting on the edge of my desk, holding a hotdog. That girl never stops eating. Is that what being pregnant is like, being hungry all the time? Aside from having a baby, I want to be pregnant. I want to experience everything there is about bringing a new life into this world. What an amazing responsibility.

“Nothing, I’m just hungover,” I lie. One Long Island iced tea gave me a decent buzz, but nothing to ruin me the next day. Chaucer did that on his own. I’m still kicking myself for not saying something to him. In a setting like that I could’ve gotten to know him and ask him about his past without breaking the rules of the club. Now I will probably never see him again. I’ve avoided all calls from Mosaic and they stopped billing my credit card for the payments, so I’m certain I’ve closed that door for good.

“I have something that will make you feel so much better,” she says.

“What?”

“Well, there seems to be some hot guy in the doorway staring right at you. I think you might have an admirer,” she says, looking across our office space toward the entrance.

I follow her gaze across the long stretch of desks that sit in rows in the big room. When I see who is standing in the doorway, I almost fall out my chair as I scramble to my feet. Chaucer stands there with his hands tucked in his pockets. He smiles and I lose my mind. How is he here? Is this a dream, something I’ve conjured out of my own mind from wishful thinking? Or maybe a symptom of low blood sugar since I haven’t eaten anything but ice cream in the last two days.

“I’ll be right back,” I say absently to Megan as I head toward him. She’s talking—I think she’s asking if I know him—but I don’t hear a word she says except for the tail end.

“Take your time with that one,” she says with a teasing lilt in her voice.

When I’m right in front of him, I realize just how tall he is. He towers over me. Hard to tell when we were horizontal on the bed.

“What are you doing here?” I ask.

“Is there somewhere private we can talk?”

I lead him to the gardens outside where the smokers used to go on their breaks before smoking was banned near the building. We can be alone here. I’m giddy as I walk, but trying to remain calm—or at least make him think I’m calm, when really I’m screaming inside. I still can’t believe he’s here.

There’s a granite bench near the rose bushes. It smells amazing out here, but nothing compared to him. I wonder if he would think I’m weird if I leaned over and gave him a good sniff. I want to bring back those memories of us together, and scent is the best way to preserve a memory.

I sit on the bench. Chaucer sits next to me. Close enough for our legs to touch even though there is plenty of room on the bench for two more people to sit. I want to lean into him, touch him the way I had when we were alone in that room. But then I remember the accusations against him, and I’m torn.

“I saw you at the bar last night,” he says with an eyebrow raised.

My entire body floods with heat, and I know from experience that my face and neck are bright red. That always happens when I’m embarrassed.

“Why did you hide from me?” he asks.

“I don’t know. I guess I wasn’t ready to see you outside of the club.”

He looks down, the mischief draining from his eyes. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you didn’t want to see me. I shouldn’t have come.” He starts to stand, but I grab his arm, desperately.

“No, it’s not that. I just didn’t want to break the rules of the club, and I wasn’t sure how the rules applied to a situation when you run into the person outside of the club.”

He falls silent and I use that moment to ask, “How did you find me?”

It’s his turn to look embarrassed. “Turns out I’m not very good with rules. I paid the bartender to give me your name after he closed out your tab.”

“You were still there?”

“I was. I watched you leave the bathroom and go to the bar.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

“You clearly didn’t want to talk to me, so I didn’t want to force myself on you.”

“Then why are you here?”

He hesitates. “Because I can’t stay away from you any longer. I need to know what happened. What did I do wrong? Why wouldn’t you make more appointments with me?”

I look down at my hands. They’re starting to sweat. “I broke the rules too. That first night we were together, I was folding your clothes and your wallet fell out. I saw your name on your ID. After our last appointment, I couldn’t help myself. I looked you up online.”

His face goes very pale. His Adam’s apple dips in his throat when he swallows.

When he doesn’t say anything, I continue. “I wasn’t sure if you were dangerous to have in my life, or if your past would lead back to a child you fathered later on.”

His eyes darken and he looks tormented. I hate seeing him this way. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I shouldn’t have judged you like that.”

“No, you’re right. Those things they said about me online are terrible. But they aren’t true. It’s all a mistake. I don’t expect you to believe me. I wouldn’t believe me either after reading those accusations. This is why I’ve stayed away from dating, why the club seemed like a good idea when I started. Women always react like this when they hear about my past. I don’t know why I thought things could be different with you and that maybe we …”

His words trail off. I lean in as if I might hear the tail-end of something if I got close enough. But he’s done talking. He stands up.

“I need to go,” he says. He turns his back on me and walks away.

I’m too stunned to follow at first. I can’t let him leave. Not like this. What did he think could happen with us?

I chase after him through the gardens. “Chaucer, wait,” I say.

He stops and turns to face me. I throw myself in his arms. His hands cling to me, arms wrapped around me tightly as he squeezes me in a hug.

When he pulls away, he looks deep into my eyes. I know he cares about me the way I care about him. I’m still worried about his past, but that doesn’t stop me from wanting to be part of his future.

“They’ll never let me back into the club after this,” he says. “I’ve broken too many rules.”

“You’ve only broken the one rule about learning my name. I can keep a secret.”

“That’s not the only rule I broke,” he says.

“What’s the other one?”

“Rule number three, the most important rule of all: Never fall in love.”

My heart grows humming bird wings and flutters in my chest. A lump sits in my throat. I struggle to swallow it down.

“I want to see you again outside of the club,” he says. “I want to be with you.”

A hundred thoughts clamor to the forefront of my mind, battling for my attention. But the one that keeps trumping all others is knowing he’s in love with me and I’m in love with him. I want to be with him more than anything.

He grips me by the waist and pulls me toward him. His lips crash against mine in a long and passionate kiss. I don’t care who sees. I don’t care about anything right now except for being with him.

When we part I say, “Let’s go.”

His lips are red from the kiss and his eyes are glazed over with lust. If I knew we wouldn’t be caught, I’d let him fuck me right here and now in the garden.

“Where?” he says.

I grab his hand and lead him out of the garden. When we’re back inside the building, we run into Megan. She’s looking curiously at me. She walks up to us and I can tell by the look on her face she knows we were up to something in the garden.

“Who is this?” she says.

Megan and I have been friends a long time. We tell each other everything. Keeping a man a secret is not part of the deal when it comes to our friendship, but I don’t want to tell her that I broke the rules of the club she helped me get into.

“This is Chaucer. We met at the bar last night.”

She smiles from ear to ear. “When were you going to tell me about this?”

“I was about to tell you before he showed up here.”

“I knew you were keeping something from me.” She looks Chaucer up and down and the look on her face is definite approval. “You don’t look like you’re feeling too well, Kate. Maybe you should take the rest of the day off,” she says with a wink.

My smile bursts across my face. “Thank you.”

Chaucer and I don’t linger a single second longer. He pulls me through the hallways and out of the building. He leads me to his car, a black SUV parked around the corner from my building. He opens the backdoor instead of the passenger side. He must have been reading my mind.

I get in. He quickly lays the back seats down so that they’re flat. Urgently he reaches for my blouse and lifts it straight off my head. Wasting no time at all, he unbuttons my skirt and I shimmy out of it. It’s a good thing his windows are blacked out with dark tinting. Pretty soon this car is going to be shaking like crazy.

He removes every stitch of clothes except my panties. When they don’t come off right away, he rips them off instead and tosses the frayed remains in the front seat.

“Every waking moment since I met you, all I can think about was fucking your sweet pussy,” he says to me while he takes off his own clothes. “And now that we’re together, we can have this all of the time.”

He’s not undressing fast enough, so I help rid him of his clothes. I grab the waist of his jeans to unbutton them, and I’m greeted by the outline of his hard cock pressing through. My mouth waters. When his pants are off, I immediately start removing his boxers. His giant dick springs out, practically the size of my forearm. That is one beautiful cock. How is this guy not a porn star? People would pay good money to see that thing. I’m proud that I have him all to myself now.

I take him in both hands, marvel at the silkiness of his skin as it glides against my palms. He moans and slowly humps my fists. His stomach muscles twitch and flex when I wrap my lips around the head and start to suck him. My tongue playfully teases the hole at the tip, then circles the head. Chaucer lets out a loud groan, and tosses his head back.

I then pull him out of my mouth and lick my way down the shaft along the vein until I reach his balls. My lips stretch wide to fit them both in my mouth at the same time. After several moments of rolling them around with my tongue and sucking at the skin around them, I make my way back up and engulf him with my mouth once more.

Chaucer’s fingers are laced through my hair, and he gently guides my head back and forth, slowly fucking my throat. I can’t resist, so I slide my hand down to my pussy. Not to my surprise, I’m soaking wet, and I slide my finger inside effortlessly.

After a minute or so he pulls out of my mouth and grabs my hand. My wet finger goes straight to his mouth and he sucks it clean of my juices. “You taste so good. I want more,” he says and puts his large hand against my chest and pushes gently until I’m lying on my back. He then spreads my legs and brings his mouth down on my pussy, but not before taking a long, appreciative look and saying, “Fuck. You’re perfect.”

If it’s even possible, his words make me wetter. He probably should’ve put a towel down before we got into this. By the time we’re done here, this car will be a mess. His tongue laps at me, then he sucks the outer folds of my pussy into his mouth and sucks them the way I did with his balls. When I feel his tongue moving toward my asshole, my breath hitches. He rims me for a long time and I start to settle into the feeling. It feels incredible and deliciously forbidden. I’ve never had anyone but him do that.

His finger slips into my pussy, and he moves it, hooking it, wriggling it. My G-spot screams with joy at all the attention it gets. I can feel the lava flow of juices spilling out of me. He takes his time with me. It’s agonizing, and I fight my feelings of wanting to come and wanting him to continue forever.

“Turn around, get on your hands and knees, and show me that beautiful ass,” he says.

I do what he tells me and bend over, spreading myself. I brace myself on the car door, but even when I think I’m prepared to take his length, I’m not. Not really. When he pushes into me with one powerful thrust, I yelp and see stars in front of my eyes. It almost feels like a jab to the gut—I guess, in a way, it is. It takes me a moment to catch my breath and get reacquainted with his size, but once I do, I’m all in.

Chaucer is almost in a frenzy as he fucks me from behind. I try to muffle my screams, but it’s difficult. He pushes so hard that I keep moving forward until my breasts are pressed up against the car window. He holds me there so I can’t move while he fucks me like a man possessed. Just then the door to the building opens and several young men from the IT department come out to vape and probably play video games on their phones. Megan always teases that they sit in the back room all day and watch porn. If they glance over at us, they’ll get a live version of it. Even with the tinted windows, there’s no doubt they’ll be able to see my breasts and the side of my face pressed against the glass.

I don’t know why, but the thought of getting caught and having these nerdy guys watching us turns me on even more.

I don’t know if they see me, or hear my cries of pleasure, or see the SUV rocking because Chaucer uses me like a Barbie doll, bending and positioning me in different ways. One minute I’m being rammed from behind, the next we’re in the sixty-nine position and his massive cock is down my throat and his tongue is up my pussy. He slurps and sucks my clit until my eyes start to roll in the back of my head. Then suddenly, I’m being flipped around again, and now he’s lying on his back and I’m on top of him facing the opposite direction with my ass toward him, reverse cowgirl style.

“Ride my fat cock with that tight pussy,” he says.

His dirty words spur me on and I continue to bounce on his dick until I feel that familiar rumble of an impending orgasm roaring toward me.

“Oh, fuck, I’m gonna cum,” I tell him.

“Me too,” he says, his voice strained.

I start to pull off of him, but he holds me tight against his body. I guess I assumed that because he wants to date me, he wouldn’t want to come inside of me right now. We haven’t discussed what me getting pregnant with his child would mean if we pursue this relationship. Maybe he hasn’t thought that far either and is just doing what we’re used to doing with each other. I don’t try to stop him. And when I feel the warmth of his semen filling my insides, I close my eyes and let it sink in.

He stays inside of me, and together we lie down in a spooning position. I don’t know how he manages to stay hard after that—or maybe he’s only semi hard and he’s so big I still feel full of him.

“What if I get pregnant now?” I ask him as he caresses my hard nipples with the tips of his fingers. It sends a shiver through me. I’m still turned on. Still ready to go at a moment’s notice. If he made a move, I’d be ready to go again.

“Do you want to get pregnant now?” he asks.

“Well, yes. I want a baby more than anything.”

“My baby?”

“Absolutely.”

“Then let’s make a baby.”

“But what do you want? Are you ready to be a father?”

He kisses my shoulder and starts to move his hips. I can feel him growing bigger inside of me as he slowly moves in and out. “I am. I’ve just been waiting for the right woman to come along, and now that you have, I want nothing more than to have a child with you. But now we can take our time and do it on our own terms.”

I gasp as he pushes all the way into me, the head of his cock buried so deep inside me it knocks against my cervix. He starts to fuck me again, but this time is less frenzied and far more sensual and loving. He takes his time, reaches around to rub my clit. I twist my body so that I can see his face, land a kiss on his lips as he fucks me from behind. I moan into his mouth as I’m engulfed in pleasure.

I can’t believe this is actually happening. I’ve fallen for a man who loves me back and is ready to start a family. I was starting to think there wasn’t such a thing. A man like that in Los Angeles is a unicorn, a yeti, something found in a fairytale that doesn’t actually exist. But he’s here, inside of me, and I have no intention of ever letting go, no matter his past.

He pulls out and rolls me onto my back and climbs on top of me. Brushing the sweaty hair off my face, he stares into my eyes and lays delicate kisses on my lips, nose, and chin as he sinks deep into me again. I wrap my legs around his waist and my arms around his neck.

His lips brush against my throat, and he sucks at my skin. There will probably be a hickey there the next morning, but I don’t care. It can be covered up with makeup. I like the way it feels and I like the possessive inclination of what it means. He’s marking his territory. I’m his. He’s mine. No one else is allowed.

As he digs deep into me, my thighs clinch against his sides, and I thrust my hips up to meet his. Our skin slaps against each other. Aggressively, passionately, forcefully, like two rams beating our horns together for territory.

The muscles in my stomach and ass start to contract and quiver. He slows down, knowing that if we keep this up we’ll both be done. I can feel him start to tense up as well and neither of us can stop or slow down what’s about to happen. He comes with a roar that can probably be heard from inside the building. My own orgasm screams out of me as well and my legs start to shake and cramp.

Chaucer, tired and smiling from his orgasm, lies next to me, his hands folded on his chest, looking up at the moon roof that spans the entire length of the car.

“You wore me out,” he says, reaching over and taking my hand in his.

I’m panting, trying to catch my breath. “I wore myself out,” I say, even though he did most of the work.

We lay here in amicable silence, touching each other’s skin, breathing each other’s air. Normally I’d be content to just lie here with him in silence, but I have to know: “Why do people think you cheated them out of their money? It seems so unlike you, it’s hard for me to imagine anyone thinking of you as the kind of person who would do something like that.”

He looks at me with a sad smile. “Most people didn’t believe it, not until I told them that I did.”

“Wait, you told people you stole their money?” He sighs and nods. I don’t understand, so I keep pressing. “Why would you do that?”

I prop myself up on my elbows, curious. I can’t imagine why he would do such a thing.

He hesitates. I can tell he doesn’t want to tell this story, but I need to know.

“Tell me what happened. I won’t judge you, and it won’t change my feelings for you. I just need to know the truth,” I say.

“I’ll never lie to you,” he says.

“Good.”

“I’ll tell you the whole story, but first, let’s eat. I’m starving.”

I smile. “Me too.”