Bared to You: A Crossfire Novel

When Mark left for the meeting with Gideon, my heartbeat quickened and a clutch of anticipation tightened my stomach. I couldn’t believe my excitement just from knowing what Gideon was doing at that particular moment, and that he’d have to think of me when he saw Mark. I hoped I’d hear from him after that.

My mood picked up at the thought.

For the next hour, I was restless waiting to hear how things had gone. When Mark reappeared with a big grin and a spring in his step, I stood up in my cubicle and applauded him.

He took a gal ant, exaggerated bow. “Thank you, Miss Tramel .”

“I’m so stoked for you!”

“Cross asked me to give you this.” He handed me a sealed manila envelope. “Come to my office and I’l give you al the deets.”

The envelope had weight and rattled. I knew from touch what I’d find inside before I opened it, but stil the sight of my keys sliding out and into my palm hit me hard. Gasping with a pain more intense than any I could remember, I read the accompanying note card.

Thank you, Eva. For everything.

Yours, G

A Dear Jane brush-off. It had to be. Otherwise, he would’ve given me the keys after work on the way to the gym.

There was a dul roaring in my ears. I felt dizzy.

Disoriented. I was frightened and agonized. Furious.

I was also at work.

Closing my eyes and clenching my fists, I pul ed myself together and fought off the driving urge to go upstairs and cal Gideon a coward. He probably saw me as a threat, someone who’d come in, unwanted and uninvited, and shook up his orderly world.

Someone who’d demanded more from him than just his hot body and hefty bank account.

I shut my emotions behind a glass wal where I was aware of them waiting in the background, but I was able to get through the rest of my workday. By the time I clocked out and headed downstairs, I stil hadn’t heard from Gideon. I was such an emotional disaster at that point I felt only a single, sharp twinge of despair as I exited the Crossfire.

I made it to the gym. I shut my brain off and ran ful -

bore on the treadmil , fleeing the anguish that would hit me soon enough. I ran until sweat coursed in rivulets down my face and body, and rubber legs forced me to stop.

Feeling battered and exhausted, I hit the showers.

Then I cal ed my mother and asked her to send Clancy to the gym to pick me up for our appointment with Dr.

Petersen. As I put my work clothes back on, I mustered the energy to get through that last task before I could go home and col apse on my bed.

I waited for the town car at the curb, feeling separate and apart from the city teeming around me. When Clancy pul ed up and hopped out to open the back door for me, I was startled to see my mom already inside. It was early yet. I’d expected to be driven solo to the apartment she shared with Stanton and wait on her twenty minutes or so. That was our usual routine.

“Hey, Mom,” I said wearily, settling on the seat beside her.

“How could you, Eva?” She was crying into a monogrammed handkerchief, her face beautiful even while reddened and wet with tears. “Why?” Jolted out of my torment by her misery, I frowned and asked, “What did I do now?”

The new cel phone, if she’d somehow found about it, wouldn’t trigger this much drama. And it was too soon after the fact for her to know about my breakup with Gideon.

“You told Gideon Cross about…what happened to you.” Her lower lip trembled with distress.

My head jerked back in shock. How could she know that? My God…Had she bugged my new place? My purse…? “What?”

“Don’t act clueless!”

“How do you know I told him?” My voice was a pained whisper. “We just talked last night.”

“He went to see Richard about it today.” I tried to picture Stanton’s face during that conversation. I couldn’t imagine my stepfather taking it wel . “Why would he do that?”

“He wanted to know what’s been done to prevent information leaks. And he wanted to know where Nathan is—” She sobbed. “He wanted to know

everything.”

My breath hissed out between my teeth. I wasn’t sure what Gideon’s motivation was, but the possibility that he’d dumped me over Nathan and was now making sure that he was safe from scandal hurt worse than anything. I twisted in pain, my spine arching away from the seatback. I’d thought it was his past that drove a wedge between us, but it made more sense that it was mine.

For once I was grateful for my mother’s self-absorption, which kept her from seeing how devastated I was.

“He had a right to know,” I managed in a voice so raw it sounded nothing like my own. “And he has a right to try and protect himself from any blowback.”

“You’ve never told any of your other boyfriends.”

“I’ve never dated anyone who makes national headlines by sneezing, either.” I stared out the car window at the traffic that boxed us in. “Gideon Cross and Cross Industries are global news, Mother. He’s light-years away from the guys I dated in col ege.” She spoke more, but I didn’t hear her. I shut down for self-protection, cutting off the reality that was suddenly too painful to be endured.

Dr. Petersen’s office was exactly as I remembered.

Decorated in soothing neutrals, it was both professional and comfortable. Dr. Petersen was the same—a handsome man with gray hair and gentle, intel igent blue eyes.

He welcomed us into his office with a wide smile, commenting on how lovely my mother looked and how like her I was. He said he was happy to see me again and that I looked wel , but I could tel he spoke for my mother’s benefit. He was too trained an observer to miss the raging emotions I suppressed.

“So,” he began, settling into his chair across from the sofa my mother and I sat on. “What brings you both in today?”

I told him about the way my mom had been tracking my movements via my cel phone signal and how violated I felt. Mom told him about my interest in Krav Maga and how she took it as a sign that I wasn’t feeling safe. I told him about how they’d pretty much taken over Parker’s studio, which made me feel suffocated and claustrophobic. She told him I’d betrayed her trust by divulging deeply personal matters to strangers, which made her feel naked and painful y exposed.

Through it al , Dr. Petersen listened attentively, took notes and spoke rarely, until we’d purged everything.

Once we’d quieted, he asked, “Monica, why didn’t you tel me about tracking Eva’s cel phone?” The angle of her chin altered, a familiar defensive posture. “I didn’t see anything wrong with it. Many parents track their children through their cel phones.”

“Underage children,” I shot back. “I’m an adult. My personal time is exactly that.”

“If you were to envision yourself in her place, Monica,” Dr. Petersen interjected, “would it be possible that you might feel as she does? What if you discovered someone was monitoring your movements without your knowledge or permission?”

“Not if the someone was my mother and I knew it gave her peace of mind,” she argued.

“And have you considered how your actions affect Eva’s peace of mind?” he queried gently. “Your need to protect her is understandable, but you should discuss the steps you wish to take openly with her. It’s important to gain her input—and expect cooperation only when she chooses to give it. You have to honor her prerogative to set limits that may not be as broad as you’d like them to be.”

My mother sputtered indignantly.

“Eva needs her boundaries, Monica,” he continued,

“and a sense of control over her own life. Those things were taken from her for a long time and we have to respect her right to establish them now in the manner that best suits her.”

“Oh.” My mother twisted her handkerchief around her fingers. “I hadn’t thought of it that way.” I reached out for my mother’s hand when her lower lip trembled violently. “Nothing could’ve stopped me from talking to Gideon about my past. But I could have forewarned you. I’m sorry I didn’t think of it.”

“You’re much stronger than I ever was,” my mother said, “but I can’t help worrying.”

“My suggestion,” Dr. Petersen said, “would be for you to take some time, Monica, and real y think about what sorts of events and situations cause you anxiety.

Then write them down.”

My mother nodded.

“When you have what wil surely not be an exhaustive list but a strong start,” he went on, “you can sit down with Eva and discuss strategies for addressing those concerns—strategies you can both live with comfortably. For example, if not hearing from Eva for a few days troubles you, perhaps a text message or an e-mail wil al eviate that.”

“Okay.”

“If you like, we can go over the list together.” The back-and-forth between the two made me want to scream. It was insult to injury. I hadn’t expected Dr.

Petersen to smack some sense into my mom, but I’d hoped he would at least take a harder line—God knew someone needed to, someone whose authority she respected.

When the hour ended and we were on our way out, I asked my mom to wait a moment so I could ask Dr.

Petersen one last personal and private question.

“Yes, Eva?” He stood in front of me, looking infinitely patient and wise.

“I just wondered…” I paused, needing to swal ow past a lump in my throat. “Is it possible for two abuse survivors to have a functional romantic relationship?”

“Absolutely.” His immediate, unequivocal answer forced the trapped air from my lungs.

I shook his hand. “Thank you.”

When I got home, I unlocked my door with the keys Gideon had returned to me and I went straight to my room, offering a lame wave to Cary, who was practicing yoga in the living room to a DVD.

I stripped off my clothes as I crossed the distance from my closed bedroom door to the bed, final y crawling between the cool sheets in just my underwear.

I hugged a pil ow and closed my eyes, so tired and drained I had nothing left.

The door opened at my back and a moment later Cary sat beside me.

He brushed my hair back from my tear-streaked face. “What’s the matter, baby girl?”

“I got kicked to the curb today. Courtesy of a fucking note card.”

He sighed. “You know the dril , Eva. He’s going to keep pushing you away, because he’s expecting you to fail him like everyone else has.”

“And I keep proving him right.” I recognized myself in the description Cary had just given. I ran when the going got tough, because I was so sure it was al going to end badly. The only control I had was to be the one who left, instead of the one who was left behind.

“Because you’re fighting to protect your own recovery.” He lay down and spooned against my back, wrapping one leanly muscular arm around me and tucking me tight against him.

I snuggled into the physical affection I hadn’t realized I needed. “He might’ve dumped me because of my past, not his.”

“If that’s true, it’s good it’s over. But I think you two wil find each other eventual y. At least I’m hoping you wil .” His sigh was soft on my neck. “I want there to be happily-ever-afters for the fucked-up crowd. Show me the way, Eva honey. Make me believe.”

Friday found Trey sharing breakfast with Cary and me after an overnighter. As I drank the day’s first cup of coffee, I watched him interact with Cary and I was genuinely thril ed to see the intimate smiles and covert touches they gave one another.

I’d had easy relationships like that and hadn’t appreciated them at the time. They had been comfortable and uncomplicated, but they’d been superficial in a fundamental way, too.

How deep could a love affair get if you didn’t know the darkest recesses of your lover’s soul? That was the dilemma I’d faced with Gideon.

Day 2 After Gideon had begun. I found myself wanting to go to him and apologize for leaving him yet again. I wanted to tel him I was there for him, ready to listen or simply offer silent comfort. But I was too emotional y invested. I got wounded too easily. I was too afraid of rejection. And knowing he wouldn’t let me get too close only intensified that fear. Even if we did figure things out, I’d only tear myself apart trying to live with just the bits and pieces he decided to share with me.

At least my job was going wel . The celebratory lunch the executives gave in honor of the agency landing the Kingsman account made me genuinely happy. I felt blessed to work in such a positive environment. But when I heard that Gideon had been invited—although no one expected him to show up—I returned quietly to my desk and focused on work the rest of the afternoon.

I hit the gym on the way home; then picked up some items to make fettuccini alfredo for dinner with crème brulée for dessert—comfort food guaranteed to put me in a carbohydrate coma. I expected sleep to offer me a break from the endless what-ifs my brain was recycling, hopeful y long into Saturday morning.

Cary and I ate in the living room with chopsticks, his idea to cheer me up. He said dinner was great, but I couldn’t tel . I snapped out of it when he fel silent, too, and I realized I was being a less than stel ar friend.

“When are the Grey Isles’ campaign ads going up?” I asked.

“I’m not sure, but get this…” He grinned. “You know how it is with male models—we’re tossed around like condoms at an orgy. It’s tough to stand out from the crowd, unless you’re dating someone famous. Which I’m suddenly reported to be doing since those photos of you and me were plastered everywhere. I’m the side piece of action in your relationship with Gideon Cross.

You’ve done wonders for making me a hot commodity.”

I laughed. “You didn’t need my help for that.”

“Wel , it certainly didn’t hurt. Anyway, they cal ed me back for a couple more shoots. I think they might just use me for more than five minutes.”

“We’l have to celebrate,” I teased.

“Absolutely. When you’re up for it.”

We ended up hanging out and watching the original Tron. His smartphone rang twenty minutes into the movie and I heard him speaking to his agency. “Sure.

I’l be there in fifteen, tops. I’l cal you when I get there.”

“Got a job?” I asked after he’d hung up.

“Yeah. A model showed up for a night shoot so trashed he’s worthless.” He studied me. “You wanna come?”

I stretched my legs out on the couch. “Nope. I’m good right here.”

“You sure you’re okay?”

“Al I need is mindless entertainment. Just the thought of getting dressed again exhausts me.” I’d be happy wearing my flannel pajama bottoms and holey old tank top al weekend. As much as I hurt inside, total

comfort outside seemed like a necessity. “Don’t worry about me. I know I’ve been a mess lately, but I’l get it together. Go on and enjoy yourself.”

After Cary rushed out, I paused the movie and went to the kitchen for some wine. I stopped by the breakfast bar, my fingertips gliding over the roses Gideon had sent me the previous weekend. Petals fel to the countertop like tears. I thought about cutting the stems and using the flower food packet that came with the bouquet, but it was pointless hanging on to them.

I’d throw the arrangement away tomorrow, the last reminder of my equal y doomed relationship.

I’d gotten farther with Gideon in one week than I had with other relationships that lasted two years. I would always love him for that. Maybe I’d always love him, period.

And one day, that might not hurt so badly.

“Rise and shine, sleepyhead,” Cary singsonged as he yanked the comforter off of me.

“Ugh. Go away.”

“You’ve got five minutes to get your ass up and in the shower, or the shower’s coming to you.” Opening one eye, I peeked at him. He was shirtless and wearing baggy pants that barely clung to his hips.

As far as wake-up cal s went, he was prime. “Why do I have to get up?”

“Because when you’re flat on your back you’re not on your feet.”

“Wow. That was deep, Cary Taylor.”

He crossed his arms and shot me an arch look. “We need to go shopping.”

I buried my face in the pil ow. “No.”

“Yes. I seem to remember you saying this was a

‘Sunday garden party’ and ‘rock star gathering’ in the same sentence. What the hel do I wear to something like that?”

“Ah, wel . Good point.”

“What are you wearing?”

“I…I don’t know. I was leaning toward the ‘English tea with hat’ look, but now I’m not so sure.” He gave a brisk nod. “Right. Let’s hit the shops and find something sexy, classy, and cool.” Growling a token protest, I rol ed out of bed and padded over to the bathroom. It was impossible to shower without thinking of Gideon, without picturing his perfect body and remembering the desperate sounds he made when he came in my mouth. Everywhere I looked, Gideon was there. I’d even started hal ucinating black Bentley SUVs al around town. I thought I spotted one damn near everywhere I went.

Cary and I had lunch; then we bounced al over the city, hitting the best of the Upper East Side thrift stores and Madison Avenue boutiques before taking a taxi downtown to SoHo. Along the way, Cary had two teenage girls ask for his autograph, which tickled me more than him, I think.

“Told you,” he crowed.

“Told me what?”

“They recognized me from an entertainment news blog. One of the posts about you and Cross.” I snorted. “Glad my love life is working out for someone.”

He was due at another job around three and I went with him, spending a few hours in the studio of a loud and brash photographer. Remembering it was Saturday, I slipped into a far corner and made my weekly cal to my dad.

“You stil happy in New York?” he asked me above the background noise of dispatch talking over the radio in his cruiser.

“So far so good.” A lie, but the truth helped no one.

His partner said something I didn’t catch. My dad snorted and said, “Hey, Chris insists he saw you on television the other day. Some cable channel, celebrity gossip thing. The guys won’t leave me alone about it.” I sighed. “Tel them watching those shows is bad for their brain cel s.”

“So you’re not dating one of the richest men in America?”

“No. What about your love life?” I asked, quickly diverting. “Are you seeing anyone?”

“Nothing serious. Hang on.” He responded to a cal on the radio, then said, “Sorry, sweetheart. I have to run. I love you. Miss you like crazy.”

“I miss you, too, Daddy. Be careful.”

“Always. Bye.”

I kil ed the cal and went back to my former spot to

wait for Cary to wrap things up. In the lul , my mind tormented me. Where was Gideon now? What was he doing?

Would Monday bring me an inbox ful of photos of him with another woman?

Sunday afternoon I borrowed Clancy and one of Stanton’s town cars for the drive out to the Vidal estate in Dutchess County. Leaning back in the seat, I looked out the window, absently admiring the serene vista of rol ing meadows and green woodlands that stretched to the distant horizon. I realized I was working on Day 4

After Gideon. The pain I’d felt the first few days had turned into a dul throbbing that felt almost like the flu.

Every part of my body ached, as if I was going through some sort of physical withdrawal and my throat burned with unshed tears.

“Are you nervous?” Cary asked me.

I glanced at him. “Not real y. Gideon won’t be there.”

“You’re sure about that?”

“I wouldn’t be going if I thought otherwise. I do have some pride you know.” I watched him drum his fingers on the armrest between our two seats. For al the shopping we’d done yesterday, he’d made only one purchase: a black leather tie. I’d teased him mercilessly about it, he of the perfect fashion sense going with something like that.

He caught me looking at it. “What? You stil don’t like my tie? I think it works wel with the emo jeans and my lounge lizard jacket.”

“Cary”—my lips quirked—“you can wear anything.” It was true. Cary could pul any look off, a benefit of having a sculpted rangy body and a face that could make angels weep.

I set my hand over his restless fingers. “Are you nervous?”

“Trey didn’t cal last night,” he muttered. “He said he would.”

I gave his hand a reassuring squeeze. “It’s just one missed cal , Cary. I’m sure it doesn’t mean anything serious.”

“He could’ve cal ed this morning,” he argued. “Trey’s not flakey like the others I’ve dated. He wouldn’t have forgotten to cal , which means he just doesn’t want to.”

“The rat bastard. I’l be sure to take lots of pictures of you having a great time looking sexy, classy, and cool to torment him with on Monday.”

His mouth twitched. “Ah, the deviousness of the female mind. It’s a shame Cross won’t see you today. I think I got a semi when you came out of your room in that dress.”

“Eww!” I smacked his shoulder and mock-glared when he laughed.

The dress had seemed perfect to both of us when we’d found it. It was cut in a classic garden party style

—fitted bodice with a knee-length skirt that flared out from the waist. It was even white with flowers. But that’s where the tea-and-crumpets style ended.

The edginess came from the strapless form, the alternating layers of black and crimson satin underskirts that gave it volume, and the black leather flowers that looked like wicked pinwheels. Cary had picked the red Jimmy Choo peep-toe pumps out of my closet and the ruby drop earrings to give it al the finishing touch. We’d decided to leave my hair loose around my shoulders, in case we arrived and learned that hats were required. Al in al , I felt pretty and confident.

Clancy drove us through an imposing set of monogrammed gates and turned into a circular driveway, fol owing the direction of a valet. Cary and I got out by the entrance, and he took my arm as my heels sank into blue-gray gravel on the walk to the house.

Upon entering the Vidal’s sprawling Tudor-style mansion, we were warmly greeted by Gideon’s family in

a

receiving

line—his

mother,

stepfather,

Christopher, and their sister.

I took in the sight, thinking the Vidal family could only look more perfect if Gideon was lined up with them.

His mother and sister had his coloring, both women boasting the same glossy obsidian hair and thickly-lashed blue eyes. They were both beautiful in a finely wrought way.

“Eva!” Gideon’s mother drew me toward her, then air-kissed both of my cheeks. “I’m so pleased to final y meet you. What a gorgeous girl you are! And your dress. I love it.”

“Thank you.”

Her hands brushed over my hair, cupped my face, and then slid down my arms. It was hard for me to bear it, because touching was sometimes an anxiety trigger for me when the person was a stranger. “Your hair, is it natural y blond?”

“Yes,” I replied, startled and confused by the question. Who asked a question like that of a stranger?

“How fascinating. Wel , welcome. I hope you have a wonderful time. We’re so glad you could make it.” Feeling strangely unsettled, I was grateful when her attention moved to Cary and zeroed in.

“And you must be Cary,” she crooned. “Here I’d been certain my two boys were the most attractive in the world. I see I was wrong about that. You are simply divine, young man.”

Cary flashed his megawatt smile. “Ah, I think I’m in love, Mrs. Vidal.”

She laughed with throaty delight. “Please. Cal me Elizabeth. Or Lizzie, if you’re brave enough.” Looking away, I found my hand clasped by Christopher Vidal Senior. In many ways, he reminded me of his son, with his slate green eyes and boyish smile. In others, he was a pleasant surprise. Dressed in khakis, loafers, and a cashmere cardigan, he looked more like a col ege professor than a music company executive.

“Eva. May I cal you Eva?”

“Please do.”

“Cal me Chris. It makes it a little easier to distinguish between me and Christopher.” His head tilted to the side as he contemplated me through quirky brass spectacles. “I can see why Gideon is so taken with you. Your eyes are a stormy gray, yet they’re so clear and direct. Quite the most beautiful eyes I think I’ve ever seen, aside from my wife’s.”

I flushed. “Thank you.”

“Is Gideon coming?”

“Not that I’m aware of.” Why didn’t his parents know the answer to that question?

“We always hope.” He gestured at a waiting servant.

“Please head back to the gardens and make yourself at home.”

Christopher greeted me with a hug and a kiss on the cheek, while Gideon’s sister Ireland sized me up in a sulky way that only a teenager could pul off. “You’re a blonde,” she said.

Jeez. Was Gideon’s preference for dark-haired women a damn law or something? “And you’re a very lovely brunette.”

Cary offered me his arm and I accepted it grateful y.

As we walked away, he asked me quietly, “Were they what you expected?”

“His mom, maybe. His stepdad, no.” I looked back over my shoulder, taking in the elegant floor-length cream sheath dress that clung to Elizabeth Vidal’s svelte figure. I thought of what little I knew about Gideon’s family. “How does a boy grow up to be a businessman who takes over his stepfather’s family business?”

“Cross owns shares in Vidal Records?”

“Control ing interest.”

“Hmm. Maybe it was a bailout?” he offered. “A helping hand during a trying time for the music industry?”

“Why not just give him the money?” I wondered.

“Because he’s a shrewd businessman?”

With a sharp exhalation, I waved the question away and cleared my mind. I was attending the party for Cary, not Gideon, and I was going to keep that first and foremost in my thoughts.

Once we’d moved outside, we found a large, elaborately decorated marquee erected in the rear garden. Although the day was beautiful enough to stay out in the sun, I found a seat at a circular table covered in white damask instead.

Cary patted my shoulder. “You relax. I’l network.”

“Go get ’em.”

He moved away, intent on his agenda.

I sipped champagne and chatted with everyone who stopped by to strike up a conversation. There were a lot of recording artists at the party whose work I listened to, and I watched them covertly, a bit starstruck. For al the elegance of the surroundings and the endless number of servants, the overal vibe was casual and relaxed.

I was starting to enjoy myself when someone I’d hoped never to see again stepped out of the house onto

the

terrace:

Magdalene

Perez,

looking

phenomenal in a rose-hued chiffon gown that floated around her knees.

A hand settled on my shoulder and squeezed, setting my heart racing because it reminded me of the night Cary and I had gone to Gideon’s club. But the figure that rounded me this time was Christopher.

“Hey, Eva.” He took the chair next to mine and set his elbows on his knees, leaning toward me. “Are you having fun? You’re not mingling much.”

“I’m having a great time.” At least I had been. “Thank you for inviting me.”

“Thank you for coming. My parents are stoked you’re here. Me, too, of course.” His grin made me smile, as did his tie, which had cartoon vinyl records al over it. “Are you hungry? The crab cakes are great.

Grab one when the tray comes by.”

“I’l do that.”

“Let me know if you need anything. And save a dance for me.” He winked, and then hopped up and away.

Ireland took his seat, arranging herself with the practiced grace of a finishing school graduate. Her hair fel in a single length to her waist and her beautiful eyes were direct in a way I could appreciate. She looked worldlier than her seventeen years. “Hi.”

“Hel o.”

“Where’s Gideon?”

I shrugged at the blunt question. “I’m not sure.” She nodded sagely. “He’s good at being a loner.”

“Has he always been that way?”

“I guess. He moved out when I was little. Do you love him?”

My breath caught for a second. I released it in a rush and said simply, “Yes.”

“I thought so when I saw that video of you two in Bryant Park.” She bit her lush lower lip. “Is he fun? You know…to hang around with?”

“Oh. Wel …” God. Did anyone know Gideon? “I wouldn’t say he’s fun, but he’s never boring.” The live band began playing “I’ve Got You Under My Skin” and Cary appeared beside me as if by magic.

“Time to make me look good, Ginger.”

“I’l try my best, Fred.” I smiled at Ireland. “Excuse me a minute.”

“Three minutes, forty seconds,” she corrected, displaying some of her family’s expertise in music.

Cary led me onto the empty dance floor and pul ed me into a swift foxtrot. It took me a minute to get into it, because I’d been stiff and tight with misery for days.

Then the synergy of longtime partners kicked in and we glided across the floor with sweeping steps.

When the singer’s voice faded with the music, we stopped, breathless. We were pleasantly surprised by applause. Cary gave an elegant bow and I held on to his hand for stability as I dipped into a curtsy.

When I lifted my head and straightened, I found Gideon standing in front of me. Startled, I stumbled back a step. He was seriously underdressed in jeans and an untucked white dress shirt that was open at the col ar and rol ed up at the sleeves, but he was so damn fine he stil put every other man in attendance to shame.

The tremendous yearning I felt at the sight of him overwhelmed me. Distantly I was aware of the band’s singer pul ing Cary away, but I couldn’t tear my gaze away from Gideon, whose wildly blue eyes burned into mine.

“What are you doing here?” he snapped, scowling.

I recoiled from his harshness. “Excuse me?”

“You shouldn’t be here.” He grabbed me by the elbow and started hauling me toward the house. “I don’t want you here.”

If he’d spit in my face, it couldn’t have devastated me more. I yanked my arm free of him and walked briskly toward the house with my head held high, praying I could make it to the privacy of the town car and Clancy’s protective watch before the tears started fal ing.

Behind me, I heard a come-hither female voice cal out Gideon’s name and I sent up a prayer that the woman would stal him long enough for me to get out without further confrontation.

I thought I just might make it when I passed into the cool interior of the house.

“Eva, wait.”

My shoulders hunched at the sound of Gideon’s voice and I refused to look at him. “Get lost. I can show myself out.”

“I’m not done—”

“I am!” I pivoted to face him. “You don’t get to talk to me that way. Who do you think you are? You think I came here for you? That I was hoping I’d see you and you’d throw me a goddamn scrap or bone…some pathetic acknowledgment of my existence? Maybe I’d be able to harass you into a quick, dirty fuck in a corner somewhere in a pitiful effort to win you back?”

“Shut up, Eva.” His gaze was scorching hot, his jaw tight and hard. “Listen to me—”

“I’m only here because I was told you wouldn’t be.

I’m here for Cary and his career. So you can go back to the party and forget about me al over again. I assure you, when I walk out the door, I’l be doing the same to you.”

“Shut your damned mouth.” He caught me by the elbows and shook me so hard my teeth snapped together. “Just shut up and let me talk.” I slapped him hard enough to turn his head. “Don’t touch me.”

With a growl, Gideon hauled me into him and kissed me hard, bruising my lips. His hand was in my hair, fisting it roughly, holding me in place so I couldn’t turn away. I bit the tongue he thrust aggressively into my mouth, then his lower lip, tasting blood, but he didn’t stop. I shoved at his shoulders with everything I had, but I couldn’t budge him.

Goddamn Stanton! If not for him and my crazy-assed mother, I’d have had a few Krav Maga classes under my belt by now…

Gideon kissed me as if he was starved for the taste of me and my resistance began to melt. He smel ed so good, so familiar. His body felt so perfectly right against mine. My nipples betrayed me, hardening into tight points, and a slow, hot trickle of arousal gathered in my core. My heart thundered in my chest.

God, I wanted him. The craving hadn’t gone away, not even for a minute.

He picked me up. Imprisoned by his tight grip, it was hard to breathe and my head began to spin. When he carried me through a door and kicked it shut behind him, I couldn’t do more than make a feeble sound of protest.

I found myself pressed against a heavy glass door on the other side of a library, Gideon’s hard and powerful body subduing my own. His arm at my waist slid lower, his hand delving beneath my skirts and finding the curves of my butt exposed by my lacy boy shorts underwear. He wrenched my hips hard to his, making me feel how hard he was, how aroused. My sex trembled with want, achingly empty.

Al the fight left me. My arms fel to my sides, my palms pressing flat to the glass. I felt the brittle tension drain from his body as I softened in surrender, the pressure of his mouth easing and his kiss turning into a passionate coaxing.

“Eva,” he breathed gruffly. “Don’t fight me. I can’t take it.”

My eyes closed. “Let me go, Gideon.”

He nuzzled his cheek against mine, his breath gusting hard and fast over my ear. “I can’t. I know you’re disgusted by what you saw the other night…

what I was doing to myself—”

“Gideon, no!” God. Did he think I left him because of that? “That’s not why—”

“I’m losing my mind without you.” His lips were gliding down my neck, his tongue stroking over my racing pulse. He sucked on my skin and pleasure radiated through me. “I can’t think. I can’t work or sleep. My body aches for you. I can make you want me again. Let me try.”

Tears slipped free and ran down my face. They splashed on the upper swel of my breasts and he licked at them, lapping them away.

How would I ever recover if he made love to me again? How would I survive if he didn’t?

“I never stopped wanting you,” I whispered. “I can’t stop. But you hurt me, Gideon. You have the power to hurt me like no one else can.”

His gaze was stark and confused on my face. “I hurt you? How?”

“You lied to me. You shut me out.” I cupped his face, needing him to understand this one thing without question. “Your past doesn’t have the power to push me away. Only you can do that, and you did.”

“I didn’t know what to do,” he rasped. “I never wanted you to see me like that…”

“That’s the problem, Gideon. I want to know who you are, the good and the bad, and you want to keep parts of yourself hidden from me. If you don’t open up, we’re going to lose each other down the road and I won’t be able to take it. I’m barely surviving it now. I’ve crawled through the last four days of my life. Another week, a month…It’l break me to give you up.”

“I can let you in, Eva. I’m trying. But your first response when I screw up is to run away. You do it every time and I can’t stand feeling like any moment I’m going to do or say something wrong and you’re going to bolt.”

His mouth was tender again as he brushed his lips back and forth over mine. I didn’t argue with him. How could I, when he was right?

“I hoped you’d come back on your own,” he murmured, “but I can’t stay away anymore. I’l carry you out of here if I have to. Whatever it takes to get you back in the same room with me, talking this out.” My heart stuttered. “You were hoping I’d come back? I thought…You gave me back my keys. I thought we were over.”

He pul ed back, his face set in fierce lines. “We’l never be over, Eva.”

I looked at him, my heart aching like an open wound at how beautiful he was, how broken and in pain he was—pain I’d caused to some degree.

On tiptoes, I kissed the reddened handprint I’d left on his cheek, clutching his thick silky hair in my hands.

Gideon bent his knees to align our bodies, his breathing harsh and erratic. “I’l do whatever you want, whatever you need. Anything. Just take me back.” Maybe I should have been scared by the depth of his need, but I felt the same passionate insanity for him.

Running my hands down his chest in an effort to soothe his trembling, I gave him the hard truth. “We can’t seem to stop making each other miserable. I can’t keep doing this to you and I can’t keep going through these crazy highs and lows. We need help, Gideon. We’re seriously dysfunctional.”

“I saw Dr. Petersen on Friday. He’s going to take me on as a patient, and—if you agree—he’l take us both on as a couple. I figured if you can trust him, I can try.”

“Dr. Petersen?” I remembered the brief jolt I’d felt at seeing a black Bentley SUV when Clancy pul ed away from the doctor’s office. At the time, I’d told myself it was wishful thinking. After al , there were countless black SUVs in New York. “You had me fol owed.” His chest expanded on a deep breath. He didn’t deny it.

I bit back my anger. I could only imagine how terrible it must be for him to be so dependent on something

— someone—he couldn’t control. What mattered most at that moment were his wil ingness to try and the fact that it wasn’t just talk. He’d actual y taken steps. “It’s going to be a lot of work, Gideon,” I warned him.

“I’m not afraid of work.” He was touching me restlessly, his hands sliding over my thighs and buttocks as if caressing my bare skin was as necessary to him as breathing. “I’m only afraid of losing you.”

I pressed my cheek to his. We completed each other. Even now, as his hands roamed possessively over me, I felt a thawing in my soul, the desperate relief of being held—final y—by the man who understood and satisfied my deepest, most intimate desires.

“I need you.” His mouth was sliding over my cheek and down my throat. “I need to be inside you…”

“No. My God. Not here.” But my protest sounded weak even to my own ears. I wanted him anywhere, anytime, any way…

“It has to be here,” he muttered, dropping to his knees. “It has to be now.”

He chafed my skin ripping the lace of my panties away; then he shoved my skirts to my waist and licked my cleft, his tongue parting my folds to stroke over my throbbing clit.

I gasped and tried to recoil, but there was nowhere to go. Not with the door at my back and a grimly determined Gideon in front, one hand keeping me pinned while the other lifted my left leg over his shoulder, opening me to his ardent mouth.

My head thudded against the glass, heat pulsing through my blood from the point where his tongue was driving me mad. My leg flexed against his back, urging him closer, my hands cupping his head to hold him stil as I rocked into him. Feeling the rough satin strands of his hair against my sensitive inner thighs was its own provocation, heightening my awareness of everything around me…

We were in Gideon’s parents’ house, in the midst of a party attended by dozens of famous people, and he was on his knees, growling his hunger as he licked and sucked my slick, aching cleft. He knew just how to get to me, knew what I liked and needed. He had an understanding of my nature that went above and beyond his incredible oral skil s. The combination was devastating and addicting.

My body shook, my eyelids heavy from the il icit pleasure. “Gideon…You make me come so hard.” His tongue rubbed over and over the clenching entrance to my body, teasing me, making me grind shamelessly into his working mouth. His hands cupped my bare butt, kneading, urging me onto his tongue as he thrust it inside me. There was reverence in the greedy way he enjoyed me, the unmistakable sense that he worshipped my body, that pleasuring it and taking pleasure from it was as vital to him as the blood in his veins.

“Yes,” I hissed, feeling the orgasm building. I was buzzed by champagne and the heated scent of Gideon’s skin mixed with my own arousal. My breasts strained within the increasingly too-tight confines of my strapless bra, my body trembling on the edge of a desperately needed orgasm. “I’m so close.” A movement on the far side of the room caught my eye and I froze, my gaze locking with Magdalene’s.

She stood just inside the door, halted midstride, staring wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the back of Gideon’s moving head.

But he was either oblivious or too impassioned to care. His lips circled my clit and his cheeks hal owed.

Sucking rhythmical y, he massaged the hypersensitive knot with the tip of his tongue.

Everything tightened viciously, then released in a fiery burst of pleasure.

The orgasm poured through me in a scorching wave. I cried out, pumping my hips mindlessly into his mouth, lost to the primal connection between us.

Gideon held me up as my knees weakened, tonguing my quivering flesh until the last tremor faded.

When I opened my eyes again, our audience of one had fled.

Standing in a rush, Gideon picked me up and carried me to the couch. He dropped me lengthwise on the cushion; then hauled my hips up to rest on the armrest, arching my spine.

I eyed him up the length of my torso. Why not just fold me over and fuck me from behind?

Then he ripped open his button-fly and pul ed his big, beautiful penis out, and I didn’t care how he took me just so long as he did. I whimpered as he shoved into me, my body struggling to accommodate the wonderful ful ness I craved. Yanking my hips to meet his powerful thrusts, Gideon battered my tender sex with that brutal y thick column of rigid flesh, his gaze dark and possessive, his breath leaving him in primitive grunts every time he hit the end of me.

A trembling moan left me, the friction of his drives stirring my never-sated need to be fucked senseless by him. Only him.

A handful of strokes and his head fel back as he gasped my name, his hips rol ing to stir me into a frenzy. “Squeeze me, Eva. Squeeze my dick.” When I complied, the ragged sound he made was so erotic my sex trembled in appreciation. “Yeah, angel…just like that.”

I tightened around him and he cursed. His gaze found mine, the stunning blue hazed with sexual euphoria. A convulsive shudder wracked his powerful frame, fol owed by an agonized sound of ecstasy. His cock jerked inside me, once, twice, and then he was coming long and hard, spurting hotly into the clutching depths of my body.

I didn’t have time to climax again, but it didn’t matter. I watched him with awe and pure female triumph. I could do this to him.

In the moments of orgasm, I owned him as completely as he owned me.

Gideon folded over me, his hair fal ing forward to tickle my chest, his lungs heaving. “God. I can’t go days without this. Even the hours at work are too long.” I ran my fingers through the sweat-damp roots of his hair. “I missed you, too.”

He nuzzled my breasts. “When you’re not with me, I feel—Don’t run anymore, Eva. I can’t take it.” He pul ed me up to stand in front of him, keeping his cock in me until the soles of my heels touched the hardwood floor. “Come home with me now.”

“I can’t leave Cary.”

“Then we’l drag him out of here with us. Shh…

Before you complain, whatever he hopes to get out of this party, I can make happen. Being here accomplishes nothing.”

“Maybe he’s having fun.”

“I don’t want you here.” He suddenly seemed distant, his tone far too control ed.

“Do you know how badly it hurts me when you say that?” I cried softly, my chest tight with the pain of it.

“What’s wrong with me that you don’t want me around your family?”

“Angel, no.” He hugged me, his hands roaming my back in soothing caresses. “There’s nothing wrong with you. It’s this place. I don’t—I can’t be here. You want to know what’s in my dreams? It’s this house.”

“Oh.” My stomach knotted with worry and confusion.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

Something in my voice lured him to press a kiss between my eyebrows. “I’ve been rough with you today. I’m sorry. I’m edgy and agitated being here, but that’s no excuse.”

I cupped his face and stared into his eyes, seeing the tumultuous emotions he was so used to hiding.

“Don’t ever apologize for being yourself with me. It’s what I want. I want to be your safe place, Gideon.”

“You are. You don’t know how much, but I’l find a way to tel you.” He rested his forehead against mine.

“Let’s go home. I bought some things for you.”

“Oh? I love gifts.” Especial y when they came from my self-professed unromantic boyfriend.

Cautiously, he began to pul out of me. I was shocked to feel how wet I was, how copiously he’d come. The final few inches of his cock slid out in a rush and semen slicked my inner thighs. A moment later, two audacious droplets fel to the hardwood floor between my spread legs.

“Oh, shit.” He groaned. “That’s so damn hot. I’m getting hard again.”

I stared at the brazen display of his virility and felt warm. “You can’t go again after that.”

“Hel if I can’t.” Cupping my sex in his hand, he rubbed the slickness al over me, coating the outer lips and massaging it into the folds. Euphoria spread through me like the warmth of fine liquor, a sense of contentment that came solely from the knowledge that Gideon found gratification in me and my body.

“I’m an animal with you,” he murmured. “I want to mark you. I want to possess you so completely there’s no separation between us.”

My hips began to move in tiny circles as his words and touch reignited the desire he’d goaded with the thrusts of his cock. I wanted to come again, knew I’d be miserable if I had to wait until we reached his bed. I was a sexual creature with him, too, so physical y attuned to him and so positive that he would never physical y hurt me, that I was…free.

I encircled his wrist with my fingers and gently directed his hand around my hip to reach for me from behind. Nipping his jaw with my teeth, I gathered the courage he inspired in me and whispered, “Touch me here with your fingers. Mark me there.” He froze, his chest lifting and fal ing rapidly. “I don’t”—his voice strengthened—“I don’t do anal play, Eva.”

Looking into his eyes, I saw something dark and volatile. Something very painful.

Of all the things for us to have in common…

The raw passion of our lust gentled into the warm familiarity of love. With my heart breaking, I confessed,

“I don’t either. At least not voluntarily.”

“Then…why?” The confusion in his voice moved me deeply.

I hugged him, pressing my cheek to his shoulder and listening to the slightly panicked beat of his heart.

“Because I believe your touch can erase Nathan’s.”

“Oh, Eva.” His cheek pressed to the crown of my head.

I snuggled closer. “You make me feel safe.” We held each other for long moments. I listened to his heartbeat slow and his breathing smooth out. I inhaled deeply, relishing the mix of his personal scent mixed with the scent of hard lust and harder sex.

When the tip of his middle finger slid gossamer-soft over the pucker of my anus, I stil ed and pul ed back to look at him. “Gideon?”

“Why me?” he asked softly, his beautiful eyes dark and stormy. “You know I’m fucked up, Eva. You saw what I…that night you woke me…You saw, damn it.

How can you trust me with your body this way?”

“I trust my heart and what it tel s me.” I smoothed the frown line between his brows. “You can give my body back to me, Gideon. I believe you’re the only one who can.”

His eyes closed and his damp forehead touched mine. “Do you have a safeword, Eva?”

Startled, I pul ed back again to study his face. A few members of my therapy group had talked about Dom/sub relationships. Some required total control to feel safe during sex. Others fel on the opposite side of the line, finding that bondage and humiliation satisfied their deep-seated need to feel pain to experience pleasure. For those who practiced that lifestyle, a safeword was an unambiguous way to say “stop.” But I couldn’t see how that had any relevance to me and Gideon. “Do you?”

“I don’t need one.” Between my legs, the gentle stroke of his finger became less tentative. He repeated his question, “Do you have a safeword?”

“No. I’ve never needed one. Missionary, doggy style, B.O.B…. that’s about the extent of my mad skil s in the sack.”

That brought a touch of amusement to his otherwise severe face. “Thank God. I wouldn’t survive you otherwise.”

And stil that fingertip massaged me, spurring a dark yearning. Gideon could do that to me, make me forget everything that happened before. I had no negative sexual triggers with him, no hesitation or fears. He’d given that to me. In return, I wanted to give him the body he’d freed from my past.

The long case clock near the door began to chime the hour.

“Gideon, we’ve been gone a long time. Someone wil come looking for us.”

He put the slightest pressure against my sensitive rosette, barely pressing. “Do you real y care if they do?”

My hips arched into the touch. Anticipation was making me hot al over again. “I don’t care about anything but you when you’re touching me.” His free hand lifted to my hair and held it at the roots, keeping my head stil . “Did you ever enjoy anal play? Accidental y or by deliberation?”

“No.”

“And yet you trust me enough to ask me for this.” He kissed my forehead as he drew the slickness of his semen back to my rear.

I gripped his waistband. “You don’t have to—”

“Yes, I do.” His voice had that wickedly assertive bite to it. “If you crave something, I’l be the one to give it to you. Al of your needs, Eva, are mine to fulfil .

Whatever it costs me.”

“Thank you, Gideon.” My hips shifted restlessly as he continued to lubricate me gently. “I want to be what you need, too.”

“I’ve told you what I need, Eva—control.” He brushed his parted lips back and forth over mine. “You’re asking me to lead you back into painful places and I wil , if that’s what you need. But we have to be extremely careful.”

“I know.”

“Trust is hard for both of us. If we break it, we could lose everything. Think of a word you associate with power. Your safeword, angel. Choose it.” The pressure of that single fingertip became more insistent. I moaned, “Crossfire.”

“Umm…I like it. Very fitting.” His tongue dipped into my mouth, barely touching mine before retreating. His finger rimmed my anus over and over, pushing his semen into the puckered hole, a soft growl escaping him as it flexed in a silent plea for more.

The next time he pressed against the ring, I pushed out and he slipped his fingertip inside me. The feeling of penetration was shockingly intense.

Just as before, surrender weighted my body, leaving me languid.

“Are you okay?” Gideon asked harshly as I sagged against him. “Should I stop?”

“No…Don’t stop.”

He pushed fractional y deeper and I clenched around him, a helpless reaction to the feel of something gliding across tender tissues. “You’re snug and scorching hot,” he murmured. “And so soft. Does it hurt?”

“No. Please. More.”

Gideon withdrew to his fingertip; then slid in to the knuckle, slow and easy. I quivered in delight, astonished by how good it felt, that teasing bit of ful ness in my rear.

“How’s that?” he asked hoarsely.

“Good. Everything you do to me feels good.” He withdrew again, glided deep again. Leaning forward, I thrust my hips back to give him easier access and pressed my breasts against his chest. His fist in my hair tightened, pul ing my head back so he could take my mouth in a lush, wet kiss. Our open mouths slid across each other, growing more frantic as my arousal built. The feel of Gideon’s finger in that darkly sexual place, thrusting in that gentle rhythm, had me rocking backward to meet his inward drives.

“You’re so beautiful,” he murmured, his voice infinitely gentle. “I love making you feel good. Love watching an orgasm move through your body.”

“Gideon.” I was lost, drowning in the powerful joy of being held by him, loved by him. Four days alone had taught me how miserable I’d be if we couldn’t work things out, how dul and colorless my world would be without him in it. “I need you.”

“I know.” He licked across my lips, making my head spin. “I’m here. Your cunt’s trembling and tightening.

You’re going to come for me again.”

With shaking hands, I reached between us for his cock, finding it hard. I lifted the layers of my underskirts so I could insert him into my drenched sex. He slid in a few inches, our standing positions preventing deeper penetration, but the connection alone was enough. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, burying my face in his neck as my knees weakened. His hand left my hair, his arm clasping my back and holding me close.

“Eva.” The tempo of his finger thrusts quickened.

“Do you know what you do to me?”

His hips nudged against mine, the wide crest of his penis massaging a sweetly tender spot. “You’re milking the head of my dick with those hungry little squeezes. You’re going to make me come for you.

When you go off, I’m going with you.”

I was distantly aware of the helpless noises spil ing from my throat. My senses were overloaded by Gideon’s scent and the heat of his hard body, the feel of his cock rubbing inside me and his finger pumping into my rear. I was surrounded by him, fil ed with him, blissful y possessed in every way. A climax was building in force, pounding through me, pooling in my core. Not just from the physical pleasure but from the knowledge that he’d been wil ing to take a risk. Once again. For me.

His finger stil ed and I made a sound of protest.

“Hush,” he whispered. “Someone’s coming.”

“Oh God! Magdalene came in earlier and saw us.

What if she told—”

“Don’t move.” Gideon didn’t let me go. He stood just as he was, fil ing me front and back, his hand caressing the length of my spine and smoothing my dress down. “Your skirts hide everything.” With my back to the room’s entrance, I pressed my flaming face into his shirt.

The door opened. There was a pause then, “Is everything al right?”

Christopher. I felt awkward being unable to turn around.

“Of course,” Gideon said smoothly, cool y in control.

“What do you want?”

To my horror, he resumed the push and withdrawal of his finger. Not with the deep strokes of before, but slow shal ow thrusts that didn’t disturb my skirts.

Already aroused to a fever pitch and hovering on the verge of orgasm, my nails dug into his neck. The tension in my body from having Christopher in the room only ramped up the erotic sensations.

“Eva?” Christopher asked.

I swal owed hard. “Yes?”

“Are you okay?”

Gideon adjusted his stance, which moved his cock inside me and bumped his pelvis against my pulsing clit.

“Y-yes. We’re just…talking. About. Dinner.” My eyes closed as Gideon’s fingertip grazed the thin wal separating his penis from his touch. If he nudged my clit again, I’d come. I was too wound up to stop it.

Gideon’s chest vibrated against my cheek as he spoke. “We’d be done sooner if you’d go, so tel me what you need.”

“Mom’s looking for you.”

“Why?” Gideon shifted again, rocking into my clit at the same moment he gave a quick, deep thrust of his finger into my rear.

I climaxed. Afraid of the wail of pleasure that wanted out of me, I sank my teeth into Gideon’s hard pectoral.

He grunted softly and started coming, his cock jerking as it pumped thick spurts of scorching semen into me.

The rest of the conversation was lost beneath the roar of my blood. Christopher said something, Gideon replied, and then the door shut again. I was lifted to sit on the armrest and Gideon started thrusting between my spread thighs, using my body to rub out the rest of his orgasm, growling in my mouth as we finished off the rawest, most exhibitionistic sexual encounter of my life.

Afterward, Gideon led me by the hand to a bathroom, where he lightly soaped a washcloth and cleansed between my legs before he paid the same attention to his cock. The way he took care of me was sweetly intimate, demonstrating yet again that as primal as his desire for me was, I was precious to him.

“I don’t want us to fight anymore,” I said quietly from my perch on the counter.

He tossed the washcloth down a concealed laundry chute and refastened his fly. Then he came to me, brushing his cool fingertips down my cheek. “We don’t fight, angel. We just have to learn not to scare the hel out of each other.”

“You make it sound so easy,” I grumbled. To cal either of us virgins would be ridiculous, yet emotional y that’s just what we were. Fumbling in the dark and too eager, completely out of our depths and self-conscious, trying to impress and missing al the subtle nuances.

“Easy or hard, doesn’t matter. We’l get through this because we have to.” He pushed his fingers through my hair, restoring order to the disheveled strands.

“We’l discuss when we get home. I think I’ve discovered the crux of our problem.”

His conviction and determination soothed the restlessness I’d been feeling the last few days. Closing my eyes, I relaxed and enjoyed the tactile delight of having my hair played with. “Your mother seemed startled that I’m a blonde.”

“Did she?”

“My mother was, too. Not about me being a blonde,” I qualified. “That you’d be interested in one.”

“Was she?”

“Gideon!”

“Hmm?” He kissed the end of my nose and ran his hands down my arms.

“I’m not the type you usual y go for, am I?” His brow arched. “I have one type: Eva Lauren Tramel . That’s it.”

I rol ed my eyes. “Okay. Whatever.”

“What does it matter? You’re the woman I’m with.”

“It doesn’t matter. I’m just curious. People don’t usual y stray from their preferred type.” Stepping between my legs, he put his arms around my hips. “Lucky for me that I fit your type.”

“Gideon, you don’t fit any type,” I drawled. “You’re in a class by yourself.”

His eyes sparkled. “Like what you see, do you?”

“You know I do, which is why we real y should get out of here before we start screwing like minks again.” Pressing his cheek to mine, he murmured, “Only you could blow my mind in a place that’s always made my skin crawl. Thank you for being exactly what I want and need.”

“Oh, Gideon.” I wrapped my arms and legs around him, holding him as close to me as possible. “You came here for me, didn’t you? To take me away from this place you hate.”

“I’d walk into hel for you, Eva, and this is pretty damn close.” He exhaled harshly. “I was about to go to your apartment and drag you away with me when I learned you’d come here. You have to stay away from Christopher.”

“Why do you keep saying that? He seems very nice.”

Gideon pul ed back, sifting my hair through his fingers. His eyes stayed fiercely locked to mine. “He takes sibling rivalry to the extreme, and he’s unstable enough to make him dangerous. He’s reaching out to you because he knows he can hurt me through you.

You have to trust me on this.”

Why was Gideon so suspicious of his half-brother’s motives? He had to have a good reason. It was yet another thing he didn’t ful y share with me. “I do trust you. Of course I do. I’l keep my distance.”

“Thank you.” Catching me by the waist, he lifted me off the counter and set me on my feet. “Let’s grab Cary and get the hel out of here.”

We made our way back outside with my hand in his.

I was uncomfortably aware that we’d been gone a very long time. The sun was going down. And I was panty-less. My ruined boy shorts were presently stuffed into the front pocket of Gideon’s jeans.

He glanced at me as we entered the marquee. “I should’ve told you before. You look gorgeous, Eva.

That dress is amazing on you and so are those fuck-me red heels.”

“Wel , clearly they work.” I bumped my shoulder into him. “Thank you.”

“For the compliment? Or the fucking?”

“Hush,” I admonished, flushing.

His dark velvet laugh turned every female head in hearing distance and some of the men’s, too. Placing our linked hands at the smal of my back, he pul ed me close and smacked a kiss on my mouth.

“Gideon!” His mother glided toward us with sparkling eyes and a wide smile on her lovely face.

“I’m so happy you’re here.”

She looked like she might hug him, but his posture altered subtly, charging the air around him with an invisible field of power that encompassed me as wel .

Elizabeth drew to an abrupt halt.

“Mother,” he greeted her with al the warmth of an arctic storm. “You can thank Eva for my being here. I’ve come to take her away.”

“But she’s having a good time, aren’t you, Eva? You should stay for her sake.” Elizabeth looked at me with a plea in her eyes.

My fingers flexed around Gideon’s hand. He came first, that was never in question, but I couldn’t help but wish I knew the story behind his coldness toward a mother who seemed to love him. Her adoring gaze slid over the face that had shades of her own, drinking in every feature hungrily. How long had it been since the last time she’d seen him in person?

Then I wondered if maybe she’d loved him too much…

Revulsion made my spine stiffen.

“Don’t put Eva on the spot,” Gideon said, rubbing his knuckles against my tense back. “You’ve gotten what you wanted—you’ve met her.”

“Perhaps you’l both come to dinner later this week?”

His only answer was an arched brow. Then his gaze lifted, luring my attention to fol ow it. I found Cary emerging from what appeared to be a hedgerow maze with a very recognizable pop princess on his arm.

Gideon gestured him over.

“Oh, not Cary, too!” Elizabeth protested. “He’s the life of the party.”

“I thought you might like him.” Gideon bared his teeth in something that was too sharp to be a smile.

“Just remember that he’s Eva’s friend, Mother. That makes him mine as wel .”

I was hugely relieved when Cary joined us, breaking the tension in his easygoing way.

“I was looking for you,” he said to me. “I was hoping you’d be ready to go. I got that cal I was expecting.” Looking into his sparkling eyes, I knew Trey had reached him. “Yes, we’re ready.”

Cary and I walked around to say our good-byes and offer our thanks. Gideon remained at my side like a possessive shadow, his demeanor calm but markedly aloof.

We were al walking toward the house when I spotted Ireland off to the side staring at Gideon. I stopped and looked up at him. “Go get your sister so we can say good-bye.”

“What?”

“She’s standing to your left.” I looked to our right to hide my prodding from the young girl whom I suspected might hero-worship her eldest brother.

He gestured Ireland over with a brusque wave of his hand. She took her time ambling over, her pretty face schooled into an expression of militant boredom. I looked at Cary with a shake of my head, remembering those days al too wel .

“Listen.” I squeezed Gideon’s wrist. “Tel her you’re sorry you two didn’t get to catch up while you were here and she should cal you sometime, if she wants.” Gideon shot me an arch look. “Catch up on what?” Rubbing his biceps, I said, “She’l do al the talking if given a chance.”

He scowled. “She’s a teenage girl. Why would I give her a chance to talk my ear off?”

I pushed onto my tiptoes and whispered in his ear,

“Because I’l owe you one.”

“You’re up to something.” He eyed me warily for a moment; then pressed a hard kiss to my lips with a

growl. “So we’l leave it open and say you owe me more than one. Quantity to be determined.” I nodded. Cary rocked back on his heels and twirled one index finger around another in a sign meaning wrapped around your finger.

Only fair, I thought, since he was wrapped around my heart.

I was surprised when Gideon accepted the keys to the Bentley SUV from one of the valets. “You drove?

Where’s Angus?”

“Day off.” He nuzzled against my temple. “I missed you, Eva.”

I settled into the front passenger seat, and he shut the door behind me. As I secured my seat belt, I saw him pause by the hood, making eye contact with two men dressed in black who waited beside a sleek black Mercedes sedan at the end of the drive. They nodded and got in the Benz. When Gideon pul ed out of the Vidal driveway, they fol owed directly behind us.

“Security detail?” I asked.

“Yes. I took off fast when I was told you were here, and they lost the tail for a while.”

Cary went home with Clancy, so Gideon and I headed straight to the penthouse. I found myself getting turned on from watching Gideon drive. He handled the luxury vehicle the way he handled everything—confidently, aggressively, and with skil ful control. He drove fast but not recklessly, weaving easily over the curves and straightaways of the scenic route back to the city. There was almost no traffic until we hit the gridlock of Manhattan.

When we arrived at his apartment, we both went straight into the master bathroom and undressed for a shower. As if he couldn’t stop touching me, Gideon washed me from head to toe; then he dried me with a towel and wrapped me in a new robe of embroidered teal silk with kimono sleeves. He finished by pul ing a pair of similarly hued drawstring silk pants out of a drawer for himself.

“Don’t I get panties?” I asked, thinking about my drawer of sexy underwear.

“No. There’s a phone hanging on the wal in the kitchen. Hit speed dial one and tel the man who answers that I want him to pick up double my usual dinner order from Peter Luger.”

“Al right.” I headed out to the living room and made the cal ; then I had to search for Gideon. I found him in his home office, a room I hadn’t been in before.

I didn’t get a good look at the space at first because the only lighting came from an angled picture light on the wal and a barrister’s lamp on his polished wood desk. Plus my eyes were more interested in focusing on him. He looked utterly sensual and compel ing sprawled in his big black leather chair. He held a tulip glass of some liquor that he warmed between his hands and the beauty of his flexing biceps sent tingles racing through me, as did the tight lacing of muscles on his abdomen.

His gaze was on the wal il uminated by the picture light, which snagged my attention, too. I was startled when I saw the art—a huge col age of blown-up photos of him and me: the picture of our kiss on the street outside the gym…a shot of us from the press gauntlet at the advocacy dinner…a candid of the tender aftermath of our fight in Bryant Park…

The focal point was the image in the center that had been taken while I slept in my own bed, lit only by the candle I’d left burning for him. It was an intimate voyeuristic shot, one that said more about the photographer than it did the subject.

I was deeply touched by the proof that he’d been fal ing along with me.

Gideon gestured at the drink he’d poured for me in advance and set on the edge of his desk. “Have a seat.”

I complied, curious. There was an edge to him that was new, a sense of purpose and calm determination paired with laser-precise focus.

What brought on his mood? And what did it mean for the rest of our evening?

Then I saw the smal photo col age frame lying on the desktop next to my drink and my worry faded. The frame was very similar to the one already on my desk, but this one held three photos of Gideon and me together.

“I want you to take that to work,” he said quietly

“Thank you.” For the first time in days, I was happy. I hugged the frame to my chest with one hand, and picked up my glass with the other.

His eyes glittered as he watched me take a seat.

“You blow kisses at me al day from your picture on my desk. I think it’s only fair that you be equal y reminded of me. Of us.”

I exhaled in a rush, my heartbeat not quite steady. “I never forget about you or us.”

“I wouldn’t let you if you tried.” Gideon took a deep drink, his throat working on a swal ow. “I think I’ve figured out where we made our first misstep, the one that’s led to al the stumbles we’ve had since.”

“Oh?”

“Take a drink of your Armagnac, angel. I think you’l need it.”

I took a cautious sip of the liquor, feeling the instantaneous burn, fol owed by recognition that I liked the flavor. I took a bigger drink.

Rol ing his glass between his palms, Gideon took another drink and eyed me thoughtful y. “Tel me which was hotter, Eva: sex in the limo when you were in charge or sex in the hotel when I was?” I shifted restlessly, unsure of where the conversation was leading. “I thought you enjoyed what happened in the limo. While it was happening, I mean. Obviously not later.”

“I loved it,” he said with quiet conviction. “The image of you in that red dress, moaning and tel ing me how good my cock feels inside you, wil haunt me as long as I live. If you’d like to top me again in the future, I’m definitely game.”

My stomach tensed. The muscles in my shoulders began to knot. “Gideon, I’m starting to freak out a little.

Al this talk of safewords and topping…it feels like this conversation is leading somewhere I can’t go.”

“You’re thinking of bondage and pain. I’m talking about a consensual power exchange.” Gideon studied me intently. “Would you like more brandy? You’re very pale.”

“You think?” I set the drained glass down. “It sounds like you’re tel ing me you’re a Dominant.”

“Angel, you knew that already.” His mouth curved in a soft, sexy smile. “What I’m tel ing you is that you’re submissive.”

I pushed to my feet in a rush.

“Don’t,” he warned in a dark purr. “You’re not running yet. We’re not done.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Being under someone else’s thumb— losing my right to say no! —was never going to happen again. “You know what I went through. I need control as much as you do.”

“Sit down, Eva.”

I stayed on my feet, just to prove my point.

His smile widened and my insides melted. “Do you have any idea how crazy I am about you?” he murmured.

murmured.

“You’re crazy al right, if you think I’m going to put up with being ordered around, especial y sexual y.”

“Come on, Eva. You know I don’t want to beat you, punish you, hurt you, demean you, or order you around like a pet. Those aren’t needs either of us has.” Straightening, Gideon leaned forward and placed his elbows on the desktop. “You’re the most important thing in my life. I treasure you. I want to protect you and make you feel safe. That’s why we’re talking about this.”

God. How could he be so wonderful and so insane at the same time? “I don’t need to be dominated!”

“What you need is someone to trust—No. Close your mouth, Eva. You’l wait until I’m finished.” My protest spluttered into silence.

“You’ve asked me to reacquaint your body with acts previously used to hurt and terrorize you. I can’t tel you what your trust means to me or what it would do to me if I broke that trust. I can’t risk it, Eva. We have to do this right.”

I crossed my arms. “I guess I’m dumber than bricks.

I thought our sex life was rockin’.”

Setting his glass down, Gideon kept going as if I hadn’t spoken. “You asked me to meet a need of yours today and I agreed. Now we need to—”

“If I’m not what you want, just spit it out!” I set the picture frame and my glass down before I did something with them I’d regret. “Don’t try and pretty it up with—”

He was around the desk and on me before I could stumble back more than a couple steps. His mouth sealed over mine, his arms caged me. As he’d done earlier, he carried me to a wal and restrained me against it, his hands banding my wrists and lifting them high above my head.

Trapped, I could nothing as he bent his knees and stroked my cleft with the rigid length of his erection.

Once, twice. Silk rasped against my swol en clit. The bite of his teeth on my covered nipple sent a shiver through me, while the clean scent of his warm skin intoxicated me. With a gasp, I sagged into his embrace.

“See how easily you submit when I take over?” His lips fol owed the arch of my brow. “And it feels good doesn’t it? It feels right.”

“That’s not fair.” I stared up at him. How could he expect me to respond any differently? As disturbed and confounded as I was, I was helplessly drawn to him.

“Of course it is. It’s also true.”

My gaze roamed over that glorious mane of inky hair and the chiseled lines of his incomparable face.

The longing I felt was so acute it was painful. The hidden damage inside him only made me love him more. There were times when I felt like I’d found the other half of myself in him.

“I can’t help it that you turn me on,” I muttered, “My body is physiological y supposed to soften and relax, so you can shove that big cock inside me.”

“Eva. Let’s be honest. You want me to have total control. It’s important to you that you can trust me to take care of you. There’s nothing wrong with that. The reverse is true for me—I need you to trust me enough to give up that control.”

I couldn’t think when he was pressed up against me, my body achingly aware of every hard inch of him. “I am not submissive.”

“You are with me. If you look back, you’l see you’ve been yielding to me al along.”

“You’re good in bed! And have more experience. Of course I let you do what you want to me.” I bit my lower lip to stop it from quivering. “I’m sorry I haven’t been as exciting for you.”

“Bul shit, Eva. You know how much I enjoy making love to you. If I could get away with it, I’d do nothing else. We’re not talking about games that get me off.”

“Then we’re talking about what gets me off? Is that what this is?”

“Yes. I thought so.” He frowned. “You’re upset. I didn’t mean—Damn it. I thought discussing this would help us.”

“Gideon.” My eyes stung, then flooded with tears. He looked as wounded and confused as I felt. “You’re breaking my heart.”

Releasing my wrists, he stepped back and swept me up in his arms, carrying me out of his office and down the hal way to a closed door. “Turn the knob,” he said quietly.

We entered a candlelit room that stil smel ed faintly of new paint. For a few seconds I was disoriented, unable to comprehend how we’d stepped out of Gideon’s apartment and into my bedroom.

“I don’t understand.” A serious understatement, but my brain was stil trying to get past the feeling of being teleported from one residence to another. “You…

moved me in with you?”

“Not quite.” He set me down, but kept an arm around me. “I recreated your room based on the photo I took of you sleeping.”

“Why?”

What the hel ? Who did something like that? Was this al to keep me from witnessing his nightmares?

The thought shattered my heart further. I felt like Gideon and I were drifting further away from each other by the moment.

His hands sifted through my damp hair, which only increased my agitation. I felt like batting his touch away and putting at least the length of the room between us.

Maybe two rooms.

“If you feel the need to run,” he said softly, “you can come in here and shut the door. I promise not to bother you until you’re ready. This way, you have your safe place and I know that you haven’t left me.” A mil ion questions and speculations roared through my mind, but the one thing that stuck out was, “Are we stil going to share a bed when we’re sleeping?”

“Every night.” Gideon’s lips touched my forehead.

“How could you think otherwise? Talk to me, Eva.

What’s going through that beautiful head of yours?”

“What’s going through my head?” I snapped. “What the fuck is going on in yours? What happened to you in the four days we were broken up?”

His jaw tightened. “We never broke up, Eva.” The phone rang in the other room. I cursed under my breath. I wanted us to talk and I wanted him to go away, both at the same time.

He squeezed my shoulders, and then let me go.

“That’s our dinner.”

I didn’t fol ow him when he left, feeling too unsettled to eat. Instead, I crawled onto the bed that was exactly like my own and curled around a pil ow, closing my eyes. I didn’t hear Gideon come back, but I felt him as he drew to a stop at the edge of the bed.

“Please don’t make me eat alone,” he said to my rigid back.

“Why don’t you just order me to eat with you?” He sighed, and then slid onto the bed to spoon behind me. His warmth was welcome, chasing away the chil that had brought goose bumps to my skin. He didn’t say anything for a long while, just gave me the comfort of having him close. Or maybe he was taking comfort in me.

“Eva.” His fingers caressed the length of my silk-clad arm. “I can’t stand you being unhappy. Talk to me.”

“I don’t know what to say. I thought we were final y coming to a point where things would smooth out between us.” I hugged the pil ow tighter.

“Don’t tense up, Eva. It hurts when you pul away from me.”

I felt like he was pushing me away.

Rol ing, I shoved him to his back; then I mounted him, my robe parting as I straddled his hips. I ran the palms of my hands over his powerful chest and raked the tanned flesh with my nails. My hips undulated over him, stroking my bare cleft over his cock. Through the thin silk of his pants, I could feel every ridge and thick vein. From the way his eyes darkened and his sculpted mouth parted on quickened breaths, I knew he could feel the outline and damp heat of me as wel .

“Is this so awful for you?” I asked, rocking my hips.

“Are you lying there thinking you’re not giving me what I want because I’m in charge?”

Gideon set his hands on my thighs. Even that innocuous touch seemed dominating.

The edginess and sharpened focus I’d detected not long ago abruptly made sense to me—he wasn’t restraining his force of wil anymore.

The tremendous power coiled inside him was now directed at me like a blast of heat.

“I’ve told you before,” he said huskily. “I’l take you however I can get you.”

“Whatever. Don’t think I don’t know you’re topping from the bottom.”

His mouth curved with unapologetic amusement.

Sliding down, I teased the flat disk of his nipple with the tip of my tongue. I blanketed him as he’d done to me in the past, stretching my body over his hips and legs, my hands shoving beneath his gorgeous ass to squeeze the firm flesh and hold him tight against me.

His cock was a thick column against my bel y, renewing my fierce appetite for him.

“Are you going to punish me with pleasure?” he asked quietly. “Because you can. You can bring me to my knees, Eva.”

My forehead dropped to his chest and the air left my lungs in an audible rush. “I wish.”

“Please don’t be so worried. We’l get through this along with everything else.”

“You’re so positive you’re right.” My gaze narrowed.

“You’re trying to prove a point.”

“And you might prove yours.” Gideon licked his lower lip and my sex clenched in silent demand.

There was a bril iant depth of emotion in his eyes.

Whatever else was going on in our relationship, there was no doubt we were seriously twisted up over each other.

And I was about to demonstrate that in the flesh.

Gideon’s neck arched as my mouth moved over his torso. “Oh, Eva.”

“Your world’s about to be rocked, Mr. Cross.” It was. I made sure of it.

Feeling goofy with feminine triumph, I sat at Gideon’s dining table and remembered him as he’d been just a short time ago—damp with sweat and panting, cursing as I took my time savoring his luscious body.

He swal owed a bite of his steak, which had been kept hot courtesy of a warming drawer, and said calmly, “You’re insatiable.”

“Wel , duh. You’re gorgeous, sexy, and very wel -

hung.”

“I’m glad you approve. I’m also extremely wealthy.” I waved one hand carelessly, encompassing the whole of what had to be a fifty-mil ion-dol ar apartment.

“Who cares about that?”

“Wel , I do, actual y.” His mouth curved.

I stabbed my fork into a German fried potato, thinking that Peter Luger food was almost as good as sex. Almost. “I’m interested in your money only if it means you can afford to stop working in favor of lounging around naked as my sex slave.”

“I could afford to financial y, yes. But you’d get bored and dump me, then where would I be?” His look was warmly amused. “Think you proved your point, do you?”

I chewed, and then said, “Should I prove it again?”

“The fact that you’re stil horny enough to want to proves my point.”

“Hmm.” I drank my wine. “Are you projecting?” He shot me a look and casual y chewed another bite of the tenderest steak I’d ever had.

Restless and worried, I took a deep breath and asked, “Would you tel me if our sex life didn’t satisfy you?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Eva.”

What else could have prompted him to bring this up after our four-day breakup? “I’m sure it doesn’t help that I’m not the type you usual y go for. And we haven’t used any of those toys you had in the hotel—”

“Stop talking.”

“Excuse me?”

Gideon set his utensils down. “I’m not going to listen to you shred your self-esteem.”

“What? You’re the only one who gets to do al the talking?”

“You can pick a fight with me, Eva, but it’s stil not going to get you fucked.”

“Who said—” I shut up when he glared. He was right. I stil wanted him. I wanted him on top of me, explosively lustful, completely in control of both my pleasure and his.

Pushing away from the table, he said curtly, “Wait here.”

When he returned a moment later, he set a black leather ring box beside my plate and resumed his seat. The sight of it hit me like a physical blow. Fear struck me first, icy cold. Fol owed swiftly by a longing that was white-hot.

My hands shook in my lap. I clasped my fingers together and realized my whole body was shaking.

Lost, I lifted my gaze to Gideon’s face.

The feel of his fingertips brushing down my cheek soothed much of the vibrating anxiety inside me, leaving behind the terrible yearning.

“It’s not that ring,” he murmured gently. “Not yet.

You’re not ready.”

Something inside me wilted. Then relief flooded me.

It was too soon. Neither of us was ready. But if I’d ever wondered how deeply I had fal en in love with Gideon, now I knew.

I nodded.

“Open it,” he said.

With cautious fingers, I pul ed the box closer and thumbed open the lid. “Oh.”

Nestled inside the black leather and velvet was a ring like no other. Gold rope-like bands were intertwined and decorated with Xs covered in diamonds.

“Bonds,” I murmured, “secured by crosses.” Gideon Cross.

“Not quite. I see the ropes as representative of the many threads of you, not bondage. But yes, the Xs are me holding on to you. By my fingernails, it feels like.” He finished his glass of wine and refil ed both our glasses.

I sat unmoving, stunned, trying to take it al in.

Everything he’d done in the time we’d been apart—the photos, the ring, Dr. Petersen, the replicated bedroom, and whoever had been fol owing me around—told me I’d never been far from his mind, if I’d even left it at al .

“You gave me my keys back,” I whispered, stil remembering the pain.

His hand reached out and covered mine. “There are a lot of reasons why I did that. You left me wearing nothing but a robe, Eva, and without your keys. I can’t stand thinking about what could’ve happened if Cary hadn’t been home to let you in right away.” Lifting his hand to my mouth, I kissed the back; then released him and closed the lid of the ring box. “It’s beautiful, Gideon. Thank you. It means a lot to me.”

“But you won’t wear it.” It wasn’t a question.

“After the conversation we’ve had tonight, it feels like a col ar.”

After a moment, he nodded. “You’re not altogether wrong.”

My brain hurt and my heart ached. Four nights of restless sleeping didn’t help. I couldn’t understand why he felt I was so necessary, even though I felt that way about him. There were thousands of women in New York alone who could replace me in his life, but there was only one Gideon Cross.

“I feel like I’m disappointing you, Gideon. After everything we’ve talked about tonight…I feel like this is the beginning of the end.”

Pushing his chair back, he angled toward me and touched my cheek. “It’s not.”

“When do we see Dr. Petersen?”

“I’l go alone on Tuesdays. After you talk to him and agree to couples counseling, we can go together on Thursdays.”

“Two hours of your week, every week. Not including the travel back and forth. That’s a big commitment.” I reached up and brushed the hair back from his cheek.

“Thank you.”

Gideon caught my hand and kissed the palm. “It’s no sacrifice, Eva.”

He went into his office to work a bit before bed and I

carried the ring box into the master bathroom with me.

I studied it further while I brushed my teeth and hair.

There was a soft hum of need beneath my skin, a persistent level of arousal that shouldn’t have been possible considering the number of orgasms I’d already had over the course of the day. It was an emotional y driven need to connect to Gideon, to reassure myself that we were okay.

Clutching the ring box in my hand, I went to my side of Gideon’s bed and set it on the nightstand. I wanted it where I’d see it first thing in the morning, after a good night’s sleep.

With a sigh, I draped my beautiful new robe over the footboard and crawled into bed. After tossing and turning for a long while, I final y crashed.

I woke sometime in the middle of the night to a racing pulse and quick, shal ow breathing. Disoriented, I lay stil for a moment, gathering my bearings and remembering where I was. I tensed when it sank in, my ears straining to hear if Gideon was having another nightmare. When I discovered him lying quietly beside me, his breathing deep and even, I relaxed with a sigh.

What time had he final y come to bed? After the days we’d spent apart, it worried me that he might have felt a need to be alone.

Then it hit me. I was aroused. Painful y so.

My breasts were ful and heavy, my nipples furled and tight. My core was aching and my cleft wet. As I lay there in the moonlit darkness, I realized that my own body had woken me with its demands. Had I dreamed something erotic? Or was it enough that Gideon was lying beside me?

Pushing up onto my elbows, I looked at him. The sheet and comforter clung to his waist, leaving his sculpted chest and biceps bared. His right arm was tossed over his head, framing the fal of dark hair around his lavishly handsome face. His left arm lay between us on the blankets, the hand fisted and bringing to relief the network of thick veins that coursed up his forearms. Even in repose he looked fierce and powerful.

I became more aware of the tension inside me, the sense that I was drawn to him by the silent exertion of his formidable wil . It wasn’t possible that he could demand my surrender while he was sleeping, yet it felt that way, felt like that invisible rope between us was pul ing me to him.

The throbbing between my legs grew unbearable and I pressed one hand against the violent pulsing, hoping to dul the ache. The pressure worsened it instead.

I couldn’t stay stil . Throwing the covers off, I slid my legs off the side of the mattress and thought about trying a glass of warm milk with the brandy Gideon had given me earlier. Abruptly, I paused, riveted by the moonlight gleaming off the leather of the ring box on the nightstand. I thought of the jewelry inside it and my desire surged. At that moment, the thought of being col ared by Gideon fil ed me with heated yearning.

You’re just horny, I scolded myself.

One of the girls in group had talked about how her

“master” could use her body any time and in any way he wanted, for his pleasure alone. There was nothing about that I’d found sexy…until I put Gideon in the picture. I loved getting him off. I loved making him come. Just because.

My fingers brushed over the lid of the tiny box.

Exhaling a shaky breath, I picked it up and opened it.

A moment later I was sliding the cool band onto the ring finger of my right hand.

“Do you like it, Eva?”

A shiver moved through me at the sound of Gideon’s voice, deeper and rougher than I’d ever heard it. He’d been awake, watching me.

How long had he been conscious? Was he as attuned to me while sleeping as I seemed to be to him?

“I love it.” I love you.

Setting the box aside, I turned my head to find him sitting up. His eyes glittered in a way that made me impossibly more aroused, but also sent a bite of fear through me. It was an unguarded look, like the one that had literal y knocked me on my ass when we met—

scorching and possessive, fil ed with dark threats of ecstasy. His gorgeous face was harsh in the shadows, his jaw taut as he lifted my right hand to his mouth and kissed the ring he’d given me.

I moved to kneel on the bed and draped my arms around his neck. “Take me. Carte blanche.” He cupped my butt and squeezed. “How does it feel to say that?”

“Almost as good as the orgasms you’re going to give me.”

“Ah, a chal enge.” The tip of his tongue teased the seam of my lips, tempting me with the promise of a kiss he deliberately withheld.

“Gideon!”

“Lay back, angel, and grip your pil ow with both hands.” His mouth curved in a wicked smile. “Don’t let go for any reason. Understand?”

Swal owing hard, I did as I was told, so turned on I thought I might come from just the relentless spasming of my needy sex.

He kicked the covers down to the footboard.

“Spread your legs and pul up your knees.” My breath caught audibly as my nipples hardened further, causing a deep ache in my breasts. God, Gideon was hot as hel like this. I was panting with excitement, my mind spinning with the possibilities.

The flesh between my legs trembled with want.

“Oh, Eva,” he crooned, running his index finger through my slick cleft. “Look how greedy you are for me. It’s a ful -time job keeping this sweet little cunt satisfied.”

That single rigid finger pushed into me, parting the swol en tissues. I tightened around him, so close to coming I could taste it. He withdrew and lifted his hand to his mouth, licking my flavor from his skin. My hips arched without volition, my body straining toward his.

“Your fault I’m so hot for you,” I gasped. “You slacked on the job for days.”

“Then I better make up for lost time.” Sliding down into a prone position, he settled his shoulders beneath my thighs and rimmed the quivering entrance to my body with the tip of his tongue. Around and around.

Ignoring my clit and refraining from fucking me even when I begged.

“Gideon, please.”

“Shh. I have to get you ready first.”

“I’m ready. I was ready before you woke up.”

“Then you should’ve woken me earlier. I’l always take care of you, Eva. I live for it.”

Whimpering in distress, I rocked my hips into that teasing tongue. Only when I was soaked with my own arousal, creaming desperately for the feel of any part of him I could get inside me, did he crawl over me and settle between my spread thighs, placing his forearms flat on the bed.

He held my gaze. His cock, feverishly hot and hard as stone, lay against the lips of my sex. I wanted it inside me more than I wanted to breathe. “Now,” I gasped. “Now.”

With a practiced shift of his hips, he rammed deep into me, shoving me up the bed.

“Ah, God,” I gasped, convulsing ecstatical y around the thick column of flesh that possessed me. This was what I’d needed since we’d talked in his home office, what I’d craved as I rode up and down his steely erection before dinner, what I’d needed even as I climaxed around his thick length.

“Don’t come,” he murmured in my ear, cupping my breasts in his hands and rol ing my nipples between his thumb and forefingers.

“What?” I was pretty sure if he’d just take a deep breath I’d go off.

“And don’t let go of the pil ow.”

Gideon began to move in a slow, lazy rhythm.

“You’re going to want to,” he murmured, nuzzling the sensitive spot beneath my ear. “You love to grab my hair and rake your nails down my back. And when you’re close to coming, you like to squeeze my ass and yank me deeper. Makes me so damn hard when you go wild like that, when you show me how much you love how I feel inside you.”

“No fair,” I moaned, knowing he was deliberately provoking me. The cadence of his raspy voice was perfectly timed with the relentless surging of his hips.

“You’re torturing me.”

“Good things come to those who wait.” His tongue traced the shel of my ear, and then dipped inside at the same moment he tugged on my nipples.

I bucked into his next thrust and nearly came.

Gideon knew my body so wel , knew al its secrets and erogenous zones. He was expertly stroking his cock inside me, rubbing over and over the tender bundle of nerves that quivered in delight.

Rol ing his hips, he screwed into me, exploiting other spots. I made a plaintive sound, on fire for him, desperately infatuated. My fingers cramped with the grip I had on my pil ow, my head thrashing against the driving need to orgasm. He could get me there just by rubbing inside me, the only man who’d ever been skil ed enough to give me an intense vaginal orgasm.

“Don’t come,” he repeated, his voice hoarse. “Make it last.”

“I c-can’t. It feels too good. God, Gideon…” Tears leaked out of the corners of my eyes. “I…I’m lost in you.”

I cried softly, afraid to say the other L-word too soon and risk upsetting the delicate balance between us.

“Oh, Eva.” He rubbed his cheek against my damp face. “I must’ve wished for you so hard and so often you had no choice but to come true.”

“Please,” I begged softly. “Slow down.” Gideon lifted his head to look at me, choosing that moment to pinch my nipples with just enough force to inflict a hint of pain. The tender muscles inside me clenched down so hard that his next thrust caused him to groan.

“Please,” I pled again, trembling with the effort to stave off my building climax. “I’m going to come if you don’t slow down.”

His gaze was hot on my face, his hips stil lunging in a measured tempo that was slowly stealing my sanity.

“Don’t you want to come, Eva?” he purred in that voice that could lure me into hel with a dreamy smile. “Isn’t that what you’ve been working toward al night?” My neck arched as his lips drifted across my throat.

“Only when you say I can,” I gasped. “Only…when you say.”

“Angel.” One hand moved to my face, brushing back the strands of hair that clung to the perspiration on my skin. He kissed me deeply, reverently, licking deep into my mouth.

Yes…

“Come for me,” he coaxed, quickening his pace.

“Come, Eva.”

On command, the orgasm struck me like a blow, shocking my system with an overload of sensation.

Wave after wave of pulsing heat rol ed through me, contracting my sex and tightening my core. I cried out, first with an inarticulate sound of agonized pleasure, then with his name. Chanting it over and over as he drove his beautiful cock into me, prolonging my climax, before pushing me into another one.

“Touch me,” he rasped, as I fel apart beneath him.

“Hold me.”

Freed from his command to hold the pil ow, I bound him to my sweat-slick body with arms and legs. He pounded deep and hard, driving strenuously toward his climax.

He came with a growl, his head thrown back as he spurted into me for long minutes. I held him until our bodies cooled and our breathing evened.

When Gideon final y rol ed off me, he didn’t go far.

He wrapped himself around my back and whispered,

“Sleep now.”

I don’t remember if I stayed awake long enough to reply.

Monday mornings could be awesome, when they began with Gideon Cross. We rode to work with my back propped against his side and his arm slung over my shoulder so that his fingers could link with mine.

As he toyed with the ring he’d given me, I kicked out my legs and eyed the classic nude heels he’d bought me along with some outfits to wear on the occasions I slept over. To start out the new week, I’d decided on a black pinstriped sheath dress with a thin blue belt that reminded me of his eyes. He had excel ent taste; I had to give him that.

Unless he was sending one of his brunette

“acquaintances” out on buying sprees…?

I pushed the unpleasant thought aside.

When I’d checked out the drawers he had set aside for me in his bathroom, I found al of my usual cosmetics and toiletries in al my usual shades. I didn’t bother to ask how he knew, which might’ve led to me freaking out. Instead, I chose to look at it as more proof of his attentiveness. He thought of everything.

The highlight of my morning had been helping Gideon dress in one of his seriously sexy suits. I’d buttoned his shirt; he’d tucked it into his pants. I’d fastened his fly; he had knotted his tie. He’d shrugged into his vest; I’d smoothed the finely tailored material over his equal y fine shirt, amazed to find that it could be just as sexy putting clothes on him as it was to take them off. It was like wrapping my own gift.

The world would see the beauty of the packaging, but only I knew the man inside it and how precious he was. His intimate smiles and his deep husky laugh, the gentleness of his touch and the ferocity of his passion were al reserved for me.

The Bentley bounced lightly over a pothole in the road and Gideon tightened his hold. “What’s the plan after work?”

“I get to start my Krav Maga classes today.” I couldn’t keep the excitement out of my voice.

“Ah, that’s right.” His lips brushed over my temple.

“You know I’m going to have to watch you go through dril s. Just thinking about it makes me hard.”

“Didn’t we already establish that everything makes you hard?” I teased, nudging him with my elbow.

“Everything about you. Which is lucky for us, since you’re insatiable. Text me when you’re done and I’l meet you at your place.”

Digging in my purse, I pul ed out my smartphone to see if it stil had a charge and saw a message from Cary. I opened it and found a video plus a text; Does

X know his bro is a douche? Stay away

from CV, baby girl *smooches*

I started the playback but it took me a minute to figure out what I was seeing. When comprehension set in, I froze.

“What is it?” Gideon asked with his lips in my hair.

Then he stiffened behind me, which told me he was looking over my shoulder.

Cary had filmed the video at the Vidal’s garden party. From the eight-foot-high hedges in the background, he was in the maze, and from the leaves framing the screen, he was in hiding. The star of the show was a couple locked in a passionate embrace.

The woman was beautiful y teary, while the man kissed over her frantic words and soothed her with gentle strokes of his hands.

They were talking about me and Gideon, talking about how I was using my body to get my hands on his mil ions.

“Don’t worry,” Christopher crooned to a distraught Magdalene. “You know Gideon gets bored fast.”

“He’s different with her. I—I think he loves her.” He kissed her forehead. “She’s not his type.” The fingers I had linked with Gideon’s tightened.

As we watched, Magdalene’s demeanor slowly changed. She began to nuzzle into Christopher’s touch, her voice softening, her mouth seeking. To an observer, it was clear he knew her body wel —where to pet and where to rub. When she responded to his skil ed seduction, he lifted her dress and fucked her.

That he was taking advantage of her was obvious. It was there in the contemptuously triumphant look on his face as he screwed her until she was limp.

I didn’t recognize the Christopher on the screen. His face, his posture, his voice…it was like he was a different man.

I was grateful when my smartphone battery died and the screen abruptly winked off. Gideon wrapped his arms around me.

“Yuck,” I whispered, snuggling careful y into him so I didn’t get makeup on his lapel. “Majorly creepy. I feel bad for her.”

He exhaled harshly. “That’s Christopher.”

“Asshole. That smug look on his face—Ugh.” I shuddered.

Pressing his lips to my hair, he murmured, “I thought Maggie would be safe from him. Our mothers have known each other for years. I forget how much he hates me.”

“Why?”

I wondered briefly if the nightmares Gideon had were related to Christopher, then I put the thought aside. No way. Gideon was older by several years and tougher al the way around. He’d kick Christopher’s ass.

“He thinks I got al the attention when we were younger,” Gideon said wearily, “because everyone was worried about how I was handling my father’s suicide. So he wants what’s mine. Everything he can get his hands on.”

I turned into him, pushing my arms underneath his jacket to get closer. There was something in his voice that made me hurt for him. His family home was a place he said haunted his nightmares and he was terribly distant from his family.

He’d never been loved. It was as simple—and as complicated—as that.

“Gideon?”

“Hmm?”

I pul ed back to look at him. Reaching up, I traced the bold arch of his brow. “I love you.” A violent shudder moved through him, one hard enough to shake me, too.

“I don’t mean to freak you out,” I reassured him quickly, averting my face to give him some privacy.

“You don’t have to do anything about it. I just didn’t want another minute to go by without you knowing how I feel. You can tuck it away now.”

One of his hands gripped my nape, the other dug almost painful y into my waist. Gideon held me there, immobile, locked against him as if I might blow away.

His breathing was ragged, his heartbeat pounding. He didn’t say another word the rest of the ride to work, but

he didn’t let me go either.

I planned on tel ing him again one day in the future, but as far as first times went, I thought we’d both done okay.

At ten o’clock sharp, I had two dozen long-stemmed red roses delivered to Gideon’s office with the note: In celebration of red dresses and limo rides.

Ten minutes later, I received an interoffice envelope with a note card that read:

Let’s do that again. Soon.

At eleven o’clock, I had a black-and-white cal a lily arrangement delivered to his office with the note: In honor of black & white garden party dresses and being dragged into libraries…

Ten minutes later, I received his reply: I’ll be dragging you to the floor in a minute…

At noon, I went shopping. Ring shopping. I hit six different shops before I found a piece that struck me as being absolutely perfect. Made of platinum engraved and studded with black diamonds, it was an industrial-looking ring that made me think of power and bondage. It was a dominant ring, very bold and masculine. I had to open a new charge account with the store to cover the hefty cost, but I considered the months of payments ahead of me worth it.

I cal ed Gideon’s office and talked with Scott, who I cal ed Gideon’s office and talked with Scott, who helped me arrange a fifteen-minute window in Gideon’s packed day for me to stop by.

“Thank you so much for your help, Scott.”

“You’re very welcome. I’ve enjoyed watching him receive your flowers today. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him smile like that.”

A warm rush of love flowed through me. I wanted to make Gideon happy. As he’d said, I lived for it.

I went back to work with a smile of my own. At two o’clock, I had a tiger lily arrangement delivered to Gideon’s office fol owed by a private note sent via interoffice envelope:

In gratitude for all the jungle sex.

His reply:

Skip the Krav Maga. I’ll give you a workout.

When three forty rol ed around—five minutes before my appointment with Gideon—I got nervous. I stood up from my chair on shaky legs and paced in the elevator on the way up to his floor. Now that the time had come to give him my gift, I worried that maybe he didn’t like rings…after al , he didn’t wear any.

Was it too presumptuous and possessive of me to want him to wear one just because I did?

The redheaded receptionist didn’t give me any trouble getting in and when Scott spotted me emerging from the hal way, he stood from his desk and greeted me with a wide grin. When I stepped into Gideon’s office, Scott closed the door behind me.

I was immediately struck by the lovely fragrance of the flowers and the way they warmed the starkly modern office.

Gideon looked up from his monitor, his brows lifting when he saw me. He pushed fluidly to his feet. “Eva. Is something wrong?”

I watched him shift gears from professional to personal, his gaze softening as he looked at me.

“No. It’s just…” I took a deep breath and went to him.

“I have something for you.”

“More? Did I forget a special occasion?” I set the ring box down in the center of his desk.

Then I turned away, feeling queasy. I seriously doubted the wisdom of my impetuous gift. It seemed like a stupid idea now.

What could I say to absolve him of guilt for not wanting it? As if it wasn’t bad enough I’d dropped the

“L” bomb on him today; then I had to fol ow it up with a damned ring. He was probably feeling the bal and chain already, dragging after him as he ran. And the noose tightening—

I heard the ring box snap open and Gideon’s sharply drawn breath. “Eva.”

His voice was dark and dangerous. I turned careful y, wincing at the austerity of his features and the starkness of his gaze. His hands were white-knuckled on the box.

“Too much?” I asked hoarsely.

“Yes.” He set the box down and rounded the desk.

“Too damn much. I can’t sit stil , I can’t concentrate. I can’t get you out of my head. I’m fucking restless, and I never am when I’m at work. I’m too busy. But you have me under siege.”

I knew damn wel how demanding his work had to be, yet I hadn’t taken that into consideration when the mood to surprise him—again and again—hit me. “I’m sorry, Gideon. I wasn’t thinking.”

He approached with the sexy stride that hinted at how great he was in the sack. “Don’t be sorry. Today has been the best day of my life.”

“Real y?” I watched him slide the ring onto his right ring finger. “I wanted to please you. Does it fit? I had to guess…”

“It’s perfect. You’re perfect.” Gideon caught up my hands and kissed my ring; then watched as I repeated the gesture with his. “What you make me feel, Eva…it hurts.”

My pulse leaped. “Is that bad?”

“It’s wonderful.” He cupped my face, his ring cool against my cheek. He kissed me passionately, his lips demanding against mine, his tongue thrusting with wicked skil into my mouth.

I wanted more, but restrained myself, thinking that I’d already gone overboard enough for one day. Plus, he’d been too distracted by my unexpected appearance to frost the glass wal to give us privacy.

“Tel me again what you said in the car,” he whispered.

“Hmm…I don’t know.” I brushed my free hand over his vest. I was afraid to tel him again that I loved him.

He’d taken it hard the first time, and I wasn’t sure he’d ful y taken in what it meant for us. For him. “You’re ridiculously handsome, you know. It’s a sucker punch every time I see you. Anyway…I don’t want to risk scaring you away.”

Leaning toward me, he touched his forehead to mine. “You regret what you said, don’t you? Al the flowers, the ring—”

“Do you real y like it?” I asked anxiously, pul ing back to study his face and see if he was hedging on the truth. “I don’t want you to wear it for me if you hate it.”

His fingers traced the shel of my ear. “It’s perfect.

It’s how you see me. I’m proud to wear it.” I loved that he got it. Of course, that’s because he got me.

“If you’re trying to soften the blow of taking back what you said—” he began, his gaze betraying a surprising anxiety.

I couldn’t resist the soft plea in his eyes. “I meant every word, Gideon.”

“I’l make you say it again,” he threatened in a seductive purr. “You’l scream it by the time I’m done with you.”

I grinned and backed away. “Get back to work, fiend.”

“I’l give you a lift home at five.” He watched me move to the door. “I want your cunt naked and wet when you come down to the car. If you touch yourself to get there, don’t make yourself come or there wil be

consequences.”

Consequences. A little shiver moved through me, but it carried a level of fear I could deal with. I trusted Gideon to know just how far to push me. “Wil you be hard and ready?”

A wry smile twisted his lips. “When am I not, with you? Thank you for today, Eva. Every minute of it.” I blew him a kiss and watched his eyes darken. The look on his face stayed with me the rest of the day.

It was six o’clock before I made it back to my apartment in a state of wel -fucked dishevelment. I’d known what I was in for when I found Gideon’s limousine at the curb after work instead of the Bentley.

He’d damn near tackled me as I climbed into the back; then proceeded to demonstrate his phenomenal oral skil s before nailing me into the seat with vigorous enthusiasm.

I was grateful that I kept in shape. Otherwise, Gideon’s insatiable sexual appetite combined with his seemingly endless stamina might’ve exhausted me by now. Not that I was complaining. Just an observation.

Clancy was already waiting for me in the lobby of my apartment building when I came rushing in. If he noted my hideously wrinkled dress, flushed cheeks, and messy hair, he didn’t point it out. I changed swiftly upstairs and we took off for Parker’s studio. I hoped the orientation would start out easy because my legs were stil a bit jel ied from two toe-curling orgasms.

By the time we arrived at the converted warehouse in Brooklyn, I was excited and ready to learn. About a dozen students were engaged in various exercises with Parker overseeing and offering encouragement from the edge of the mats. When he saw me, he came over and directed me to a far corner of the sparring area where we could work one-on-one.

“So…how’s it going?” I asked, to break my own tension.

He smiled, showing off a very interesting and arresting face. “Nervous?”

“A little.”

“We’re going to work on your physical strength and stamina, as wel as your awareness. I’m also going to start training you not to freeze or hesitate in unexpected confrontations.”

Before we began, I thought I had pretty good physical strength and stamina, but I learned both could be better. We started out with a brief introduction to the equipment and layout of the space, and then moved on to an explanation of both fighting and neutral/passive stances. We warmed up with basic bodyweight calisthenics; then progressed to “tagging,” where we tried to tag each other’s shoulders and knees while standing face-to-face and blocking countermoves.

Parker was amazing at tagging, of course, but I started to get the hang of it. The majority of the time, however, was spent covering groundwork and I real y sunk my teeth into that. I knew very wel what it was like

to be down and at a disadvantage.

If Parker noted my underlying vehemence, he didn’t comment on it.

When Gideon showed up at my apartment later that evening, he found me soaking my aching body in my bathtub. Although I could tel he was fresh from a shower after his own workout with his personal trainer, he stripped and slid into the bath behind me, cradling me with his arms and legs. I whimpered as he rocked me.

“That good, huh?” he teased, catching my earlobe in his teeth.

“Who knew rol ing around for an hour with a hot guy could be so exhausting?” Cary had been right about Krav Maga causing bruises; I could see a few shadows blooming beneath my skin already and we hadn’t even gotten to the hard stuff yet.

“I might be jealous,” Gideon murmured, squeezing my breasts, “if I didn’t know Smith was married with children.”

I snorted at yet another tidbit of knowledge he shouldn’t know. “Do you also know his shoe and hat sizes?”

“Not yet.” He laughed at my exasperated growl and I couldn’t hold back a smile at hearing the rare sound.

One day soon we were going to have to talk about his obsession with information gathering, but today wasn’t the day to get into it. We’d been at odds too much lately and Cary’s warning about making sure we had as much fun as not was ever-present in my mind.

Playing with the ring on Gideon’s finger, I told him about the conversation I’d had with my dad on Saturday and how his fel ow cops had been ribbing him over the gossip about me dating the Gideon Cross.

He sighed. “I’m sorry.”

Turning, I faced him. “It’s not your fault you’re news.

You can’t help being insanely attractive.”

“One of these days,” he said dryly, “I’l figure out whether my face is a curse or not.”

“Wel , if my opinion counts for anything, I’m rather fond of it.”

Gideon’s lips twitched and he touched my cheek.

“Your opinion is the only one that means anything. And your dad’s. I want him to like me, Eva, not think I’m exposing his daughter to invasions of her privacy.”

“You’l win him over. He just wants me to be safe and happy.”

He visibly relaxed and pul ed me closer. “Do I make you happy?”

“Yes.” I rested my cheek over his heart. “I love being with you. When we’re not together, I wish we were.”

“You said you didn’t want to fight anymore,” he murmured in my hair. “It’s been bugging me. Are you getting tired of me fucking up al the time?”

“You do not fuck up al the time. And I’ve screwed up, too. Relationships are hard, Gideon. Most of them don’t have kick-ass sex like we do. I put us in the lucky column.”

He cupped water in his hand and poured in down my back, over and over, soothing me with its sinuous warmth. “I don’t real y remember my dad.”

“Oh?” I tried to not tense up and reveal my surprise.

Or my agitated excitement and desperate hunger to learn more about him. He’d never talked about his family before. It kil ed me not to prod with questions, but I didn’t want to push if he wasn’t ready….

His chest lifted and fel on a deep exhale. There was something in the sound of his sigh that brought my head up and ruined my intention to be cautious.

I ran my hand over his hard pectorals. “Want to talk about what you do remember?”

“Just…impressions. He wasn’t around much. He worked a lot. I guess I get my drive from him.”

“Maybe

workaholism—is

that

a

word?—is

something you have in common, but that’s it.”

“How would you know?” he shot back, defiant.

Reaching up, I brushed the hair back from his face.

“I’m sorry, Gideon, but your father was a fraud who took the easy, selfish way out. You don’t have it in you to be that way.”

“Not that way, no.” He paused. “But I don’t think he ever learned how to connect to people, how to care about anything but his own immediate needs.” I studied him. “Do you think that describes you?”

“I don’t know,” he answered quietly.

“Wel , I know, and it doesn’t.” I pressed a kiss to the tip of his nose. “You’re a keeper.”

“I better be.” His arms tightened around me. “I can’t think about you with someone else, Eva. Just the idea of another man seeing you the way I do, seeing you like this…putting his hands on you…It takes me to a dark place.”

“It’s not going to happen, Gideon.” I knew how he felt. I wouldn’t be able to bear it if he was intimate with another woman.

“You’ve changed everything for me. I couldn’t stand losing you.”

I hugged him. “The feeling’s mutual.”

Tilting my head back, Gideon took my mouth in a fierce kiss.

In moments it became clear we were soon going to be sloshing water al over the floor. I pul ed away. “I need to eat if you want to go at it again, fiend.”

“Says the girlfriend rubbing her wet naked body al over me.” He sat back with a sinful smile.

“Let’s order cheap Chinese and eat it out of the box with chopsticks.”

“Let’s order good Chinese and do that.”

Cary joined us in the living room for excel ent Chinese, a sweet plum wine, and Monday night television. As we flipped channels and laughed over the hilarious names of some reality television shows, I watched as two of the most important men in my life enjoyed some relaxation time and each other. They got along wel , ribbing and playful y insulting each other in that way men had. I’d never seen that side of Gideon before and I loved it.

While I hogged one whole side of our sectional sofa, the two guys sat cross-legged on the floor and used the coffee table as a dining table. Both were wearing loose sweatpants and fitted T-shirts, and I appreciated the view. Was I a lucky girl or what?

Cracking his knuckles, Cary dramatical y prepared to open his fortune cookie. “Let’s see. Wil I be rich?

Famous? About to meet Mr. or Ms. Tal , Dark, and Tasty? Traveling to distant lands? What’d you guys get?”

“Mine’s lame,” I said. “In the end all things will be known. Duh. I didn’t need a fortune to figure that out.” Gideon opened his and read, “Prosperity will knock on your door soon.”

I snorted.

Cary shot me a look. “I know, right? You snatched someone else’s cookie, Cross.”

“He better not be anywhere near someone else’s cookie,” I said dryly.

Reaching over, Gideon plucked half of mine out of my fingers. “Don’t worry, angel. Your cookie is the only one I want.” He popped it in his mouth with a wink.

“Gag,” Cary muttered. “Get a room.” He cracked his fortune with a flourish, and then scowled. “What the fuck?”

I leaned forward. “What’s it say?”

“Confucius say,” Gideon ad-libbed, “man with hand in pocket feel cocky al day.”

Cary threw half his cookie at Gideon, who caught it deftly and grinned.

“Give me that.” I snatched the fortune out from between Cary’s fingers and read it. Then laughed.

“Fuck you, Eva.”

“Wel ?” Gideon prodded.

“Pick another cookie.”

Gideon smiled. “Pwned by a fortune.” Cary threw the other half of his cookie.

I was reminded of similar evenings spent with Cary when I was attending SDSU, which made me try and picture what Gideon had been like in col ege. From the articles I’d read, I knew he’d attended Columbia for his undergraduate studies, then left to focus on his expanding business interests.

Had he associated with the other students? Did he go to frat parties, screw around and/or drink too much?

He was such a control ed man, I had a hard time picturing him that carefree, and yet here he was being exactly that with me and Cary.

He glanced at me then, stil smiling, and my heart turned over in my chest. He looked his age for once, young and seriously fine and so very normal. At that moment, we were just a twenty-something couple relaxing at home with a roommate and a remote control. He was just my boyfriend, hanging out. It was al so sweet and uncomplicated, and I found the il usion a poignant one.

The intercom buzzed and Cary leaped to his feet to answer it. He glanced at me with a smile. “Maybe it’s Trey.”

I held up a hand with my fingers crossed.

But when Cary answered the door a few minutes later, it was the leggy blonde from the other night who came in.

“Hey,” she said, taking in the remnants of dinner on the table. She eyed Gideon appraisingly as he politely unfolded and stood in that powerful y graceful way of his. She shot me a smirk; then unleashed a dazzling supermodel smile on Gideon and held out her hand.

“Tatiana Cherlin.”

He shook her hand. “Eva’s boyfriend.”

My brows lifted at his introduction. Was he protecting his identity? Or his personal space? Either way, I liked his response.

Cary came back into the room with a bottle of wine and two glasses. “Come on,” he said, gestured down the hal way to his bedroom.

Tatiana gave a little wave and preceded Cary out. I mouthed behind her back to Cary, What are you doing?

He winked and whispered, “Picking another cookie.”

Gideon and I cal ed it a night shortly after and headed to my room. As we got ready for bed, I asked him something I’d wondered about earlier. “Did you have a fuck pad in col ege, too?”

His T-shirt cleared his head. “Excuse me?”

“You know, like the hotel room. You’re a randy guy. I just wondered if you’d had some kind of setup even then.”

He was shaking his head as I ogled his divinely perfect torso and lean hips. “I’ve had as much sex since I met you as I’ve had in the last two years combined.”

“No way.”

“I work hard and I work out harder, both of which keep me pleasantly exhausted most of the time.

Occasional y, I might’ve gotten an offer I didn’t refuse, but otherwise I could take or leave sex until I met you.”

“Bul shit.” I found that impossible to believe.

He shot me a look before he headed toward the bathroom with a black leather toiletry bag. “Keep doubting me, Eva. See what happens.”

“What?” I fol owed him, enjoying the sight of his delectable ass. “You’re going to prove that you can take or leave sex by doing me again?”

“It takes two.” He opened his bag and pul ed out a new toothbrush that he extricated from its packaging and dropped into my toothbrush holder. “You’ve initiated sex between us as much as I have. You need the connection as much as I do.”

“You’re right. It’s just…”

“Just what?” He pul ed open a drawer, frowned at finding it ful , and moved on to pul open another.

“Other sink,” I said, smiling at his presumption that he would get drawers at my place, too, and his scowl when he couldn’t find them. “They’re al yours.” Gideon moved over to the second sink and began unpacking his bag into the drawers. “Just what?” he repeated, taking shampoo and body wash over to my shower.

Leaning my hip into the sink and crossing my arms, I watched him stake his claim al over my bathroom.

There was no doubt that’s what he was doing, just as there was no doubt that anyone walking into the room would know right away there was a man in my life.

It struck me then that I had a similar claim on his private space. His household staff had to know their boss was in a committed relationship now. The thought gave me a little thril .

“I was thinking about you in col ege earlier,” I went on, “when we were eating dinner, imagining what it would be like to see you around on campus. I would’ve been obsessed with you. I would have gone out of my way to see you around just to enjoy the view. I would’ve tried to get in the same classes as you, so I could daydream during lectures about getting into your pants.”

“Sex maniac.” He kissed the tip of my nose as he passed me and went to brush his teeth. “We both know what would’ve happened once I saw you.” I brushed my hair and teeth; then washed my face.

“So…did you have a sex pad for the rare occasions some lucky bitch got you in bed?”

His gaze caught my soapy reflection in the mirror.

“I’ve always used the hotel.”

“That’s the only place you’ve had sex? Before me?”

“The only place I’ve had consensual sex,” he said quietly, “before you.”

“Oh.” My heart broke.

I walked over to him, hugging him from behind. I rubbed my cheek against his back.

We went to bed and wrapped ourselves around each other. I buried my face in his neck and breathed

him in, snuggling. His body was hard, yet it was wonderful y comfortable against mine. He was so warm and strong, so powerful y male. I only had to think of him to want him.

I slid my leg over his hips and rose above him, my hands splayed atop the ridges of his abdomen. It was dark, I couldn’t see him, but I didn’t need to. As much as I loved that face of his—the one he resented at times—it was the way he touched me and murmured to me that real y got to me. As if there was no one else in the world for him, nothing he wanted more.

“Gideon.” I didn’t need to say anything else.

Sitting up, he wrapped his arms around me and kissed me deeply. Then he rol ed me beneath him and made love to me with a tender possessiveness that rocked me to the soul.

I woke with a jolt of surprise. A heavy weight crushed me and a harsh voice spit ugly, nasty words into my ear. Panic gripped me, cutting off my air.

Not again. No…Please, no…

My stepbrother’s hand covered my mouth and he yanked my legs apart. I felt the hard thing between his legs poking blindly, trying to push into my body. My scream was muffled by his palm smashed over my lips and I cringed away, my heart pounding so hard I thought it would burst. Nathan was so heavy. So heavy and strong. I couldn’t buck him off. I couldn’t shove him away.

Stop it! Get off me. Don’t touch me. Oh, God…

please don’t do that to me…not again…

Where was Mama? Ma-ma!

I screamed, but Nathan’s hand covered my mouth. It pressed down on me, squashing my head into the pil ow. The more I fought, the more excited he became.

Panting like a dog, he rammed against me over and over…trying to shove himself inside me…

“You’re going to know what it feels like.” I froze. I knew that voice. I knew it wasn’t Nathan’s.

Not a dream. Stil a nightmare.

God, no. Blinking madly in the darkness, I struggled to see. The blood was roaring through my ears. I couldn’t hear.

But I knew the smel of his skin. Knew his touch, even when it was cruel. Knew the feel of his body on mine, even as it tried to invade me.

Gideon’s erection battered into the crease of my thigh. Panicked, I heaved upward with al my strength.

His hand on my face dislodged.

Sucking air into my lungs, I screamed.

His chest heaved as he growled, “Not so neat and tidy when you’re the one getting fucked.”

“Crossfire,” I gasped.

A flash of light from the hal way blinded me, fol owed by the blessed removal of Gideon’s smothering weight. Rol ing to my side, I sobbed, my eyes streaming tears that blurred my view of Cary shoving Gideon across the room and into the wal , denting the

drywal .

“Eva! Are you okay?” Cary turned on the bedside light, cursing when he saw me curled in a fetal position, rocking violently.

When Gideon straightened, Cary rounded on him.

“Move one fucking muscle before the cops get here and I’l beat you to a bloody pulp!”

Swal owing past my burning throat, I pushed up to a seated position. My gaze locked with Gideon’s and I watched the haze of sleep leave his eyes, replaced by a dawning horror.

“Dream,” I choked out, catching Cary’s arm as he reached for the phone. “He’s d-dreaming.” Cary glanced at where Gideon crouched naked on the floor like a wild animal. Cary’s arm dropped back to his side. “Jesus Christ,” he breathed. “And I thought I was fucked up.”

Sliding off the bed, I stood on shaky legs, sick with lingering fear. My knees gave out and Cary caught me, lowering to the floor with me and holding me as I cried.

“I’m gonna crash on the couch.” Cary ran a hand through his sleep-mussed hair and leaned into the hal way wal . The door to my bedroom was open behind me and Gideon was inside, looking pale and haunted. “I’l set out some blankets and pil ows for him, too. I don’t think he should go home alone. He’s shredded.”

“Thanks, Cary.” The arms I had wrapped around my middle tightened. “Is Tatiana stil here?”

“Hel , no. It’s not like that. We just fuck.”

“What about Trey?” I asked quietly, my mind already drifting back to Gideon.

“I love Trey. I think he’s the best person I’ve ever met aside from you.” He bent forward and kissed my forehead. “And what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.

Stop worrying about me and take care of you.” I looked up at him, my eyes swimming in tears. “I don’t know what to do.”

Cary sighed, his green eyes dark and serious. “I think you need to decide if you’re in over your head, baby girl. Some people can’t be fixed. Look at me. I’ve got a great guy and I’m giving it to a girl I can’t stand.”

“Cary…” Reaching out, I touched his shoulder.

He caught my hand and squeezed it. “I’m here if you need me.”

Gideon was zipping up his duffel bag when I returned to my room. He looked at me and fear slithered in my gut. Not for me, but for him. I’d never seen anyone look so desolate, so utterly broken. The bleakness in his beautiful eyes frightened me. There was no life in him. He was gray as death with deep shadows in al the angles and planes of his breathtaking face.

“What are you doing?” I whispered.

He backed up, as if he wanted to be as far away from me as he could get. “I can’t stay.” It worried me that I felt a surge of relief at the thought of being alone. “We agreed—no running.”

“That was before I attacked you!” he snapped, showing the first sign of spirit in over an hour.

“You were unconscious.”

“You’re not going to be a victim ever again, Eva. My God…what I almost did to you…” He turned his back to me, his shoulders hunched in a way that scared me as much as the attack had.

“If you leave, we lose and our pasts win.” I saw my words hit him like a blow. Every light in my room was on, as if electricity alone could banish al the shadows on our souls. “If you give up now, I’m afraid it’l be easier for you to stay away and for me to let you. We’l be over, Gideon.”

“How can I stay? Why would you want me to?” Turning around, he looked at me with such longing it brought fresh tears to my eyes. “I’d kil myself before I hurt you.”

Which was one of my fears. I had a difficult time picturing the Gideon I knew—the dominant, wil ful force of nature—taking his own life, but the Gideon standing before me was an entirely different person. And he was the child of a suicidal parent.

My fingers plucked at the hem of my T-shirt. “You’d never hurt me.”

“You’re afraid of me,” he said hoarsely. “I can see it on your face. I’m afraid of me. Afraid of sleeping with you and doing something that wil destroy us both.” He was right. I was afraid. Dread chil ed my stomach.

Now I knew the explosive violence in him. The festering fury. And we were so impassioned with each other. I’d slapped his face at the garden party, lashing out physical y when I never did that.

It was the nature of our relationship to be lusty and emotional, earthy and raw. The trust that held us together also opened us up to each other in ways that made us both vulnerable and dangerous. And it would get worse before it got better.

He shoved a hand through his hair. “Eva, I—”

“I love you, Gideon.”

“God.” He looked at me with something that resembled disgust. Whether it was directed at me or himself, I didn’t know. “How can you say that?”

“Because it’s the truth.”

“You just see this”—he gestured at himself with a wave of his hand. “You’re not seeing the fucked-up, broken mess inside.”

I inhaled sharply. “You can say that to me? When you know I’m fucked up and broken, too?”

“Maybe you’re wired to go for someone who’s terrible for you,” he said bitterly.

“Stop it. I know you’re hurting, but lashing out at me is only going to make you hurt worse.” I glanced at the clock and saw it was four in the morning. I walked toward him, needing to get past my fear of touching him and being touched by him.

He held up a hand as if to hold me off. “I’m going home, Eva.”

“Sleep on the couch here. Don’t fight me about this, Gideon. Please. I’l worry myself sick if you go.”

“You’l be more worried if I stay.” He stared at me, looking lost and angry and fil ed with terrible yearning.

His eyes pleaded with me for forgiveness, but he wouldn’t accept it when I tried to give it to him.

I went to him and took his hand, fighting back the surge of apprehension that hit me when we touched.

My nerves were stil raw, my throat and mouth stil sore, the memory of his attempts at penetration—so like Nathan’s—were stil too fresh. “We’l g-get through this,” I promised him, hating that my voice quavered.

“You’l talk to Dr. Petersen and we’l go from there.” His hand lifted as if to touch my face. “If Cary hadn’t been here—”

“He was, and I’l be fine. I love you. We’l get past this.” I walked into him, hugging him, pushing my hands beneath his shirt to touch his bare skin. “We’re not going to let the past get in the way of what we have.” I wasn’t sure which of us I was trying to convince.

“Eva.” His returning hug squeezed al of the air out of me. “I’m sorry. It’s kil ing me. Please. Forgive me…I can’t lose you.”

“You won’t.” My eyes closed, focusing on the feel of him. The smel of him. Remembering that I once feared nothing when I was with him.

“I’m so sorry.” His shaking hands stroked the curve of my spine. “I’l do anything…”

“Shh. I love you. We’l be okay.”

Turning his head, he kissed me softly. “Forgive me, Eva. I need you. I’m afraid of what I’l become if I lose you…”

“I’m not going anywhere.” My skin tingled beneath the restless glide of his hands on my back. “I’m right here. No more running.”

He paused, his breath gusting harshly against my lips. Then he tilted his head and sealed his mouth over mine. My body responded to the gentle coaxing of his kiss. I arched into him without volition, pul ing him closer.

He cupped my breasts in his hands, kneading them, circling the pads of his thumbs over my nipples until they peaked and ached. I moaned with a mixture of fear and hunger, and he quivered at the sound.

“Eva…?”

“I—I can’t.” The memory of how I’d woken up was too fresh in my mind. It hurt me to deny him, knowing he needed the same thing from me as I’d needed from him when I told him about Nathan—proof that the desire was stil there, that as ugly as the scars of our pasts were, they didn’t affect what we were to each other now.

But I couldn’t give him that. Not yet. I felt too raw and vulnerable. “Just hold me, Gideon. Please.” He nodded, wrapping his arms around me.

I urged him to sink to the floor with me, hoping I could get him to fal asleep. I curled into his side, my leg thrown over his, my arm draped over his hard stomach. He squeezed me gently, pressing his lips to my forehead, whispering over and over again how sorry he was.

“Don’t leave me,” I whispered. “Stay.”

Gideon didn’t answer, didn’t make any promises, but he didn’t let me go either.

I woke sometime later, hearing Gideon’s heart beating steadily beneath my ear. Al the lights were stil on, and the carpeted floor was hard and uncomfortable.

Gideon lay on his back, his beautiful face youthful in sleep, his shirt lifted just enough to expose his navel and the ripped muscles of his abdomen.

This was the man I loved. This was the man whose body gave me such pleasure, whose thoughtfulness moved me over and over again. He was stil here. And from the frown that marred the space between his brows, he was stil hurting.

I slid my hand into his sweatpants. For the first time since we’d been together, he wasn’t hot steel in my palms, but he quickly swel ed and thickened as I tentatively stroked him from root to tip. Fear lingered just beneath my arousal, but I was more afraid of losing him than of living with the demons inside him.

He stirred, his arm tightening around my back.

“Eva…?”

This time I answered him the way I couldn’t before.

“Let’s forget,” I breathed into his mouth. “Make us forget.”

“Eva.”

He rol ed into me, peeling my shirt off with cautious movements. I was similarly tentative in undressing him.

We approached each other as if each of us was breakable. The bond between us was fragile just then, both of us apprehensive about the future and the wounds we could inflict with al of our jagged edges.

His lips wrapped around my nipple, his cheeks hol owing slowly, his seduction subdued. The tender suckling felt so good I gasped and arched into his hand. He caressed my side from breast to hip and back again, over and over, gentling me as my heart raced wildly.

He kissed across my chest to the other breast, murmuring words of apology and need in a voice broken by regret and misery. His tongue lapped at the hardened point, worrying it, before surrounding it with wet heat and suction.

“Gideon.” The delicate pul s expertly coaxed desire through my skittish mind. My body was already lost in him, greedily seeking the pleasure and beauty of his.

“Don’t be afraid of me,” he whispered. “Don’t pul away.”

He kissed my navel, and then moved lower, his hair caressing my stomach as he settled between my legs.

He held me open with shaking hands and nuzzled my clit. His light, teasing licks through my cleft and the fluttering dips into my trembling sex took me to the edge of insanity.

My back bowed. Hoarse pleas left my lips. Tension spread through my body, tightening everything until I felt like I might snap under the pressure. And then he pushed me into orgasm with the softest nudge of the tip of his tongue.

I cried out, heated relief pulsing through my writhing body.

“I can’t let you go, Eva.” Gideon levered over me as I vibrated with pleasure. “I can’t.”

Brushing away the tear tracks from his face, I stared into his reddened eyes. His torment was painful for me to witness, hurting my heart. “I wouldn’t let you if you tried.”

He took himself in hand and fed his cock slowly, careful y into me. My head pressed hard into the floor as he sank deeper, possessing my body one thick inch at a time.

When I’d taken al of him, he began to move in measured, deliberate thrusts. I closed my eyes and focused on the connection between us. Then he settled onto me, his stomach pressed to mine, and my pulse leaped with panic. Abruptly frightened, I hesitated.

“Look at me, Eva.” His voice was so hoarse it was unrecognizable.

I did, and saw his anguish.

“Make love to me,” he begged in a breathless whisper. “Make love with me. Touch me, angel. Put your hands on me.”

“Yes.” My palms pressed flat to his back; then stroked over the quivering muscles to his ass.

Squeezing the hard flexing flesh, I urged him to move faster, plunge deeper.

The rhythmic strokes of his heavy cock through the clenching depths of my sex pushed ecstasy through me in heated waves. He felt so good. My legs wrapped around his plunging hips, my breath quickening as the cold knot inside me began to melt.

Our gazes held.

Tears coursed down my temples. “I love you, Gideon.”

“Please…” His eyes squeezed shut.

“I love you.”

He lured me to orgasm with the skil ed rol ing of his hips, stirring his cock inside me. My sex clenched tightly, trying to hold him, trying to keep him deep in me.

“Come, Eva,” he gasped against my throat.

I struggled for it, struggled to get past the lingering apprehension that came from having him on top of me.

The anxiety mingled with the desire, keeping me on edge.

He made a hoarse sound fil ed with pain and regret.

“Need you to come, Eva…need to feel you…

Please…”

Cupping my buttocks, he angled my hips and stroked over and over that sensitive spot inside me.

He was tireless, relentless, fucking me long and hard until my mind lost control of my body and I came violently. I bit his shoulder to stem my cries as I shook beneath him, the tiny muscles inside me trembling with ecstatic ripples. He groaned deep in his chest, a serrated sound of tormented pleasure.

“More,” he ordered, deepening his drives to give me that delectable bite of soreness. That he once again trusted us both enough to introduce that little touch of pain chased away the last of my reservations. As much as we trusted each other, we were learning to trust our instincts, too.

I came again, ferociously, my toes curling until they cramped. I felt the familiar tension grip Gideon and tightened my grasp on his hips, spurring him on, desperate to feel him spurting inside me.

“No!” He wrenched away, fal ing to his back and throwing an arm over his eyes. Punishing himself by denying his body the comfort and pleasure of mine.

His chest heaved and glistened with sweat. His cock lay heavily on his bel y, brutal-looking with its broad purpled head and thick roping of veins.

I dove for it with hands and mouth, ignoring his vicious curse. Pinning his torso with my forearm, I pumped him hard with my other fist and sucked voraciously on the sensitive crown. His thighs quivered, his legs kicking restlessly.

“Damn it, Eva. Fuck.” He stiffened and gasped, his hands shoving into my hair, his hips bucking. “Oh, fuck.

Suck it hard…Ah, Christ…”

He exploded in a powerful rush that almost choked me, coming hard, flooding my mouth. I took it al , my fist milking pulse after pulse up the throbbing length of his cock, swal owing repeatedly until he shuddered with the surfeit of sensation and begged me to stop.

I straightened and Gideon sat up and wrapped himself around me. He took me back down to the floor

where he buried his face in my throat and cried until dawn.

I wore a black long-sleeved silk blouse and slacks to work on Tuesday, feeling the need to have a barrier between myself and the world. In the kitchen, Gideon cupped my face in his hands and brushed his mouth across mine with heartrending tenderness. His gaze remained haunted.

“Lunch?” I asked, feeling like we needed to cling to the connection between us.

“I have a business lunch.” He ran his fingers through my loose hair. “Would you come? I’l make sure Angus gets you back to work on time.”

“I’d love to come along.” I thought of the schedule of evening events, meetings, and appointments he’d sent to my smartphone. “And tomorrow night we have a benefit dinner at the Waldorf=Astoria?” His gaze softened. Dressed for work, he looked somber yet col ected. I knew he was anything but.

“You real y won’t give up on me, wil you?” he asked quietly.

I held up my right hand and showed him my ring.

“You’re stuck with me, Cross. Get used to it.” On the drive to work, he cuddled me in his lap, and again on the ride to lunch at Jean Georges. I didn’t speak more than a dozen words during the meal, which Gideon ordered for me and I enjoyed

immensely.

I sat quietly at his side, my left hand resting on his hard thigh beneath the tablecloth, a wordless affirmation of my commitment to him. To us. One of his hands rested over mine, warm and strong, as he discussed a new property in development on St. Croix.

We kept that connection throughout the entire meal, each of us choosing to eat one-handed rather than separate.

With each hour that passed, I felt the horror of the night before drain away from both of us. It would be another scar to add to his col ection, another bitter memory he’d always have, a memory I would share and fear along with him, but it wouldn’t rule us. We wouldn’t let it.

Angus was waiting to take me home when my day ended. Gideon was working late, and then going directly from the Crossfire to Dr. Petersen’s office. I used the length of the drive to steel myself for the next round of training with Parker. I debated skipping it, but ended up deciding it was important to keep to a routine. So much in my life was uncontrol able at the moment. Fol owing a schedule was one of the few things total y within my power.

After an hour and a half of tagging and groundwork with Parker at the studio, I was relieved when Clancy dropped me off at home and proud of myself for working out when it was the last thing I’d wanted to do.

When I stepped into the lobby, I found Trey talking to the front desk.

“Hey,” I greeted him. “Going up?”

He turned to face me, his brown eyes warm and his smile open. Trey had a gentleness to him, a kind of straightforward naïveté that was different from the other relationships Cary’d had before. Or maybe I should just say Trey was “normal,” which so few of the people in my and Cary’s lives were.

“Cary’s not in,” he said. “They just tried cal ing.”

“You’re welcome to come up with me and wait. I won’t be going out again.”

“If you real y don’t mind.” He fel into step beside me as I waved at the gal at the front desk and moved toward the elevators. “I brought something for him.”

“I don’t mind at al ,” I assured him, returning his sweet smile.

He eyed my yoga pants and tank top. “You just get back from the gym?”

“Yeah. Despite it being one of those days when I’d rather have done anything else.” He laughed as we stepped into the elevator. “I know that feeling.”

As we rode up, silence descended. It was weighted.

“Everything al right?” I asked him.

“Wel …” Trey adjusted the sling of his backpack.

“Cary’s just seemed a little off the last few days.”

“Oh?” I bit my lower lip. “In what way?”

“I don’t know. It’s hard to explain. I just feel like maybe something’s up with him and I’m missing what it is.”

I thought of the blonde and winced inwardly. “Maybe he’s stressed about the Grey Isles job and he doesn’t want to bother you with it. He knows you’ve got your hands ful with your job and school.”

The tension in his shoulders softened. “Maybe that’s it. It makes sense. Okay. Thank you.”

I let us in to the apartment and told him to make himself at home. Trey headed to Cary’s room to drop his stuff, while I went to the phone to check the voice mail.

A shout from down the hal way had me reaching for the phone for a different reason, my heart thudding with thoughts of intruders and imminent danger. More yel ing fol owed, with one voice clearly belonging to Cary.

I exhaled in a rush, relieved. With the phone in my hand, I ventured to see what the hel was going on. I was nearly run over by Tatiana rounding the hal way corner stil buttoning her blouse.

“Oops,” she said, with an unapologetic grin. “See ya.”

I couldn’t hear the door shut behind her over Trey’s shouting.

“Fuck you, Cary. We talked about this! You promised!”

“You’re blowing this out of proportion,” Cary barked.

“It’s not what you think.”

Trey came storming out of Cary’s bedroom in such a rush that I plastered myself to the hal way wal to get out of his way. Cary fol owed, with a sheet slung around his waist. As he passed me, I shot him a narrow-eyed glance that earned me a fuck-off middle finger.

I left the two men alone and escaped into my shower, angry at Cary for once again ruining something good in his life. It was a pattern I kept hoping he’d break, but he couldn’t seem to kick it.

When I came out to the kitchen a half hour later, the stil ness in the apartment was absolute. I focused on cooking dinner, deciding to go with a pork roast and new potatoes with asparagus, one of Cary’s favorite dinners, in case he was home for dinner and needed some cheering up.

The sight of Trey stepping into the hal way while I was putting the roast in the oven surprised me, and then it made me sad. I hated to see him leave looking flushed, disheveled, and crying. My pity turned to fierce disappointment when Cary joined me in the kitchen with the scent of male sweat and sex clinging to him.

He shot me a scowl as he passed me on his way to the wine fridge.

I faced him with my arms crossed. “Screwing a heartbroken lover on the same sheets he’s just caught you cheating on isn’t going to make things better.”

“Shut up, Eva.”

“He’s probably hating himself right now for giving in.”

“I said shut the fuck up.”

“Fine.” I turned away from him and focused on seasoning the potatoes to put in the oven with the roast.

Cary grabbed wineglasses out of the cupboard. “I can feel you judging me. Stop it. He wouldn’t be half as pissed if it’d been a man he caught me fucking.”

“It’s al his fault, huh?”

“Newsflash: Your love life isn’t perfect either.”

“Low blow, Cary. I’m not going to be your punching bag over this. You messed up, and then you made it worse. It’s al on you.”

“Don’t get on your damn high horse. You’re sleeping with a man who’s going to rape you any day now.”

“It’s not like that!”

He snorted and leaned his hip against the counter, his green eyes fil ed with pain and anger. “If you’re going to make excuses for him because he’s sleeping when he attacks you, you’l have to make those same excuses for drunks and druggies. They don’t know what they’re doing either.”

The truth of his words struck me hard, as did the fact that he was deliberately trying to wound me. “You can put down a bottle. You can’t quit sleeping.” Straightening, Cary opened the bottle he’d selected and poured two glasses, sliding one across the counter toward me. “If anyone knows what it’s like to be involved with people who hurt you, it’s me. You love him. You want to save him. But who’s going to save you, Eva? I’m not always going to be around when you’re with him and he’s a ticking time bomb.”

“You wanna talk about being in relationships that hurt, Cary?” I shot back, deflecting him away from my painful truths. “Did you screw Trey over to protect yourself? Did you figure you’d push him away before he had the chance to disappoint you?”

Cary’s mouth curved bitterly. He tapped his glass to mine, which stil sat on the counter. “Cheers to us, the seriously fucked up. At least we have each other.” He stalked out of the room and I deflated. I’d known this was coming—the unraveling of circumstances too good to be true. Contentment and happiness didn’t exist in my life for more than a few moments at a time, and they were real y only il usionary.

There was always something hidden. Lying in wait to spring up and ruin everything.

Gideon arrived just as dinner was coming out of the oven. He had a garment bag in one hand and a laptop case in the other. I’d worried that he would try to go home alone after his session with Dr. Petersen and was relieved when he’d cal ed to say he was on his way. Stil , when I first opened the door and saw him on the threshold, a shiver of unease slid through me.

“Hey,” he said quietly, fol owing me back into the kitchen. “Smel s delicious in here.”

“I hope you’re hungry. There’s a lot of food and I’l be surprised if Cary joins us to help eat it al .” Gideon dropped his stuff on the breakfast bar and approached me cautiously, his gaze searching my face as he neared. “I brought some things with me to stay the night, but I’l go if you want. At any time. Just tel me.”

I blew out my breath in a harsh rush, determined not to let fear dictate my actions. “I want you here.”

“I want to be here.” He paused beside me. “Can I hold you?”

I turned into him and squeezed him hard. “Please.” He pressed his cheek against mine and hugged me close. The embrace wasn’t as natural and easy as we’d grown used to. There was a new wariness between us that was different from anything we’d felt before.

“How are you doing?” he murmured.

“Better now that you’re here.”

“But stil nervous.” He pressed his lips to my forehead. “Me, too. I don’t know how we’re ever going to fal asleep next to each other again.” Pul ing back slightly, I looked at him. That was my fear as wel , and my earlier conversation with Cary didn’t help matters. He’s a ticking time bomb…

“We’l figure it out,” I said.

He was quiet for a long moment. “Has Nathan ever contacted you?”

“No.” Although I had a deep-rooted fear that I might see him again one day, whether accidental y or deliberately. He was out there somewhere, breathing the same air…“Why?”

“It was on my mind today.”

I pul ed back to search his face, a knot forming in my throat at how tormented he looked. “Why?”

“Because we’ve got a lot of baggage between us.”

“Are you thinking it’s too much?”

Gideon shook his head. “I can’t think that way.” I didn’t know what to do or say. What assurances could I give him, when I wasn’t sure my love and his need would be enough to make our relationship work?

“What’s going through your mind?” he asked.

“Thoughts of food. I’m starving. Why don’t you go see if Cary wants to eat? Then we can get started on dinner.”

Gideon found Cary sleeping, so he and I ate a candlelit dinner for two at the dining table, a somewhat formal meal while lounging in the worn T-shirts and pajama bottoms we’d put on after our respective showers. I was worried about Cary, but spending quiet downtime alone with Gideon felt like just what we needed.

“I had lunch with Magdalene in my office yesterday,” he said after we’d enjoyed a few initial bites.

“Oh?” While I’d been ring shopping, Magdalene had been enjoying private time with my man?

“Don’t take that tone,” he admonished. “She ate a meal in an office covered in your flowers, with you blowing kisses from my desk. You were as much there as she was.”

“Sorry. Knee-jerk reaction.”

He lifted my hand to his mouth and pressed a quick, hard kiss to the back. “I’m relieved you can stil get jealous over me.”

I sighed. My emotions had been al over the map al day; I couldn’t decide how I felt about anything. “Did you say anything to her about Christopher?”

“That was the point of the lunch. I showed her the video.”

“What?” I frowned, remembering my phone had died in his car. “How’d you do that?”

“I took your phone up to my office and pul ed the video off via USB. Didn’t you notice I brought it back last night, ful y charged?”

“No.” I set my silverware down. Dominant or not, Gideon and I were going to have to work on which lines crossed over into my freak-out zone. “You can’t just hack into my phone, Gideon.”

“I didn’t hack into it. You haven’t set a password yet.”

“That’s not the point! It’s a serious invasion of my fucking privacy. Jesus…” Why in hel did no one in my life understand that I had boundaries? “Would you like me rummaging through your stuff?”

“I’ve got nothing to hide.” He pul ed his smartphone out of an inner pocket of his sweats and held it out to me. “And you won’t either.”

I didn’t want to get into a fight now, things were too shaky as it was, but I’d let this go long enough. “It doesn’t matter whether or not I have something I don’t want you to see. I have a right to space and privacy, and you need to ask before you help yourself to my information and my belongings. You have to stop taking whatever you want without my permission.”

“What was private about it?’ he asked with a frown.

“You showed it to me yourself.”

“Don’t be like my mother, Gideon!” I shouted.

“There’s only so much crazy I can handle.” He jerked back at my vehemence, clearly surprised by how upset I was. “Okay. I’m sorry.”

I gulped down my wine, trying to rein in my temper and unease. “Sorry I’m mad? Or sorry you did it?” After the length of several heartbeats, Gideon said,

“I’m sorry you’re mad.”

He real y didn’t get it. “Why don’t you see how weird this is?”

“Eva.” He sighed and shoved a hand through his hair. “I spend a quarter of every day inside you. When you set limits outside of that I can’t help but see them as arbitrary.”

“Wel , they’re not. They’re important to me. If there’s something you want to know, you need to ask me.”

“Al right.”

“Don’t do it anymore,” I warned. “I’m not kidding, Gideon.”

His jaw tightened. “Okay. I get it.”

Then, because I real y didn’t want to fight, I moved on. “What did she say when she saw it?” He visibly relaxed. “It was difficult, of course. Even more difficult to know I’d seen it.”

“She saw us in the library.”

“We didn’t talk about that directly, but then, what was there to say? I won’t apologize for making love to my girlfriend in a closed room.” He leaned back in his chair and exhaled harshly. “Seeing Christopher’s face on the video—seeing what he real y thought of her

— that hurt her. It’s hard to see yourself being used that way. Especial y by someone you think you know, someone who’s supposed to care about you.” To hide my reaction, I busied myself with refil ing both my glass and his. He spoke as if from experience. What exactly had been done to him?

After a quick gulp of wine, I asked, “How are you doing with it?”

“What can I do? Over the years, I’ve made every attempt to talk to Christopher. I’ve tried throwing money at him. I’ve tried threatening him. He’s never shown any inclination to change. I realized long ago that I can only do damage control. And keep you as far away from him as possible.”

“I’l be helping you with that, now that I know.”

“Good.” He took a drink, eyeing me over the lip of his glass. “You’re not asking me about my appointment with Dr. Petersen.”

“It’s none of my business. Unless you want to share.” I met his gaze, wil ing him to do just that. “I’m here to listen whenever you need an ear, but I’m not going to pry. When you’re ready to let me in, you wil . That said, I’d love to know if you like him.”

“So far.” He smiled. “He talks me around in circles.

Not many people can do that.”

“Yes. Talks you back around and makes you come at it from a different angle that has you thinking, ‘Now why didn’t I see it like that?’”

Gideon’s fingers stroked up and down the stem of his glass. “He prescribed something for me to take at night before bed. I fil ed it before I came over.”

“How do you feel about taking drugs?”

He looked at me with dark, haunted eyes. “I feel it’s necessary. I have to be with you and I have to make that safe for you, whatever it takes. Dr. Petersen says the drug combined with therapy has been successful for other ‘atypical sexual parasomniacs.’ I have to believe that.”

I reached over to squeeze his hand. Taking medication was a big step, especial y for someone who’d avoided facing his problems for a long time.

“Thank you.”

Gideon’s grip tightened. “Apparently there are enough people with this problem that there have been sleep studies on it. He told me about a documented case where a man sexual y assaulted his wife in his sleep for twelve years before they sought help.”

“Twelve years? Jesus.”

“Apparently part of the reason they waited so long was because the man was a better lay when he was asleep,” he said dryly. “And if that’s not a kil er blow to the ego, I don’t know what is.”

I stared at him. “Wel , shit.”

“I know, right?” His wry smile faded. “But I don’t want you to feel pressured to share a bed with me, Eva.

There is no magic pil . I can sleep on the couch or I can

go home, although of the two choices I’d prefer the couch. My whole day is better after getting ready for work with you.”

“For me, too.”

Reaching over, Gideon caught my hand and lifted it to his lips. “I never imagined I could have this…

Someone in my life who knows what you do about me.

Someone who could talk about my fuck-ups over dinner because they accept me anyway…I’m grateful for you, Eva.”

My heart twisted with a sweet pain in my chest. He could say such beautiful things, the perfect things.

“I feel the same way about you, ace.” Deeper, maybe, because I loved him. But I didn’t say that aloud.

He’d get there someday. I wasn’t going to give up until he was absolutely, irrevocably mine.

With his bare feet propped on the coffee table and his computer on his lap, Gideon looked so at home and relaxed that he kept distracting me from my television shows.

How did we get here? I asked myself. This extravagantly sexy man and me?

“You’re staring,” he murmured, his gaze on his laptop screen.

I stuck my tongue out at him.

“Is that a sexual suggestion, Miss Tramel ?”

“How do you see me while staring at whatever

you’re working on?”

He looked up then and caught my gaze. His blue eyes blazed with power and heat. “I’ve always seen you, angel. From the moment you found me, I’ve seen nothing but you.”

Wednesday started with Gideon’s cock pushing into me from behind, my new favorite way to wake up.

“Wel , then,” I said hoarsely, rubbing the sleep from my eyes as his arm hitched around my waist and hauled me closer to his warm, hard chest. “You’re frisky this morning.”

“You’re gorgeous and sexy every morning,” he murmured, nibbling on my shoulder. “I love waking up to you.”

We celebrated a night of uninterrupted sleep with a handful of orgasms between us.

Much later in the day, I had lunch with Mark and his partner Steven at a lovely Mexican restaurant tucked beneath the street. We descended a short set of cement stairs into a surprisingly spacious restaurant with black-vested waitstaff and plenty of light.

“You’l need to bring your man back here,” Steven said, “and have him buy you one of the pomegranate margaritas.”

“Good stuff?” I asked.

“Oh, yeah.”

When the waitress came to take our orders, she flirted outrageously with Mark, fluttering enviously long lashes. Mark flirted back. As the meal progressed, the exuberant redhead—whose name tag introduced her as Shawna—became bolder, touching Mark’s shoulders and the back of his neck every time she came by. In return, Mark’s banter became more suggestive, until I eyed Steven nervously, watching his face redden and his scowl deepen by the moment.

Shifting uncomfortably, I was counting down the minutes until the tension-fraught meal was over.

“Let’s get together tonight,” Shawna said to Mark when she brought the check. “One night with me and I’l cure you.”

I gaped. Seriously?

“Seven o’clock work for you?” Mark purred. “I’l ruin you, Shawna. You know what happens once you go black…”

I inhaled my water down the wrong pipe and choked.

Steven leaped to his feet and rounded the table, pounding me on the back. “Hel , Eva,” he said, laughing. “We’re just playing with you. Don’t die on us.”

“What?” I gasped, my eyes watering.

Grinning, he came around my shoulder and tossed his arm around the waitress. “Eva, meet my sister, Shawna. Shawna, Eva here is the one who makes Mark’s life easier.”

“That’s good,” Shawna said, “since he’s got you to

make things harder.”

Steven winked at me. “That’s why he keeps me around.”

Seeing the brother and sister pair so close together, I final y caught the resemblance I’d missed before. I sagged into my seat and narrowed my eyes at Mark.

“That was rotten. I thought Steven was going to blow a gasket.”

Mark held up his hands in a show of surrender. “It was al his idea. He’s the drama queen, remember?” Rocking back on his heels, Steven grinned and said, “Now, Eva. You know Mark’s the idea man in this relationship.”

Shawna dug a business card out of her pocket and handed it to me. “My number’s on the flipside. Gimme a cal . I’ve got the inside dirt on these two. You can pay

’em back real y good.”

“Traitor!” Steven accused.

“Hey.” Shawna shrugged. “Us girls have to stick together.”

After work, Gideon and I went to his gym. Angus dropped us off at the curb and we headed inside. The place was hopping and the locker room crowded. I changed and stowed my stuff; then met Gideon in the hal way.

I waved at Daniel, the trainer who’d talked to me on my first visit to CrossTrainer, and got a smack on the ass for it.

“Hey,” I protested, swatting at Gideon’s chastising hand. “Cut it out.”

He tugged my ponytail and gently urged my head back, tilting my mouth up so he could mark his territory with a deep, lush kiss.

The way he pul ed my hair sent electricity sweeping across my skin. “If this is your idea of a deterrent,” I whispered against his lips, “I have to say it’s much more of an incentive.”

“I’m quite wil ing to take it up a notch.” He nipped my lower lip with his teeth. “But I wouldn’t suggest testing my limits that way, Eva.”

“Don’t worry. I have other ways to do it.” Gideon hit the treadmil first, affording me the pleasure of seeing his body glistening with sweat…in public. As often as I saw him that way in private, it never ceased to be a major turn-on.

And God, I loved the way he looked with his hair tied back. And the flex of his muscles beneath lightly tanned skin. And the graceful power of his movements.

Seeing such an elegantly urbane man shed the suits and show off his animal side hit al my hot buttons.

I couldn’t stop staring and was happy I didn’t have to. He was mine, after al ; a fact that sent warm pleasure sliding through me. Besides, every other woman in the gym was checking him out, too. As he moved from station to station, dozens of admiring eyes fol owed.

When he caught me ogling, I shot him a suggestive glance and ran my tongue along my lower lip. His arched brow and rueful half-smile made me tingly. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been so motivated while working out. An hour and a half just flew by.

By the time we got back in the Bentley and headed to the penthouse, I was squirming in my seat. My gaze slid repeatedly to Gideon in silent invitation.

He linked his fingers with mine. “You’l wait for it.” That pronouncement startled me. “What?”

“You heard me.” He kissed my fingers and had the nerve to give me a wicked smile. “Delayed gratification, angel.”

“Why would we do that?”

“Think of how crazed we’l be for each other after dinner.”

I leaned closer so Angus didn’t overhear me, although I knew he was professional enough to ignore us. “That’s a given, waiting or not. I say we go with not.” But he wouldn’t budge. Instead, he tortured us both.

Having us undress one another for a steamy shower, our hands petting and caressing the curves and hol ows of each other’s bodies; then dressing for dinner. He went al out in black tie, but skipped the tie.

His crisp white shirt was unbuttoned at the col ar, revealing a flash of skin. The cocktail dress he selected for me was a champagne silk Vera Wang with a strapless bustier bodice, an open back, and a tiered skirt that ended a few inches above my knees.

I smiled when I saw it, knowing it was going to drive him nuts seeing me in that dress al night. It was gorgeous and I loved it, but it was a style meant for tal , slender models, not short curvy girls. In a pitiful bid for modesty, I left my hair down to hang over my breasts, but it didn’t help much if Gideon’s expression was any indication.

“My God, Eva.” He adjusted himself in his slacks.

“I’ve changed my mind about that dress. You shouldn’t wear it in public.”

“We don’t have time for you to change your mind.”

“I thought there was more material than that.” I shrugged with a grin. “What can I say? You bought it.”

“I’m having second thoughts. How long could it possibly take to remove it?”

Sliding my tongue along my lower lip, I said, “I don’t know. Why don’t you find out?”

His eyes turned dark. “We’d never get out of here.”

“I wouldn’t complain.” He looked so damn hot and I wanted him—as always—real y damned bad.

“Isn’t there a jacket or something you can put over that? A parka, maybe? Or a trench coat?” Laughing, I grabbed my clutch off the dresser and wrapped my arm around his. “Don’t worry. Everyone wil be too busy checking you out to even bother noticing me.”

He scowled as I tugged him out of the bedroom.

“Seriously. Have your tits gotten bigger? They’re spil ing out over the top of that thing.”

“I’m twenty-four years old, Gideon,” I said dryly. “I stopped developing years ago. What you see is what you get.”

“Yes, but I’m the only one who’s supposed to be seeing, since I’m the only one who’s al owed to be getting.”

We moved into the living room. In the short time it took us to pass through to the foyer, I relished the quiet beauty of Gideon’s home. I loved how warm and inviting it was. The old world charm of the décor was so elegant, yet it was also remarkably comfortable.

The stunning view out of the arched windows complemented the interior, but didn’t distract from it.

The mixture of dark woods, distressed stone, warm colors, and vivid jeweled accents was clearly expensive, as was the art hung on the wal s, but it was a tasteful display of wealth. I couldn’t imagine anyone feeling awkward about what to touch or where to sit. It just wasn’t that kind of space.

We caught the private elevator and Gideon faced me as the doors closed. He immediately tried tugging my bodice up.

“If you’re not careful,” I warned, “you’l expose my crotch instead.”

“Damn it.”

“We could have fun with this. I could play the role of a bubbleheaded blond bimbo who’s after your cock and your mil ions, and you can be yourself—the bil ionaire playboy with his latest toy. Just look bored and indulgent while I rub up against you and coo about how bril iant you are.”

“That’s not funny.” Then he brightened. “What about

a scarf?”

Once we checked in for the gala dinner benefitting a new crisis shelter for women and children, we were directed to a press gauntlet, triggering my fear of exposure. I focused on Gideon because nothing distracted me as thoroughly as he did. And because I was paying such close attention, I was able to watch the change from private man to public persona as it happened.

The mask slipped smoothly into place. His irises chil ed to an icy blue and his sensual mouth lost any hint of curve. I could almost feel the force of his wil enclosing us. There was a shield between us and the rest of the world simply because he wished it to be there. Standing beside him, I knew no one would approach or speak to me until he gave them some sign that they could.

Stil , the don’t-touch vibe didn’t extend to looking.

Gideon turned heads as we walked to the bal room and eyes fol owed him. I got a nervous twitch from al the attention he garnered, but he seemed oblivious and completely unruffled.

If I’d had my heart set on cooing and rubbing al over Gideon, I would’ve had to wait in line. He was pretty much mobbed the moment we stopped walking. I stepped away to make room for those vying to catch his attention and wandered off to find some champagne. Waters Field & Leaman had done the pro bono advertising for the gala, and I spotted a few people I knew.

I’d managed to snag a glass off a passing waiter’s tray when I heard someone cal out my name. Turning, I saw Stanton’s nephew approaching with a broad smile. Dark-haired and green-eyed, he was around my age. I knew him from the times I’d visited my mother on holiday breaks and was glad to see him.

“Martin!” I greeted him with open arms and we hugged briefly. “How are you? You look fabulous.”

“I was about to say the same.” He eyed my dress appreciatively. “I’d heard you’d moved to New York and meant to look you up. How long have you been in town?”

“Not long. A few weeks.”

“Drink your champagne,” he said. “And let’s dance.” The wine was stil bubbling nicely through my system when we moved onto the dance floor to the sound of Bil ie Hol iday singing “Summertime.”

“So,” he began, “are you working?”

As we danced, I told him about my job and I asked what he was up to. I wasn’t surprised to hear he was working for Stanton’s investment firm and doing wel .

“I’d love to come uptown and take you out to lunch sometime,” he said.

“That would be great.” I stepped back as the music ended and bumped into someone behind me. Hands went to my waist to steady me and I looked over my shoulder to find Gideon at my back.

“Hel o,” he purred, his icy gaze on Martin. “Introduce us.”

“Gideon, this is Martin Stanton. We’ve known each other for a few years now. He’s my stepfather’s nephew.” I took a deep breath and went for it. “Martin, this is the significant man in my life, Gideon Cross.”

“Cross.” Martin grinned and held out his hand. “I know who you are, of course. It’s a pleasure to meet you. If things work out, maybe I’l be seeing you at some of the family gatherings.”

Gideon’s arm slid around my shoulders. “Count on it.”

Martin was hailed by someone he knew and he leaned forward to kiss my cheek. “I’l cal you about lunch. Next week maybe?”

“Great.” I was highly conscious of Gideon vibrating with energy beside me, although when I glanced at him, his face with calm and impassive.

He pul ed me into a dance, with Louis Armstrong singing “What a Wonderful World.” “Not sure I like him,” he muttered.

“Martin’s a very nice guy.”

“Just so long as he knows you’re mine.” He pressed his cheek to my temple and placed his hand within the cutout back of my dress, skin to skin. There was no way to doubt that I belonged to him when he was holding me like that.