“Back here!” Tia called from her bedroom as she heard Eli open her front door.

She was running late, as usual, for a date with him. The hospital had been just crazy over the last few days and she’d taken pains not to run into Owen again, which meant ducking and dodging around her workplace in a way that was particularly annoying and deflating. She came home from every shift feeling like she could sleep for a year.

And most nights these days she was very decidedly not running home and sleeping. No. She was seeing Eli. Eating dinner with Eli, falling asleep on his shoulder while they watched a movie. She was very aware that she was starting to fall into a habit that felt good. Felt very good. Tia had been incredibly relieved to note that things weren’t necessarily accelerating with Eli. He was keeping a respectful distance around her boundaries and though Tia had been very tempted herself, she wasn’t pushing them either. The kiss on the floor of her house was the closest they’d come to breaking Tia’s rules.

Part of her was extremely relieved by that. Because the closer they got to sleeping together, the less time they had together. Because she knew she would break things off before she let them progress that far. Before Eli found out her secret. But the other part of her was extremely frustrated by the ever-present brakes on their relationship. There was no doubt in her mind that she wanted Eli. She wanted his flavor, his touch, his gruff little sounds of satisfaction in the back of his throat. Tia wanted him so badly. And tortured herself knowing she’d never let herself have him.

But none of that mattered, because they’d settled into a rhythm that suited both of them. One where they got to be with one another. And one where they weren’t pushing each other. Tia was comfortable inside her emotional box and Eli was taking the time he needed to heal.

But tonight they were breaking the pattern. Eli had invited her out to dinner. Something they’d never done before. Ate in public. He swore that he knew a place where he could eat discreetly. That no one would bother them. He’d said they needed to celebrate. He hadn’t told her what.

She slid her dress carefully over her hair and let it fall into place. She’d done her hair to perfection, pulling out all of Laura’s tricks so that it tumbled over her shoulders. She’d also allowed herself a touch of makeup at her eyes and mouth. She wore sapphires at her ears—earrings her mother had given her when she’d graduated med school. The color perfectly complemented her deep blue dress that fit her snugly from shoulder to knee, even though it flapped open in the back where she’d yet to zip it.

Tia fluffed her hair, leaning toward the mirror and wiggling into one shoe and then the next.

“Oh,” Eli said from the doorway of her bedroom.

Tia froze. He’d never been back here before. And certainly never when her entire back was exposed by her open dress. She followed the track of his eyes in the mirror and knew he was taking in the golden expanse of her naked back, he saw only the thin lace clasp of her black bra and perhaps the matching dove tail of the underwear she wore.

Tia straightened and eyed him in the mirror.

“I thought you were calling me back here,” he said, his voice low and gruff and his eyes still glued to her bared body.

Tia ran over her greeting in her head and realized that it could certainly have been construed that way. She’d merely meant to tell him that she was at home and almost ready, but she didn’t fault him for taking it as a direction. Not wanting to seem ashamed of her body, or to make him feel badly, Tia merely shrugged her shoulder. “That’s alright,” she said and reached back to start zipping her dress.

“Please,” Eli said, his voice deeper and more gravelly than she’d ever heard it before. “Let me.”

He stepped into the room, breaking the threshold of the door and everything in Tia’s body pulled tight. She suddenly felt as if she were in some sort of pressurized bubble and every step he took closer to her sucked more air out of the room. She couldn’t have moved if there’d been an earthquake. His eyes were quiet, darker than she’d ever seen them, and on hers in the mirror.

She couldn’t speak, so she simply dropped her hands to her sides. He took the signal for what it was. And then he was standing behind her, singeing the air between them. She could feel the heat rolling off his body in waves. She’d never seen the two of them in a mirror before and she was shocked at their size difference.

He dwarfed her. It was all Tia could do not to melt back into him, let him engulf her the way he was supposed to. That thought had Tia’s mind blanking right out. The way he was supposed to? No. She couldn’t afford to be thinking like that. Not at a moment like this. Not when his hands were large and warm and gliding up the curve of her back, zipping her into her dress.

He did it slowly. Sue him. This was the closest he’d been to undressing her—the irony was not lost on him that he was actually dressing her—and he was going to milk every second of it that he could. She was so warm, so fragrant. Her skin, as it slipped past his knuckles, was smoother than silk.

It was a crime against humanity to cover this skin up, but he did it. He could tell from her heavy-lidded eyes, from her parted lips, that she was as affected by his nearness as he was by hers. But he could also tell from the set of her shoulders that she wasn’t entirely comfortable either. He let out a deep breath as he latched the clasp at the top of her dress. He felt his yearning for her curl and stretch out from his body like a tiger waking up from a deep sleep, but he reined it in. He had to rein it in. She had rules, and he was determined to respect them.

But that didn’t mean he couldn’t sweep her hair to one side and drop his lips to the back of her gorgeous neck. He hadn’t tasted her there yet and he was in danger of drowning in her flavor.

She mewled in the back of her throat and when his eyes came open to view her in the mirror it was to see her eyes were slammed shut, her head had fallen to one side and her nipples were pressed, hard, against her dress. Eli wasn’t going to take everything, but he couldn’t resist pushing a little bit. He crossed an arm over her front, clasping her opposite hip and pressing her back into him.

He opened his mouth against her neck and she moaned again. He knew she would be able to feel his desire for her pressing into her back but he couldn’t bring himself to care. This was what she did to him. He wasn’t going to hide it. He couldn’t have hid it if he’d wanted to.

It was when his other hand came around her front that she opened her eyes. When his other hand slid over the soft plain of her belly. When his fingers grazed a scant inch above the place where she wanted him most. Where she was pure, liquid heat for wanting him.

Tia brought her lip between her teeth and tried to bite some sense into herself. She was a breath away from dragging him to her bed and getting them both into something that would only turn out to be disappointing. Reminding herself that all she could do was enjoy these moments, because they were the best it was ever going to be, Tia straightened a little. Eli got her hint and let his arms loosen and fall away from her. His hands came to her shoulders instead and his eyes were striking into hers in the mirror. Gold into silver.

“Hell of a dress,” he murmured and planted a kiss in her hair.

Tia grinned, relief and gratitude pouring out of her in tandem. He wasn’t turning into an asshole because she’d subtly pulled away from him yet again. In fact, he was smiling at her and tracing circles on her shoulders with his thumbs.

Tia cleared her throat. “You’re not so bad yourself,” she noted his suit and tie.

He gestured carelessly at it as he turned and looked around her room. “You’ve gotta wear it at least once a year or else it gets all lonely and pouty in the closet.”

Tia laughed. “I have a dress like that. If I don’t wear her, for a while, suddenly she refuses to fit. I swear she shrinks on purpose.”

Eli grinned and held out his hand to her. “Dinner?”

“Absolutely.”

“No glasses tonight?” he asked as they exited her bedroom.

“For our fancy night, I’ll wear contacts.”

The sexual tension from her bedroom was burning off like early morning mist as they moved through the house, both bending to pet Ham goodbye. Eli opened the passenger door of his car for her and Tia slid in. She had, for what felt like the millionth time, twin sensations of relief and disappointment. She didn’t want this thing to burn out of control, she reminded herself. Because then she would just have to end it. It was better this way, moments of heat punctuated by relief.

But then Eli slid into the car and the air itself seemed to heat. They were sitting so close to one another and his hands were so confident on the steering wheel. His profile was so handsome. The same face she’d lusted after since she was fourteen years old. His suit was charcoal gray with a pure white shirt. He wore a deep green tie that somehow made his eyes look even more golden. Some time on their walk through the house, Eli had loosened his tie a bit and just a bit of his chest hair peeked out the opening in his shirt.

As he drove, Tia shifted in her seat, the heat between her legs threatening to burn her alive. Eli’s eyes slid to the side as he tracked the movement. He white knuckled the steering wheel for a second before thinking what the hell and letting his right hand trail across the car.

He rested his hand on her leg and Tia’s hand automatically went to his. His eyes on the road, Eli played with her fingers for a second, but noting the movement of her legs again, decided to play with a little fire. He gave her hand a small squeeze, let his fingers trail through hers, and kept on sliding.

Tia gave a small gasp as his hand slid down her thigh, toward her knee, and toward the hem of her dress. He paused at the smooth, silky skin just above her knee. His fingers grazed over it and he let them slide, ever so slightly, underneath the hem of her dress. Now Tia’s gasp was just a bit louder than before and it took everything he had not to grin in triumph. He didn’t want to do anything that might break the spell he had going with her.

And then, in the single greatest moment of his life—and he’d won the Superbowl—Tia’s legs parted slightly. He saw her gripping the handle of the door for dear life and her eyes were glued to his hand. Her dress didn’t allow her a ton of movement, but sure enough, she was opening her legs to him.

Eli was not a religious man. But he made a note to donate a large sum of money to every temple, mosque, and church within a fifty-mile radius. Because this felt suspiciously like prayers answered.

Eli yanked back on his impulse to slide his hand straight home. Instead, he let his fingers slide between her legs, he felt the heat of her warm thighs surrounding him. He knew his skin would be rough on her sensitive, delicate skin. Her breathing was rough and harsh and he knew his own was the same. But he wasn’t actually aware of almost anything besides the silken glide of her skin against his as he dipped and played with her inner thighs, just inches below the hem of her dress.

With regret, Eli pulled into the restaurant parking lot. He’d been tempted to drive a few times around the block to really see where this was going, but he was also sick to death of multitasking when all he wanted to do was swan dive into Tia, give her his entire attention.

So he flicked off the car and swung around the car to help her out into the crisp spring air of the evening. He was smugly satisfied to see that she wasn’t altogether steady on her feet when he slid her out of the car. But the bite of chill in the air helped to dissipate a bit of their tension and Eli knew it was a good thing. They were about to go into a public place and as much as he wanted her panting for him, he didn’t particularly want other people to see her like that. That was just for him.

“Ambrosia?” Tia asked in confusion as she recognized the restaurant they were walking into. “But I thought you said it was private? Everyone will see you here.”

He smiled at her confusion before veering around to the back of the building. “Trust me.”

He tugged her through a steel door, peeling with paint, and was immediately greeted by shouts from all directions.

“Eli!”

“Well, if it ain’t Elijah Bird.”

“My man!”

“Eli!”

It seemed that the kitchen staff knew Eli pretty well. And an older, hawk-faced woman with black hair fiercely gelled off her forehead slid sinuously over to them. “Eli darlin’.” She went up on her toes and kissed his cheek. “You don’t even look like you were in an accident. You’re just faking, aren’t you? To get out of next season? Always were lazy.”

“Nope, just a great healer. That’s what we’re here celebrating, in fact. I got the all clear from the doctor today to start back in on my preseason training with a physical therapist.”

Tia’s mouth dropped open as his eyes slid to hers. It had been two weeks since his last appointment already. “Eli, that’s incredible!”

She couldn’t help but fling her arms around his neck. That meant that he was completely healed from the trauma of his accident. It might take a while to get back to where he was athletically, but he had made huge leaps and bounds already. Tia was absolutely thrilled for him.

“And who is this?”

The woman’s eyes scanned over Tia in a quiet, calculating manner. Tia scanned right back. Who was this lady? And what claim did she have over Eli? She was a bit older than his usual hook-ups, but she was pretty enough, Tia supposed she could be a past lover. Great. Her stomach turned. She really, really hoped that Eli wasn’t foolish enough to bring her somewhere she’d have to eat food cooked by someone he’d slept with.

“Tia Camellia, meet Nat Brady. She’s the head chef.” Eli gestured between the two of them.

“Brady?” Tia asked, taking the woman’s firm grip. “Any relation to Jay?”

Nat nodded briskly. “My sister’s son. You know him?”

“A little. We all went to school together.”

“Is that right?” Nat leaned on her hip and made no secret of surveying Tia up and down again. “High school or college?”

“Waterson High. I was at Harvard while the boys were at Michigan.”

“Huh.” Nat shifted hips. “I went to Harvard myself.”

“I didn’t know they had a culinary program.” Tia squinted her eyes.

“They don’t. I dropped out and skipped town for Italy. That’s where I studied.”

“Ah.” Not entirely sure what to say about that, Tia sniffed the air. “Smells great in here.”

“Yeah. Here’s your table.”

Nat led them over to a corner of the kitchen under a small window. It was set for two with a semi-wilted rosebud in a tumbler half full of water and complete with a candle, damn near burned down to the nub.

Eli grinned at the less than stellar table dressings. “You didn’t have to pull out all the trimmings just for little old me, Aunt Nat.”

“You want ambience? You can eat out there with the rest of the general public.” She gestured to the dining room but couldn’t hold back the smile that finally softened her face. She accepted a kiss on her cheek from Eli.

“It looks great, it smells great, and I’m starving, so let’s get this show on the road.”

“Alright.” Nat clapped her hands together and turned to Tia again, her manner cooling a touch. “At the chef’s table, you’ll eat whatever I bring you. Any allergies?”

“None.”

“Good. Also, like I said, you’re not getting any ambience back here. The dishwashers are gonna curse, the waiters are gonna come back here and bitch about the clientele, and my chef’s jacket will challenge your delicate sensibilities by the end of the night.” Nat waved her hand toward the front of her formerly white jacket, which had something green smeared across one side and what was almost definitely blood from raw meat on the other side.

“That’s nothing compared to what I look like when I’m on the job,” Tia said, crossing her arms and leaning back. “I’m a surgeon.”

If it impressed Nat, it didn’t show on her face. “Fair enough. We’re starting with wine and salad.”

She tossed a corked wine bottle and a corkscrew on the table in front of Eli and then plunked two plates in front of them, stalking back into the other end of the kitchen.

“She’s a real charmer, Aunt Nat is,” Tia said dryly, holding out her wine glass to Eli as he uncorked the bottle and poured her a glass.

He grinned. “She’s bit of an acquired taste. But you get used to her. She’s the best. She’s a little, ah, protective of me, I think.”

“You think?” Tia’s eyebrows rose up off her face. “She damn near had me in a headlock.”

“Yeah, well. I’ve never brought a girl to meet her before. I think she’s surprised.”

Tia was surprised herself, actually. He’d never brought a woman to this restaurant before? She laid a hand over her stomach for a second, to calm the butterflies. But she found that her sip of wine was much more affective.

“Oh,” Tia slid a hand over her mouth as her eyes fell closed. The wine exploded over her tongue in fifty different flavors at once. “That’s lovely.”

“Yes,” Eli said, his eyes trained on her. Tia resisted the urge to squirm under his gaze. He cleared his throat. “Try the salad.”

A few minutes later Nat reappeared with a tray on one hip. “How’d you like the salad,” she asked in a flat, uninterested voice.

“I think salad is an inadequate word for what that was,” Tia said honestly.

“I’m sorry?” Nat raised an eyebrow.

“I think of salad, I think of something cold and vinegary. This was… something else. Fresh and smooth and tart but not too tart.”

Nat pursed her lips and clattered their empty plates onto her tray. “Glad you liked it. Here’s soup.”

And then she was gone and Tia didn’t even care that she’d been rude again, because the scents wafting out of her bowl of soup were incredibly sinful. As they moved through the courses, each one better than the last, Tia got the distinct impression that Eli was paying more attention to her than he was to his own meal.

Every time her lips closed over a bite, he shifted in his seat. Every small moan or groan of happy satisfaction she made, his hand clenched around his fork.

She was starting to get the feeling that she might be driving him a little wild and… she didn’t hate it. Her body was still buzzing from his hand on her thigh in the car. In fact, Tia could still feel the imprint of each individual finger on her skin. She hadn’t wanted him to stop. In fact, she’d wanted him to touch her all over. And it had scared the hell out of her, alone in the car with him.

But now they were here, in a public restaurant, she was free to tempt him without the ramifications of getting too caught up in the moment. And though she’d never done anything like it before, Tia found herself pushing the boundaries. When the dessert course came, chocolate mousse with raspberries, Tia found herself making eye contact with him.

His eyes darkened as they followed the path of her tongue over a raspberry. She flicked it into her mouth and moaned at the bright, tart flavor. Eli set his spoon down and laced his hands in front of him.

Tia dipped her spoon into her chocolate mousse and closed her mouth over it, letting her eyes come closed at the deep flavor. “Oh, god,” she whispered. “That’s so good.”

Eli’s eyes darkened even further. He held up a hand to Aunt Nat as she came over with a bottle of champagne. “Thanks, Nat. But we don’t need it. We’re going to be leaving in a second.”

Nat’s eyes darted back and forth between them, instant comprehension dawning on her face. “Uh huh. Well.”

“Dinner was absolutely delicious.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Third best meal I’ve ever eaten,” Tia said, certain that would get a reaction out of the pompous chef. She wasn’t disappointed.

Nat finally cracked a smile for Tia. “Those first two meals better be your mother’s home cooking or you’re never eating in my restaurant again.”

Tia smiled back and nodded. “Mom’s lasagna is number one and Mom’s chicken cacciatore is number two.”

“Fair enough,” Nat conceded. “There’s no competing with mothers.” She leaned down and kissed Eli on the cheek. “Now get out of my kitchen before you two set it on fire.”

Eli grinned at Tia and grabbed her hand. He brought her around the table and weaved through the kitchen staff, waving goodbye and shaking hands as he went.

The steel door slammed behind them as they stepped into the parking lot, blocking out the din of the noisy kitchen.

Tia squinted into the dark. “What did she mean, set the kitchen on fire?”

“She meant this,” Eli growled as he caught her by the hand and swung her around. He easily lifted her up, his ribs aching but not screaming, and fastened her legs around his hips. Giving her just enough of his weight, he pressed her into the side of the brick building. “She meant that this thing between us is hot enough to be a fire hazard.”

He spoke, just a breath away from her lips, before his mouth crashed down on hers.

Tia was instantly engulfed in the heat of it. She’d thought there would be no ramifications for provoking him at dinner, all those sexy glances and licked lips. But here it was. She’d poked the beast and she had zero regrets. Because here he was, tasting like chocolate and Eli, and using his gigantic, muscular body to press her into the next dimension.

His mouth ravaged hers, devoured her. And Tia was just about ready to give up her mortgage and live full time in his mouth. But then headlights swept over them and they both froze. They were in public, for god sakes. And Eli was a very famous man. Tia would be mortified if pictures like that were run in some tabloid.

Eli was having the exact same thoughts. That he’d never forgive himself if she was degraded by the paparazzi in that way. Reluctantly he stepped away from the wall and let her slide, bit by bit, down his body.

“Let’s get you home, baby,” he whispered, tucking her hair behind her ear.

It was the first time he’d ever used the endearment and it did something to her. Made her float while she walked next to him toward the car. She realized, with a little jolt, as she buckled in, that every time she and Eli got more intimate, he became more tender with her, sweeter. It was the opposite of the way things had been with every other man in her life. Usually, after intimate physical moments, they became distant, wanted space.

She mulled over that piece of information as he strode around the car and slid in. The second that his door was slammed shut, the car was transformed back into that pressurized bubble from before. God, how were they ever gonna make it back home?