Table of Contents

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Acknowledgments

About the Author

If you love erotica, one-click these hot Scorched releases…

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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2017 by Laura Jardine. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

Entangled Publishing, LLC

2614 South Timberline Road

Suite 109

Fort Collins, CO 80525

Visit our website at www.entangledpublishing.com.

Scorched is an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC.

Edited by Nina Bruhns & Brenda Chin

Cover design by Curtis Svehlak

Cover art from iStock

ISBN 978-1-64063-162-5

Manufactured in the United States of America

First Edition August 2017

For Jeff

Chapter One

Cassidy Monroe slipped into a pair of brown shorts with a large flat tail sewn onto the back, plus a tight brown T-shirt and leggings. Before opening the bedroom door, she put on a pair of fake buck teeth and a headband with little brown ears. She’d been working on this costume for the past week, and she was rather proud of it.

“What do you think?” she asked her best friend, Rachel Malone.

Rachel’s mouth fell open. “When I suggested you dress as a sexy animal for Halloween, that was not what I had in mind. You’re a beaver?”

“Exactly.” Cassie ducked back into her bedroom and came out with a small log. She had scraped some wood off one end so it was pointed. It looked like it had been gnawed by a beaver. “Do you think I should carry this with me?”

Rachel pressed her hand to her forehead. She was dressed as a flapper girl. “Oh my God. There are so many dirty jokes running through my mind. Beaver. Wood. Make it stop.”

“I’d be interested in hearing some of those,” said Cole Sampson, Rachel’s boyfriend. He was lounging on the sofa.

Rachel stuck out her tongue at him and turned back to Cassie. “Lose the log. And the buck teeth.”

Cassie pulled them out with a sigh. “But they make me look more like a beaver.”

“The point is not to look like a beaver. The point is to look as sexy as possible so Johnny can’t take his eyes off you. Buck teeth are not sexy. And carrying a log around all night is just weird. What will you do when he kisses you? Drop it on his foot?”

“Fine, fine. No log.” She put it on the table.

Halloween wasn’t until next Tuesday, but their other best friend, Jenna, and her husband were hosting their Halloween party tonight. Rachel had insisted the party be on a Friday so she and Cole could come down to Georgeville from Ottawa.

“A beaver is an odd choice,” Rachel said. “Why not a bunny rabbit?”

“That’s so unoriginal.”

“Again, the point isn’t to be original.”

Cassie attempted to shake her tail. “It’s very Canadian, eh?”

Rachel snickered. “I guess sexy animal costumes are almost always rabbits or members of the cat family. I’m not used to seeing anything else. A beaver just doesn’t seem sexy.”

“The whole idea of considering any animal ‘sexy’ is a little weird to me.”

“I don’t know. I can see how there’s something kind of hot about a cheetah. It’s quick and sleek. Beavers are pudgy and have funny teeth. Not to say you look pudgy in that costume, but…”

Cassie narrowed her gaze. “What about a bear? Would that have been better? Or a fox?”

“Those aren’t so bad.”

“How about a lobster?” She had briefly considered that idea last week. She’d rejected it not because lobsters weren’t sexy enough, but because it was a more complicated costume than a beaver. “Perhaps a lizard? Or a squid?”

Rachel rolled her eyes. “Thank you for reminding me that this could be so much worse.”

“A squid is better than an ogre,” Cole muttered from the couch. “I can’t believe I have to wear this tonight.” He picked up the green mask on the coffee table and shoved it over his head. “Tell me again why I’m doing this?”

“Because it’s hilarious,” Rachel said. “You probably don’t even need to wear the mask. With the plaid pants, white shirt, and vest, plus that stunning ogre personality of yours, people will automatically know you’re Shrek.”

“Thank you for that.”

Rachel sauntered over and sat on his lap. “And later tonight, I’ll—”

“Cut it out, lovebirds.” Cassie didn’t need to witness a make-out session. “So, Rachel, is the beaver costume okay without the buck teeth and the log?”

“The ears are cute. The shirt is fine. Just pull it down a little. Maximize your cleavage.”

Cassie complied. “What do you think now?”

Rachel looked her up and down. “I think it’ll do the job just fine.”

Although Rachel had escaped to the city earlier this year, Cassie was perfectly happy in the small town of Georgeville, where she, Rachel, and Jenna had grown up. She knew almost everyone, and she liked her job at the doctor’s office. It was a nice, peaceful existence.

But there was something missing.

Fortunately, she had the perfect solution to that problem—in the form of Johnny Fitzpatrick, the owner of the town’s hardware store. He was five years older, so they hadn’t gone to school together, but she’d gotten to know him in the past few months. They’d started chatting when they saw each other around town, and two weeks ago, she’d gone to the hardware store to buy a toilet plunger—yes, she was the queen of sexiness—and he’d asked her out for coffee afterward.

They’d had a good time at Tim Hortons, the only coffee shop in town, talking about nothing in particular. A little flirting, but so far it hadn’t progressed to anything more.

She hoped that would change tonight.

Not that she was in a big rush to get a serious boyfriend and settle down. She was only twenty-five. But aside from one brief and ill-fated attempt at BDSM, she hadn’t been with a guy for a year.

It was past time to move on from her last relationship with a man—Blaine, whom she’d spent one glorious, heartbreaking week with the summer before last.

She needed to move on. For her own sanity.

She shook her head and pushed Blaine out of her mind. For the rest of tonight, she would focus on Johnny Fitzpatrick, who was kind and funny and everything a boyfriend should be.

“So what should I do?” she asked Rachel. “Just walk up to him, wiggle my beaver tail, and ask if he wants to make out?”

Rachel laughed. “Try standing close to him. Touch him casually on the shoulder, then later, leave your hand there just a little longer than usual. Discreetly pull down your shirt even more. And maybe drink some alcohol to help you loosen up. Come on, it’s not too hard.”

It just wasn’t something that came naturally to Cassie, unlike Rachel.

Except with Blaine. With him, it had been so easy…

God, she needed to stop thinking about that asshole.

Johnny. He was the guy she wanted.

…

Blaine Richards flipped on his high beams. He was out of Ottawa now, driving on the back roads that would take him back to Georgeville. To a woman he hadn’t seen in over a year.

He’d been such a damn idiot.

The problem was that he was a very logical person. And falling in love with a woman the instant he set eyes on her made no sense. It was completely illogical, and so he had assumed it wasn’t really love.

He tried to think about it from an evolutionary perspective. There must be some explanation for why humans had developed the ability to fall in love at first sight. Perhaps those people had more sex and thus were more likely to pass on their genes, or…

No, he couldn’t think about evolution right now.

Last night, he’d gone on his third first date in a month with a woman he’d met on an online dating website. Based on her profile and the texts they’d sent each other, Mellie scored an 8.75 on his ranking system, which was over his threshold of eight. So he’d asked her out.

The date had started off fine. He’d taken her to a nice seafood restaurant in the Byward Market, and it hadn’t turned out that she was a fruitarian or allergic to seafood or anything like that. But although she was intelligent and easygoing and pretty—like his previous two dates—there were no sparks.

It was just fine. Nothing more.

Still, he’d kissed her when he drove her home after dinner. Maybe that had been the problem with those other first dates—they’d never gotten around to kissing.

He’d walked Mellie to her door. When he’d leaned in, she’d leaned in, and the instant his lips had met hers, it had been all wrong. She’d tasted pleasant. Unsurprisingly, she’d tasted like the cheesecake they’d split for dessert. And that had been just fine, but…

He’d jerked back, she’d jerked back, and they’d both said, at exactly the same time, “I’m in love with someone else.”

Well, that had been a relief.

So she’d invited him in for tea, and they’d talked about their hopeless love lives. Mellie was in love with a married man, and Blaine was in love with a woman he’d lied to and left more than a year ago because he hadn’t been able to believe they had anything real. But after that unfortunate kiss with Mellie, he was forced to accept the truth. He didn’t want anyone but Cassie. It had been sixteen months since he’d seen her, and he still loved her.

And so now, he was driving to Georgeville. Without a plan. Which was very unlike him. All he knew was that he was going to knock on Cassie’s door and say hello.

She would probably be pissed at him. That was understandable. But surely, with a little talking and apologizing, he could get her to give him another chance. She’d told him that she loved him. She’d wanted to have a relationship with him, even though he lived far away.

However, the unexpected death of his father a few months before he’d met her had devastated him, and he hadn’t been in the right frame of mind to consider it. He’d been too damn logical—and stupid—to believe that what he felt for her was real. He’d assumed he was just clinging to the first woman he’d kissed after that tragedy, and it couldn’t truly be love—his mind was playing tricks on him.

His hands shook on the steering wheel. He tried to calm himself by slowly reciting the geologic time periods. There was something calming about saying “Cambrian” and “Ordovician.” At least, he’d always thought so.

Most people would probably just think he was a nutcase.

A nutcase who had looked at the evidence and now had to conclude that love at first sight was a very real thing, even if it didn’t sound rational.

He flipped off the high beams as he entered Georgeville, the town where he’d somehow found himself last year. Back then, he’d had his tent and sleeping bag in his trunk, and he’d planned to spend a week driving across Ontario—camping, hiking, looking at rocks and trees, calming himself the fuck down after the horrible spring he’d had.

But then he’d stopped at Tim Hortons to get a coffee, and he’d seen her. She’d been buying a chocolate dip donut. Wearing jeans and a blue T-shirt. Nothing fancy, but he’d quite literally stopped breathing for a few seconds.

She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes on.

And she was his.

Somehow, he’d just known that.

Some people would probably describe him as cocky.

Okay, more than a few people would definitely describe him as cocky. But that was regarding anything related to science. When it came to women, he wasn’t cocky. He wasn’t a total blubbering idiot, either, but he was no Casanova.

With Cassie, however, it had been different. They’d seen each other…and twenty minutes later, they’d been having sex on her couch.

And the week he’d planned to spend camping, he’d spent with her instead. Except when she’d been at work, of course…although he’d persuaded her to call in sick once.

Such a wonderful week. The best of his life.

Now it was time to get her back.

Cassie lived in an apartment above a dentist’s office. The entrance was at the back. He parked his car, climbed up the steps, and knocked, his heart hammering. He continued to repeat the geologic time periods in his mind, but he didn’t say them out loud. He didn’t want her to come to the door when he was in the middle of saying “Silurian.”

A minute passed, and there was no answer. He put his ear to the door but couldn’t hear anything inside. No footsteps scampering down the hall. So he knocked again, a little louder this time.

Still no answer.

An awful thought occurred to him. What if she didn’t live here, anymore? It had been well over a year. She could be living somewhere else in Georgeville, or she could have moved out of town.

He had no other way of reaching her. He didn’t know her last name or her phone number. He’d insisted on that because he’d wanted nothing serious, just a week of fun.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

He banged on the door once more. Even though it was quite reasonable that she could have moved, she had to be here. She was his. She had to be here to give him a chance.

Five minutes later, he had to accept that she wasn’t coming to the door. Maybe she did live in this apartment but was out with friends for the night. Perhaps he’d scope out the bar—there was only one bar in town. If she wasn’t there, he could come back and wait by her door for a few hours to see if she returned.

He walked down the stairs with heavy footsteps.

“Can I help you?”

He whipped his head toward the gravelly voice. An older man—a little older than his father would be if he were still alive—stood before him.

“Umm…” Blaine wasn’t interested in telling a stranger that he was trying to get the love of his life back.

“You’re not from around here,” the man said.

“No.”

“You looking for Cassie? I saw you knocking on her door.”

Blaine couldn’t help but smile at the mention of her name. And the knowledge that this was still where she lived.

“I am. Just in the area and thought I’d surprise her.”

“She’s at a Halloween party tonight. Told me the other day about the costume she was making. I can’t remember what it was, though. My memory’s not as good as it used to be, but—”

“Do you know where this party is?”

“Sorry. Can’t say I do. You should text her on those phones all you young people have. My phone’s attached to the wall, and I pay my bills at the bank. My son laughs at me, and—”

“Thank you for your help.” Blaine jumped into his car before he found himself in the middle of a half-hour conversation.

Of course, he still had a problem. He didn’t know where the party was. But assuming it was in Georgeville, he could probably find it.

He drove up and down the town’s streets, looking for any house with lots of activity. Perhaps there would be loud music and several cars out front.

And perhaps Cassie would be dressed as a sexy bunny rabbit. Or a sexy nurse. Or a sexy French maid.

Honestly, she would look sexy in whatever she was wearing, even if it was a paper bag.

Finally, he found a promising house on Edward Street. There were lots of decorations out front—including an inflatable Grim Reaper—and a fairy and a giant pumpkin were walking up the driveway. It sure looked like a Halloween party.

Well. Time to walk into a party of drunk, costumed strangers and declare his love for a woman he hadn’t seen since last June.

A totally normal Friday night for Blaine Richards.

Not.

Chapter Two

It was only nine o’clock and the party would last for several more hours, but Cassie was already drunk. On sugar. She’d only had one glass of punch, but Jenna had set out a wide selection of candy on cut-glass serving trays, and Cassie was indulging herself as she waited for Johnny to show up.

“I’m surprised you brought out your nice dishes for this party,” she said to Jenna. Her friend was dressed as a witch.

Jenna shrugged. “I’ve had them for a year, and I hadn’t used them yet. Figured it was time.”

Jenna and her husband, Theo, had run off to Vegas together last fall, and despite the fact that they hadn’t had a “proper” wedding, her family had gotten them a ton of wedding presents.

Cassie plucked a sour candy from a dish. Although it was supposed to be sour, it still had enough sugar to add to her sugar high.

Whatever. It was Halloween. The whole purpose was to eat candy and wear costumes.

Darrell Summers walked up to them. He was wearing a toga. “Hey, Jenna. Great party.”

“Thanks,” Jenna said. “Where’s Biscuit? I thought you were going to bring your dog?”

“Nah. I thought about it, but this is too much excitement for her. Who knows what kind of trouble she would have caused? And did the ancient Greeks have dogs? I’m not sure it would have gone with my costume.”

“Togas were worn by the Romans,” Cassie said. “Not the Greeks.”

He laughed and held up his beer. “I’ll blame my mistake on the booze.”

Darrell’s toga was made out of a bedsheet and exposed one of his pecs. The guy had a great body. That was undeniable, even though Cassie had never had any interest in him. But she could totally understand why he was popular with the women in town.

“I didn’t know you had a dog,” she said.

“You know Katherine Windham, the old lady who died last month? I offered to take her dog since her sons weren’t interested.”

“Didn’t she have a tiny white maltipoo that always wore a pink hair bow?”

“Yes. Biscuit is a very manly dog.”

Cassie laughed at the idea of Darrell, tall and muscled, owning a dog like that.

“I refuse to put a bow on her,” he said. “That’s too much for me. Unfortunately, I’m stuck with the name Biscuit, which I think is a terrible name for a dog.”

“Aw,” Jenna said. “It’s cute.”

“I tried calling her ‘Buster’ for a while, hoping it would be okay because it sounds similar. But she refused to answer to it. So Biscuit it is. She’s great, though. And not just because women go crazy over her.”

Well, Cassie doubted Darrell needed help with the ladies.

Rachel walked over, towing Cole behind her. “Good to see you,” she said to Darrell, giving him a quick hug.

“Cole looks much less pleased to see me,” Darrell said.

“He’s not happy to see anyone. I just dragged him out of the corner, where he’d been eating black licorice and scowling for the better part of an hour.”

“Too many damn people,” Cole muttered. “I just want to go back to my swamp.” He took off his ogre mask. “Am I doing a good job of staying in character?”

“Yeah, you’re doing great, sweetie,” Rachel said. “Not that this requires much acting for you. Plus there’s no law that says you need to act like your Halloween costume. Otherwise Cassie would be crawling around and gnawing on wood, which might be a problem. Wouldn’t want her to destroy all of Jenna’s furniture.”

Cassie chuckled and glanced around the living room. There were about twenty-five people at the party so far, and a crap-load of candy and booze. But the one person she wanted to see had yet to make an appearance.

“Still no sign of Johnny?” Rachel said. “Are you sure he’s coming?”

“He promised he’d be here.”

“Speak of the devil…” Jenna nodded toward the front door, and Cassie turned.

And there he was.

Her heart didn’t speed up when she saw him. In fact, she wrinkled her nose. Because Johnny was wearing a costume that was decidedly less sexy than a beaver. Or a devil.

He was dressed as Big Bird.

She couldn’t help but cringe.

Not that she had anything against big yellow birds. But when you had a crush on a guy, you kind of hoped he showed up to a Halloween party wearing something hot. A toga would have been preferable. Hell, even an ogre would have been better.

Rachel snickered. “We’ll leave you to it.”

Cassie stuffed another sour candy in her mouth and headed over to Johnny, wiggling her hips a little.

“You look great,” he said, smiling at her. “What are you—a mouse?”

She spun around to show him her tail.

“Ah. You’re a beaver. Yes.”

They looked at each other awkwardly for a moment, and her mind wandered back to the quasi-date they’d had at Tim Hortons. It had been pleasant, but there’d been a few uncomfortable silences then, too.

And then, because she couldn’t help herself, she remembered the day she’d met Blaine at Tim Hortons, the way he’d—

Focus, Cassie. You’re over Blaine.

Perhaps she hadn’t had enough to drink.

“Us beavers really like our punch,” she said. “It’s very…punchy. Want to get some with me? It’s in the kitchen.”

“Absolutely.” Johnny placed his hand on her lower back, just above her tail, and guided her toward the kitchen.

“Did you have trouble finding the place?”

“Um, no.”

Of course not. That was an idiotic question. Georgeville was so small, it was impossible to get lost. And Johnny had lived here his whole life. What was wrong with her today?

He was touching her, though. That was good, wasn’t it?

There was a crowd of people jostling around the punch bowl, and she and Johnny were pushed closer together. The length of his body pressed against hers. She didn’t feel anything, but that was okay. It might just take time to get that spark. And given all the padding in the Big Bird costume, it wasn’t surprising that she felt nothing. Right?

Or maybe you don’t belong together…

She pushed aside the irritating voice in her head. Johnny was the guy she wanted. He was nice and steady, and he wasn’t the sort who would leave her after a week.

He handed her a cup of punch before pouring one for himself. Then he took her hand and led her to the side of the refrigerator.

“How was the hardware store today?” she asked. “Sell any toilet plungers?”

He smiled at her. “Not today. But I did sell several wrenches.”

He continued to talk about wrenches for five minutes, which she couldn’t say she found terribly interesting. So she took the time to discreetly—or perhaps not so discreetly—pull down her shirt to show off her cleavage, then placed her hand on his shoulder. There was no heat emanating through the bright yellow feathers of his costume.

Then she realized he’d stopped talking. Crap. Had he asked her a question? Did he expect her to say something intelligent about wrenches or hammers?

Well, now seemed as good a time as any for a first kiss. She pushed up the beak on his Big Bird costume, leaned forward, and brushed her lips over his.

As soon as his lips met hers, it felt all wrong.

But she kept kissing him anyway.

This was the guy she wanted.

Really, he was.

…

Blaine knocked on the door. A witch and a flapper girl answered. Behind them, two ghosts walked by with red Solo cups, and Minnie Mouse danced with a man in a bedsheet toga. The bass was pumping, and the lights were turned down low.

It reminded him of the parties he’d gone to back in university.

“Who are you?” asked the witch. “You weren’t invited.”

“No.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I…um…I’m looking for Cassie. Is she here?”

“What’s your name?”

“Blaine.”

The witch and the flapper girl exchanged a look. Not a nice one.

Uh-oh.

“Blaine.” The flapper girl looked him up and down. “I thought you lived on the other side of the country.”

Yes, that’s what he’d told Cassie. He’d said he was just in the area for a few weeks, that he lived across the country, and nothing lasting could happen between them.

These must be her friends.

“It’s complicated,” he said. “Could I please just talk to her?”

The flapper girl shook her head. “We know exactly what you did to her.”

But the witch reluctantly nodded. “You were an ass. But Cassie should decide what she wants to do with you. Not us.”

“I suppose that’s true,” said the flapper girl, not sounding too happy about it. “We’ll let you in, but if she wants you out, you’re gone.”

“Thank you.” He stepped inside, but she blocked his path.

“It’s a Halloween party. You need to wear a costume.”

This was a complication he hadn’t expected. Was there anything in his car he could use? He had a hard hat, a safety vest, and steel-toed boots. It wouldn’t really feel like a costume, given he had to wear such things on site for work sometimes, but he could say he was a construction worker.

“You know who he looks like?” said the witch to the flapper girl. “That guy who plays Sherlock Holmes. What’s his name?”

“Benedict Cumberbatch,” supplied the flapper girl. “You think so? I don’t see it.”

“Theo has a winter hat that sort of looks like the Sherlock Holmes hat, and we should have a magnifying glass around here somewhere. What do you think, Blaine? Sherlock Holmes? You good at solving mysteries?”

“Look,” he said. “I just want to see Cassie.”

“And we’ll let you,” said the witch. “Once you’re in costume.”

“I’ll go out to my car and come back dressed as a construction worker.”

“No. Too boring.”

“I dunno,” said the flapper girl. “Construction workers are kind of hot, don’t you think? But I see what you’re saying. It’s not the most exciting costume.”

He curled his hands into fists. He didn’t have time for this nonsense, but he didn’t want to piss off Cassie’s friends any more than he already had.

“I’ll be back in a minute.” He started to turn, but the witch put a hand on his arm.

“I have a better idea than Sherlock Holmes. Just wait here.” She scurried up the stairs.

He stayed in the front hall, unsure what to say to the flapper girl. He didn’t have much experience with social situations like this one.

“What did you say?” asked the flapper girl.

“I wasn’t…”

Oh, crap. She was right. He’d been muttering the geologic time periods under his breath again. But he didn’t want to admit that.

“If you hurt her again, I’ll set my ogre on you,” she said. “Trust me, you don’t want to mess with him.”

“I won’t hurt her. I screwed up last time. I know I was an ass.”

“At least you’re willing to admit it.”

The witch bounded down the stairs and handed him a mask and a navy cape. The mask was black, with a very long and pointy nose.

“What’s this?” he asked.

“Honestly, I have no idea. Theo’s aunt bought it in Italy and gave it to him for his birthday, for reasons that are not clear to me. But I think it works perfectly for a villain. That’s what you’ll be dressed as. A villain.”

“Okay…” Was it too late to say he’d prefer Sherlock Holmes?

He put on the cape and tied the mask behind his head.

“Do you think we should make him a cardboard sword?” the witch asked the flapper girl. “A villain should have a weapon of some sort, don’t you think?”

He’d had enough of this. He pushed his way past the two women and stalked around the main floor looking for Cassie. She wasn’t in the living room, although he found a cowboy making out with a tiger on top of the coffee table.

He turned away and moved to the dining room, where he found lots of candy and a cooler full of beer.

But still no Cassie.

So he went into the kitchen, and he stopped in his tracks when he saw her pressed against the refrigerator, a large yellow bird dipping its head and kissing her.

No.

This couldn’t be happening.

But it had been more than a year. It shouldn’t be surprising she’d found a boyfriend in that time.

However, as he looked at Cassie and Big Bird making out against the refrigerator, he had a feeling this wasn’t her boyfriend. The kiss looked decidedly awkward. The guy was all wrong for her. That much was obvious.

So Blaine pushed Big Bird out of the way and took his place.

Chapter Three

Kissing Johnny was far from amazing, but Cassie kept at it, determined it would get better. She pressed her mouth over his again, keeping her eyes closed. The Big Bird costume kind of ruined the mood—she didn’t want to see it. But when she was about to press her lips to his one last time, nothing was there.

Before she could open her eyes, a pair of lips brushed against hers, and she knew immediately that it wasn’t Johnny. A hand cupped the back of her head, and a strong male body—without Big Bird padding—pushed her firmly against the fridge, one of his legs between hers.

She moaned. She couldn’t help it.

He slid his tongue over her bottom lip then dipped it into her mouth, and that sent sparks through every inch of her body. She hadn’t felt anything when Johnny touched her, but she sure as hell felt a lot now. The ache between her legs grew steadily with each passing second.

There was only one other man who’d ever made her feel like this when he kissed her. She’d thought it would never happen again, and yet…

She froze.

Wait.

Maybe it was him.

Before she could open her eyes, a low voice murmured, “Hello, Cassidy.”

Goose bumps broke out on her skin at the sound of that voice—at the same time as red-hot fury spread through her veins.

She looked up at his face, into his blue eyes. A smile touched his lips. He was wearing a cape, and a giant mask was pushed up on top of his head.

God, he was gorgeous.

And she hated him.

“What the hell are you doing here?” she asked through clamped teeth.

“I’ve come to take you home with me,” he said simply.

Her skin prickled. She hated her skin right now. Hated being affected by this man.

“I thought you lived on the other side of the country,” she said.

“I lied. I live in Ottawa.”

“Ottawa! That’s two hours away. You made me think you lived in Calgary or Vancouver.”

“I know what I did.”

“And now, over a year later, you show up out of the blue and expect me to go home with you?”

“I was an asshole. I won’t deny it. But I also know you’ll come home with me.”

Which only increased her anger. “Why would you say that?”

“Because we belong together.”

Once, she’d thought they belonged together. But he’d told her he was from far away, and he could only give her a week. The day before he left, she’d begged him to give their relationship a chance. She’d even been willing to move for him, wherever his home was.

Instead, he’d left without even giving her a phone number.

He’d broken her.

Completely.

But she was done pining for him. She wouldn’t give him the chance to break her again.

Unlike her mother, Cassie would not make the same mistake twice.

When her mother had been pregnant with her younger brother, her father had started sleeping with someone else. His wife was due to have a baby, and he was out warming some other woman’s bed. But Cassie’s mother had forgiven him. A few years later, he’d cheated again, with the town’s kindergarten teacher. That affair had become public knowledge, and the town had gossiped about it for months. Finally, her mother had kicked him to the curb, as she should have done the first time.

“Cassie?” Rachel said. “You want us to get rid of him?” Behind her stood Darrell, Theo, and Cole.

That’s what she should do. She should let her friends get rid of him and be done with it.

But she’d spent so much of the past sixteen months missing him. Longing for his touch. So even though she had no intention of giving him a second chance, she didn’t want him to leave, not yet. Not until she could give him a piece of her mind.

“No,” she said. “It’s okay. We have some things to talk about.”

She looked around for Johnny. Where was that big yellow bird? She couldn’t see him anywhere. She sighed. Well, this was great. Just great.

“You want some privacy?” Jenna asked. “A cowboy and a tiger just disappeared into the upstairs washroom, and someone appears to have locked our bedroom door from the inside, but the spare bedroom’s free. It’s filled with coats, but no one’s in there.”

Cassie’s skin tingled again at the thought of being alone with Blaine.

She really needed to get a grip.

He put his hand on her lower back and guided her up the stairs. Unlike when Johnny had touched her in exactly the same place, this touch nearly seared her skin.

Once they were in the bedroom, she shut the door and turned to yell at him, but the words died in her throat when his hands came up to cup her face, his thumbs stroking her cheekbones.

“Calm down,” he said. “It’ll all be okay. I’m here now.”

His words were like a drug. When he dipped his mouth to hers again, she didn’t protest. He was gentle, sliding his lips along hers, slowly adding pressure. He grasped her wrists and held them against the door. It didn’t hurt. No, it felt safe.

But this was anything but safe.

He spun her around so she was facing away from him. His body pressed against her back, his cock against her ass. She moaned.

Usually she thought of herself as an ordinary girl, but in his arms, she’d always felt so, so special. He was a passionate person, who found many things fascinating, and for whatever reason, he found her fascinating, too. When he turned all of that focus on her, it was irresistible.

His mouth dipped to her neck, kissing just below her ear before sliding farther down, a trail of wet heat across her skin. His arms were wrapped securely around her, one hand sliding under her T-shirt.

She had to resist him.

In the months after he left, she’d been a wreck. Crying all the time, except during the few days when she’d thought she was pregnant. She hadn’t planned to tell anyone about Blaine, but she’d needed to let Rachel and Jenna and her mother in on the secret, because it had been so obvious something was wrong.

“No.” She turned away before his mouth could touch hers again. “We can’t do this.”

“I was going through a very bad time in my life when I met you,” he said. “I’d been numb for months, and then I saw you. I loved you from that very first moment, but I couldn’t believe it was real. I assumed you were just meant to pull me out of my numbness. I didn’t truly believe it was anything more. But it’s been over a year, and I haven’t forgotten you. I’ll never forget you.”

She turned to face him, filled with conflicting desires. “I want to slap you.”

“Go ahead. If it’ll make you feel better, I’m happy to take it.”

“No.” She paused, taking in the details of his appearance, and frowned. “You’re in costume. Did you know you’d be going to a Halloween party tonight?”

He shook his head. “Your friends forced it on me. I’m supposed to be a villain.”

She couldn’t help a wry smile. “How did you find me?”

“Your neighbor told me you were at a Halloween party. So I drove around town looking for a party. It wasn’t hard.”

She pulled away from him. “I hate you.”

“It’s only temporary.”

“I don’t think it is.”

“In a way, I’m glad you hate me. It’s better than indifference. It means you really cared.”

“I did. But I won’t feel that way again.” She couldn’t. It was impossible. He’d hurt her too badly. “If you’d come to me two or three months later, it might have been different. If you’d come last Halloween, let’s say. But it took more than a year to realize you want to be with me? A year?”

“I wanted you the whole time, but I assumed I was just being irrational.” He paused. “Being without you…it felt all wrong. Like you kissing Big Bird.”

“Johnny is a nice man.”

“He’s boring.”

She snorted. “Unlike you? Who could probably talk about granite for an hour?”

“I could definitely talk about granite for an hour, but I won’t, for your sake.” He pulled her beaver tail with one hand before sliding his arms around her again. “It’s not so much that I think he’s a boring person by himself—I don’t know him. But the two of you together—it’s boring. That, I could tell.” He dipped his head to her ear, his breath hot on her skin. “I’m not going to give up. You’re mine, Cassie.”

“You presumptuous, arrogant ass. Are you like this with other women?”

“No. Only you.”

He backed her up against the door again, his chest pressing against hers. She gasped as his mouth captured hers, and he slipped his hand into her little brown beaver shorts and ran his finger along the lace at the top of her panties.

Oh God.

She was wearing pretty underwear today. Just in case she got somewhere with Johnny.

But instead, she was with Blaine.

He toyed with the lace for a long time, his kiss leisurely, his tall frame towering above her. He was lean, unlike her. There was something about his face that was a little aristocratic and severe, but that wasn’t how it felt when they kissed.

She whimpered, wanting to feel him inside her. But she refused to beg. That would give him too much satisfaction. Still, he must have been able to tell how desperate she was from the way she was squirming against him.

Finally, he edged his fingers under the top of her panties. He held his hand there, so close to her heat, before running the tips of his fingers over her folds, his touch unbearably light.

She inhaled sharply.

“Is it like this with anyone else, Cassie? I don’t think it is.”

“I won’t deny the sex was good,” she said, forcing herself to sound calmer than she felt. “If we do it now, I’m sure I’d enjoy it.”

“I won’t fuck you here. I’ll only fuck you if you come home with me.”

She groaned in frustration as his fingers pressed closer to her opening. She was wet for him. So wet. She spread her legs a little more.

“Not fair,” she said.

“Nothing in life is fair.”

Yeah, tell me about it.

He curled a finger inside her, and she let out a strangled noise. His face was impassive, but his eyes gleamed.

Like a villain.

And like a villain, he removed his hand just as things were about to get really good.

“How about this?” he said. “I’ll take you home with me tonight. We’ll spend the whole weekend together. We’ll fuck as much as you want. And at the end of it, I bet you won’t be able to walk away like I mean nothing to you. I bet you’ll agree to the relationship that I stupidly refused last time.”

One weekend in his bed. She squeezed her thighs together, her body craving what Blaine could give her. She’d only had sex twice since he left, and sleeping with Leo had been a mistake.

One hot weekend with Blaine. What could it hurt? He was an incredible lover. And she wouldn’t let her heart be involved this time. She hated him. It shouldn’t be hard to keep her heart safe as she let him use her body.

He was rough in bed. He expected her to do what he wanted. He took her to the edge of her comfort zone but not beyond it.

She loved what he did to her. It wasn’t like that with anyone else—that was true.

Her body felt empty without him. She needed him to finish what he’d started.

“Fine.” She squared her shoulders. “I will go to Ottawa with you. And at the end of the weekend, I will leave you. I know you don’t think I’ll be able to do it, but I will. I’ll prove there’s nothing left between us but sex.”

He stepped away from her. “You’re right. I don’t believe you. But I’d love to see you try.”

…

“You’re leaving with him?” Rachel asked, pushing up her flapper girl headband. “Are you sure that’s smart?”

“It’ll be fine,” Cassie said, in part to convince herself. “I’ll spend the weekend with him, get him totally out of my system. That’s all.”

“I don’t know if ‘getting him out of your system’ ever works.”

“It will.” Cassie grabbed a handful of jelly beans from the glass serving tray. “I’ll walk away on Sunday night without giving him another thought, the same way he did to me last year.”

“You sound vindictive. It’s not like you.”

Well, that’s what he’d done to her. Made her feel like she wasn’t herself anymore.

In good ways at first. He’d made her feel special and treasured and interesting. Later, she’d become a blubbering mess. That wasn’t like her, either.

She wanted him to feel every bit of the pain she had.

“Okay.” Rachel nodded. “Go have no-strings-attached sex. But I think this is a bad idea.”

Cassie gave her a weak smile. “You’re a good friend.”

Rachel sighed. “Jenna thinks he looks like Benedict Cumberbatch.”

“Yeah? I don’t think so.” To Cassie, he was unlike anyone else.

She would be fine this weekend. She would make sure of it.

“We were supposed to hang out tomorrow,” Rachel said. “Before Cole and I head back. But that’s okay. I saw you tonight.”

“Oh, shit! I’m sorry. Maybe Blaine can bring me around to your place on Sunday, since he lives in Ottawa.”

“Or maybe you’ll be too busy having sex in the shower.”

Cassie blushed.

“Did you have sex in the shower with him last year?” Rachel asked. “Or were you too busy getting spanked—”

“Rachel!!”

“What? I’ve seen those books you read.”

“Doesn’t mean that’s what I want in real life.”

Oh, the stories she could tell her friend. Rachel might be hard to shock, but if she knew what Cassie had done with Leo…

Rachel turned serious again. “Text me his phone number and address. If anything happens, we’ll know where to find you.”

“Will do.”

Cassie wiggled her beaver tail when she turned around, and Rachel laughed. She went out to the car to join Blaine, unable to stop the excitement pumping through her veins.

But it was only because she was looking forward to the sex. Nothing more.

Chapter Four

This was lunacy. Blaine should have taken Cassie on the bed in the spare room, on top of the enormous pile of coats. His house was two hours away, and he didn’t want to wait that long to be with her. Inside her.

But it had been more than a year. What was another two hours?

Except now, she was sitting beside him, her beaver costume covered in a navy trench coat, her light brown hair spilling over her shoulders, down to her ample breasts. She was gorgeous.

Unfortunately, she wasn’t being particularly friendly toward him at the moment. He could hardly blame her. After all, he was the one who’d left. For more than a year. And then he’d pulled his hand out of her panties before she could get off.

It wouldn’t have taken long. He could have brought her to orgasm in a minute or two. He would have covered her mouth with his other hand to muffle her scream, as the bass pumped and the laughter of drunk people floated up the stairs.

It would have been hot.

But he’d been afraid that if he left her satisfied, she wouldn’t come home with him.

He shifted in his seat. It would be a long drive back.

He flipped on his high beams as he exited Georgeville. “I remember reading about high beams in the driver’s handbook when I was sixteen. I didn’t understand when you would ever need to use them. I was used to the city. So one day my dad took me out to the country…”

He was chattering inanely about nothing. High beams. Honestly, she wouldn’t care. He didn’t even care.

This wasn’t what he had wanted. He’d hoped that after he apologized and told her she was the only woman for him… Well, he’d hoped that would have been enough for her to forgive him.

But she hadn’t.

Still, she was coming home with him. That was something.

He had the weekend to convince her they had more than just amazing sex between them. That sex so amazing had to mean something.

He couldn’t wait to get started.

But when she let out a long-suffering sigh, he was afraid she’d changed her mind.

“You promised me the whole weekend,” he said. “Don’t back out now.”

“I won’t. But I will walk away at the end of it. And if I hurt you, then so much the better.”

That didn’t sound like the woman he’d known. Her words had an edge to them.

Fuck. He’d done this to her.

He said nothing, just put a hand on her leg. She was wearing leggings under her shorts, the material rather thin. He rubbed his fingers over it, and he could tell she was trying not to moan.

“Don’t hold back with me,” he whispered. “Never do that.”

She said nothing. It was just the two of them, alone on the empty road, tension filling the space between them.

…

If only Cassie had held back the day she’d met him. Instead, she’d plunged headfirst into a week-long love affair.

It had been a Sunday afternoon, the summer before last. Warm, but not disgustingly hot, and there’d been a nice breeze. She’d just finished doing a load of laundry and cleaning her kitchen, and a walk had sounded pleasant. Although she’d initially planned on walking down the McNeil Trail through the woods, somehow she’d found herself heading toward Tim Hortons for a chocolate dip donut and a coffee. It was as if she’d been pulled there.

She’d stepped inside, and before long, she’d been placing her order with the bored teenager behind the counter. Then she’d turned.

And there he was.

He’d been standing at the back of the short line, but he was all she could see. His gaze had been serious, penetrating. She’d felt pinned by it.

He was tall, lean. A little older than she was. Dark, somewhat floppy hair that didn’t seem to fit with his serious demeanor. Sharp blue eyes. But listing his individual features…that hadn’t come close to explaining what they were like when they were all put together.

He was suddenly everything.

“Your change,” said the teenager, sounding slightly irritated.

She’d fumbled as she put the coins in her wallet, then had turned back to the man in line. He’d lifted his eyebrows, just slightly. She’d felt light-headed, unfamiliar emotions coursing through her.

Love. It had to be love.

But that was preposterous. Maybe all the cleaning products had gone to her head.

Still, after she’d grabbed her coffee and donut, she’d walked toward him. She couldn’t help it.

“Meet me outside,” he murmured.

Oh, his voice. It had made her skin pebble. Or was that the air conditioning?

No. It had been his voice. She’d nearly shivered—it had such a strong effect on her.

She’d walked out into the warm day, her heart beating rapidly. She’d been very aware of the sun shining down on her, the breeze fluttering her hair. What would he do when he joined her?

When he’d come out, large coffee cup in hand, he’d tilted his head and said, “My car’s just over there.”

And once they were standing by his car, he’d kissed her. They’d both been holding their coffees, and her, her donut, and it had been just one press of his lips against hers. Over in a second. Yet it had reverberated through her long afterward.

“This is the part,” he’d said, “where I would ask you to go home with me.”

She’d pressed her thighs together. God, she’d wanted him there. Sliding his tongue over her skin and doing everything he could to her. It hadn’t been simply a physical desire; she’d wanted everything. Even though he was a stranger.

“But there’s a little problem,” he’d continued. “I don’t live anywhere near here, and there doesn’t seem to be a motel in town. So I’m hoping—”

“Will you come back to my place?” The words had come out in a rush.

“Why, yes. I would be delighted to.” One corner of his mouth had kicked up, and her knees had gone weak. He was incredibly gorgeous.

“I live nearby. Only a two-minute drive.” And she’d just cleaned her apartment, as if knowing she’d have company today.

He’d gazed at her steadily and then cupped her cheek and kissed her once more. A longer kiss this time, his lips closing over hers again and again, his tongue slipping inside her mouth.

“You,” he said, “are utterly perfect.”

“You forgot the part where you ask me my name.”

“Sorry, I’m not accustomed to situations like this.”

“Neither am I.”

He hesitated. “What’s your name?”

“I’m Cassie.”

“And I’m Blaine.”

There was something about it all that had been familiar, like some part of her had always known it would happen this way.

She’d shifted her donut and coffee to one hand and held out the other for him to shake. With a quirk of his lips, he’d taken her hand, holding it a long time, rubbing his thumb over hers.

“Cassie,” he’d said. “Is that short for something? Cassandra?”

“Cassidy. But no one calls me that.”

“Well, I will. When we’re in bed together.”

Her breath had hitched, and she’d known he heard it.

He’d laughed softly before walking to the passenger’s side and opening the door for her.

They’d gone back to her place, and the instant they were through the door, they were on each other, lips meeting, hands caressing, clothing coming off. Every touch had taken her breath away, and when they’d been in bed and he’d been above her, ready to enter her…

She had never needed anything in her life as badly as she needed to feel him inside her. And once he was there, it was the greatest pleasure she’d ever known.

Afterward, he’d held her, and they’d finished their lukewarm coffee and fed each other pieces of donut, and she knew it had been real. It had been love, even if it had happened in an instant at Tim Hortons.

On one hand, it was hard to regret anything so magical. But later, she wished she’d never had a craving for a chocolate dip donut. Wished she’d just gone to the McNeil Trail, even though her body was drawn in the opposite direction, because then, she wouldn’t have been heartbroken. Wished she hadn’t listened when he’d said, “Meet me outside.”

Pain-filled weeks turned into months, which turned into a year, and still, she could hardly stand being without him. Could hardly even bear to go to the damn coffee shop.

And now he was here. She was in the car with him once more, but this time he was taking her back to his place. She could not forgive him for how he’d left her so completely devastated, and she would never let him do that to her again.

This time, it would be different.

She would make sure of it.

Chapter Five

Cassie was surprised when Blaine pulled up to a decent-sized brick house near Bank Street. She’d expected him to live in a condo.

He must be doing well for himself as a geotechnical engineer. Assuming he really was a geotechnical engineer. That’s what he’d told her last year, but then, he’d also said he lived on the other side of the country.

Still, she didn’t think he’d been lying about the job. He’d told her a little about his work, and he certainly seemed to know a lot about rocks. On the day she’d called in sick, they’d gone to the nearby provincial park. They’d rented a canoe and paddled past the rocky cliffs bordering the lake. Granite with mafic dykes—was that what he’d said? He’d talked about the rocks for a while, until he’d realized what he was doing. But she hadn’t minded at all. She’d loved that he found things so interesting, and she’d enjoyed hearing all the random facts he knew, his voice animated as he’d spoken.

Blaine was ten years older than she was, so it wasn’t surprising he owned property. But a house like this, in what she knew wasn’t a cheap part of Ottawa?

She didn’t ask.

He unlocked the front door, and when they were inside, he curved his hand around her waist. It had been uncomfortable between them in the car, but now that they could touch each other, it was different.

He pressed her against the door, just as he’d done at Jenna’s. His lips were more demanding now, coaxing moans from her. And this time, he wasn’t wearing a cape, and he didn’t have that ridiculous mask shoved atop his head.

But she was still dressed as a beaver.

“Are you laughing at me?” He nuzzled her neck.

“No. I’m laughing at me. Rachel suggested I wear a sexy animal costume tonight. To entice Johnny.”

“I’m going to make sure you never think about him again,” Blaine growled, sliding his hand inside her panties.

She let her head drop back. What had she been saying?

Oh, right.

“But when I showed her my beaver costume, she told me it wasn’t what she’d had in mind. Apparently beavers are not sexy animals. Unlike, say, bunny rabbits.”

“A beaver is more original.”

“That’s what I said. She vetoed the buck teeth, though. I guess I can see her point.”

“You’d look sexy in anything.”

“Well, it’s only you who thinks that.”

But one day, she would find someone else who saw her the same way. Someone who hadn’t crushed her heart to gravel.

He slipped two fingers inside her, thrust them in and out.

Someday, she would find someone else who could touch her like he did.

Someone who wasn’t so mean that he removed his fingers—yet again—when she was getting close.

He pushed her to her knees. “Open your mouth and take me inside. Then I’ll touch you again.”

“Asshole,” she muttered.

“You like it.”

True. Her heart beat faster as he ordered her around.

She’d missed this.

She unzipped his pants and pulled out his cock through the opening in his boxers. He was already hard for her, which gave her a thrill of satisfaction. She swirled her tongue around the head as she squirmed against the cold tile floor. She desperately needed to get off.

But she would do exactly as he said.

She wrapped her hand around the base, pumping up and down, then wrapped her lips around him. His fingers sifted through her hair as she sucked on him. He didn’t pull her hair, like he sometimes had. This time, it was simply affectionate.

She took him deeper. She did love to have her mouth full of him.

He groaned. She had so much power over him, even if she was the one on her knees.

“That’s it,” he murmured. “Just like that. Look at yourself in the mirror.”

She glanced to the right. The closet doors were mirrors, and there she was, kneeling on the ground, her lips around his cock.

It was so fucking hot.

And then she ruined the mood by bursting into laughter.

He pulled her hair, forcing her to tilt her head up to look at him. His eyebrows were furrowed.

“I’m a beaver,” she said, “and I have wood in my mouth.”

His lips twitched, but he seemed determined not to laugh.

“Take off your costume,” he said. “I want a naked woman sucking my cock, not a beaver. That sounds dangerous.”

“I also had a log. I whittled one end to a point so it looked like it had been cut by a beaver.”

“Cassie—”

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll take off my clothes.”

Still on her knees, she pulled her T-shirt over her head, followed by her bra. A pretty one, like her panties, just in case she’d gotten somewhere with Johnny tonight. Not Blaine.

Although she couldn’t deny that she’d been thinking about him as she put on the underwear earlier. Whenever she thought of anything sexual, she always thought of Blaine. She couldn’t help it.

She stood up and toed off her boots. Next she slid her shorts—beaver tail and all—to the floor, followed by her leggings and her panties. He didn’t help her, just watched, his arms crossed over his chest, his cock jutting out of his pants.

“Okay?” she said.

He took off her headband and threw it aside. “More than okay. As you well know.” He pulled her toward him, eyes blazing. “You’re the most beautiful woman in the world.”

Even though she was rather average looking and far from slender, she truly believed that’s how he saw her.

His hands firm on her shoulders, he dipped his mouth and kissed her, his cock bumping against her stomach. She shut her eyes and took in the sensations, until he forced her to her knees again.

She glanced at the two of them in the mirror as she wrapped her hand around his erection. Now she was naked on the floor before him, and he was fully dressed, his hand holding her where she belonged.

She shuddered.

She squeezed her hand up and down, and a bead of pre-cum appeared at the tip of his cock.

“Lick it,” he said, and she did.

And then she took him in her mouth, as much as she could, until she felt like she would gag, before pulling back. She kept her hand around the base as she sucked him in and out, and she couldn’t help but writhe in frustration. She felt empty. His hand tightened in her hair, and he moved her head up and down on his cock.

“That’s good,” he said. “Yes. Just like that. Take all of it. You missed this, didn’t you?”

His expression was cool and hard, but there were still the faint groans, the tightness of his hand in her hair—and, of course, his erection—to tell her that he liked this very much.

“Have you sucked off another man since you were with me?”

She released him with a pop. “No.”

“You haven’t been with anyone since me.”

It was not a question. It was a statement. But it was incorrect.

“I have,” she said. “It’s not like you ruined me for all other men.”

“No?”

His cock bobbed in front of her face, slick with his pre-cum and her saliva.

The truth was, he had ruined her. The two times she’d had sex in the past year hadn’t been anything like what she’d wanted.

Because she wanted exactly what Blaine gave her.

Just…not with him.

“No,” she said, trying to sound sure of herself. “I’ve had sex since you left me, and I enjoyed it just fine.” Anger began to spread through her. “Are you mad that I didn’t remain faithful to a man who walked out on me? You’ve no right.” She squeezed his dick, and his eyes rolled back.

“I’m not mad.” He was breathing harshly. “But I’m not going to pretend I like it. And I’m not going to pretend that I don’t know it wasn’t as good as it was with me.”

“Is that what you say to all your women?” She ran her tongue up his shaft. “You’re so full of shit.”

“You need a good hard fucking to get your head on straight. To shut that impertinent mouth of yours.”

“You’re not supposed to use words like ‘impertinent’ when you’re getting a blowjob. And if you think I need a good fucking, then why don’t you give it to me?”

“Don’t worry, I’ll fuck you. But not until I see my cum dribbling out of your mouth.”

She parted her lips, and he shoved his cock inside. She sucked him quickly, her pussy clenching with each bob of her head. She slipped one hand between her legs to touch her clit. After all, there was no reason she couldn’t get off now, too. But he jerked her wrist away.

“No,” he said. “You focus only on me.”

The hard, satiny skin of him filled her mouth, but she couldn’t focus just on him—need was building between her legs as she sucked.

But since he’d told her to stop, she didn’t touch herself again.

He squeezed her shoulder. That’s what he always did before he came in her mouth. A moment later, warm liquid flooded her, and she tried to swallow as much as possible. But she didn’t worry too much about getting it all.

Because he liked to see it leaking down her chin.

“That’s so fucking pretty,” he said, pulling back from her face. He used his thumb to wipe some of his cum from her lips, sliding it into her mouth before tucking himself back into his pants. “Now let’s celebrate my first blowjob in more than a year by having some wine.”

Dammit. He wasn’t going to get her off yet.

And then the rest of what he’d said registered.

“You haven’t done that since you left me?”

He shook his head. “In the past two years, the furthest I got with a woman—other than you—was a single kiss.”

Chapter Six

Blaine’s revelation shocked Cassie. He hadn’t been with anyone else in all this time?

The man was pretty damn attractive. He had Justin Trudeau’s hair. And seriously, didn’t women love Justin Trudeau’s hair? Okay, he didn’t seem as friendly and charming as the Prime Minister, but she would have thought there’d have been at least one or two women.

“I only wanted you,” he said.

“And yet it took you sixteen months to come for me.” Not that she was counting.

Okay, yes, she was counting.

“Can we talk about that later?”

She nodded. She would get answers out of him, but they had all weekend. She reached for her T-shirt, which was lying on the floor by the closet, but Blaine shook his head.

“I thought we were having wine?” she said.

“Yes. You will be naked while we drink it.”

“And you’ll be fully clothed?”

“Precisely.”

“That hardly seems fair.”

“Nothing in life is fair,” he said. “As I told you before.”

She ground her teeth. “We should at least strive for fairness, don’t you think?”

“Not when it comes to this.”

She pouted for a moment before standing up.

“I have blueberry wine.” He walked into the kitchen, and she followed. “My mother went to Vermont recently, and she brought some back for me.”

“Blueberry wine is sweet, isn’t it? I’ve already had more than my share of sugar today.”

“Chocolate dip donuts at Tim Hortons?”

“No. Candy at the Halloween party.”

He smiled as though her comment was quite amusing, then pulled the bottle out of the cupboard. “The label says it’s dry wine. I have to confess, I rarely drink wine, and this is the only bottle I have. Is it okay? We could drink scotch, if you prefer.”

“The wine sounds good.”

He pulled out two wineglasses as she looked around the kitchen. The house was older, but the kitchen had been redone. There was a large island in the center with a black countertop.

He brought the bottle over to the island and started pouring. Seeing the direction of her gaze, he said, “The contractor called it black granite, which made me cringe. So-called black granite is usually gabbro.”

She laughed. “Did you tell him that?”

“Of course. He was not interested in my professional opinion.”

He handed her a glass, and she had a sip. It was fruity but not sweet.

“Mmm. I like this,” she said.

He clinked his glass against hers. “Cheers to us.”

She had no idea how to respond. She didn’t want to be with him, not anymore. She was only here for the weekend.

It had been such an odd day. Six hours ago, she’d gotten off work. Then she’d gone to a Halloween party dressed as a beaver and kissed Johnny. And now she was standing in the kitchen of a man she’d thought she’d never see again, naked and drinking blueberry wine.

Suddenly very conscious of her nudity, she covered her breasts with one arm.

“Oh no. We can’t have that,” Blaine murmured. He stepped toward her and moved her arm down to her side. “I’ve never had a naked woman in this house before. I need to get the full experience.”

She clenched her thighs together, need pooling between her legs once more. “You are welcome to take advantage of that naked woman whenever you like.”

“I’ll make her wait. Just a little. I’m still recovering from a most excellent blowjob.” He slipped his hand between her legs and ran his finger once over her slit. But nothing more.

“You’re a jerk,” she said.

“I thought you already knew that.”

“I did. I just felt the need to remind you.”

“I’m not really a jerk. Most of the time. Which I hope to show you this weekend.”

He pressed his lips to hers, the taste of him mingling with the blueberry wine. It was intoxicating.

Of course, he drew away a moment later. Because he was an ass.

“How long have you lived here?” she asked.

“Only three months. I still have a little unpacking to do. Would you like a tour?”

“I feel rather uncomfortable walking around your house without any clothes on.”

“I’m sure you’ll manage. Don’t worry. All the curtains are closed.”

He led her into the living room, where there was a fireplace, a couch, a couple of chairs, a TV, and several bookcases. It was surprisingly warm and homey. She wandered over to the bookshelves, glass of wine in hand. One bookshelf was fiction. The second was non-fiction. The third had a few more rows of non-fiction—mostly science—as well as one shelf of fossils and one of vibrant green rocks.

“What do you collect?” she asked.

“The green mineral is malachite. It’s my favorite mineral.”

“You have a favorite mineral?”

“Don’t you?” He chuckled before handing her a piece of polished malachite. It had concentric bands of different shades of green. “It’s very distinctive. I think it’s quite pretty. It makes me think of a rainforest.”

After she put the stone back, he dipped his head and swirled his tongue over her nipple. It tightened to a stiff peak. Once again, one of his hands dropped between her legs, and he ran his finger around her entrance.

“The other shelf,” he said, still touching her casually, although he’d lifted his head from her breast, “contains ammonites. They’re an extinct mollusc with a spiral shell.”

She studied the largest specimen, but he drew her attention back between her legs when his finger pressed inside her, just barely.

“They’re a type of cephalopod,” he continued, “and—”

“Blaine. Shut up.”

“Language, darling.”

“Are you more interested in fossils than my pussy? That’s what it feels like.”

“Then I gave you the wrong impression. I am most interested in pissing you off and then fucking your brains out. I thought you liked playing by my rules?”

Oh, she did like it, this dance of theirs. And she knew it would be worth it in the end, even if she was annoyed with him at the moment. The thing about Blaine was that he somehow made her both submissive and insubordinate at the same time.

“I seem to have rendered you speechless,” he said. “How interesting. I should conduct a scientific study to determine what led to this miraculous event.”

When she flipped him the middle finger, he took the wineglass from her hands and set both of their glasses on a side table.

“I’m normally a quiet person,” she said. “But when I’m with you…”

She trailed off as he cupped her ass and pressed her against him.

“With you,” he whispered, “everything is exponentially better. I can still scarcely believe you’re here.”

He swept her off her feet and into his arms, and he carried her across the room to the couch. He knelt before her and parted her thighs.

“Is this what you were looking for?” He slipped two fingers inside her.

She arched back and moaned.

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

He thrust his fingers in and out, and then he added his mouth.

Oh God.

When he circled his tongue over her clit, she clutched his hair. She’d been ready for this moment for hours, since he’d fondled her in a bedroom at Jenna’s house.

His dark head bobbed between her legs. She tilted her hips toward him, wanting everything he could possibly give her. It had been far too long, and it was him, the man who’d haunted her erotic dreams, even though she didn’t want to think of him at all.

He removed his fingers and slid his tongue over her entrance, making her even wetter. He explored her with his tongue for a minute, and although his attention was all on that single part of her body, she felt it everywhere, zinging up and down.

“Blaine,” she murmured.

The two times she’d been with Leo, she’d feared she would say the wrong name. But now she could relax. There was no danger of her saying the wrong name with this man.

He looked up, his expression wicked.

“There are still cephalopods alive today. Such as…” He tilted his head. “Shall I continue?”

“With making me come? Yes, you should. Most definitely.”

He raised himself up and pressed a kiss to her lips. “I love you.”

She shut her eyes.

She’d told him that, once before. The day she’d begged him to give them a chance.

He hadn’t said it back, not then.

But now…

I love you.

She didn’t love him. Not anymore. But damn, she really needed him to get her off.

He slipped his fingers inside her again, curving them slightly as he flicked his tongue over her clit, and pleasure exploded through her body like fireworks. She made unintelligible sounds as she came apart in a way she hadn’t in a very long time, wiping away those thoughts of love.

She still hadn’t finished shattering when he slipped his hands under her ass and picked her up again.

“Now I’m going to fuck you,” he said.

Chapter Seven

Blaine carried Cassie upstairs. He loved having her in his arms again.

“Mmm,” she said. “I needed that. You’d deprived me for far too long.”

“But not anymore. Don’t you worry. I’ll take such good care of you that you won’t be able to walk afterward.”

“Sounds lovely.”

She looked peacefully blissed out now, not squirming and on edge as she’d been before. But he enjoyed her like that, too. When he could so easily tease and provoke her.

He’d been sated—briefly. But after watching her walk around his house in the nude, and licking her pussy until she came, he needed to be inside her.

He laid her down on his bed, in the large bedroom where he’d never brought a woman before but where he’d thought of her countless times.

“Roll onto your stomach,” he said. “Stick your ass in the air.”

She obeyed him.

He left her like that, not touching her but enjoying the view as he shed his clothes. Once those were on the floor, he walked around the bed, inspecting her from all angles. When he’d been with her before, she’d had a tan, but now her skin was pale against the brown hair that flowed down her back. Her ass was ample, enticing. He squeezed it before kneeling behind her and touching her pussy again.

“You’re still very wet,” he said.

“Yes.”

“Ready for me to use.”

“Or ready to listen to a lecture on cephalopods.”

“Very funny.” He kneaded her ass. “Do you remember when I tied you to the bed and made you stay there for three hours, taking you whenever I wanted? However I wanted?”

“Yes.” She groaned as she spoke. “I remember all of that week.”

He licked a finger and slid it into her ass. “I took your ass that night. While you had a toy in your pussy. Do you remember that?”

“Of course.”

He leaned forward, his bare chest against her back, and whispered in her ear. “You were so, so full. So wonderfully tight. Trembling, because it was almost too much for you. But you could still take it. I was proud of you.” He ran his other hand through her hair as he listened to her quickening breath. “The man you fucked after me—did you let him in your ass?”

“No.”

He reached for a condom and rolled it over his cock. When he rubbed himself up and down her slit, she gasped. “I don’t want you to let another man inside you ever again. You’re mine.”

He shoved inside before she could protest, and she was so warm and wet and perfect around him. She jerked forward on the bed.

“Yes,” he said, running a hand up her back. “Just like that.”

He began to thrust brutally, digging his fingers into her skin. He knew she liked it this way. Rough, just to the edge of pain. He pinched her clit and she yelped, then he circled it gently, spreading her juices.

“Can you come for me again?” he asked.

Soon she was shaking, clutching the sheets in her hands, and she cried out as he brought her over the edge again.

God, he’d missed that sound.

“Good girl,” he said, sliding his hand through her hair. He slowed his thrusts, gave her a bit of a reprieve. “Tomorrow I’m going to tie you up again. I’m going to do whatever I want to you. For an hour. Or maybe four, if that’s what I feel like. What do you think, Cassidy?”

“Yes. I’ll take your cock. However you want.”

Oh, the things he would do to her this weekend. He would make her realize that no one else could ever satisfy her.

She bucked against him, and he sped up, fucking her so hard that everything was a blur around them. Except for where they were connected, joined—finally—after so much time apart.

He came with a growl, finding release inside a woman for the first time in sixteen months.

The only woman he wanted.

…

Afterward, Blaine curled his body around Cassie, his skin pressed against hers. How had he gone without her for so long? He wouldn’t let that happen again.

“What do you want?” he murmured.

She rolled onto her back. “You know what I’m craving? Poutine.”

That wasn’t the answer he’d hoped for, but it made him laugh. It was midnight, they’d just had sex, and she wanted gravy-covered fries with cheese curds.

“Whenever I go to Ottawa, I get poutine,” she said. “You can’t get it in Georgeville. The diner’s the only proper restaurant in town, and they don’t have it. You can’t get it at the bakery or Tim Hortons, either. And I love poutine.”

“I’ll get you some.” Of course he would get her whatever she wanted. “Would you like to stay here while I pick it up? Or shall we go out together?”

“Let’s go out.” She sat up, then covered her mouth with her hand, suppressing a laugh. A cute blush crept up her cheeks. “Crap. The only thing I have to wear is the beaver costume. You really should have taken me home first to pack a bag for the weekend.”

“No, I shouldn’t have. Because now you’ll be naked for most of the weekend.”

“So this was all part of your devious plan.”

“I’m the villain, remember?”

In truth, he’d just been so eager to take her home with him that he hadn’t been able to think of anything else.

“If you don’t put on your headband and don’t take off your jacket,” he said, “nobody will know you’re a beaver. Plus it’s the weekend before Halloween. I’m sure other people are walking the streets dressed as pirates and demons and cephalopods.”

He pulled her on top of his body so she was straddling him, and he kissed her again and again, just because he could. Because she was actually here. In his house.

She playfully pushed him away. “You know somewhere to go for poutine at this time of night?”

“I do.”

Ten minutes later, they were on their way to a late-night poutine and shawarma place on Rideau Street. There were a few other people inside, all of whom appeared somewhat intoxicated.

They sat by the window with their poutine, and he discovered that watching Cassie eat was mesmerizing. He recalled that being true the summer before last, as well. Although he remembered so much of their week together, there were still things he’d forgotten.

She picked up a fry with lots of gravy and popped it into her mouth. “God, this is so good. Candy, punch, blueberry wine, and poutine—that’s what I’ve had tonight. Interesting combination, don’t you think?”

He raised his eyebrows. “Those aren’t the only things you’ve had in your mouth.”

“Right. I’m a beaver. I was gnawing on wood earlier.”

“I hope you didn’t do any gnawing. Can’t say I like the image.”

She laughed, and that made him smile.

It hurt to think of how many of Cassie’s smiles he might have taken away when he left her. He pushed that thought to the back of his mind.

“So what’s new with you?” she asked. “What’s happened in the past year?”

“I bought the house,” he said, “and I realized I couldn’t live without you.”

She looked down, shaking her head. “It’s too late, Blaine.”

“It’s never too late.”

She smiled sadly. “Did you go on any trips?”

“New York City. And Utah.”

“Utah?”

“There are lots of rocks there.” He took out his phone to show her a picture of the orange hoodoos in Bryce Canyon and another of a rock arch.

“Those are so cool,” she said.

“You wouldn’t want to travel with me. I think you would find it annoying.”

“Because you’d keep yapping about the geology?”

When he was a child, his father would take him camping on Cape Breton Island, out in Nova Scotia, every couple of years. They’d gone again two years ago. After his dad’s death last year, Blaine wondered if his father had been planning his escape from this world for a long time before he put that bullet in his head, and had wanted one last trip with his son. They hadn’t traveled anywhere together for years before that.

His father had let him talk on and on about the rocks while they were out there, plus the vegetation and the animals. He hadn’t asked him to shut up once.

Okay. Maybe once. But that was all.

Blaine was different from his father. His dad had been the kind of guy who always smiled, whose idea of a good afternoon was a couple of cold beers and a game on TV.

The kind of guy you couldn’t ever imagine taking his own life.

“Blaine?” Cassie said.

He would tell her this weekend. But not tonight.

“Yes,” he said. “You might find it annoying.”

“Not gonna lie. At some point, I probably would. But I like listening to you talk about what you find interesting. You seem to find so many things fascinating, whereas I don’t.”

“I don’t think that’s true.”

She shrugged. “Still. I’m not like you. But when we went to Bon Echo and you were talking about the rocks and the pictographs, I thought it was cool.” She paused. “Were most of the things you told me about yourself true, aside from the lie about where you lived?”

He nodded. “I’m a geotechnical engineer. I have a master’s degree. My parents divorced when I was six. I’m an only child. Those things—and nearly everything else—are entirely true.”

“I was worried that I’d gotten to know someone who wasn’t you.”

“No. You knew me.” He might not have told her why he’d taken a week off to drive around the province with a tent in his trunk and no plans, but still, she knew him. Mostly.

“I remember you telling me you wanted to be a paleontologist when you were a kid.”

“Lots of children like dinosaurs, but not as obsessively as I did. I knew everything there was to know about each dinosaur, even if I struggled to pronounce their names.”

“When did you decide to be a geotechnical engineer?” she asked.

“Grade eleven, I think. After a brief phase of wanting to be a surgeon.”

“A surgeon?”

“When I was sixteen, I sliced my finger pretty good with the hedge trimmer and had to go to the ER. I watched as the doctor stitched me up and thought it was cool.”

“I’m not sure that’s a normal reaction to getting stitches.”

“I’ve never pretended to be normal.” He paused. “What about you? What’s happened to you in the past year or more?”

“Not much. I’ve been working at the same job, living in the same place. My friend Rachel—the flapper girl—moved to Ottawa with a guy and started college. Jenna—the witch—got married. But me…not too much has changed.”

He knew from the way she was avoiding his gaze that she wasn’t telling him everything, but he wouldn’t press her, not now.

He would be a hypocrite if he did.

…

When they got home, he told her to take off her clothes in the front hall.

She hesitated. “I don’t think I’m ready for another round. It’s one in the morning, and it’s been a long day.”

It had been a long day for him, too. “No sex. But I will enjoy watching you walk up the stairs without any clothes on.”

She stuck out her tongue, but she obeyed him, her hips swinging as she climbed the stairs to his bedroom in the unnecessarily large house that he lived in alone. He admired her ass as he followed her up.

She climbed into his bed, and as he looked at her long hair spilling down her shoulders, curling around her naked breasts, his heart clenched.

He needed this weekend to work, needed to make her his.

But truthfully, he wasn’t as confident as he acted. He was just pretending to be confident he’d win her back…because the thought of losing another person he loved was too much to bear. It terrified him.

He’d lost his father. He couldn’t lose Cassie, too.

He didn’t know how he’d survive without her.

Chapter Eight

In some of the books Cassie had read, people woke up in their lover’s bed and it took them a minute to realize where they were.

But she knew. Even before she opened her eyes. The events of last night were at the forefront of her mind.

She smiled. She’d had amazing sex.

And amazing poutine.

But then she frowned. She shouldn’t be so happy about having a fun night with Blaine. She couldn’t let herself get used to this. Couldn’t let him break her heart again.

She didn’t believe in second chances, not after the pain she’d gone through. Especially not after what had happened with her mother. Those who didn’t learn from history were doomed to repeat it.

She rolled over and saw him lying next to her, reading an anthropology book. Damn, he was so handsome, his hair a little disheveled. And when he turned toward her and smiled like she was the only thing that mattered, she felt like the luckiest woman in the world. She was in his bed, wearing his Ottawa Senators T-shirt—because she hadn’t wanted to sleep naked, despite his protests—and he could touch her like nobody else.

Dangerous.

“Sleep well?” he asked.

She looked at the clock on his bedside table. It was nine thirty. Holy crap, she certainly had slept well. She rarely slept past nine.

He put aside his book and rolled on top of her. She loved being pressed beneath his weight, unable to move easily. When his lips followed her hairline down to the side of her neck, she squirmed in pleasure.

“I’ll take your lack of response as a yes,” he murmured.

He sucked one of her nipples into his mouth, his hand squeezing the other gently, and swirled his tongue around the peak, making her arch against him. His cock was hard, digging into her stomach.

He slid back onto his knees. “Spread your legs and show me your pussy.”

She did as instructed, pulling up the large T-shirt so he could see her.

“Mmm. Yes.” He slipped two fingers inside her wetness. “You’re a horny little girl. But don’t worry. I’ll take care of you all morning.”

“I hope you won’t fuck me all morning. I’m not sure I could handle it.”

“No? That sounds like a challenge.” He gently moved his fingers in and out of her body. “But it wasn’t what I had in mind. I’m going to fuck you only once, then run you a bath while I make you breakfast.”

“And what happens after that?”

His gaze roved her body. “Well, when I was listening to you snore—”

“I snore?” she interrupted.

“Yes. It’s cute, I promise. No loud, ugly snores for you.”

No one had ever told her she snored before. Then again, none of her relationships had lasted long. She’d spent nearly as many full nights with Blaine as she’d spent with any of her boyfriends.

“Anyway,” he said, “when I was listening to you snore sweetly at four in the morning, I came up with a plan for the day. I’ll fuck you this morning, but I won’t fuck you again until after dinner. You’ll be desperate for my cock, and I’ll tie you to the bed like I did before. I’ll use you however I wish, for as long as I wish—as I told you last night. And you will lie there and please me like a good girl. Although, to be honest, you’ll probably talk back at least once.”

Her pussy clenched around his fingers. “What will we do for dinner?”

“We’ll go out. Somewhere nice—I’ll make reservations. But I doubt beavers will be welcome at the restaurant, so I’ll go to the mall this afternoon to get you something to wear.”

“You’re going to buy me clothes? Really?”

“I assume I can manage. But if you prefer, you can put on your beaver outfit and come to the store with me.”

“Um, no. I think I’ll pass.”

“I’ll buy a few things, and you can decide what to keep. What size are you?”

She turned away from him, slightly embarrassed.

“You’ve been naked a good part of the time you’ve been in my company,” he said. “I know exactly what you look like, and I think you’re incredibly beautiful. No number will change that.”

“Fourteen,” she said, still a little uncomfortable.

His response was to thrust his fingers deeper inside her, and she clutched the sheets in her hand. She could hear her body’s wetness as he thrust in and out, and she squirmed even more.

“That’s right,” he murmured. “You want it so badly, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“What exactly do you want?”

“Your cock.”

“Like this?” He shifted his body up and pressed his cock against her lips.

“No…inside my pussy.”

“Ah. I’m glad you made that clear.” The corners of his mouth twitched. He slid down and pressed his mouth to her clit, circling it and making her nearly fly off the bed. And then she was bereft of his touch and his tongue once more.

She moaned in agony.

Blaine was the only man she desired this much. Johnny in a Big Bird costume, that kiss where their mouths smashed together awkwardly? Not the same. Not even close.

She continued to squirm. Blaine still didn’t fuck her.

He was wearing boxers and no shirt, dark hair dusting his chest. He was not what she’d call broad-shouldered, but he was still muscled. And his heated look contained a touch of mischief.

He rolled on a condom. With one hand, he gripped her wrists together over her head. With his other hand, he notched his cock against her, but he didn’t enter her, just slid himself over her slit.

She whimpered in frustration. “That’s not…inside. I—”

He shut her up by kissing her, continuing to leisurely slide himself over her. He was far more patient than he ought to be, considering he’d gone for more than a year without sex. When he leaned back, his blue eyes pierced hers.

The gaping emptiness inside her was unbearable. And judging by his smirk, he knew just how badly she needed him.

When he finally pushed inside, the smirk disappeared. He closed his eyes in what looked like ecstasy.

And she was the one doing that to him.

He set a slow rhythm, holding himself up on one elbow while his other hand pinned her hands over her head.

“Oh God,” she murmured. “Oh God.”

He was silent now, fucking her with an intensity that was too much and yet so necessary. Their bodies were joined together, and it felt like they belonged this way.

But it shouldn’t be like this, not after what he’d done to her. She shut her eyes, but that didn’t help. Every time he buried himself deep inside her, it felt as though he was leaving behind a shard of himself that would hurt forever.

His pace increased steadily, and she gave herself over to him, because she was incapable of doing anything else. When he grunted as he came inside her, she couldn’t help but cry out as she, too, found her release.

It was wrong that she should be so in sync with him.

He left the room afterward, as though he sensed she needed some time without him, but in a way, that made it even worse. He always knew exactly what she needed.

She heard him turn on the water in the bathroom. Running her a bath, as he’d said.

She rolled onto her stomach and buried her face in the pillow and tried to slow her breathing. She could do this. She could spend a weekend with him and walk away with her heart intact.

She could.

“Cassidy?” he said a few minutes later.

She lifted her head. He was at the door.

“You all right?” he asked.

“Yes. Of course. I’m fine.”

“Ready for a bath?”

He led her to the washroom and stripped off her T-shirt. She stepped into the tub. She thought he would make breakfast now, but he slipped into the tub behind her, his legs bent on either side of her thighs. She leaned back against his chest in the water that was nearly too hot, and she couldn’t bear to ask him to leave.

He grabbed a bar of soap and started lathering her up.

“It’s better than using your pink puffball,” he said.

“Hey. I like my shower poufs. I buy them in all different colors. They’re whimsical.”

“I suppose they are. But I was forced to use your silly puffballs with your girly lavender body wash for the whole week I stayed at your place. A bar of soap is so much simpler and more practical.”

“I guess it’s only fair that I use green deodorant soap when I stay at your house.”

“Yes. Although…” He was washing her shoulders now. When he put the bar of soap down and started massaging them, she tilted her head back in bliss. “I like how your skin smells of lavender. I almost bought lavender body wash once, to remind me of you.”

She felt a painful swell in her chest.

He distracted her by saying, “Puffballs are also a type of edible mushroom. They can get quite large. No idea what they taste like—I’ve never had one.”

“They sound too sophisticated for Georgeville.”

“I can try to find a restaurant that serves them tonight, if you like.”

“No, that’s quite all right.”

“What would you like to eat for dinner? Any requests?”

She shook her head, spraying water droplets. “Surprise me.”

“As you wish.”

He cupped her cheek, turned her toward him, and kissed her before climbing out of the tub. She watched the water drip off him as he reached for a towel. He was unbearably sexy.

“Actually, I do have a request,” she said. “Let’s go to a restaurant where you won’t look out of place wearing a suit.”

“You want to see me all dressed up?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Very well.” He smiled before leaning over and kissing her again. “Come downstairs in twenty minutes, and I’ll have breakfast ready.”

As soon as he was gone, she leaned back and submerged her head under the water.

Why, oh, why did he have to be so wonderful?

She’d told him there would be nothing between them but sex. She’d been convinced of it. How could there be any feelings left—other than bitterness—after the way he’d broken her heart last year?

But that wasn’t true. It wasn’t merely sex between them. She knew that now.

She had to make damned sure she didn’t fan those dying embers of love that lingered in her heart.

And there was one thing that would definitely put tender thoughts of hot baths and massages and warm breakfasts out of both of their minds.

Chapter Nine

Cassidy Monroe was in his kitchen. Blaine smiled. Last night hadn’t been a dream.

She was wearing another of his T-shirts, her wet hair dripping down the towel draped over her shoulders, and she was sipping coffee as she sat on a bar stool at his kitchen island.

Blaine wished he was an accomplished cook. He wanted to impress her. But a simple cheese omelette would have to do. A cheese omelette, plus a grapefruit, and toast with jam. In his experience, women were impressed if you simply cooked breakfast for them, even if the food was pretty average.

He set half an omelette and toast in front of her, then went to the fridge and got out a jar of blueberry jam. His mother had brought it back from her trip to New England, in addition to the wine.

Cassie ate carefully, methodically, for a couple of minutes.

Then she said, “After you left last year, I started reading erotic romance novels. They’d never appealed to me much before, but after you, it was a nice escape. I read a lot of BDSM romances, and I fantasized about it. And I decided I wanted to try it.”

He frowned. “But you’d already done it before. Right? You’ve always been submissive in the bedroom with me.”

When he’d been with her last year, he’d noticed how her eyes would flare whenever he commanded her to do something, even if she sometimes disobeyed him. She also liked when he used his strength to push her around, hold her down.

He liked being in charge of her pleasure. They worked well together.

Or so he’d thought. Hadn’t he given her exactly what she wanted?

“I felt like trying something more hard-core,” she said. “I wanted a man to tie me up and whip me. I wanted to beg him to stop and have him ignore my pleas. I wanted to hurt. Physically. And then I wanted him to enter me brutally when I was bruised and maybe bleeding.”

Blaine felt his eyes widen in shock. She probably didn’t notice—she was looking out the window.

“So I found a guy online…”

“Cassie,” he said, horrified. “That’s incredibly dangerous.”

“And sleeping with a strange man fifteen minutes after I met him in Tim Hortons isn’t?” she argued.

“Not the same.”

“I wasn’t stupid about it. I met him on a site with a good reputation. He lives in Kingston, and the first time we met in person, we just went to a coffee shop and talked, made sure we were on the same page. He didn’t touch me. I told him my safe word.”

A safe word. That much, Blaine did know. He could see the appeal of plunging into a woman—into Cassie—while she begged him not to and cried, “No, no, no!” knowing all the while that she really wanted to be fucked because they’d agreed to it all in advance.

However, the idea of whipping a woman? God, no. Not for him.

He wasn’t one to judge, if that’s what other people liked… But Cassie? Getting whipped? He couldn’t bear to think of it, and he couldn’t imagine her enjoying it.

Did she truly like pain? He’d never gotten that impression. But then, he’d never actually hurt her.

Physically.

“The second time, we went to his place,” she said. “He tied me to his St. Andrew’s cross and flogged me. And then he fucked me.”

Blaine clenched his hands. He couldn’t eat right now. But Cassie spread jam on her toast, seemingly detached from her words.

“What’s a St. Andrew’s cross?” he asked.

“It looks like this.” She formed an x with her arms. “He was a fairly experienced Dom, so I felt like I was in good hands. But unfortunately, getting flogged over and over…it just didn’t do it for me.”

“So there wasn’t a third time?”

“There was. But I used my safe word. It was just…too much. But Leo was nice and understanding. We still talk occasionally. No more floggings, though.”

Thank God.

“Why are you telling me this?” he said, his jaw clenched.

She shrugged. “To piss you off? I can’t imagine you like hearing about me being beaten and fucked by another man. Do you?”

“No,” he growled.

“I still enjoy reading those books. I still enjoy fantasizing about that stuff. But exploring fantasies in real life doesn’t always go as planned.”

“You don’t think the problem was simply that he was the wrong man for you?”

She cocked her head to the side. “Are you suggesting I would enjoy it if you beat me?”

He grimaced. “No. Absolutely not. I want to tie you to my bed and have my way with you, but I don’t consider myself a sadist.”

She had a sip of coffee. She seemed so blasé about the whole thing, even though she’d been tied to a fucking cross and flogged.

She surprised him sometimes.

“Anyway. You asked what I’d been up to in the past year,” she said. “Well, now you know.”

…

After lunch, Cassie was left alone at Blaine’s house while he went out to buy her clothes. She walked around the main floor, glancing at his books and malachite and ammonite collections but not really paying close attention.

Telling him about Leo had backfired. Because now she was fantasizing about Blaine hurting her. Even though she didn’t want him actually to beat her, she couldn’t help but think about it. Talking about the time she’d been tied up to a St. Andrew’s cross was hardly romantic, like taking a bath together and having her shoulders massaged, but it hadn’t purged those feelings of closeness as she’d hoped.

She’d told Blaine something important about herself. Something she’d never told another living soul—not even Rachel or Jenna. Sure, she’d told Rachel that she was meeting a man she met online, had left her friend his address and phone number as a precautionary measure. But Rachel didn’t know what she’d actually done with Leo.

And yet, she’d told Blaine.

How stupid of her.

At least she’d shocked him. Made him uncomfortable. That had to count for something.

I want to tie you to my bed and have my way with you.

God, she had to clench her thighs together when she thought of his words…and when she thought of that night, more than a year ago, when he’d done just that.

He’d promised he would do it again tonight.

She couldn’t wait.

A framed painting on the far bookshelf caught her eye. It looked familiar…because she was the one who’d painted it. It was a small picture of wildflowers, done in watercolors and ink, and she’d given it to him because he’d liked it and admired her talent. And because she had liked the idea of him having something she’d created.

He’d kept it all this time.

She felt a strange pressure in her chest. Talking to him about Leo, seeing this little watercolor in his living room—these things were affecting her far too much, stirring up feelings she had no business having. She needed to do something about it.

The painting gave her an idea.

She went up to his office on the second floor, where she pulled a sheet of blank paper out of his printer and found a pencil. Back in the living room, she picked up the largest ammonite and brought it to the dining room table, where she started sketching.

Cassie had never wanted to seriously pursue art. But from the time she could hold a crayon, she’d loved drawing and painting. As a child, she’d drawn pictures of unicorns and Santa’s workshop, but now it was mostly nature that captured her artistic interest. Sometimes landscapes, more often close-ups of flowers and such. She found it meditative.

The shapes and patterns in nature were amazing. And to think that millions and millions of years ago, there must have been a soft body inside this ammonite shell. How did scientists know what it looked like?

She’d been sketching for five minutes when her phone beeped. She reached for it eagerly, certain the text message was from Blaine.

It was the first text message he’d ever sent her.

Last year he’d refused to ask for her number. But today, she’d given it to him before he went to the store so he could send her pictures of dresses.

What do you think? the text asked.

The accompanying photo showed a hideous green dress. It was the color of malachite, and that was a terrible color for her. And the sequins!

Wow, she responded. Just…wow.

She wondered if he’d sent it to her as a joke or if he seriously thought it would look good on her. She feared it was the latter. Perhaps it had been a mistake to let him buy something for her to wear tonight. She should have gone to the mall with him, even if she had to wear a beaver costume.

The next photo he sent her was of a strapless cream dress. It wasn’t hideous, but…

That would look terrible on me, she texted. And I don’t have a strapless bra here.

Bra-less? came the suggestion with a winky face.

Why did men love the idea of women going without a bra? Did they not understand that bras were often needed for nice cleavage? Plus, her boobs were far too big for her to go without a bra in public. She needed the support.

Next was a bright red dress—the color of a fire engine—that was disturbingly short. Or was it a shirt…?

This was followed by a dress with an ugly floral print. She couldn’t decide whether or not it was worse than the first dress.

She went back to sketching for a few minutes, fearing she would need to keep her coat on all night. When he hadn’t texted her for fifteen minutes, she worried he’d bought a dress that was even worse than the ones he’d sent her pictures of.

Her phone beeped, and she pounced on it.

Nice shop lady has taken pity on me and offered her help. She would like to see what you look like, so can you send a selfie?

Cassie hoped “nice shop lady” had good taste.

Her phone beeped again.

I explained that, due to complicated circumstances, you are staying at my house with only a beaver costume.

She cringed. Had it really been necessary to add that part? And who used words like “circumstances” in text messages?

And yet… The thought of Blaine, the man with an ammonite collection and shelves full of science books, at a women’s clothing store, desperately trying to find a dress for her, was rather endearing.

She took a photo of herself and sent it to him. A minute later, a message popped up.

Shop lady says you are beautiful. I think that is the understatement of the year.

Oh man. This guy.

Her phone was silent for several minutes. She kept working on her sketch of the ammonite. Usually, she was very focused when she was drawing, but today her mind was wandering.

Did Blaine find this whole shopping trip a pain in the ass…or fascinating? She could see him being intrigued by all the different styles.

She was about to get a glass of water when he sent her another message.

Found you lovely dress. But I have been informed that such a dress requires stick-on cups rather than a proper bra. Not sure if you would be interested…?

Good Lord.

Tell nice shop lady I would like a dress that will allow me to wear a regular bra, she texted. And the only shoes I have with me are brown ankle boots.

That was the last she heard from him.

For nearly two hours.

Dear God. She was genuinely terrified. What was he buying for her?

…

Blaine had never shopped for women’s clothing before. When he’d first gotten to the mall, he’d walked into a couple of women’s clothing stores and felt completely overwhelmed. He’d picked up a few things in an effort to determine whether they were tube tops or short skirts or really wide belts. Not that he planned to get such things for Cassie, but he’d been curious.

The malachite-colored dress hadn’t seemed so bad, but he’d interpreted her “wow” as sarcastic. He’d lucked out with the last store, however. The older lady who worked there found his attempts to buy a dress for his girlfriend charming and took pity on him.

Yes, he’d called Cassie his girlfriend. Because that’s what he wanted her to be, and it was much simpler than the truth.

In addition to the helpful saleslady, the store also carried almost everything in her size. He walked out with three dresses, all of which could be worn with a regular bra. He hoped Cassie would like at least one of them.

Finished with his main task, he decided to further his knowledge of women’s clothing by checking out a lingerie store.

There were racks and racks of bras. Apparently there were all sorts of styles, but frankly, he couldn’t see any difference between them other than color. Hmm. Maybe he just wasn’t looking hard enough. He picked up an “everyday bra” and a “super-duper pusher-upper,” which looked outwardly similar, but upon feeling the cups, the latter did, indeed, have quite a bit of padding. What was the difference between that and a regular push-up bra?

“Could I help you?” A young woman with short blond hair and a nametag approached him.

He dropped one of the bras.

“Um.” At the dress store, he’d felt comfortable asking for help, but he was decidedly less comfortable in the lingerie store. Particularly since there wasn’t anything he actually needed to buy. Although, surely, Cassie would look good in all of it. “No, just looking.”

“Let me know if you need anything. Is this for your wife?”

“Uh, girlfriend.”

“We have some lovely new babydolls at the front, in either black or pink lace.”

Dolls? What the hell was she talking about?

“We also have some satin and lace slips on sale,” she continued. “Buy one, get one fifty percent off.”

“I’ll be sure to keep that in mind, thank you.”

Not willing to continue this conversation any longer, he escaped the bra section and spent a couple of minutes looking at panties. Again, there were so many styles that looked almost the same to him. As far as he was concerned, women’s underwear came in two types: thong and non-thong. But apparently it was more complicated than that.

If only Cassie were here to try on everything for him. Then perhaps he’d get a better understanding of the difference.

He made his way to another section, which would be best described as “skimpy pieces of fabric to wear when you want to impress your man and have sex.” Not, of course, that Cassie needed to wear any of this to impress him. Though, doubtless, he would enjoy it if she did.

He picked up a mostly sheer purple thing and glanced at the price tag.

Crap! This stuff was expensive. So much money for so little fabric.

Next he looked at something that he thought was called a corset. He definitely wanted to see Cassie in one of these. But he didn’t know her band and cup size, and—

Why on earth was he trying to understand women’s underwear when he had the woman of his dreams at home?

He could come back some other time and get her a corset. He made a mental note to look at her bra so he knew which size she was, and then he headed to the jewelry store.

There was one more thing he wanted to buy for Cassie.

Chapter Ten

As soon as Blaine dropped his shopping bags on the floor, Cassie scurried over and gave him a kiss.

Yes, he could certainly get used to coming home to her.

He was still taking off his shoes when she pulled the first dress out of the bag.

“This is nice!” She held the dress up to her chest. “I love burgundy.”

“Burgundy?” What was that? A color? Why not just say it was red? “You can try on the dress right here. In front of the full-length mirror. I don’t have one in my bedroom.”

She slipped his T-shirt over her head and pulled on the dress.

As the shop lady had assured him, Cassie looked gorgeous in it. He pulled her toward him and kissed her lips. Her arms wound around his neck. He put his hand on the zipper and was about to undo it when there was a sharp knock on the door.

She jumped back.

“Probably a salesperson,” he said. “They’ll go away in a moment.” He pressed her against the closet door, but there was another knock.

Dammit.

“Maybe you should get that,” she said.

He opened the door with a sigh.

His friends Matthew and Sara were standing on his doorstep. Sara was carrying a baby car seat.

“Hey,” Matthew said. “Are you… Oh.” He froze in place. “You have a girl over?”

Great. Just what he needed. They had terrible timing.

“This is Cassie,” he said. “My girlfriend.”

Matthew’s eyes widened, as did Sara’s.

Blaine felt compelled to fill the uncomfortable silence with more of an explanation. “The woman I’m going to marry.”

There was certainly no silence now.

“What?” Cassie said, whipping her head around.

“What?” Sara squealed.

Matthew laughed. “Looks your girlfriend didn’t get the news. You sure move fast.”

Cassie held up a hand. “I’m not even his girlfriend. It’s just more convenient than telling the truth.”

“Now I’m definitely intrigued,” Sara said. “But I better put this little girl down first.” She took off her boots and walked in with the baby.

Blaine glanced at the sleeping Victoria. He’d last seen her when she was a week old and a bit funny looking, but she was cute now.

Still, she sort of freaked him out, which was how he always felt around babies. Could Victoria even lift her head yet? Matthew had tried to get him to hold her last time, and he’d refused, convinced he would do irreparable damage to the tiny baby. He liked young children, but little babies who did nothing but cry, poop, sleep, and drink milk weren’t the same.

“Oh, she’s so sweet!” Cassie gushed. “How old is she?”

“Six weeks,” Matthew said, making himself at home on the couch. “Her name is Victoria. So how did you meet Blaine? And when did this happen?” He gestured vaguely between them.

“You haven’t mentioned a woman in years,” Sara said to Blaine. “Tell me everything.”

He was a bit overwhelmed. What should he say? And why were his friends here? Maybe he should start there.

“Did we have plans?” he asked.

“We did, indeed,” Matthew said. “Sara is hosting a bachelorette party for her sister tonight. You and Victoria and I were supposed to hang out for the evening, order some pizza, and watch the hockey game. Sara just stopped by to see your new place.”

“And you, of course,” she interjected, touching his arm.

“This is Matthew,” Blaine said to Cassie. “And his wife, Sara. We all went to university together.”

“He was a much better student than I was,” Matthew said. “But I still graduated, so it’s all good.”

“Thanks to my help in differential equations,” Sara said smugly.

Blaine wanted to get this sorted out in a hurry, then get back to finishing Cassie’s fashion show. The red—well, burgundy—dress looked great on her, and he wanted to see the others. And give her the other thing he’d bought for her.

“So I’m guessing,” Matthew said with a grin, “that I’m unwanted and should find something else to do for the evening.”

“I wouldn’t say unwanted.” Though that was precisely the truth. “But…”

“I get it.” Matthew held up his hands. “We’ll leave soon. Once we get the full story. We’d also like a brief tour of the house you bought with your inheritance.”

“Inheritance?” Cassie said questioningly.

Oh God. Why couldn’t Matthew keep his mouth shut? Time for some damage control.

“Why don’t you two come upstairs with me?” Blaine said. “I’ll show you around. Cassie can keep an eye on Victoria. Okay?” He hurried up the stairs before anyone could protest, and his friends followed.

Matthew poked his head into the master bedroom. “What’s that on the bed?”

“It’s Cassie’s beaver costume. For Halloween.”

Matthew snickered. “Sure it is. I bet you’ve got some really weird rodent fetish.”

That comment rendered Blaine speechless. Did his friends seriously think he was that weird?

Matthew slapped him on the back. “I’m kidding. Now, why don’t you tell us what’s going on? Perhaps starting with how you met her?”

Blaine knew he would have to tell the truth sooner or later, so it might as well be now. He led Matthew and Sara to his office, and they sat down.

“The summer before last, I—”

“Wait. You met her more than a year ago, and this is the first I’m hearing about it?” Sara said.

“Shut up and let him tell the story,” Matthew said, looking at his wife fondly.

“Okay,” Blaine said. “So do you remember the summer before last, when I went on that camping trip?”

“Yeah…”

“Well, I didn’t actually do any camping. I met Cassie at a Tim Hortons on my drive out of Ottawa, and I, um, went back to her place. We spent the week together.”

He was comfortable talking about sex with Cassie. But with his friends, it was a different story.

“You just growled, threw her over your shoulder like a caveman, and that was that?” Matthew said, laughing. “Or was there a little more finesse to it?”

Blaine rolled his eyes. “Please. I have moves.”

“I remember that one time in undergrad, we were at a party and you—”

“Shut up.”

“Okay, okay.” Matthew held up his hands.

Blaine hesitated. “With her, it’s different. I don’t know how to explain it, but I just knew she was special, and everything…well, it just happened. And then at the end of the week, I went back Ottawa, and we didn’t see each other again. Not until yesterday.”

Matthew and Sara exchanged a look.

“Come again?” Matthew said. “You spent this amazing week with a woman, and then you didn’t make plans to see her again?”

“That would be correct.” It seemed logical at the time.

“Are you a total idiot?”

“Apparently.” He paused, glancing down at his hands. “I didn’t think it was anything real. I mean, it was just one week, and I was…not really myself. After my dad…” He didn’t want to go into details about the complicated emotions that had been swirling inside him about his father’s suicide.

Sara reached out and squeezed his knee.

He knitted his fingers together and continued to stare at them. “She made me feel normal again after my dad died. But I didn’t think it was anything more than that. I told her I could only give her a week. I refused to even tell her my phone number or that I lived in Ottawa. But ever since, I’ve been unable to get her out of my mind.” He picked up a pen and started fiddling with it. “So I went back to see her yesterday, and now she’s here for the weekend. Unfortunately, she’s still kind of pissed at me—”

“Understandable,” Sara said.

“But I bet her that she wouldn’t be able to walk away from me on Sunday night.”

“And now you’re having lots and lots of sex in order to convince her,” Matthew finished.

“Something like that.”

“Let me tell you a few things that are guaranteed—”

Sara smacked Matthew’s head. “Stop talking about our sex life.”

“I wasn’t going to say anything about our sex life. Just a few pointers.”

“Except I’m the only woman you’ve slept with, so—”

“I can’t wait until you have your postpartum exam so we can start having sex again,” Matthew muttered.

Blaine dropped his head in his hands. “Guys, can we please put an end to this conversation? I need you to get out of here so I can continue wooing Cassie. I only have one weekend. And I assure you, I do not need help in bed. I just need…time.”

“I should head out, anyway,” Sara said, rising. “The girls are coming over in half an hour. Matthew, I’ll see you tonight. You can go to my mother’s with Victoria if you like, since Blaine has other plans.” She gave her husband a kiss on the cheek and walked downstairs.

Matthew leaned forward. “She’s the one, eh?”

“She is,” Blaine said.

“Word of warning. You came on a bit strong with the whole ‘girl I’m going to marry’ business.”

Blaine grimaced. “I figured that out, thank you. But it’s too late now.”

Matthew slapped him on the back. “Good luck. Call me if you need any more advice.”

“Thank you for the kind offer, but I’ve got it covered.”

“Ask her to come upstairs to see your ammonite collection.”

“Actually, she’s already seen it. I keep it downstairs.”

Visions of her walking around naked in his living room after giving him a blowjob jolted through his mind… He almost groaned aloud.

“I won’t ask what you’re remembering right now,” Matthew said. “I don’t want to know. Probably has something to do with that rodent fetish of yours.”

Five minutes later, Matthew was out the door with Victoria, and Blaine was alone with Cassie once more. She was still wearing the burgundy dress, and she was still the woman he wanted to marry.

But surprisingly, that wasn’t the first thing she brought up.

“Your inheritance,” she said gently, studying his face. “Did a grandparent die?”

He shook his head. He didn’t want to talk about this now, but he wouldn’t lie.

“My father,” he said. “Last year. Three months before I met you.”

She wrapped him in her arms. “I’m so sorry.”

“That’s why I was pretty messed up when we met. It was a huge shock. He was sixty-two, and he wasn’t sick. That I knew of.”

She held him for a minute but seemed to sense he didn’t want to say any more about it right now. “I like your friends, and Victoria is adorable.” She paused. “It’s nice to see a different part of your life. Before, you tried to tell me as little as possible. I held onto every scrap of information. Like, you love artificial banana flavor, and you liked when you had to take amoxicillin as a child. And you told me about crinoids, the marine animal. You usually just see cross-sections of the stem in the fossil record. Little donut shapes. But if you see the whole thing, they look a bit like flowers. Do you have any idea how many times I Googled ‘crinoids’ because it made me feel closer to you?”

“I framed the watercolor you gave me,” he said.

“I saw it on your bookshelf.”

“I look at it every day and think of you.”

She didn’t ask him why the hell he’d waited a year when he thought of her all the time.

“How about you try on the other dresses?” he suggested.

He’d also gotten a light brown dress with a V-neck and a blue dress with something called a boat neck. Women’s clothes had so many different necklines—he’d never really noticed that before. Cassie didn’t like the blue dress, but she liked the brown and burgundy ones.

“Keep them both,” he said. Frankly, he thought she looked amazing in all three.

“Which one should I wear tonight?”

“The brown one.”

“Because it shows more cleavage?”

“You got me.”

She laughed.

“Cleavage is a geology word, you know. Imagine how entertaining that was to a bunch of nineteen-year-old university students.”

“Oh, I can imagine.”

He reached into a bag and pulled out a box from the jeweler. “One more thing.”

“Blaine, you didn’t need—”

“Hush,” he said, opening the box. It contained a silver necklace with a small heart pendant. “May I?”

She hesitated but finally nodded, and he fastened it around her neck.

“I love you,” he whispered.

She opened her mouth, then closed it, without saying the words he so desperately wanted to hear.

Chapter Eleven

When Cassie saw Blaine dressed up for the first time, she had to remind herself to breathe. His suit was gray, his shirt was white, and he looked like a dream.

There was only one problem.

“Your tie,” she said. The navy color was nice, but…

“Did I do it wrong? I don’t wear a tie very often.”

“It’s crooked.” She stepped toward him until they were very close together. She could feel the heat radiating off him. “Let me fix it.”

He put his hands at his sides as she untied it, looped it around his neck again, and knotted it correctly. Her fingers itched to unbutton his shirt and touch his chest, but she behaved herself. They had reservations in half an hour, and she wanted to go on a proper date with him, something they’d never done before.

And then he would have his way with her.

Her skin prickled almost unbearably.

“Thank you,” he whispered. He held out his arm, and she put her hand in the crook of his elbow.

He drove them to an Italian restaurant. Dim lighting, white tablecloths, a single red rose on each table.

So romantic.

As they followed the hostess to their table at the back, Cassie noticed a couple of women looking in their direction. Looking at Blaine.

Yeah, sorry. He’s with me.

At least, for tonight.

He pulled out a chair for her, and she felt almost giddy as she took a seat. It was all perfect. It felt like they should be in a movie.

They each ordered a glass of red wine. Once again, he clinked his glass against hers.

“Cheers to us,” he murmured.

She couldn’t help smiling.

She read the menu over and over. Everything looked so good. Eventually she decided on tagliatelle with wild mushrooms. No puffballs, though.

The waiter returned, and Blaine ordered short ribs, as well as the antipasti board.

“I want you to have lots of energy for tonight,” he said once they were alone again. He took her hand and slid his fingers up her wrist, gently brushing her skin.

How could he make her feel so much with so little?

No wonder she’d struggled to get over him, when every touch was so meaningful. He sought explanations for everything, enjoyed unraveling the mysteries of how the world worked, but this thing between them seemed beyond explanation.

A memory suddenly came to her. She’d made herself pasta with a mushroom cream sauce for dinner, maybe a month after he’d left—soon after she’d realized she wasn’t pregnant with his baby. After a week of eating junk, she’d decided she needed to eat proper food.

And she remembered listlessly twirling her fork in the linguine or spaghetti or whatever it was, barely able to consume the nice dinner she’d cooked for herself.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, his finger sliding farther up her arm.

She shook her head. “Nothing.”

For tonight, they were together, and she would live in the moment.

…

Cassie placed some cured meat on a slice of bread. There were four types of meat on the platter, but she hadn’t paid attention when the waiter explained what they were, too distracted by the man in front of her. Although she’d always preferred to draw and paint nature, she was filled with the sudden urge to capture Blaine’s face with charcoal. A quick sketch of how impossibly handsome he was.

Their date was wonderful. They talked, they laughed. The pasta was delicious, as were his short ribs. But the best part of the meal was the flourless chocolate cake that he insisted they order for dessert. Honestly, it was the most amazing thing she’d ever tasted. She groaned and closed her eyes in ecstasy as she put the first bite in her mouth.

“I take it you like it,” Blaine said, slicing the small cake down the middle. “This is to ensure you don’t eat more than your share.”

“Come on,” she said. “Please?”

“Maybe for you. But I don’t usually like it when other people eat my chocolate. When I was young, I thought liking chocolate was a guy thing, like beer and wings. My father and I loved chocolate, but my mom never had much of a sweet tooth.” He looked down. “Hey!”

She’d snuck the plate to her side of the table. “Finders keepers.”

“Don’t you dare.” He grabbed the plate back and took a big bite.

She watched his Adam’s apple as he chewed. She could be mesmerized by him doing the simplest things.

He picked up a forkful of cake from her half.

“Oh no, you don’t,” she said.

But before she could say anything more, he held the fork up to her lips. She wished he could feed her with his fingers, but this was probably as far as they ought to go in public. She took the bite he offered and chewed slowly. He watched her mouth.

A lock of hair flopped over his forehead, and she reached out to push it back. Any excuse to touch him. Under the table, she slid her other hand up the inside of his knee, and she could tell he was struggling for composure.

She imagined him sliding his hand all the way up her leg, dipping his finger inside her. Pulling off her clothes and tossing her, naked, onto the bed, while his blue eyes pierced her. Jerking her arm to the side and tying it to the bedpost.

As she looked at him in his suit, he seemed not so much like a geotechnical engineer, but a very powerful man. Like the billionaires in some of the books she read.

A man who always got what he wanted.

She squirmed in her seat. “I have an idea for when we get home.”

…

Blaine was confused. Didn’t they already have a plan? He was going to tie her up and screw her six ways to Sunday. He did not like the thought of changing things.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “It won’t be all that different from what you already want to do to me. Just a little more…intense.”

He popped another bite of chocolate cake into his mouth. It really was the greatest dessert in the world, but all his attention was on Cassie in that slinky brown dress, her beautiful hair spilling over her shoulders. She’d told him it was a pity she didn’t have any makeup with her, but he thought she looked perfect tonight.

A little more intense. What could she mean? Desire pumped through his body.

“What are you muttering under your breath?” she asked.

Shit. He’d done it out of habit.

“To calm myself down,” he said, “I recite the geologic time periods. Sexy, I know.”

“And why do you need to calm yourself down, right now?”

He raised his eyebrows over his glass of wine. “I think you know.”

Her gaze locked on his. “I’m not going to tell you my idea yet.” She glanced to the left and right. “Too many people around.”

They finished the chocolate cake. He paid the bill, then he took her hand and stepped outside.

“Now you can tell me,” he said, not wanting to wait any longer.

“In the car.” She winked at him.

Christ. This woman drove him mad.

Fortunately the car was only a three-minute walk away. He opened the door for her, and once she was in the passenger’s seat and he was behind the wheel, she spoke.

“If you’re not comfortable with this, I totally understand.” She hesitated, then said, “When we get back to your house, I want us to pretend that we went on a nice first date together.”

He frowned. “But that’s more or less the truth, isn’t it?”

“Except the difference is, I won’t want to sleep with you. I’m not ready for that yet. We’ll pretend that your house is my house, and I don’t want to let you in. But you’re a rich asshole who’s used to getting his way and won’t take no for an answer. You think because you bought me dinner, I owe you sex, and you force yourself on me.”

“I…rape you.”

She hesitated. “I know it might sound weird, but lots of women have that kind of fantasy.”

“So I’ve heard.” He cupped her cheek with his hand and stroked his thumb over her upper lip. “You would trust me to do that?”

“Yes.”

He swallowed a stab of desire. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“I won’t fight too hard. You don’t need to be much rougher than usual.”

He pictured her under him, whimpering, “No, no, no,” and thrashing her arms. “What’s your safe word? Because you’re going to say no, and I’ll keep fucking you.”

“Puffball,” she said with a wobbly smile. “And one more thing. Don’t rip my clothing. I like this dress. I want to keep it.”

He nodded. “Deal.”

A little light from the streetlights filtered into the car. He could see her worrying her lip now.

“You’re not disgusted by this?” she asked quietly.

“No. I’m just… You’ve acted out your fantasies before, right? With that guy you met online. And you didn’t enjoy it.”

“This isn’t the same sort of fantasy. Being whipped and flogged…” She glanced away for a moment. “I think I just wanted to feel some sort of pain that wasn’t heartbreak. But it didn’t push you out of my mind. I couldn’t help but think of you when I was naked on a cross, my legs spread wide.”

Jesus.

“I’m sorry,” he said, his own heart breaking that he had caused this amazing woman such emotional agony. “So fucking sorry.”

She didn’t say anything.

But she trusted him enough to describe her dark fantasy and act it out with him. And that was precious.

His cock hardened unbearably at her trust in him and at the scenario she’d suggested, though this wasn’t the sort of thing he ever thought about when he got himself off. He definitely liked being in control in bed but not with an unwilling companion.

Except Cassie was willing. Very willing. This had been her idea.

And God, he wanted it, too.

Now.

Chapter Twelve

If Cassie were Blaine, she’d be reciting the geologic time periods right now to calm herself down. Still, under her nervousness, she felt a swell of desire, the likes of which she’d never experienced before.

She crossed one leg over the other and squeezed her thighs together.

It wasn’t a long drive, thankfully.

He parked the car and handed her the keys. “Since we’re pretending it’s your house,” he explained at her questioning look. “We can start as soon as you get out of the car.”

Her confidence faded as she curled her hand over the keys. Oh God. This was really going to happen, and she’d never done anything like it before.

“I don’t know what I should say,” she whispered. “I’m not very good at acting.”

He hesitated. “I’ll walk you to the door, you’ll tell me you had a nice time tonight, and then you’ll open the door to go inside. I’ll follow you, then ask if you’re forgetting something.”

She cleared her suddenly dry throat. “Okay.”

She could do this. She would just follow his lead. He’d keep her safe, and he would give her what she yearned for in the dark recesses of her mind.

She stepped out of the car, and he followed her up the path to the front door.

It was time.

“I had a lovely evening,” she said, turning toward him.

“Me, too.”

“Thank you.” She pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Good night.”

She fumbled with the key in the door, unable to get it to work. She laughed. This was not how it was supposed to go.

“Allow me.” Blaine opened the door for her. When she stepped inside, he said darkly, “Aren’t you forgetting something?”

She lifted her purse. “Nope. I’ve got everything.”

“That’s not what I mean.” He came closer, invading her personal space. “You’re not going to let me go with just a kiss on the cheek, are you?”

His safe, familiar voice now had a steely edge to it. She shivered.

“Yes,” she said, swallowing. “I am. I had a lovely time at dinner, but I never sleep with a man on the first date.”

She turned to close the door, but he was there, looming over her.

“There’s a first time for everything, isn’t there?” he said.

She tried to sidestep him. “Get away from me.”

“You see, Cassie, I took you out to a nice restaurant. I paid for a nice dinner. Now you owe me something in return.”

“I don’t owe you anything.”

“Yes, you do. And I always get my way.” He dipped his head to her ear and whispered, “Always.”

Her skin tingled with fear and excitement blended together. But she was safe with him. It was an intoxicating combination of feelings.

“Please,” she said. “Don’t do this.”

He grabbed her arms and shoved her against the door, forcing his leg between her thighs. “I like when you struggle.” He rubbed his crotch against her, showing her exactly how turned on it was making him.

The size of him shocked her, even though he’d been inside her many times before.

“Be a good girl and give me what I want.”

She twisted, trying to get away. “No.”

“Very well. We’ll do this the hard way.”

When he scooped her up in his arms, she cried out in protest. It felt so…real.

“Stop!” She hit his back with her fists over and over as he carried her up the stairs and threw her onto his bed.

“Strip for me,” he commanded.

“No.”

“Strip, or I’ll tear off your dress. And I don’t think you want that, do you? It’s such a pretty dress. Does a great job of showing off your tits.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Do it. Now.”

She scrambled up and ran toward the door, but he blocked her path.

“You’re not getting out of here,” he said. “Until I fuck you good and hard. And even then…” His lips curved in an evil grin. “I might keep you here all night. Have my way with you over and over again. Make sure you learn your lesson.”

Her panties were soaked, her heart thundering as she tried to push past him. He gripped her by the shoulders and held her still.

“Let go of me.”

“Fine.” He lifted his hands from her body. “Just so you can take off your dress.”

“I won’t do it.”

“You will,” he said and leaned in to whisper, “or I’ll tell everyone your little secret. You wouldn’t want that to get out, would you?”

She blinked. She didn’t know what kind of secrets she had, other than this rape fantasy. But still, a shiver traveled down her spine as she looked into his eyes, followed quickly by a bolt of pure arousal.

God, he was so damn sexy in that suit.

She grasped the bottom of her dress with shaking hands and pulled it over her head.

“That’s a good girl,” he said, his voice smooth and confident and oh, so chilling. “Sure looks like you planned to get fucked tonight. Matching lace panties and bra. I like it.”

“I hate you.”

“Now, now, Cassie. I know that’s not true.” He pushed aside her panties and shoved a finger inside her. “You see? Your body says you’re aching for me. Look how wet you are.” He held up his hand, glistening with her moisture.

“That doesn’t mean I want you.”

“Liar.” He slipped his finger into her mouth. “Taste your desire for me.”

She jerked her head away, but she could still taste her arousal.

“Show me the rest.” He snapped his fingers. “Quick, quick. I don’t have all night.”

Her cheeks burned as she unhooked her bra and pushed her panties to the floor. He looked her up and down, hand on his chin, appraising her.

“Well, well,” he said. “I think you’ll do just fine.” He swatted her ass, and she yelped. “Get on the bed. On your back.”

She sat on the bed, but she didn’t lie back. She liked being defiant with him, pushing him, making him control her.

“You don’t really want to disobey me, do you? I know your dirty little secret, remember.”

She lifted her chin. “You’re an asshole.”

“You won’t admit it, but you love this. I know you do. I know exactly what you need. What you crave.”

He pushed her shoulder, and she let herself fall onto her back, swallowing hard. She knew she’d soak his sheets.

He did know exactly what she needed. He could read her so well.

“Good girl,” he said. “But I don’t trust you to stay put, so I’m going to tie you to the bed.”

“No!”

He held her down as he took off the tie that she’d lovingly knotted for him earlier that evening. He tied her left wrist to one corner post of the bed as she writhed in protest. With a satisfied smirk, he opened the top couple of buttons on his shirt, revealing a sprinkle of dark hair, then strode over to the closet and came back with three more neckties. He tied her other limbs to the bed while she squirmed in an intoxicating combination of desperation and fear.

His knots weren’t tight. She could free herself if she wanted to. But still, they were enough to make the fantasy seem real.

When he unzipped his pants and his cock sprang free, she couldn’t help but lick her lips.

It did not escape his notice.

“You want to suck me, don’t you?”

“No! I—”

He was on the bed, shoving his cock between her lips before she could say anything more. He fucked her mouth a few times before rolling on a condom.

“You gonna beg me one last time?”

“Please. You don’t have to do this. The secret— I’ll pay you to keep your mouth shut.”

He snorted as he lowered himself between her legs. “I have more money than I know what to do with. You’re getting my cock.”

And he thrust into her savagely.

When she cried out, he covered her mouth with his hand.

“Feels good, doesn’t it?” he said.

It did feel good. God, did it ever feel good. But she didn’t want to admit that, not yet. This was what she craved. Feeling small, helpless, on the edge of pain…but not over it.

She shook her head. “Please stop.”

“Don’t you worry. I’ll make sure you enjoy it.”

She tried to twist to the side, but his weight held her down as he thrust into her unrelentingly. Over and over. And she took it, giving him only feeble protests.

He sped up, beads of sweat forming on his forehead. She was getting close, oh, so close, when he pulled out of her, tore off the condom, and came on her stomach. She whimpered at the loss of his shaft inside her, at the way he’d crudely spent himself on her.

“If you hadn’t fought me,” he said, “I would have let you come. But you’ll have your chance. Eventually.”

He left her. She heard him close the door to the washroom then walk down the stairs.

She stretched as best she could within her bonds. Her heart was pounding in exhilaration, and need coursed through her. If only she could touch herself.

He came back to the room a few minutes later, his pants done up. In his hand, he carried an espresso. Sitting down on the chair on the other side of the room, he regarded her over the rim of his cup. She squirmed under his careful gaze. He was dressed—except for his lack of tie—and she was lying on his bed, naked, her legs spread wide, her pussy on display.

And his cum on her stomach.

He quirked his lips, a self-satisfied smile.

“Ready to admit you liked it?” he asked.

“Fuck you.”

He just laughed and calmly sipped his coffee. When he was finished, he picked up a book and started reading. Or pretending to, she suspected. How could he actually read at a time like this?

After what seemed like an eternity, he snapped the book shut and placed it on the bedside table. He began undressing, starting with his suit jacket and pants, which he hung in the closet.

“Like what you see, Cassie?” He smiled darkly at her as he unbuttoned his shirt.

Oh, yes, she liked what she saw. Every lean, muscled inch of him, coming into view.

She couldn’t help but lick her lips again.

…

Once Blaine had stripped off his clothes, he sat down in the chair and took his cock in hand, pumping it a few times until he was hard. He watched Cassie’s face as he stroked himself. Her gaze was aimed at his crotch, and he laughed softly.

She was tied to his bed, at his mercy, and she loved that.

And so did he.

He came to the bed and wiped his cum off her stomach, so they didn’t stick together when he fucked her for the second time. It sure hadn’t taken long for him to be ready to go again. He rolled on a condom and rubbed himself over her slit.

“What about now?” he said. “Ready to say you want it?”

She shook her head weakly.

“Too bad. I’ll give it to you anyway.”

He shoved inside her again, and her inner muscles tightened around him. Oh God, did she ever feel amazing. So warm and wet. He wished he could be inside her without a condom, wished he could feel exactly what he was doing to her.

He moved in and out of her leisurely. After all, he’d come not long ago. Cassie, on the other hand…

She bucked against him.

“Look at you,” he said. “Such a dirty, dirty girl. Your body’s telling me what your lips refuse to say.”

“Shut up,” she said but without the force she’d had before.

He rested his weight on top of her, her smooth skin against his, so much of their bodies touching. And still he wanted more. He always did. When she turned her head away, he pulled her hair so she had to look at him.

“That’s right,” he said. “You’re mine.”

She whimpered.

He withdrew.

She whimpered even louder.

“You want to come, don’t you?” he said. “You want me to shove my cock inside you and touch your clit until you scream and clutch the sheets.” He pressed his lips to her ear. “Except you can’t clutch the sheets because you’re tied to my bed.” He slipped the tip of his cock inside her. “Is that enough?”

She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head.

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” he said, pushing in a little farther. “What about this?”

“No,” she whispered.

He shoved all the way in, but once he was seated within her, he didn’t move.

She opened her eyes, and she broke.

“Please. Touch me. Fuck me. Make me come. I’ll give you anything.”

“Anything?” he said, his mild tone belying the intense emotion roiling in his chest.

“Yes. Please. Just tell me what you want,” she begged.

Don’t leave me. Stay here, where you belong.

But he didn’t say that.

He raised himself on one elbow and dropped his other hand to her clit. He circled the tip of his finger over her as he slammed into her pussy, until her breaths came closer and closer together, and she released an unrestrained cry, which sent him over the edge, too.

He untied her afterward, curled his body around her, and held her close.

“Puffball,” he said, in case it wasn’t clear that he was finished with their roleplaying.

She turned to face him, a lazy, satisfied smile on her face, and it hit him deep in the gut. His feelings for her spiraled through him, becoming an even more integral part of who he was.

“That was perfect,” she said. “Not something I need to do often, but you were…perfect.” She laughed. “I need a shower.”

He got out of bed and led her to the bathroom. When she stepped inside the tub, she flopped against the wall. He turned on the water and started washing her with his green bar of soap. She was pliable in his hands, barely able to stand.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

She laughed again and leaned against him. “I’m in post-orgasmic bliss.”

“It looks like you’re on drugs.”

“I can’t imagine any drug would feel this good. You make an amazing alpha-hole billionaire.”

“How would you normally describe me?”

“Infuriating science nerd with Justin Trudeau’s hair and a nice cock?”

He barked out a laugh. “You are so drunk right now.”

“I only had one glass of wine.” She pouted.

Without any help from Cassie, he shampooed her hair, dried her off, and got her into bed. When he came back from turning out the light in the bathroom, she was already asleep.

He brushed some wet hair back from her cheek. Even though he’d just pretended to violate her, he felt impossibly close to her now. More than ever, he wanted to explore everything with her—both in and out of bed.

And he knew exactly where he wanted to start.

If she would let him.

Chapter Thirteen

Cassie woke up at three in the morning. Blaine was tugging the blankets away from her.

“Sorry,” he said. “You stole most of them, and I’m getting cold.”

“Then I’m the one who should be sorry. But I know how to make it up to you.”

She rolled on top of him and kissed him languidly. She was still rather boneless from when he’d tied her up and forced himself on her, but she felt a desperate need to be with him once more. She rocked her hips against his and felt him harden.

Why had acting out that scene made her feel closer to him? She didn’t know.

She kissed a line down the side of his face, down his neck, lower and lower, until she swirled her tongue around his nipple, and he caught his breath. He was sensitive there—one of the many things she’d learned about him during their week together.

She rolled on a condom and eased herself down on top of him.

“Oh God,” she murmured.

There was no need to be quiet. They were alone in his house. But for some reason, in a dark room in the dead of the night, she felt the need to make as little noise as possible.

He grabbed her hips and held her as she moved up and down on him, setting a slow pace. She put her hands on her breasts and massaged them roughly, her nipples tight peaks. When she started to get close, she licked her finger and touched her clit, and it didn’t take long before she was coming apart on top of him. She collapsed on his chest, and he thrust up into her a few times before he, too, climaxed.

She curled against him afterward. She didn’t want to stop touching him.

“Cassidy,” he murmured a few minutes later.

No one ever used her full name but him. She liked it. It was something that was just between the two of them.

“I want to ask you something,” he said. “Something I’d like to do with you. You can say no, of course. No pressure.”

She was intrigued. “Tell me.”

“I want to…fist you.”

She sucked in a breath. “Where?”

“Here.” He slipped his finger inside her pussy. She was still damp. “Will you let me?”

“Now?”

“No. Some other time.”

She clenched around him, and he withdrew. Fisting wasn’t something she’d ever considered before, but as she closed her eyes and imagined his whole hand inside her, she shivered.

“Is this the kind of porn you watch?” she asked.

“Who said I watched porn?”

“You’re a guy, aren’t you? I remember reading about a study in which they tried to compare men who watched porn to men who didn’t, but they struggled to find any men who didn’t watch it.”

He laughed. “Fine. I watch porn on occasion. Rocks and fossils are all very nice, but they don’t turn me on.” A moment later, he added, “More often, though, I just think of you.”

She stayed quiet against him. She couldn’t tell whether the tension in her chest was tightening or uncoiling.

“Yes,” she said. “We can try it.”

She heard the hitch in his breathing.

“It will probably hurt a bit. We can stop whenever you need to.” He paused. “I don’t know why, but the thought of fisting you…it makes me so hard.”

“This is a very romantic middle-of-the-night conversation.”

“That it is.” He ran his hand up and down her back, and she could almost feel his smile through his touch.

“You sleeping okay? You had an espresso at ten o’clock.”

“A bit of a mistake but I didn’t want to drink alcohol when I had you tied up. Took me over an hour to fall asleep, but that’s okay. You’re here with me, and that’s what I want most of all.”

He pressed her closer to the heat of his body, and that was how she fell asleep.

…

Cassie woke up the next morning to a chirping sound. Had a bird flown into the room?

Once the fog started to clear from her head, she realized it was her phone, discarded beside the bed in the flurry of last night’s activities.

She looked at the text message.

Call me, Rachel said.

Although Cassie had spent a lot of time in the past two days walking around Blaine’s house in the nude, it seemed weird to talk to her friend on the phone when she was naked. So she opened the dresser and put on the first T-shirt she found. It had a chemical formula on it.

Blaine was still asleep, one arm thrown across the side of the bed that she had just vacated, and she smiled at him before padding down the hall to his office. She sat on his desk chair and called Rachel.

“Hey,” Cassie said. “How are you? Still in Georgeville?”

“We came back to Ottawa last night. Cole is currently recovering from twenty-four hours of socializing. It’s a lot for him, poor man. But enough about us. I want to hear about you. How’s your weekend of hot sex going?”

Cassie felt herself blush. “It’s been…um…hot. Yes.”

“You getting him out of your system?”

She gripped the arm of the chair as she realized this wasn’t going as planned. She was definitely not getting him out of her system. The more she slept with Blaine, the more she wanted him.

“I guess that’s a no,” Rachel said. “Like I said, the whole ‘getting it out of your system’ thing rarely works. But will you still be able to walk away from him tonight? Crush his heart beneath your feet?”

Right. It was Sunday. Nine thirty in the morning. She only had twelve hours left with him. A wave of melancholy rushed over her.

But she had to walk away. She would break his heart, just as he’d broken hers, and if she hurt a little in the process, well, she could handle it. It wouldn’t be anywhere near as bad as before. Sure, the sex was awesome. But it wasn’t as if she still loved him.

She couldn’t stay. As wonderful as Blaine had been in the past couple of days, he was still the guy who’d utterly destroyed her last year. She remembered the day Rachel had found her weeping in the bakery, a plate of two large brownies in front of her. She’d gone to Mullin’s Bakery because she couldn’t bear to set foot in Tim Hortons, the place where she’d met him.

If a little part of her was tempted to forgive him, all she had to do was remind herself of how awful things had been after he dumped her. And not just for a couple of days. She’d been a wreck for months.

Yesterday evening, she’d pushed all of that out of her mind—while he made her fantasies come true, while they had lazy sex in the middle of the night. But she couldn’t let herself forget again, not in the bright light of the morning.

“Yes,” she told Rachel. “I will walk away.”

“What about Johnny?” Rachel asked.

Crap. Johnny. She hadn’t thought of him at all and, frankly, couldn’t imagine being with him after what she’d shared with Blaine this weekend. That kiss with Johnny—it had been nothing in comparison. It wasn’t even on the same scale.

She was only twenty-five. Yes, she wanted to get married and have a family, but there was no need to think about settling down yet. She would find someone she loved as much as she’d loved Blaine, someone who fucked and kissed like he did, but wouldn’t break her heart.

She could trust Blaine with her body and with her darkest secrets, but she couldn’t trust him with her heart.

“I’m done with Johnny,” Cassie said. “That Big Bird costume was horrible.”

“Would you have preferred Cookie Monster? Elmo? Or Oscar the Grouch, like me?”

She chuckled. “Of course, the costume wasn’t the biggest problem.” If Blaine had dressed as Big Bird, he probably still would have been hot. If anyone could make a big yellow bird sexy, he could. “Johnny’s kiss, on the other hand…”

She talked to Rachel for a few more minutes before heading back to the bedroom. Blaine was awake now, sitting up in bed with a book in his hands. His chest was bare, and he looked…mouthwatering. Yes. That was a good word for him.

It was okay that she found him attractive. She just couldn’t let it be anything more.

“I see you found my cummingtonite shirt,” he said.

Her jaw dropped. “Your what?”

“The formula on the shirt you’re wearing. It’s for the mineral cummingtonite.”

“You’re making this up.”

“C-U-M-M-I-N-G-T-O-N-I-T-E. It’s named after Cummington, Massachusetts, and it lends itself to some very obvious puns.”

He was good at making her smile. All of his quirks…

Which made her frown. Why did he have to be so goddamn endearing?

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

I like you too much, and we can’t do this again.

Fortunately, she knew the perfect way to remind herself and, at the same time, let him know just how much he’d hurt her. Because she wasn’t sure he truly understood.

She sat beside him and pulled the T-shirt over her knees. Not looking at him, she said, “After you left last year, I thought I was pregnant.”

Chapter Fourteen

The summer of last year

There was only one line.

Cassie stared at it, willing there to be a second line, however faint. A faint line was still a positive.

But there was only one line.

She’d bought a second test, so once again, she peed on a stick and waited the proper amount of time, her heart hammering.

Once again, she only saw one line.

She was not pregnant.

She burst into tears.

Not tears of relief. She ought to be relieved. She’d just turned twenty-four; she wasn’t in a relationship. She didn’t even know the full name of the man she’d slept with. Didn’t know where he lived, didn’t know how to find him.

But she wasn’t relieved.

Oh, it was lame, but she wanted to have his baby.

Still, even though she was several days late and the test ought to be accurate, she held out a bit of hope. If she didn’t get her period by the end of the week, she’d do another test.

But it had started the next day. And on the short walk home from work, she saw a man and a woman with a baby in a stroller. The baby was perhaps a year old—a boy, she assumed, based on the blue clothes. He was wailing at the top of his lungs.

It was one of those moments when she ought to be thinking, Thank God I don’t have to deal with that right now.

Instead, she envied the mother with circles under her eyes. She wished the next couple of months would be filled with morning sickness. Wished that in nine months, she’d be changing poopy diapers while Blaine sang a lullaby. When he heard she was pregnant, he would come back to her. They’d be the perfect family. Just her, Blaine, and their baby. It was all she wanted.

But it wasn’t going to happen.

And all because of that stupid single line on the pregnancy test.

…

Blaine’s eyes widened. He could do nothing but stare at Cassie.

She smiled grimly. “You heard correctly. I thought I was pregnant. You see, when a man and a woman—”

He didn’t need to hear the rest of her sarcastic comment. “We always used protection.”

“Yes. And the condom never broke. But I’ve always been quite regular, so when I was late, I couldn’t help but think…”

He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Then you took a test and it was negative, correct?”

“I didn’t take a test until I was almost a week late. Because I didn’t want to know the truth. I knew it was unlikely I was pregnant, but the idea that I could be…” She shook her head. “It made me so happy,” she whispered.

He ought to be freaked out by the idea of her getting pregnant when they weren’t even together. However, when he thought of her carrying a little bundle in her arms, he was slammed with a completely different emotion.

He’d always assumed he’d have children. It hadn’t been a major priority for him, but he’d always figured it would happen eventually. But now, he desperately wanted a couple of them. With Cassie. He pictured laying in bed on a lazy Sunday morning, a baby between them, crawling onto his chest.

“I didn’t try to find you,” she said. “Not when you’d made it clear you wanted nothing more to do with me and even refused to tell me your last name.” She held up a hand when he opened his mouth to tell her. “I know now—it’s Richards. I saw the diploma in your office.” She paused. “But if I’d been pregnant, I would have hired a private investigator. It probably wouldn’t have been too hard to find you. I had one crappy picture on my phone—”

“I don’t remember you taking a picture of me.”

“Yeah, you didn’t notice. I assumed you wouldn’t want me to, but one morning before you woke up, I took one because I wanted to remember you. So I had the picture, your first name, your career, and your license plate. You’d told me it was a rental car, but since it was actually your car, it should have been easy to track you down with the license plate number. Anyway, I would have found you somehow. You see, I couldn’t help but think that if you knew I was having your baby, you would change your mind. We’d be together, and it would be perfect.”

Oh God. He couldn’t take this. He ached for what had never come to pass.

“I’m not ready for a baby,” she said. “But I do want children, and I would have kept it. At the time, I saw it as a way to get you back. When I finally took the pregnancy test and it was negative, and then I got my period the next day…” She shut her eyes for a moment. “I was a wreck. I couldn’t sleep. I stopped eating proper meals. I didn’t want to let you destroy me, but I couldn’t seem to stop it from happening.” A sob escaped. “It was silly of me ever to hope. Just a stupid fantasy.”

“Oh, Cassie.” He pulled her into his arms, agony swirling inside him. She let him hold her, let him run a hand through her hair and stroke her back. But it felt totally inadequate to convey his regret. “I’m so, so sorry.”

She lifted her head, her eyes red from her tears. “If I’d tracked you down and told you I was pregnant, what would you have done?”

“I would have asked you to marry me.”

“Because it seemed like the right thing to do? You didn’t truly want me then, right?”

Blaine didn’t really believe in signs. But if she’d gotten pregnant during their week-long affair, despite proper contraceptive use, he would have seen it as a sign that they should be together. He would have asked her to move to Ottawa to be with him—since there were no jobs for geotechnical engineers in Georgeville—and he would have hurried up his search for a house.

“You would have come to resent me,” she said.

He shook his head. “You’re wrong. I came back for you, didn’t I? And I do want to marry you. I said so yesterday, when Matthew and Sara were here.”

“Yeah, such a great way for me to find out about your intentions. Real smooth.”

“I panicked. It was an awkward situation.” Not that he regretted saying it.

She shifted away from him and studied the quilt. It was solid navy—there was no pattern to examine. “You don’t want kids, do you?”

“Yes, I do. And I want them with you.” He tried to take her hand, but she wouldn’t let him. “Maybe two. No more than three.”

“I saw you look at Victoria yesterday. It wasn’t an ‘Aw, isn’t she cute?’ look. It was an ‘Oh my God, what is this alien creature?’ look.”

He pushed a hand through his hair. “I haven’t been around new babies much. They freak me out a bit because they seem so fragile. But I would figure it out.”

He felt an ache in his chest as he thought of his father, who would never know his grandchildren. He remembered flying kites with his dad at the park. At the age of eight, Blaine had gone through a phase where he was obsessed with kites and trying to make them as aerodynamic as possible.

Yes, he wanted to be a father. Likely, he wouldn’t have a child who was interested in rocks and aerodynamics, but that was fine. He didn’t want a child who was just like him. He loved the idea of having a baby and watching his or her unique personality and interests develop.

“Well,” Cassie said, “it doesn’t matter. At the end of today, I’ll walk out of your life. You think I should be jumping to give you a second chance, but you just don’t get it.”

His heart felt heavy with all she’d told him. “I think I’m starting to.”

“When you came to Georgeville, you expected to find the woman you left behind. But it’s been a long time. I’m not the same person, and a lot of that is because of you, and that stupid pregnancy scare.”

God, he’d been such an idiot. He wished he could go back and do it over again.

Because now he might lose her, and the thought was unbearable.

“Come here,” he said, lifting his arms to her. She hesitated, but then she stepped toward him and sat between his legs. “I promise, I swear I won’t leave you this time.”

“I don’t see how I’m supposed to believe that, despite your talk of marriage.” She paused. “I know you were in a bad place because of your father’s death. I just wish you’d said something about it. You could have told me that you had shit happening in your life, and maybe now wasn’t a great time, but we could keep in touch and see how things were in a few months.”

He felt like a broken record, but it was the truth. “I wasn’t convinced it was really love. It felt like love the moment I saw you buying a donut, but love at first sight didn’t seem rational or logical to me.”

“Fine,” she said. “You couldn’t be certain if you loved me, even after we spent that week together. But there was obviously something between us. Why weren’t you willing to give it a chance and see what happened? It’s not like you actually live on the other side of the country. Two hours isn’t all that far. There are just so many things that could have happened that wouldn’t have led to me being a mess afterward. I tried to be strong. But I couldn’t help being heartbroken.”

Guilt and regret were like twin vises on his heart.

“Do you love me now?” he asked softly.

“No.”

As much as that hurt, he wasn’t surprised.

“You claim you love me,” she said. “Maybe that’s true, but how am I supposed to believe it’ll last?”

“Cassidy.” He wrapped his arms tightly around her. “I don’t have the words to tell you how sorry I am.”

“I believe you’re sorry. But I’m still going to leave you today.” In a much quieter voice, she added, “I think.”

Chapter Fifteen

That had backfired.

Cassie had thought talking about the pregnancy scare would freak Blaine out—as well as remind herself of how far she could fall if she gave him another chance.

Yes, she’d vividly recalled the pain, but she also remembered the love. And worst of all, the hope. The hope that he would come back so they could be a family.

She’d only had four or five days of hope.

But recovering from the disappointment had taken so much longer.

Now he was giving her hope once more. He was telling her that he would marry her and that they could have children together. He’d promised to give her exactly what she wanted, this man whom she’d once loved—and feared she could so easily love again.

Today she was supposed to leave him, and she was starting to worry she wouldn’t be able to do it. That he would pull her into his arms, and she would agree to whatever he asked.

But she couldn’t do that. It would be far too dangerous.

She was terrified to trust him that much.

She sat at the kitchen island and watched as he made banana pancakes. He’d laid out a plate, utensils, and a small pitcher of maple syrup in front of her.

She’d made banana pancakes for him once, and she was sure he was making banana pancakes because he remembered that morning. She’d woken up early to make a nice breakfast before going to work, and he’d fucked her over the counter after they ate.

He seemed to remember a lot from the one week they’d spent together. Just like she did.

He flipped a couple of pancakes onto her plate with a flourish.

“Show-off,” she said.

He winked at her.

She was about to butter up her pancakes when her phone rang. It was her mother.

“Cassie! Where are you? I’m at your door, and you’re not answering.”

Her mother showing up at her apartment unannounced was not a regular occurrence, but it wasn’t so rare that it made her fear something awful had happened.

“I’m, um, out of town for the weekend,” Cassie said. “At Rachel’s in Ottawa.”

“I thought Rachel was in Georgeville for the weekend,” her mom said.

“Just Friday night. Then I went back to Ottawa with her. You know, to hit the town, do some shopping.”

Hit the town? That wasn’t how she usually talked.

But this was not a usual situation. She was having breakfast at her—

Well, she had no idea what to call Blaine. The man who’d broken her heart and who was now screwing her for the weekend.

Her mother knew about him. Cassie hadn’t wanted her to know, but her mom had confronted her back then, wondering what was wrong because she’d been so miserable for so long. She’d thought she’d been doing an okay job of faking it around her family, but apparently not.

She wouldn’t tell her mother that she was with Blaine now. Not only because being at a man’s house at ten in the morning suggested they’d slept together the night before, and even a vague allusion to sex when talking to her mom was awkward.

No, it was more that her mother would not approve of giving Blaine a second chance.

Which was not what she was doing.

She was just having a weekend of good sex. That wasn’t how her mother would see it, though.

Cassie buttered her pancakes with one hand, holding the phone to her ear with the other. Then she poured maple syrup over her plate.

“Well, have fun!” her mom said. “Tell Rachel I say hi.”

“Will do.”

“She’s still with that man—what’s his name? The one who’s always scowling?”

Cassie chuckled. “Cole. Yes. They’re still together.”

“You know, you haven’t mentioned going out with a guy since that jerk left you last year. Don’t you think it’s time to get out there again?”

“For all you know, I could be doing a ton of dating.”

“I would have heard about it by now. If not from you, then from someone else.”

Yeah, Georgeville wasn’t a big place. Hard to keep secrets.

“I dated a man from out of town back in March.” Not a lie, depending on one’s definition of dating. Did having kinky sex with Leo count? “I’m over Blaine, don’t you worry.”

Blaine put a fist to his heart and pouted. She couldn’t help but laugh.

“Mom, I better get going. Rachel’s making weird faces at me. Why did you stop by?”

“Can’t I just pop over to see my daughter before church and bring her some of her favorite carrot-pineapple muffins? But that’s okay. You can pick them up tonight or tomorrow after work. Have fun in Ottawa!”

Cassie set down the phone and started on her pancakes. She groaned in bliss as she put the first bite in her mouth. She’d sure done a lot of moaning and groaning this weekend.

“These are really good,” she said. “You didn’t use a mix, did you?”

He sat down beside her with a plate of three pancakes. Just sitting next to him for breakfast… Oh, it did things to her.

“No,” he said. “I made them from scratch.”

“What about the maple syrup? Did you tap the maple trees yourself, too?”

“I don’t think you’re over me, Cassie,” he said seriously.

“I’m not lying,” she said, partly to convince herself. Not that it actually worked. “But even if I wasn’t over you, that doesn’t mean I’d say yes to a relationship with you. I don’t believe in second chances.”

“That hardly seems fair. I’ve offered you what you wanted, haven’t I?”

But nothing would be enough to make her truly believe in him.

Her mother had offered her cheating husband another chance when he’d swore he’d change, swore he’d become a new man. And look how that had turned out.

No, Cassie had been a fool in love once. Enough of a fool to fantasize about having a baby with Blaine. She wouldn’t do that again.

“It seems fair to me,” she said. “It took you over a year to come back. Interestingly, you said you never slept with another woman in that time, and I believe that. But it’s not like you were with me, either.”

He put down his fork. “I started dating again a couple months ago. But no one even came close to measuring up to you. Thursday I went on a date with another woman, and she was nice and pretty and smart, but she wasn’t you. The kiss was all wrong. And that was when I knew I couldn’t be with anyone else.”

She gaped at him. “So it’s only been three days since you decided you want me? Three days? How am I supposed to have any confidence in that?”

“I wanted you the whole time. I just kept lying to myself.”

She shook her head at the waste—of her love, of all that time. “I don’t understand you.”

“You’re not the only one.” He stabbed at his pancakes. “I don’t understand how I could lie to myself for so long. Because you’re…you.”

He shoved himself to his feet and pulled her into his arms, his mouth capturing hers. Kissing her desperately, as though trying to find the perfect touch, the key that would get her to change her mind.

“Let’s go upstairs,” he said, slipping his hand under her cummingtonite shirt and cupping her mound.

“Sex won’t change my mind. Yes, the sex is great. I won’t deny that. Last night was…” She struggled for the appropriate word. “Fun” didn’t seem quite right. “Intense. But that doesn’t mean we have anything more than sex.”

“You wouldn’t let any other man tie you up and pretend to rape you, would you?”

“I let another man tie me up and beat me,” she said, lifting her chin.

“Only because you were trying to forget me.”

Irritation flooded through her. “You’re arrogant as fuck. You know that?”

One corner of his mouth curled up. “Sometimes I am.”

“You’re not God’s gift to women.”

“Well, no shit. I’m a thirty-five-year-old man with a rock collection who has an entire shelf of books about the Burgess Shale.”

“Whatever the fuck that is.”

“Exactly my point.” He backed her up until her ass hit the cupboard. “But you still find me interesting. And desirable.”

She had the childish urge to cover her ears.

He pulled off her shirt, pushed aside her panties, and thrust his fingers inside her. She shut her eyes as her body instantly responded to his touch.

“I’m going to do something to you that no other man has ever done before,” he said. “I’m going to stick my entire hand in your pussy. You’ll lie on my bed and clutch the sheets, and you’ll take it. Nothing makes you feel more alive than being with me.”

She breathed harshly as he touched her clit. She knew he would stop if she told him to, but if they were fucking, they wouldn’t be arguing. She wouldn’t be opening up her soul and telling him about how he’d crushed her hopes.

“Or would you rather I take your ass?” he said, slipping one of his fingers, wet from her juices, into her other hole. “I know you haven’t done that with anyone but me.”

Oh, fuck. She clenched around his finger.

“So what’ll it be? My cock in your ass or my fist in your pussy?”

She could barely breathe. She needed him so badly.

“The second,” she said, surrendering.

Chapter Sixteen

“I’m going to wash my hands and trim my nails,” Blaine said once they were upstairs. “You can lie on my bed and think about what I’m going to do to you.”

As if Cassie could think about anything else.

She went to the bedroom, took off her clothes, and obeyed him. She thought about his wrist disappearing into her body, his hand inside her. But she wasn’t sure how it would feel, just that she would be very, very full.

When he came into the room, he lay on top of her, his weight pressing her into the mattress. He kissed her, the kiss slowly escalating in intensity.

“Do you want to orgasm first?” he asked. “Perhaps that would make it easier.”

When she nodded, his dark head slipped between her legs, and he licked her. There was something odd about it, though. He’d gone down on her many times, and it had never felt quite like this.

“Are you doing the alphabet?” she asked, rolling her eyes.

He lifted his head and grinned. “I wanted to see if you’d notice. Shall I spell words out and see if you can guess them?”

“Blaine…” She slapped his shoulder.

“I’ll give you a hint. The first one will be ‘cummingtonite.’ But that isn’t quite right. Perhaps it will be ‘cumming-this-morning.’”

“You’re a nut.”

His grin was lopsided and made her feel slightly dizzy, even though she was lying down.

“Very well,” he said. “I’ll resume my usual technique.”

“And what’s your usual technique?”

“Make-Cassie-feel-good.”

“Aren’t you sweet.”

“I try. I’ve gotten quite skilled at make-Cassie-feel-good. I know exactly what you like, what makes you moan.”

“There you go again, being all arrogant.”

But that arrogance was different now. She was naked, and they were back to their playful banter rather than arguing.

“It’s not arrogance if it’s true.”

“Well, then,” she said. “Prove it.”

His tongue was on her again, and God, yes, he was good at this. Pleasure coursed through her, and oh, she loved the sight of his head between her legs. She tensed her muscles and relaxed them with a shuddering breath. When he ran his tongue over her slit, where he would enter her in a few minutes, then circled it around her clit, the pleasure exploded. She gripped his shoulders as the orgasm shattered over her.

“First mission complete.” He slid up her body for a kiss, her arousal on his lips. “We can stop whenever you like,” he murmured, as she was still experiencing aftershocks. “If we can’t manage it today, there’s always next time.”

Except today was their last day. There wouldn’t be a next time.

She pushed down her sorrow. She was in bed with a gorgeous man, and he’d just given her an amazing orgasm. She should focus on the moment.

He needed to get his whole hand inside her today. She wanted to feel what it was like.

He sat up on his knees. “So this is how it works. I’ll slide one finger inside you, then add a second and a third. To get you prepared. Then, with lots of lube, I’ll make a duck beak with my fingers and start pushing inside.” He demonstrated. “The knuckle is the widest part. Once I’m in, I’ll make my hand into a fist.”

“You’ve done your research,” she said. This wasn’t something she’d ever thought she would do. But she was excited about trying it with Blaine.

“Yes. I’ve wanted to do this for a long time.”

She didn’t trust him not to break her heart, but she knew she was in good hands now.

He pushed one finger inside her, then added another. Nothing they hadn’t done before. He thrust in and out a few times before adding a third finger. The heel of his hand pressed against her clit, and she whimpered from the sensation…and the anticipation.

“Good girl,” he whispered. “You’re so wet. But we’ll still need some of this.” He removed his hand from her body, and she felt the absence keenly. She moaned in protest. He pulled a bottle of lube out of his night table.

“Wait.”

“You want to stop?”

“No!” she said, practically jumping out of her skin. “I want you to take off your clothes so I can enjoy the view.”

“You don’t enjoy seeing me in a polo shirt and jeans? That doesn’t do it for you?”

“Take off your damn clothes, Blaine.”

He laughed and did as she’d requested. Or demanded, more like. She followed the trail of hair down his chest to his thick, hard cock.

Yes, this was better.

He squeezed some lube onto his hands and did as he’d described earlier.

Oh. The tip of the duck beak was in her pussy now. All other thoughts fled her mind as he eased in.

“That’s it, baby,” he said. “Take it.”

He was looking at her intently, so he would notice any slight change in her expression.

He would take care of her.

She moaned as he pushed a little deeper, stretching her out. Preparing her to take everything. When he pushed in farther, she breathed in sharply.

His hand stilled. “Does it hurt?”

“A little. But it feels good at the same time. Keep going.”

Blaine continued to move his fingers in and out of her, thrusting almost to his knuckles before withdrawing. He worked her slowly for a long time.

She looked down at his erection. She loved what this did to him. What she did to him.

He dipped his mouth to hers and kissed her. “You ready?”

“Ready,” she managed to say.

“Try to relax your muscles.” He sat up on his knees and pushed all the way in.

She grabbed the quilt and screamed.

He looked down at her entrance. “God, Cassie. Can you take this?”

She nodded mutely and tried to remember to breathe as he held himself motionless inside her. It felt like he was ripping her insides apart. But if she just waited a little…

“Tell me,” he said. “What should I do?”

The pain faded, changing into a glorious intensity. She felt so incredibly full, and yes, there was still an edge of pain, but somehow that made it feel even more amazing.

“Just stay there,” she said. “Maybe move a little, but not much. It’s just— Oh.”

“What’s it like?”

“So intense.” She didn’t want to close her eyes. Her gaze flickered between his face and his crotch. He was stroking himself absently with his other hand. “It almost feels like I’m glowing. I know that sounds stupid, but…” She squirmed around his fist. “It’s this strange kind of high, I can’t explain. The endorphins, I can feel them.”

“I like when you use words like ‘endorphins.’”

“Of course, you do.”

He smiled at her, and that smile made her glow even more. She felt so good, glowing and flying, and so many other things all at once. And she was giving him his fantasy, and that gave her such a rush.

“Fuck,” he whispered. “I love seeing you like this. You look so hot with my hand inside your pussy.”

He moved tentatively in and out, and she just laid back and enjoyed it. The way he felt inside her, the way he looked at her, his gaze so loving and heated at the same time.

She didn’t know how long it lasted. Maybe it was a minute, or maybe it was ten. She wasn’t conscious of time anymore, just of her body swallowing up his fist.

“Do you want to come?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said, but she hardly needed it with all that she felt.

He circled his tongue over her clit. No alphabet this time, or maybe he was doing the alphabet. She wasn’t sure she’d be able to tell right now, not when she was floating like this.

Her orgasm caught her by surprise, and she screamed, or maybe she didn’t, she wasn’t sure anymore. At some point later, he gently worked his hand out of her. She felt empty now, but she couldn’t help but giggle, because she also felt so good.

“You like?” he said.

She giggled again at the ridiculous question. There was no reason to answer. He knew she’d enjoyed herself.

He looked down at his cock and stroked himself with the hand that had been inside her body—all the way inside her—just moments ago. The lube and her juices made his cock glisten.

“Can I come in your mouth? On your tits? Tell me what you want.”

“On my chest.” She feared she would choke if he put his cock in her mouth. She didn’t feel fully in control of herself right now.

He tugged himself a few more times before his cum, thick and white, hit her breasts.

“Cassidy,” he groaned.

Afterward, he captured her mouth for a lazy kiss that just kept on going and going.

She didn’t want to leave him.

…

Blaine cleaned Cassie with a warm towel, and they stayed in bed for a while. She was half-lying on top of him, her head on his shoulder. He expected she must be sore.

But she seemed giddy, too. That, he hadn’t expected.

For years, he’d loved the fantasy of having his hand fully inside a woman’s pussy, seeing her body swallow him up. But his own pleasure was what he’d always focused on, not on how the woman would respond. Selfish, maybe, but it had just been a fantasy.

Until today.

Now he’d had his fist inside her, and she was an adorable puddle.

He tightened his arm around her. “I assume you would be willing to do that again, sometime in the future?”

“Mmm. Yes. Not often—it’s so intense—but yes.”

He smiled as he pressed a kiss to her hair.

She’d told him that sex wouldn’t change her mind. She’d told him it was meaningless. Just an hour ago.

But it was hard to believe she’d be able to leave him after what they’d just shared.

God, he hoped he was right.

His life wouldn’t be nearly as good without Cassie.

Chapter Seventeen

At eleven o’clock, they sat at the kitchen island, drinking coffee and eating microwaved banana pancakes with a generous amount of maple syrup. Blaine tilted his head and studied Cassie. She’d been in a good mood when they were snuggled up in bed, but she hadn’t said anything for several minutes now and kept frowning at her plate.

“If the reheated pancakes aren’t living up to expectations,” he said, “I can make you new ones. Or something else.”

She looked up and blinked, as though surprised to hear his voice. Like she’d been off in her own world and forgotten he was here.

“Oh, no,” she said, clearly forcing a smile. “It’s delicious. Thank you. It’s not often someone makes me breakfast. And pancakes aren’t the sort of food I cook when I’m alone, so I haven’t had them in ages.”

“I cook them every weekend.”

“Just for yourself?”

“Just for me.”

He wished he could make them every Sunday for her, too.

“I have a favor to ask,” she said, all polite and proper—which worried him. “Could you drive me to my friend Rachel’s apartment after breakfast? Just for an hour or two. She doesn’t live far from here.”

“I assume I am not invited to tag along for this…girl time?”

Cassie shook her head. “Don’t worry, I’ll spend the rest of the day with you.”

Did she want to talk with her friend about him? Did she want to talk about what they’d done in bed?

The idea made him uncomfortable, and his heart sank at the thought of letting her go, even for a few hours. But he would give her what she wanted.

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll drop you off and come back to do some work.”

“Thank you.” She kissed him on the mouth, tasting of maple syrup.

But in his gut, he knew that something wasn’t right.

…

Cassie knocked on Rachel’s door.

She’d thought Blaine might have put up a fuss over her going to visit a friend. You were supposed to spend all weekend with me. But he hadn’t.

She knocked again. A few seconds later, Cole answered.

“Hi,” he grunted. “Rachel ran out to the store. Said something about Haagen Dazs. She’ll be back in a few minutes.”

“How was the party after I left?”

“Oh.” Cole held out his arm, and she handed him her coat. “It was a party. You know how these things are. People drink and act like idiots and expect me to have a good time.”

“Right.”

“You were the talk of the hour, you and your mystery man. Until some drunk girl tried to mount the blow-up Grim Reaper in the front yard.”

“Yeah? Who was that?”

“Can’t remember her name.”

“Well, thank you for catching me up on all the gossip.”

“I aim to please.”

Rachel walked through the door. “Very funny. You don’t give a crap about pleasing other people. Except me, obviously. And that’s just because I’m sleeping with you.”

Cassie could detect a faint smile under Cole’s beard.

“I guess I’ll leave now,” he said. “I’ll be back in two hours, okay?”

“Where are you going?” Cassie asked.

“I was ordered to vacate the apartment for your little chat, so I’m going to visit my mother.” He put on his jacket and gave Rachel a kiss on the cheek before walking out the door.

“You didn’t need to kick him out,” Cassie said.

“Don’t worry about it,” Rachel said. “He was supposed to see his family this weekend, anyway.” She brought her purchases—both chocolate and salted caramel ice cream—into the kitchen and served up two decent-sized bowls. She handed one to Cassie. “Whatever the problem is, this should make you feel better.”

“I’ve already eaten too much junk this weekend. And unlike you, I actually gain weight.”

Rachel looked her up and down. “You look hot. Where’d you get the dress?”

Cassie had put on the burgundy dress after breakfast, not in the mood to wear a beaver costume in public again. “Blaine bought it for me yesterday, since I didn’t have any clothes other than the costume.”

“You didn’t ask him to stop at your place before driving to Ottawa?”

“No, that was the furthest thing from my mind.”

“Just thinking about having your brains fucked out?”

“I wouldn’t put it quite that way.” Although she was happy to talk like that around Blaine. And yes, it was more or less the truth.

“Fornicating? Making sweet love on a bed of roses? Actually, roses have thorns. Better just to use the petals.”

“The L-word. That’s my problem.” Cassie groaned as they sat down on the couch with their ice cream. “I think I’m falling in love with him again.”

“But you told me just a few hours ago—”

“Yeah. I know.” She gave a short laugh. “That was before…”

Did she want to tell her friend about her sexual exploits? It would be hard to shock Rachel, but this seemed like something that should just remain between her and Blaine.

God, there was something seriously wrong with her. Who the hell started to fall in love with a man after he stuck his fist inside her?

Or maybe she’d been falling for him all along and was just in denial.

“We, um… We did something new in bed. A new sort of fornicating, let’s say.” The soreness between her legs would probably linger at least until tomorrow. “I felt all giddy and stupid afterward.”

“Oh?” Rachel said. “What exactly did you do? Threesome?”

Cassie scrunched up her face. “Sleeping with a second man would not make me feel closer to the first. That’s weird.”

Rachel shrugged innocently. “Still possible.”

Cassie stared at her friend. “You ever had a threesome?”

“More than once.”

“Don’t tell me who, or I won’t ever be able to look the guy in the face.”

Cassie glanced at her hands. Hands that had been all over Blaine’s body this weekend, caressing his cheek, gripping his arm… She quickly dropped them.

“So what was it?” Rachel asked. “Spanking? Cucumbers? Or perhaps you’re more of an eggplant girl.”

Cassie’s eyes widened in horror. She didn’t want a vegetable patch in the bedroom. No, vegetables were decidedly unsexy.

“Please.” She brought her hands up to her ears.

“There’s something called figging. Never tried it, but you put a piece of ginger—”

“Rachel!”

“Sorry, sorry. I was just trying to distract you from your misery.” Rachel pulled her legs up to her chest. “So you did something special in bed with this guy—and I won’t press you for details—and now you’re falling for him. Again.”

“I’m afraid I won’t be able to leave him tonight. Afraid I’ll agree to all his nice words about us having a future together. And then he’ll break my heart again, and it’ll be just as bad as last time.” She shook her head. “I couldn’t cope with that. I barely survived the first time.”

Rachel put down her bowl and gave her a hug. “I would be there for you. You know that.”

“But letting it happen a second time…that’s just stupidity.”

Cassie didn’t say anything more for a long time. She spooned ice cream into her mouth and looked out the window. Would she enjoy living in Ottawa, like Rachel? Last year, she’d said she would move in with Blaine, wherever his home was.

She’d been so foolish.

“What did he tell you about the future?” Rachel asked.

“He wants to marry me. I even told him about the pregnancy scare, and he said he wanted to have kids with me, too. Everything I wanted before. He lives in a lovely brick house near Bank Street, big enough for a family, and I found myself thinking about what it would be like to live there with him.”

“That’s a real change from last time.”

“Yeah, it is. He’s not trying to hide his life from me now. We’ve had such a great weekend together—”

“And how much of the weekend did you spend getting your brains fucked out?”

“Um.” Cassie shoved some more ice cream into her mouth. “Not quite all of it. We went out last night, plus he spent two hours at the mall yesterday buying me dresses and a necklace.”

She couldn’t help but smile when she thought of him at the jewelry store, inspecting everything on display and no doubt giving the person behind the counter a lecture on how diamonds were formed.

But she couldn’t wear the necklace again, even though it was so pretty.

“Maybe he wouldn’t break your heart this time,” Rachel said quietly.

Cassie smacked down her ice cream bowl. “Really? You know when he decided he wanted to be with me? Thursday! Three days ago. Who says he won’t change his mind again by the end of the week? How can I take that chance?”

“Some people, once they decide what they want, don’t change their minds. They just know. He sounds different now, yet you connect with him just like before.”

Cassie felt a sliver of hope at her friend’s words. Maybe it really was possible for a man to change. Unlike her father…

No. She couldn’t do it.

If she left Blaine today, she would still have some of her sanity intact—although it had certainly been foolish to think she could walk away with her emotions unscathed. If they tried again, maybe there was a chance it would work out, but it wasn’t worth risking so much for that small chance.

“Sometimes,” Rachel said softly, “the things that are most worth having involve a risk. Like me moving to Ottawa. I was terrified, but I’m so glad I finally got out of Georgeville. And love? Trust me, it’s worth it.”

“Who are you and what have you done with my friend?” Cassie muttered. “You sound like a self-help guru.” She patted Rachel’s knee. “But I’m happy everything worked out for you.”

“It will for you, too.”

Cassie sighed. If only. The sinking feeling in her stomach told her otherwise. “You’ve become such an optimist. It’s disgusting.”

“Would you like it better if I talked about vegetables? I’ve got a couple of zucchinis in the fridge. I could give them to you, if you like.”

“Rachel!”

“For zucchini bread, obviously. What did you think I was talking about?”

Cassie rolled her eyes before reaching for her ice cream. “You seriously think I should give him another chance?”

Rachel nodded slowly. “It’s worth considering.”

But Cassie wasn’t convinced.

Chapter Eighteen

When Blaine got home, he sat at his computer and tried to work on a slope stability analysis, but he couldn’t concentrate. It was unusual for him. He could usually lose himself in his work pretty easily.

He couldn’t stop thinking about Cassie. Earlier, when they were lying in bed together, he’d thought for sure she would decide to stay. But now he wasn’t so certain. After all, she was going to see the flapper girl who’d given him a hard time on Friday. Maybe this weekend really would be the end for him and Cassie.

It was too awful to contemplate.

He pushed that thought out of his mind and went downstairs to clean up the living room and dining room. On the table, he found a pencil drawing of an ammonite, and he smiled. She’d probably done that when he was out buying her clothes yesterday.

He put it on his ammonite shelf, and from another shelf, he picked up the picture of him and his father on Cape Breton two years ago. That was the only remotely recent photo he had of the two of them. He wasn’t sure he even had another picture of them together since his graduation, when he’d gotten his master’s degree.

It had been his dad’s idea for him to study geological engineering. In high school, he’d been debating between lots of things. Maybe chemistry, maybe geology, maybe electrical engineering. How was he supposed to choose when they all sounded interesting? His father had a colleague whose brother was a geological engineer and had arranged for Blaine to talk to him, and that was when he’d made his decision. It would allow him to take a paleontology course, too, and he’d have the geology background he’d need in case he wanted to study paleontology in grad school. But he’d stuck with engineering. It really was interesting—designing things, understanding how they worked. Plus there were more jobs, and it would be easier to stay in Ottawa.

He was glad he’d been here to see his father every month, glad he’d been here when he got the awful news.

There was one other picture on the shelf, an old one he’d found in his father’s photo album when he was clearing out the house. It was of the two of them in Alberta, in front of the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Paleontology. Blaine had been eight.

It had been his first big trip. His first time on a plane. His father had arranged it the summer after the divorce. A trip that had clearly been planned for Blaine—it was like the equivalent of Disneyland for him. They’d flown into Calgary and went to the Badlands, Dinosaur Provincial Park, and the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Paleontology. It had been awesome.

Blaine smiled as he remembered that summer.

His father had always been supportive of his interests. He hadn’t thought there was anything wrong with Blaine being able to spell the names of a hundred dinosaurs at the age of seven. Hadn’t thought there was anything wrong with him memorizing all sorts of chemical formulas. His mother, on the other hand, had worried that he was too much of a weirdo, not that she ever said it. But his father rarely worried about anything.

Although Blaine’s parents would argue about him on occasion, as far as divorced parents went, they’d gotten along reasonably well. They’d never tried to turn him against the other. He’d lived with his mother and stayed with his father every other weekend, but they’d talked on the phone most days.

But after his father’s death, he’d felt like he’d never really understood the man.

Perhaps he should tell Cassie more about what had happened last summer. He’d told her that his father had died unexpectedly, but he hadn’t explained just how messed up that had made Blaine and why. The complicated grief and guilt. Perhaps that would help her understand what an odd state he’d been in when he’d met her. And why he’d reacted as stupidly as he had.

…

Blaine picked up Cassie when she texted him. He brought her home and pulled her onto his lap on the sofa.

“I want to talk to you,” he said, looking into her pretty brown eyes.

“Okay,” she said. “About what?”

“My father’s death… It was a suicide. He drove out to the middle of nowhere, called 911, and shot himself in the head. There was no note. No hint that he was depressed or otherwise sick. He just did it.”

Her eyes went wide, and she tightened her arms around him.

“Oh, Blaine,” she whispered.

“Often we think of suicide as something that young people do. But suicide actually peaks in middle age, at least here in Canada. And men kill themselves more frequently than women, even though women are more likely to attempt—”

Cassie gently covered his mouth with her hand, then trailed it over his cheek. “Stop with the statistics. I don’t think that’s what you wanted to tell me.”

No, it wasn’t. But in the aftermath, he’d been numb, and he’d read too much about suicide, taken comfort in tables full of numbers. He memorized the suicide rates for dozens of countries.

Numbers made sense to him, gave him a semblance of control. The fact that his father had killed himself—that didn’t make any sense.

“For a while,” he continued, “I was obsessed with understanding why he’d done it. I thought back to every time I’d seen him in the past year, looked all over his house for clues. The only odd thing about the house was that he’d cleared out the basement. It was as if he’d wanted me to have less to deal with afterward. But there was nothing else. He’d retired two years earlier, and maybe that was part of it, that his life felt empty without a job. But he was never particularly attached to his job. It was just a way to make a living. And if you knew my dad, he was nothing like me. He was the sort of easygoing guy who’d enjoy sitting around the TV with a few friends, watching the football game. I tried and tried, but I couldn’t understand how he’d come to take his own life. Eventually, I had to let it go and just accept.”

Blaine moved Cassie slightly apart from him, needing to see her face as he spoke. Her chin wobbled, but she said nothing as she trailed her hand up his back.

“Did you feel guilty?” she asked.

He let out a humorless laugh. “Lots of suicide survivors—the people left behind, that is—feel guilty, thinking, ‘If only I’d done this or that.’”

She nodded. “That’s what I’ve heard.”

“But not me. My dad never gave me a hint that anything was wrong, and I talked to him regularly, saw him once or twice a month. So even though I tried to understand what had happened afterward, I didn’t feel there was something else I should have done while he was alive. I didn’t feel guilty about that…but then I started feeling guilty that I didn’t feel guilty.” He laughed again without humor.

The silence stretched for a minute or two. Cassie was here with him, and he didn’t feel the need to fill it with meaningless words.

“I thought I was broken,” he said at last. “Most people have to learn to let go of the guilt, but I didn’t. I felt like a freak, like I wasn’t normal. And the one person who’d always thought I was okay just the way I was…he was dead. There was no one to reassure me.”

“Oh, Blaine.” She sounded so pained. “You are not a freak because you didn’t feel guilty. Don’t put that on yourself. You are okay, just the way you are.”

She sounded sincere. That made him feel a little better, so he went on.

“I kept working after he died. I liked having the structure of my regular life. But after a few months, I knew I needed to get away. So I threw a tent and a sleeping bag in the back of my car, and I just started driving. And then—”

“You met me.”

He recalled that moment in Tim Hortons when he’d first seen her. Just another Tim Hortons in a nondescript Ontario town, and he’d just been there to get a coffee, on the way to who-knew-where. Nothing special should have happened there, but it had.

“I saw you,” he said, “and the fog lifted. The world was in color again, and I could finally breathe. It felt just like love—love at first sight. But my rational side said it had to be an illusion, that I was feeling things that weren’t real. It was just me being emotionally needy because of how awful my life had been. That made more sense to me than love at first sight. How can you love someone you don’t know? So I told myself I would enjoy that wonderful feeling for a week, but it couldn’t last.”

She cupped a hand over the side of his face and stroked his cheek.

He swallowed. She could be so gentle and understanding.

“But it did last,” he said. “For over a year, half of me loved you, and the other half thought I was kidding myself. None of it made sense. Then I started dating again, and I knew. It was only you.”

He placed his hands on her cheeks and brought her face toward him in slow motion. He kissed her on the lips. Once, twice, three times.

“I also knew that I’d treated you badly and you might be reluctant to take me back. But I was finally convinced my feelings for you were real. I hoped yours were real, too, and if I apologized enough, you wouldn’t be able to say no to a relationship.”

He’d tried not to think about the alternative, not then.

“They’re real,” she said, pressing a kiss to his lips.

His heart stuttered. “You’ll stay with me?”

“I didn’t say that.”

The stutter became a painful twist. “Tell me what you need, and I’ll give it to you.”

She gazed into his eyes. “I need to believe, with absolute certainty, that you won’t leave me again. Because I wouldn’t survive that. I think I finally understand why you did what you did. But that doesn’t mean I can trust you.”

Despair washed through him. “What can I say to convince you?”

“I don’t know if there is anything.” She shook her head bleakly. “I just don’t know.”

Tonight he would drive her back to Georgeville.

It might be the last time he ever saw her.

Chapter Nineteen

Cassie had arrived in Ottawa with little more than her wallet, her phone, and a beaver costume. She’d had to borrow a toothbrush and a comb. But one thing she did have was her e-reader, which she carried in her purse out of habit.

With a cup of coffee on the table beside her, she lay back on the sofa with it now, her feet in Blaine’s lap as he picked up a science-fiction novel.

It was nice to be peaceful with him after that difficult conversation. It was nice to just be.

This was what a lazy weekend afternoon would be like if she lived with him—the two of them reading together and—

No. She would not let herself fantasize about that.

However, as she read her novel, she did some fantasizing of another kind. It was an erotic romance about a young woman who was curious about BDSM and went to a kinky party at a CEO’s mansion. Obviously, she attracted the attention of the CEO himself, and he took her to his playroom and did unspeakable things to her. Some of the things, Cassie had done with Leo…and hadn’t particularly enjoyed. Still, she found herself closing her eyes and picturing a man flogging her. She hadn’t gotten wet when Leo had done that. But the scenario was still something she could fantasize about—if it was with Blaine. Not that she wanted him to actually flog her in real life, but that was the great thing about fantasies…they were totally safe and painless.

“Cassie?” Blaine said softly—not in her imagination. “You awake?”

She put down her e-reader and climbed onto his lap, plucking the book from his hands and tossing it to the ground.

“I was reading about a BDSM party,” she said.

His eyes flared. “Is that so?”

She didn’t know how he did it so quickly, but two seconds later, she was flat on her back and he was on top of her, his weight pressing her into the couch. He pushed down the neckline of the burgundy dress and sucked on her nipple. She tipped her head back in pleasure. When he bit her lightly, that pleasure increased.

His hand dipped between her legs, and he pushed aside her panties and touched her.

“Are you sore?” he asked.

“Yes. But not so sore that you can’t fuck me. Just be a little gentler than usual.”

He swirled a finger around her clit. “Good. And don’t forget, you promised we could do it again someday.”

“I misspoke,” she said, shifting a little closer. She had no plans to see him again after tonight.

“Next time, I’ll get a toy for you, and I’ll make you wear it for hours before I fuck you with my fist. And you won’t be allowed to get yourself off. You’ll just feel it inside you and squirm with need. Until I give you some relief.”

She squirmed against his hand, wanting him to do it now. “You’re trying to convince me to stay again.”

“Is it working?”

“I can’t forget the heartbreak.”

“Maybe this will help.”

He shifted and circled his tongue around her other nipple, sliding two fingers into her pussy. And she did, momentarily, forget about the heartbreak as he touched her body like no one else ever had.

She struggled with his shirt, so he sat up to pull it over his head.

She wanted to memorize every detail of his body. This might be the last time she ever saw him naked.

She pushed that thought away.

Her hands went to his crotch, where her fingers fumbled with the zipper on his jeans. Eventually she got it, sliding her hand inside to grip him. He was deliciously hard for her.

Their touches were all desperation now. His mouth sloppily met hers before he pulled back.

“You know what I want?” he said. “To take you bare. Nothing between us. Perhaps you could go on the pill or get an IUD, and then…”

He was talking as though this would continue.

And oh God, she wanted him like that. Wanted him to slip inside her, just like this. No barriers.

He shoved her panties down and pushed up the skirt of her dress so he could rub his cock right against her.

“Wouldn’t you like that?” He dropped his voice. “Being able to feel my cum in your pussy? I could stay inside you until I got soft…”

Her inner muscles clenched.

“Stay with me,” he said. “Give us the chance to do that.”

She wanted it, but she couldn’t stay.

However…

“We don’t have to wait,” she said. “I went on the pill after the pregnancy scare, and I got tested a few months ago. I haven’t been with anyone since.”

His breathing went shallow and jerky. He rubbed himself against her again, more firmly this time. “I haven’t been tested in two years, but you’re the only woman I’ve been with since then.”

“Let’s do it, then. Please.”

He smiled and pressed the tip of his cock to her entrance. Was he going to plunge into her right now, just like that?

Her pulse rocketed. Then fell again when he rolled off.

He was being a tease.

He stood up and said, “Let’s go upstairs.”

…

They were naked in bed, skin against skin. Blaine kissed his way down Cassie’s neck to her breasts and over her stomach. Every inch of this woman was exquisite. He would never find anyone this lovely again. He pressed a kiss between her legs before continuing down her right thigh.

She groaned. “Please, Blaine.”

How he loved to hear her plead his name.

He kept kissing, all the way down to her toes, sucking one into his mouth before switching to the other foot and sliding his mouth upward again. His pace even more leisurely now, he kissed his way up to her left thigh. She grasped his hair in her hands, and then he was licking her pussy once more, glorying in all of her sexy noises and unconscious movements as she soared toward climax.

But he didn’t let her come. Not against his mouth. When he knew she was about to finish, he pushed his cock inside her, and she cried out as she tightened around him.

“Yes,” he said. “I’m here. I will always be here for you.”

She was so wet around him. So hot.

He kissed her as he moved slowly within her, nothing between them for the first time. It felt so right.

“You have to stay,” he whispered. “I need you.”

No matter what she’d said earlier… The fact that she was letting him inside her like this—it had to mean something, right?

He kept thrusting gently. Normally he would be rough with her, but all kinds of sex were amazing with Cassie. And this was a time to savor her, slowly and thoroughly.

“You feel so good,” she murmured. “So hard.”

“Only for you.”

He lost track of time when he was inside her. Eventually he slid out and sat on the edge of the bed. She sat on top of him, easing down onto his cock. He grabbed her breasts from behind, pinched her nipples, and she turned around for a kiss as she moved up and down.

“You’re mine,” he whispered. Wanting to claim her. Needing to own her, body and soul.

“You feel amazing,” she said.

He wrapped his arms around her, and they lay back on the bed together. He thrust into her from underneath, a little more urgently than before.

When he put his finger to her mouth, her tongue darted out and licked it. He dropped his hand between her legs, touching her clit, and she came once more, shattering on top of him.

Afterward, he rolled her onto her back, and then he was in her again. She seemed to be capable of nothing but whimpering beneath him.

“Slow down for a minute,” she whispered. “It’s too intense.”

He looked down at her and smiled. He knew what she meant. It was almost achingly intense, in a different way than their earlier activities.

He moved within her slowly, the only woman he would ever want. He could be with her over and over and over again, and he would never tire of it. How could you tire of perfection?

“Come inside me now,” she said. “I want to feel it.”

He picked up his pace for a few strokes, and then he spent himself with a savage combination of a growl, a scream, and a whimper.

He stayed inside her afterward, planting kisses over every inch of her skin that he could reach. Sweat held their bodies together, and her hair was a wild mess, but still, this was all so beautiful. She was so beautiful.

“Have you ever done that with another man?” he asked.

“No,” she said, and it was the answer he’d expected. And wanted, if he was honest. “You?”

“With an ex-girlfriend. Ten years ago, maybe?”

“I was still in high school then.”

“And I’d finished grad school.” He paused. “Do you think I’m too old for you?”

She shook her head. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

He slipped out of her and rolled onto his side, throwing his arm over her. But he couldn’t resist sliding his finger into her yet again, feeling his semen inside her body.

“In the unlikely event that you get pregnant, I will be there for you. You don’t ever have to worry.”

They lay like that for a little longer, then she went to the washroom to clean up. As he lay there alone, he felt a tightness in his chest as he realized that the reason she had agreed not to use a condom was not because she planned to stay with him.

No, she’d told him they could do it today because she wasn’t going to stay with him. This was the last chance they’d have to be together.

Chapter Twenty

The rest of the afternoon passed in quiet discomfort. Cassie read some more, but she could hardly concentrate on the words. And even when she could read the words, the sentences didn’t make sense. Still, she persisted. She needed to do something.

For dinner, Blaine made grilled chicken and salad. “Since we weren’t exactly healthy the rest of the weekend,” he said.

It was nice to have someone looking after her, but she refused to get used to it.

After dinner, she searched for the ammonite sketch she’d made yesterday and found it on the shelf with his collection.

“Blaine,” she said. He was in the kitchen, scrubbing a pot, but he came immediately. “Ammonites had soft bodies, right? There must have been something inside the shell. Like snails.”

“There was.”

“Do scientists know what they looked like?”

“They have a pretty good idea.”

“But soft bodies aren’t preserved, right?”

“In rare cases they can be. Very special conditions are required. For example, there is excellent preservation of the soft parts of animals in the Burgess Shale in British Columbia. But those are from the Cambrian, and I don’t think ammonites appeared until the Devonian.”

“I can’t figure out,” she said, “whether I would have learned better in school if you were my teacher, or if I would have been too distracted by your good looks to absorb any information.”

He chuckled. “Where is the Burgess Shale?”

“British Columbia. You just said that.”

“See? You would have learned just fine.”

She made a face at him. “You liked school, didn’t you?”

“I enjoyed university. Before that, I liked learning, but I didn’t always enjoy school. How about you?”

“I didn’t mind it, but there was never anything that truly captured me. Unlike you, who seems to find so much interesting.”

“Perhaps you just haven’t found the right thing yet.”

“Perhaps. I like art, but it’s a hobby. I’ve never had a desire to pursue it further.” She paused. “I do like my job, actually, working in healthcare. After the pregnancy scare, I got more interested in women’s health in particular. I’ve considered studying to be a nurse but never seriously. I’m not sure what I want, and sometimes it feels like it’s too late.”

“Which is ridiculous. You’re young.”

“I know,” she said. “I know.”

“You could live with me and go to school in Ottawa. Free accommodation.”

“Blaine. Don’t.”

He looked at her sadly. “You’re going to leave me, aren’t you?”

“I am.”

He sighed. “What can I do to change that?”

“Time machine?” she suggested. “Or you could knock me on the head and give me amnesia. But it would have to be just the right sort of amnesia, so I’d forget the week we spent together and how heartbroken I was afterward, but not the rest of my life. You’re an engineer. You should be able to figure it out.”

He quirked his lips as he picked up the picture of the ammonite.

“May I keep this?” he asked.

“Sure.”

He returned the drawing to the shelf. “I’d feel guilty if I needed to resort to amnesia. And if I had a time machine, I suppose I would try to save my dad, so we might never have met.”

There was no point in thinking about how things could have been different. It was what it was. They’d had one week plus a weekend together, and that would be the end of their story.

“Your father,” Blaine said. “He cheated on your mother, she took him back, and then he did it again with a different woman, right?”

Seriously? These were their last few minutes together, and he had to bring up that unpleasant memory? She ground her teeth and nodded. “That’s right.”

“But I’m not like him,” he said. “I swear to you, I would never break your heart again. You can trust me with a second chance.”

How many times had they gone through this? “How can you know that? You only decided on Thursday—”

“Cassie.” He spoke quietly but firmly. “I’ve never felt like this about any other woman. I love you. I want to marry you. I won’t change my mind.”

His conviction was touching. But she couldn’t. She just couldn’t.

He took her hand. “I think you love me.”

That was probably true. She didn’t want to examine her feelings too closely. If she didn’t admit she loved him, maybe she wouldn’t hurt as much tomorrow.

…

Blaine was pretty sure Cassie was in denial about her feelings for him. But nothing he’d said had made her change her mind about staying. Instead of saying she loved him, she had taken a deep breath and asked him to drive her back to Georgeville.

They were on the road, almost halfway there. He wasn’t sure why she had put her beaver costume back on for the drive. The two dresses she liked were in a bag at her feet.

They’d barely said anything for the past hour.

“What did you dress up as for Halloween when you were a child?” she asked.

The break in the oppressive silence threw him off for a second. Then he said, “You can probably guess.”

“Dinosaur?”

“More than once.”

“Scientist?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“What else?” she asked.

“Albert Einstein.”

“I already guessed scientist.”

“I dressed up as a scientist when I was seven. I wore a lab coat. But when I was eight, I dressed up as a specific scientist. Then when I was nine, I was zombie Einstein.”

She laughed.

Oh, he would miss that sound.

“What about you?” he asked.

“The usual things. Princess, fairy. The Little Mermaid. My mom sewed my costumes, and they were pretty good. One year I was even a dinosaur. See? We have something in common.”

“I know,” he murmured. “We have lots in common.”

She kept chattering away. “Stegosaurus was my favorite. What was yours?”

“It kept changing.”

“Ah. You have commitment problems.”

He gave her a hard look before turning back to the road. “Don’t tease me about that. It’s not true.”

“Fine. So what was one of your favorites?”

“Pachycephalosaurus.”

“That’s a mouthful.”

“It had a very thick skull. I thought that would be useful. Also, ankylosaurus. It was covered in armor plates, plus it had a club at the end of its tail. Sounded cool to me.”

“I remember that one,” she said. “Do you still read about paleontology?”

“Yes, but I’m less focused on dinosaurs. Ammonites, for example, are cool, too.”

They were quiet for a few moments, but he couldn’t stand the silence any longer.

“You could be a sexy ladybug next year,” he suggested. “Or maybe a sexy stegosaurus.”

“Ha. When I was nineteen, I dressed as a female lumberjack. Can’t remember why.”

“Because you wanted to make jokes about wood, obviously.”

He shouldn’t be teasing her about some old Halloween costume. He ought to say something meaningful, make one last attempt.

“If you gave me another chance,” he asked, “logically speaking, what do you think are the odds that I’d leave you?”

She thought about that for a while. He slowed down so he was driving below the speed limit, increasing the time he’d get to spend with her, if only by a tiny amount.

“One in three,” she said at last.

“So you think there’s a better than fifty percent chance that I wouldn’t leave you?”

“It’s not enough. A one in three chance of dying in a car accident—those would be terrible odds. Or a one in three chance of being clubbed by an ankylosaurus. Can you imagine?”

“I’ll miss you,” he said. “So much.”

…

When Blaine dropped Cassie off, she walked out of the car without a kiss, without a backward glance. He sat there for a few minutes, staring up at her apartment.

So this was it. He hadn’t gotten what he wanted.

If he was honest with himself, he’d always kind of expected her to leave. He’d hurt her badly. He’d just clung to the hope of winning her back because he knew how much it hurt to lose someone he loved, and how he’d have done pretty much anything to make that pain go away.

And now he’d lost her.

He started on the long drive home, all by himself.

As he crossed a bridge, he had the impulse to jerk the wheel to the right, to crash over the barrier and into the water. And that would be that.

He took deep breaths. “Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian…” he muttered. Since there was no reason to be quiet when he was all alone, he spoke again, louder this time. “Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian…”

He was a nut. That was okay.

But he would not drive off a bridge.

Dad, why did you do it? Why didn’t you tell me?

There were no answers, and he didn’t know how he would get through this. His fear of losing control of his life, of losing someone else he loved—it had happened again.

And it was just as horrible as he’d expected.

Chapter Twenty-One

Cassie sat by herself at the bar. It was Halloween, and she’d gone out to Lawson’s because she was tired of sitting alone in her apartment, reliving her weekend with Blaine over and over. She rolled the beer glass between her hands and sighed.

Lawson’s wasn’t too busy, but there were a few people around. One was dressed as a skeleton; another was a lion. Cassie wasn’t wearing her beaver costume. It seemed weird to put on a costume to go to the bar to drink alone.

She sighed again. Her heart hurt just as much as it had last time, even though she was the one who’d walked away from Blaine. Still, she believed she’d done the right thing.

The door opened, and Darrell sauntered in. He said something to the skeleton before coming over to the bar.

“Cassie,” he said after the bartender handed him a pint. “What are you doing here on a Tuesday night?”

“It’s Halloween.” She lifted her glass. “I’m celebrating. Can’t you tell?”

He gave her a skeptical look. “Um…”

“What are you doing here on a Tuesday night?”

“I come here all the time. You know that. Lawson’s wouldn’t be the same without my smiling face several times a week.”

Darrell sat down on the stool beside hers. They’d been in the same year in school, but they’d never talked much. He was friends with Rachel, however.

“You want company?” he asked. “Or should I get lost?”

“You can stay. It’s less pathetic than drinking alone.”

“Heartbreak?” he said casually.

She snapped her head toward his. “Why would you say that?”

“Let’s see. A man I’d never seen before shows up at Jenna’s party, kisses you, and whisks you away. I don’t know, just guessing it has something to do with him.”

During that week she’d spent with Blaine, so long ago now, they’d hardly left her apartment. Certainly, no one had seen them making out. And no one had asked about him after he left. But this time…that kiss. So public. She touched her hand to her lips, remembering. It had only been four days ago, but it felt like a lifetime.

“You got it bad,” Darrell observed.

“And what would you know about that?”

“I’ve been heartbroken. Bunch of times. Hey, don’t look so surprised.”

It was just… Darrell seemed so easygoing and free. Slept with whoever he wanted to, didn’t get attached. She couldn’t quite reconcile that with him having been heartbroken.

There was a loud cheer from the pool table. She glanced over, then turned to the man beside her.

“Does he love you back?” Darrell asked.

“Yes. So he claims.”

“But you don’t believe him?”

“I believe him,” she said, “but I don’t believe it’ll last. He hurt me badly once before.”

“Asshole.”

She laughed. It felt good to have a friend.

Darrell turned to the bartender and ordered two shots of half rye, half tequila.

“One of those for me?” Cassie asked. “It sounds disgusting.”

“It is. But sometimes I’m in the mood for disgusting. You know what I’m saying?”

Not really.

The bartender set down two shot glasses in front of them. Darrell picked up one, and she picked up the other.

“Cheers,” he said, then downed his shot with a grimace.

She tipped her shot back, too. It was, indeed, disgusting. She gulped some beer to wash the taste out of her mouth.

“You bought me a drink,” she said. “Are you hitting on me?”

“Nah. I don’t think you want that right now. Plus you’re a good friend of Rachel’s, so it might be weird.” He grinned. “Not that I don’t appreciate the view.”

A bowl of trick-or-treat-sized candy sat on the bar, and she grabbed a Coffee Crisp. It was Halloween, and she was heartbroken. She could indulge herself.

Last night, she’d spent half an hour looking at herself in the mirror as she cried. She didn’t know why she’d felt the need to see herself become a snotty mess, but she had.

God, she missed him so much.

“Anyway. I’d give him another chance,” Darrell said. “Because if anyone I loved actually loved me back, I would jump at it. Then again, you probably shouldn’t take advice from me.” He had a sip of beer. “You know what I should do? Lend you Biscuit for the weekend.”

“Biscuit? Your very manly dog?”

“Yep. She’s adorbs.”

Cassie rolled her eyes.

“Seriously. She’ll cheer you up. It’s hard to be completely down in the dumps when you have a fluffy maltipoo slobbering on your leg. My father is supposed to look after her next weekend while I go to Toronto, but you could do it instead. Dad doesn’t like Biscuit, anyway.”

“Why not?”

“He thinks dogs should not be small enough to fit in a purse.”

Another laugh rose up from the pool table, and a bunch of high fives were exchanged.

“Well,” Darrell said, “I don’t think this ruminating suits me. I’m gonna try to get in on that pool game. Sounds like we’re missing out. You in?”

“Nah.” She shook her head. She’d just be a downer.

“Okay. Just let me know about Biscuit.”

He walked off toward the pool table. A minute later, he threw his head back and laughed.

Cassie looked down at her beer. She was getting a bit of a buzz. This was her second pint, and she’d had a shot, as well. Geez, this really wasn’t like her.

The first time she’d been heartbroken over Blaine, she hadn’t ventured out in public much, other than for work, of course. No drinking alone at the bar. She’d occasionally stuffed her face with brownies at the bakery, but she’d nursed her heartbreak at home most of the time.

She reached over to the candy bowl for a box of Smarties—those had always been her favorite as a kid. She wondered about Blaine. What was his favorite Halloween candy?

Staring at the box in her hand, she was consumed by an awful feeling.

She loved the man.

It was useless to pretend otherwise.

…

When Blaine got home from work on Tuesday, he had a quick dinner, then put out the two jack-o-lanterns he’d carved the day before. They were, frankly, not very good. This was the first time he’d ever carved a pumpkin. Until this year, he’d lived in a condo, and kids didn’t go trick-or-treating down the hallway. But now he had a house.

He’d sketched rough plans for each jack-o-lantern before he started carving, but they hadn’t turned out as planned. Their faces were horribly lopsided.

That was okay. They were jack-o-lanterns, for God’s sake. It just made his house scarier.

Having no idea how many kids to expect, he’d bought three big boxes of candy, but that seemed excessive now. He sat near the door and tried to read while waiting for the next group of children. No one had come for more than ten minutes.

The doorbell finally rang, and he opened the door. The youngest kid—perhaps three years old—was a sheriff. The other kid, dressed in blue… Well, Blaine had no idea, and he wouldn’t ask. The last time he’d asked, the little girl had burst into tears. Mommy, he doesn’t know who I am!

The three year old looked at him warily, then turned and hurried away without saying, “Trick or treat.”

Shit. Did he really look that scary today?

Yes, he was in a bad mood, and he had dark circles under his eyes from not sleeping. But really?

Oh, great. The little sheriff was now crying. The mother gave Blaine a dark look, so he handed her a fistful of candy and shut the door. He sat down and opened his book, reading the words but not really comprehending what was going on in the story. There were aliens. Maybe they were green with seven eyes, maybe they were yellow with seven legs, maybe they wore necklaces made of ammonites. It all seemed meaningless.

He was struggling to get through each day in his Cassie-less existence. True, he’d been without her for a long time before this weekend…but now he’d tried to get her back, and she had rejected him.

Fuck.

He texted Matthew.

…

Blaine met Matthew at a nondescript bar the following night. Blaine ordered a beer, even though he didn’t particularly like beer. But if he went straight for hard liquor, he’d drink too much.

“So I take it you didn’t convince her to give you a chance,” Matthew said. “Sorry, man. Look, if you need any pointers on sex—”

“Shut up.”

“Ouch. You really are in a bad mood.”

“The sex was brilliant. I know she agreed.”

“Brilliant? What are you, British?”

“I’m told I look like Sherlock Holmes.”

“Were you trying for a British accent there? It sounded like… Oh, hell, I don’t know. Maybe a seal drowning off the coast of Scotland? A seal that had spent some time in Newfoundland, that is.”

Blaine just looked balefully at his friend.

“Sorry,” Matthew said. “I was hoping you’d laugh. But apparently, I’m not funny.”

“You’re not.”

“Thanks. I guess I can forgive you since you’re drowning your sorrows in beer, which isn’t like you at all. Why did she leave if the sex was, quote, ‘brilliant?’”

“She thinks there’s a one in three chance I’ll break her heart again.”

Matthew stared at him. “That’s exactly what she said? She assigned an actual number to it?”

Blaine nodded. “I asked her what she thought the odds were, and that was her answer. This was after we discussed our favorite dinosaurs.”

“How the hell does that—” Matthew shook his head. “So you love her.”

“Yes.”

“I suppose you must, since you spent all weekend together. Usually if you spend that much time with someone, you start crawling up the walls.”

True.

“Like the time a few of us went canoeing in Algonquin,” Matthew said. “You were ready to slam that paddle through my skull.”

“You wouldn’t shut up. We were in the middle of the park, and it would have been peaceful, but you were yakking away about some stupid TV show. Describing every episode.”

But now Matthew was quiet. They were both quiet for several minutes, occasionally taking sips of their drinks.

It was easier to talk about dinosaurs and canoeing trips than unrequited love.

He released a shuddering breath.

“You okay?” Matthew asked, patting his arm.

“Yeah. Kind of.”

“Are you going to try again with Cassie?”

Blaine shook his head. “If I couldn’t change her mind after the weekend we had, I don’t think there’s anything else I can do.”

She cared for him, yes, and she’d loved him once upon a time. But he’d hurt her too much for her to give him another chance. She’d made that clear.

Maybe one day, with another woman…

No. He couldn’t bear to think of being with anyone else. He only wanted Cassie, and he’d blown it.

“For what it’s worth,” Matthew said, “I believe you wouldn’t hurt her again, even if she doesn’t. But I’ve known you for more than fifteen years. She’s spent a mere ten days with you, with zero communication for over a year after day seven. You’re actually a stable, loyal, trustworthy person, but she doesn’t believe that about you, and I can understand why. It’s hard to show someone those things in a single weekend. If you find a way to do that, maybe she’ll change her mind.”

Blaine pondered this for a minute, and then it came to him. “You’re a genius.”

“I never thought I’d hear you say that.”

“You’re brilliant.”

“Or that.”

“I know what I need to do.” He slapped his friend’s shoulder. “Thanks.”

For the first time since Blaine had made that little sheriff cry, he felt a sliver of hope.

Chapter Twenty-Two

“Hey, Biscuit. Come here, girl.” Cassie patted the cushion beside her on the couch. “You played with that pink monkey all morning. Don’t you want to do something else now?”

On the floor with her beloved toy, Biscuit let out a whimper.

Cassie grabbed the toy and flung it to the other side of the room. Biscuit trotted off, retrieved the monkey, then deposited it at Cassie’s feet.

“Oh, so now you want to play fetch? When I took you to the park, you weren’t interested at all.” She threw the toy again, and Biscuit dutifully brought it back to her, dropping it on the floor with a bark that seemed to say, “Look at me, aren’t I clever?”

She really was cute.

It was nice to have something to snuggle, even if that something wasn’t a six-foot-tall geotechnical engineer. But Cassie was far from cheery.

Rather than throwing the pink monkey again, she put it on the couch. Biscuit hopped up and happily started chewing the toy, and Cassie picked up her e-reader. She was nearly finished the book she’d started at Blaine’s last weekend. Only two chapters left. Reading with a little dog curled up beside her sounded like a nice way to pass a Saturday afternoon, even if it wasn’t enough to make her smile.

It had not been a good week. In fact, it had been even worse than when she’d realized she wasn’t pregnant.

All week, she’d been a slob. Then this morning, disgusted with herself, she’d gone on a cleaning spree. Her muscles were still sore from scrubbing the tub. Biscuit had also managed to tear up a pillow, and she’d had to clean up the carnage.

Cleaning had been good, though. It had helped push Blaine out of her mind. Just a little, but she couldn’t expect more than that.

Later, she would clean out her cupboards, but for now, she’d take a break and lose herself in the erotic adventures of a CEO and his young submissive. Ooh…there was a fisting scene. How about that.

Her heart twisted as she thought of Blaine. But as she kept reading, she got more into the scene, and her hand drifted between her legs. She pushed aside her panties—big, ugly yellow ones, because what was the point of wearing sexy underwear for no one?—and touched herself idly as she read. When the CEO finally penetrated his submissive with his entire hand, she thrust her finger in—

There was a knock at the door. She jerked up guiltily.

Crap. This was inconvenient. Perhaps the person would go away if she ignored them. She read another page…

Another knock. Damn it. Why couldn’t people just leave her alone to masturbate and get over Blaine?

She pushed herself to her feet and fixed her clothes before heading to the door, not in a particularly friendly mood.

“What do…?”

The words died on her lips when she opened the door and saw Blaine. He was wearing a lavender dress shirt—which was a great color on him—and carrying a bouquet of pink roses.

Oh God. He was gorgeous, and he was here. Just when she’d been about to get herself off. That was quite convenient, actually.

She yanked him inside and tossed the flowers on the counter.

“Cassie, I—”

She kissed him. If she let more than a couple of words come out of his mouth, she would undoubtedly realize this was a horrible idea. But he was here, and she wanted sex, and she wouldn’t let anything get in the way.

When he understood she wasn’t going to let him speak, he pushed her against the door, one hand holding her wrists above her head. She ground against him shamelessly and kissed him in a frenzy. It felt so damn good to be physical.

“Touch me,” he ordered, releasing one of her hands.

She undid his pants, which was a bit of a struggle with one hand, but then she was reaching inside, touching the hardness of him, stroking up and down, running her thumb over the tip. A bead of pre-cum leaked out, and she slicked her finger through it greedily.

He pushed down her pajama pants and ripped off her underwear. Yes, he actually ripped them off and threw them to the floor.

“I wasn’t expecting company,” she said, trying to explain why she’d been wearing such a hideous undergarment.

He reached under her shirt. “No bra.”

And then her chest was thrust against the door, her bare nipples pressing against the chilly wood as his hands kneaded her ass.

“Do you want me to use a condom?” he asked.

“No. Just fuck me.” He hadn’t touched her pussy yet, but she was wet and full of need. She needed to feel him inside her. “Please.”

“Very well. As you wish.” He shoved inside her from behind.

She groaned as he filled her, giving her exactly what she craved.

His thrusts were quick, and the wood of the door scraped the tender flesh of her breasts as he pounded into her. She squeezed her eyes shut and let the touch and smell of him wash over her, losing herself in the sensations, in the sound of his skin slapping against hers.

Biscuit yelped.

“Shut up,” she snapped.

But then Biscuit let out a stream of high-pitched barks.

For the first time in her life, Cassie was tempted to kick a puppy.

“Oh, for God’s sake, can’t you tell I’m getting laid?”

Blaine chuckled in her ear as he continued to pump.

And then, even worse, there was a knock at the door. With a low curse, she put her hand on his hip to still him. “Let’s go to the bedroom,” she whispered. “Away from the dog and the damn door.”

Much as she’d enjoyed being fucked against the door, apparently the world had other plans for her today.

“Cassie!” said a voice from outside. “I can hear you. I know you’re home.”

Her eyes widened. Oh, hell no. And she’d thought this couldn’t get any worse.

She pushed Blaine away and handed him her ripped underwear. “Get in the bedroom. Now. Don’t you dare make an appearance.”

“Who is—?”

“Just go.”

She pulled up her pants and ran to splash water on her face and hands before opening the door.

“Hello, Mom,” she said.

“Hello, dear. Sounded like there was a bit of a commotion in here. When did you get a dog?”

“Oh. Um. I’m watching a friend’s dog. Biscuit.”

“You know, perhaps you should get a dog of your own. Since you’re home by yourself so much. It would be good company.” Her mom crouched down and scratched behind Biscuit’s ears. “Who’s a good boy?”

“Actually, she’s a girl.”

“Do you have someone over, too? Or were you just talking to Biscuit a minute ago?”

Thank God. Her mother hadn’t heard her exact words.

“Biscuit and I were reading together. Weren’t we, sweetie?”

The dog yelped in response before trotting off to play with her beloved pink monkey.

“Anyway,” Cassie said. “What’s the reason for the visit? More carrot-pineapple muffins? I’ve still got one left.”

“No, no. It’s just… Doris said you were looking rather glum at the doctor’s office yesterday. I thought I’d stop by and see how you were doing.”

Her whole body was sparking with frustration. “I’m fine. But I’ve got to get going soon. I have plans with Jenna.” Or a certain hot guy hiding in the next room.

Her mother eyed her suspiciously. “It’s very clean in here.”

“That’s a good thing, isn’t it?”

“After I kicked your father out, the house was positively sparkling, even though I had two young children. I was obsessed with keeping it clean. Is something wrong, Cassie?”

“Nope, nothing’s wrong!” she said, perhaps a bit too cheerfully.

Just the fact that you interrupted some mindblowing sex with the man who broke my heart. Nothing else.

“Boy troubles?”

Cassie plastered a smile on her face. “No, I’m happily single.”

Her mother looked at her for a minute. “You sure you’re okay?

“You worry too much. Seriously.”

Five minutes later, her mom finally made it out the door, and Cassie went to the bedroom, where Blaine was pressed up against the wall by the door hinges.

“Why are you standing there?” she asked.

“In case someone opened the bedroom door.”

“Ah.” She looked at his cock, which was no longer at attention. Well, an impromptu visit from her mother was definitely a mood killer. Hopefully it wouldn’t take long to get back in the mood. “So where were we?”

He cleared his throat. “I didn’t come here to have sex with you.”

Disappointment shot through her. “Maybe you should have made that clear when I jumped you.”

“I’m not complaining. But that wasn’t the reason for the visit.”

She sat on the bed, and he sat beside her. “I was just reading an erotic romance and thinking about you. It made me a little, well, horny. So when you actually showed up…”

He laughed. “We can get back to that in a minute. But first…” He took her hands in his. “I admit I did things wrong last week. I thought I would give you one great weekend and that would make it impossible for you to walk away from me. But you did, anyway.”

She released a breath. “I had to.”

He nodded. “What you need isn’t one great weekend. It’s for me to prove that I won’t leave you again. To prove how committed I am. Which, for understandable reasons, you don’t believe. Your hypothesis is that there’s a one in three chance I’ll leave you. Not great odds. I want to show you I can be reliable, that there’s not a thirty-three percent chance I’ll walk away.”

She looked down at their hands, twined together. “I don’t know if that’s possible.”

“I’d like to try, if you’ll let me,” he said. “I’ll come to see you every weekend. An hour every Sunday afternoon, or three hours on Saturday morning, or all weekend. Whatever you want, each week. I’ll do that until you believe I’m serious, and you agree to be my girlfriend.”

“Is sex going to be part of every visit?”

“Whatever you want.”

“Can I see other men?”

“If you like. Just don’t tell me about it. I promise I won’t see anyone else, though.” He rubbed his thumbs over the back of her hands. “What do you think?”

A million thoughts jumbled through her brain. “How long will you do this?”

“As long as it takes. But I might re-evaluate my approach if it doesn’t work within a year.”

Shock rocketed through her. “A year! You would willingly do that for a whole year?”

“Only for you.” There wasn’t a trace of doubt in his voice.

A part of her was still unconvinced.

“We can talk during the week, too,” he said. “Not just sex. I want to try having a more…normal relationship. Think of it as me auditioning to be your boyfriend.”

But another part of her was slowly starting to believe this man just might be her future.

“Do you still want to marry me?”

“Yes. But first, you need to be able to trust me.”

“I do trust you…in some ways,” she said. “A lot of ways, actually.”

It was rather remarkable what she had trusted him to do. With her. To her. Things she never would have done with anyone else.

She gave him a sexy smile and touched his knee with a finger.

His eyes darkened.

A moment later, she was on her back beneath him. He quickly unzipped his pants and pushed down hers, and then he was inside her again.

Oh God. He felt so good. So right.

“Yes,” he murmured. “Take it.”

He may have been in a rush to get inside her, but he seemed to be in no rush to get off. He worked her slowly until she had come three times, until she was a warm, sated puddle on the bed.

She couldn’t do it again—she couldn’t.

Still, she moaned in frustration when he pulled out of her.

“On your knees,” he said. “Cock in your mouth.”

He tasted of sex. The combination of the two of them. She sucked him, and he kept his hand in her hair, exerting a little pressure. Then he held her cheeks and fucked her mouth with every big, thick, overwhelming inch of him. When she looked up, she could see the crazed desire in his expression.

She loved pleasuring him.

He pulled out and pinned her beneath him, slamming into her pussy once more. When he came inside her, she cried out, not because of her own orgasm, but at the joy of being so close to this incredible man.

All of the things they’d done together last weekend…she wanted to do them again. She didn’t want them to simply be memories.

“So?” he said. “Will you give me a chance?”

“You can visit me next Saturday, just for the afternoon. We’ll start slow.”

“Barring family emergencies or natural disasters, I will be here.”

She did believe that. And for now, it was enough.

When they left the bedroom, Biscuit was sitting just outside the door, as though guarding it from intruders. She barked once when she saw Blaine.

“Whose dog is that?” he asked.

“Darrell’s.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“We’re just friends,” she said. “He was the guy wearing the toga at the Halloween party.”

He gave her a smile, but she could tell it was a little forced. “As I said, you can date anyone you want. Just give me a chance.”

No way would she date anyone else, even if he let her. She had no interest in any other man. Not when she might be able to have Blaine for keeps.

After he left, she made mac and cheese and watched a movie, then finished her book with Biscuit curled up beside her.

She didn’t do any obsessive cleaning.

And she didn’t shed a single tear.

Her heart was slowly piecing itself back together.

Chapter Twenty-Three

It had been just over a month since Blaine had crashed a Halloween party in Georgeville, found Cassie the Beaver kissing Big Bird, and taken her back to his house for the weekend. In that month, he’d seen her several times. Every Saturday morning, he drove to Georgeville and they spent the day together. He had yet to spend the night with her, but that was okay. He could be patient and have faith they would get there eventually. Give her time to trust and forgive him.

Even though she didn’t let him stay overnight, that didn’t mean they weren’t having sex. She’d mused about stopping the physical part of their relationship and getting to know him in other ways, but that had lasted all of five minutes.

His life now revolved around those Saturday visits. As he approached Georgeville, his heart would always speed up at the thought of seeing her. And whenever his phone beeped, he would pounce on it, hoping it was her.

Sometimes it was. She would text him every now and then, call him about twice a week. It was all just so…normal. His love for her was fitting into regular life, not confined to one isolated, intense week of passion.

That night at the bar with Matthew, he’d started to believe he could have a real relationship with Cassie. Now he fully believed it.

She was exactly what he wanted.

He was exactly what she needed.

On Thursday afternoon, he left the office an hour early and was now sitting on a bench just inside the entrance to the mall, waiting for Sara.

Ah, there she was, pushing a stroller that was nearly as big as a tank. The storage area underneath was crammed with stuff.

“Sorry we were delayed,” Sara said. “Leaving the house can be such a production. Look who woke up just in time to say hello!”

Victoria’s mouth opened and…

Wow.

“She smiles now?” Blaine asked, leaning closer to grin back.

“I’m the one who’s home with her all day, but she first smiled for her daddy. Last week. Isn’t that right, sweetie?” Sara touched her daughter’s cheek, and Victoria gurgled. “You want to hold her, Blaine?”

“Um,” he said. “Well…I guess.”

“She won’t bite. She has no teeth yet.” Sara picked up the baby and handed her to him.

He took her awkwardly and bounced her up and down a little. She wasn’t wailing, so he supposed it wasn’t going badly. Eventually he managed to coax another smile out of her, and man, she was adorable.

“Do you want one?” Sara asked.

“Someday. But I have to get Cassie first.”

“You will.”

Victoria started fussing, and Sara took her back and placed her in the stroller.

“You’re going to be a good little girl for the next hour, aren’t you?” Sara said, her voice pitched higher than usual. “Just one hour and then you can go home and watch that fascinating fish mobile of yours.”

He pictured Cassie making a fish mobile. Seemed like the sort of thing she would do. Or maybe she’d make one with prehistoric creatures.

“Okay,” Sara said as she started walking. “The best store is to the right.”

With Sara’s help—and one crying fit, courtesy of Victoria—forty-five minutes later, he was in possession of a white gold promise ring with two hearts.

He didn’t plan to give it to Cassie yet. He would wait a little—at least until she agreed to be his girlfriend. But he wanted to be prepared for the right moment when it came.

“She’s going to love it,” Sara assured him.

At the door to the mall, he placed his hand above Victoria to say good-bye, and she grasped his pinky finger, her hands so impossibly tiny next to his.

One day, he told himself. One day.

Later, he was in his bedroom, putting the ring box in his dresser, when his phone rang. He grabbed it immediately, thinking it might be Cassie. Really, he should give her a special ringtone.

It wasn’t Cassie, however.

It was Mellie. The other woman he’d kissed this year.

“Did you get her back?” she asked.

“Working on it,” he said.

“That sounds promising.” She sighed. “I’m happy for you.”

“It will happen for you, too.” He couldn’t help but feel optimistic today.

“He’s married, and he’s not going to leave her.”

“Someone else, I mean. Someone who isn’t married, and someone who doesn’t jerk back when you kiss him.”

Yes, it was his date with Mellie that had forced him to admit his feelings for Cassie. He’d made up his mind during that kiss, and he hadn’t been able to stay away from Cassie any longer.

He got off the phone a few minutes later. He had some baking to do.

Cassie had told him that the flourless chocolate cake they’d shared at the Italian restaurant was the best thing she’d ever tasted, and watching her eat it had been almost as good as watching her orgasm. Over the past three weeks, he’d made a few flourless chocolate cakes, trying to find the perfect recipe. They’d all been good but not quite right, so he had yet to bring a cake to her. Instead, he’d eaten all of the chocolate cake himself. In fact, he’d now eaten flourless chocolate cake nineteen days in a row, which was probably not great for his body, so he’d been trying to balance it out with extra trips to the gym.

He pulled out the eggs and the butter from the fridge—he’d gone through a disturbing amount of butter lately. He was reaching for the cocoa powder when the phone rang.

This time it was Cassie.

He couldn’t stop himself from grinning.

“Saturday,” she said. “You’ll be here around noon?”

“Mm-hmm.” He was picturing her lips. How kissable they were. What if they were dusted with cocoa powder…?

“Rachel’s going to be in town tomorrow for the first time since Halloween. So I’ll be at Jenna’s, probably getting drunk on bad sangria.”

“That’s one thing I haven’t received from you yet. A drunken phone call.”

A chuckle came over the line. “Does that bother you?”

“It would be amusing.”

“Hmm. I’ll consider it.”

“What are you wearing?” he asked.

“Nothing.”

His cock jerked to attention. “Really?”

“No, silly. I changed out of my work clothes into my pajamas. I can’t believe you asked what I was wearing.”

“Too cliché? I wanted a complete picture.”

“You wanted phone sex.”

She knew him so well.

“My expectations were not high. That, like drunk dialing, is something that has not happened yet.” He paused. “What are you like when you’re drunk? I haven’t gotten drunk in a long time, but when I was nineteen, I tried to marry my calculus textbook after an excessive number of tequila shots.”

She laughed. “I better be going.” She never stayed on the phone long. “Time to cook dinner. I’ll see you on Saturday.”

Damn.

He put down the phone and returned to Flourless Chocolate Cake Attempt No. 5.

…

Jenna threw open the door. “Cassie! You’re late! We already made the sangria. And since I foolishly left Rachel alone with it for a minute, it contains not just wine, but vodka, too.”

Five minutes later, they were in Jenna’s living room, each lounging on a chair with a glass of strong sangria in hand. There was a platter of crackers, vegetables, and cheese on the table, but no one had touched it yet.

“Theo put it together before he went to Lawson’s,” Jenna said. “Last time you girls were over, we finished two family-sized bags of potato chips, and he thought I should be eating more nutritious meals.”

“Damn you and your thoughtful husband.” Rachel turned to Cassie. “But you’re the one who needs to start talking.”

Jenna pouted. “Aww. You don’t care about my life? I found a drowned mouse in the toilet yesterday. You may have heard the scream from Ottawa.”

Rachel ignored her. “What’s going on with Blaine? I hear he comes to Georgeville every weekend.”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Cassie said. “I’m just giving him a chance to prove he’s reliable and not just a one-passionate-week-of-amazing-sex kind of guy.” She shrugged. “No big deal.”

“It is a big deal. You’re taking my advice for once. I can’t remember the last time that happened.”

“Halloween. I dressed as a sexy animal, remember?”

“Really? You dressed as a beaver.” Rachel took a sip of sangria. “Anyway, you look really happy about this man of yours. I know it’s not just our lovely company that’s making you glow. Jenna, pass me a mirror.”

“A mirror? You’re kidding, right?” Jenna muttered.

“Fine. I’ll show you what your face looks like right now.” Rachel gave Cassie such an exaggerated grin that she had to laugh.

Yes, it was going well with Blaine, even though she was trying to take things slow. She kept wanting to call him, but often, when she reached for the phone, she’d snatch her hand back. She only let herself make the call once or twice a week.

“Stop with the stupid faces,” Jenna said to Rachel. “You look like the Cheshire Cat.” She turned to Cassie. “What’s holding you back from actually calling him your boyfriend?”

“I need to be a hundred percent certain he won’t leave me again. And right now, I’m sitting at about eighty-three percent.”

“Eighty-three?” Rachel said. “You sure it’s not eight-six? Or seventy-nine?”

“Come on. I was just throwing out an approximate number.” Cassie choked on her sangria. Man, this stuff sure was strong. “Up from sixty-seven percent, so he’s doing well.”

Rachel and Jenna looked at each other.

“What?” Cassie said.

“Enough with the numbers,” Jenna said.

“You’re never going to be a hundred percent certain of anything,” Rachel said. “You’re waiting for the impossible. At some point, you just have to take the risk.”

“But if he breaks my heart again—”

“You’ll survive.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“People can be married for thirty years and suddenly get divorced. Shit happens. You can’t live life never taking any risks. It’s not realistic.”

Cassie frowned. “Are you saying I never take risks?”

Jenna put her sangria on the table and reached for her hand. “Cassie, I love you, but you do play it safe. That’s not always a bad thing, but this is different.” She leaned back and waved a dismissive hand. “Yeah, Rachel and I gave Blaine a hard time when he showed up at the Halloween party, but he’s already proven he’s changed, and you clearly love him.”

Cassie wasn’t going to protest and say she didn’t love Blaine. Because she did. She’d resisted it at first when he came back into her life, but she couldn’t deny it now.

Was her friend right? Did she always play it safe?

Well, no. She’d met a man on the internet for BDSM. That couldn’t be considered playing it safe.

But maybe with her heart… She thought back to Johnny and how he’d felt like a safe option for her. A nice guy who worked at the hardware store. How much safer could you get?

Maybe her friends were right.

Maybe she needed to take a leap of faith.

“I know what it is.” Rachel smacked her glass down on the table. “Your mother. She gave your father a second chance, and he blew it in spectacular fashion. You don’t want to be like her. You’re terrified of turning into your mother, just like I’m terrified of turning into mine. In a different way, obviously.”

Jenna looked at her. “Wow. College sure is turning you into a psychoanalyst. Who would have thought?”

“It’s true,” Cassie said quietly. “I am scared of being like her.”

“But things turned out okay for your mother,” Rachel said. “She married someone else a few years later, and she’s happy, right?”

“She’s fine. Except when she knocked on my door when I was having sex with Blaine against the door. That was far from fine.”

Cassie slapped her hand over her mouth. Crap, had she actually said that out loud?

Jenna and Rachel howled with laughter.

“Were you doing it from behind?” Rachel asked. “Or—”

“Shut up or I’ll dump this sangria all over you.”

“Hey,” Jenna said. “I’m not cleaning that shit up from the couch.”

“Don’t worry,” Cassie said. “I’ll drink it instead of dumping it on Rachel. Pity to waste good alcohol.” She had another sip.

Rachel was right. Giving Cassie’s father a second chance hadn’t ruined her mother’s life. And giving Blaine a second chance wouldn’t ruin Cassie’s life, either. She wouldn’t let it.

Plus there was an eighty-three percent chance that wouldn’t happen.

“How certain were you about moving to Ottawa with Cole?” she asked Rachel.

“Not a hundred percent, that’s for sure,” Rachel said. “It was a big move, one I’d been terrified of making for ages. Though it was easier with him.” She leaned forward. “Are you thinking of moving to Ottawa?”

“Not now.”

Perhaps in the future. Although she liked Georgeville, it wouldn’t feel like a big sacrifice if she left town to be with Blaine. Where she lived wasn’t that important.

But before she considered moving for him, she should probably agree to be his girlfriend.

That thought didn’t seem so scary now.

She could handle a little risk for this man who made her feel like nobody else ever had.

Last Saturday, they’d gone for a walk around town and down the McNeil Trail. Even though it was the end of November and the bitter gusts of wind had chilled her to the bone, she hadn’t minded.

Because she was with him.

“Tomorrow,” she said, “I’ll call him my boyfriend.”

She pictured his face lighting up, those blue eyes that focused so intently on her sparkling with happiness.

“Good choice.” Rachel lifted her glass with a grin and clinked it against Cassie’s. “We need to celebrate. Jenna, where’s your secret stash of chips?”

…

Cassie woke up at seven the next morning, even though it wasn’t a work day. Despite all the sangria she’d had last night, her head wasn’t pounding…although she had a slight I’ve-been-drinking feeling.

She snuggled up under the blankets and tried to go back to sleep. But sleep wouldn’t come.

Blaine would be there in five hours.

Five hours.

That was far too long. She couldn’t wait until noon to see him. Couldn’t wait to tell him the truth.

I love you. I want to be with you. Only you.

She could call him, of course, but she didn’t want to tell him over the phone. She wanted to see his face. Wanted to touch him, too. Wanted to wrap her arms around him and press her face into the crook of his neck and feel his heat surrounding her.

She threw on a pair of jeans and a sweater, and then she packed a bag with a change of clothes and toiletries. She was on the road to Ottawa before seven thirty.

She didn’t call to tell him she was coming. She wanted it to be a surprise.

It was worth taking a risk for Blaine. She had no doubt of that now.

Chapter Twenty-Four

In a few minutes, Blaine would leave for Georgeville, as he had every Saturday for the past month. He’d woken up before eight and had been tempted to leave right away, but he’d told Cassie he would be there around noon.

He walked over to his bookshelf. In front of a row of novels, author names A through F, there was a photo of him and Cassie that he’d taken last weekend. Beside it was the old picture of him and his father in front of the Royal Tyrrell Museum.

I wish you could meet her. It seemed horribly wrong that his father would never get to know the woman who’d captured his heart.

Life was strange, and it didn’t always make sense, but somehow his had led him to Cassie, and for that, he was thankful.

He moved to the next shelf and picked up an ammonite. The one she’d sketched for him. He was just putting it back when there was a knock at the door.

He couldn’t help but remember the time Cassie’s mom had interrupted them while a tiny dog barked at their feet. That made him smile, even though someone was knocking on his door at nine thirty in the morning, and they were probably going to try to sell him window cleaning or a new roof.

He swung open the door, prepared to get the interruption over with as fast as possible.

But it wasn’t a salesman.

“Cassie,” he said, half in shock.

She was here. At his door.

And she was carrying a very large purse.

“Clean clothes for tomorrow,” she explained. “I don’t plan to spend a weekend in a beaver costume ever again.”

“Cassidy. You…”

“I came to you this time. For the rest of the weekend. ” She shut the door behind her and wrapped her arms around his neck. “I love you.”

Holy crap. Had he heard her right?

He was pretty sure he had. So he pulled her close and held her as tightly as he could.

Somewhere in his brain, there existed these things called words. Now would be a good time to string a few of them together. But he couldn’t do anything but kiss her for a long, long time, their lips melding together perfectly.

“I love you, too,” he finally managed to respond.

“I can’t think of anyone but you. I sure as hell haven’t been able to date anyone else in the past month. And I trust you. We can have those days when we do nothing but stay in bed and have sex, and those are great. But we have so much more than that, too. You were right, Blaine.”

“Mm,” he said. “I like hearing those words. I’m glad I won the bet after all.”

She gave him a playful shove. “I can’t walk away from you now. You proved to me that our relationship isn’t just about mindblowing sex, but the fact that the sex is so good with you…I do think that means something. So…I’ll be your girlfriend. There’s nothing I want more than you in my life.”

She started kissing her way up his neck, and when she reached his mouth, they shared a deep kiss that felt like a promise.

“The time we spent together,” he said, “both this year and last year—I always felt like I could be my weird, nerdy self with you. That you liked those parts of me. And the things we explored in bed together—I couldn’t do that with any other woman. For me, you’re unlike anyone else, and I want us to last forever.” He paused. “I bought you something. Let me get it.”

He ran upstairs to his bedroom feeling weightless with joy and took the promise ring out of his night table.

Cassie Monroe loved him.

She’d finally agreed to be with him, only him, so it felt like exactly the right time to do this.

He came back to the living room and held out the ring in the palm of his hand. “It’s a promise ring,” he said. “May I?”

She nodded, her eyes sparkling.

He turned her hand over in his, touching her soft skin, and slid the ring onto her finger. “If it makes you uncomfortable, you don’t have to wear it.”

“Of course I want to wear it. But I don’t need this to know you’re devoted to me—”

He smiled wide. “Devoted. That’s exactly what I am.”

“Still, I love it, and I love the idea of always wearing something you gave me.”

He took both of her hands in his. “Someday, we will have the dress and the picket fence, the two-and-a-half kids and a dog, too. But for now, it’s just the two of us. And that’s everything I want.”

He wasn’t going to lose Cassie. She was his.

And it filled him with joy.

…

Now that Cassie was with Blaine, really with him, she didn’t feel like she was risking her heart at all.

She looked at the ring, and then she looked into his eyes. And like the first time she’d caught sight of him at Tim Hortons more than a year ago, it nearly knocked her off her feet, that special connection that arced between them.

But he wasn’t a stranger anymore. She knew him, and she trusted him. They’d spent a whole weekend together a month ago, and they would spend this weekend together, too.

This time, she wouldn’t try to prove it was sex and nothing else. This time, she wouldn’t fantasize about breaking his heart the way he’d broken hers. This time, she wouldn’t fear that she was falling in love with him all over again.

Because she was in love with him. And there was nothing to be afraid of.

She rubbed her ring finger over his cheek, the metal pressing against his skin. “Just the two of us? Sounds good to me. I wonder what sort of trouble we could get up to…?”

She was about to drop to her knees when something on the kitchen island caught her eye. It was a large plastic container with a chocolate cake inside.

“Wow. Did you bake for me?”

“Sort of. I wasn’t going to bring it to you today, but—”

“No?” She went to the kitchen and pulled the lid off the container. “There’s three-quarters of a homemade chocolate cake in here, and you’re saying you never intended to give me any of it?”

He looked semi-guilty. “I didn’t bring you the chocolate cakes I made the last three weeks, either.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Cakes? How many?”

“Um…this makes five.”

Okay, that was truly shocking.

Although the idea of him baking was kind of hot.

Very hot.

“Blaine, we need to talk about your duties and responsibilities as my official boyfriend. If you bake chocolate cake, I get some. Or any other flavor of cake. Or pie. Or cookies.”

“Okay. Got it.”

But she still didn’t understand. “Are you just making chocolate cakes and eating them by yourself?”

“Well, yes. I’ve been trying to find the perfect flourless chocolate cake recipe for you, but my research isn’t complete yet. This one’s the best so far, but it’s still not quite right. The butter-to-chocolate ratio, perhaps? I have high hopes for number six, though.”

She started laughing. Oh man. This guy. Life would always be interesting with him, no matter where they were. She didn’t know where life would take them—perhaps she would move to Ottawa in the next few months?—but the important thing was that they were together.

Cassie cut herself a thin slice of cake.

“Wow,” she said after she tasted it. “This is incredible.”

“But not quite as incredible as the cake we had at the restaurant, which was my goal. Your response to that cake was a little more…orgasmic.”

“Was it?”

“Mm-hmm. Fortunately, I have lots of non-chocolate cake ideas that are guaranteed to get the same response out of you.”

“Do you, now?”

“I do. I think you’ll like them very much.”

And with that, he swept her off her feet and carried her to bed.

They didn’t eat any more cake for a very long time.

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Acknowledgments

Thank you to everyone at Entangled for getting Seducing His True Love out into the world. My editors, Brenda Chin and Nina Bruhns, helped make this book even better, and I couldn’t have done it without them. Thank you also to Toronto Romance Writers and to my husband and father for all their support.

About the Author

Laura Jardine decided she wanted to be a writer when she was in grade two, sometime between writing “The Heart That Got Lost” and “The Land of Shapes.” She later studied engineering and worked as a geophysicist before turning to writing romance novels.

Laura lives in Toronto with her husband, and despite living in Canada her whole life, she hates winter. When she’s not writing, she enjoys cooking, hiking, eating too much gelato, and reading on the balcony when it’s raining.

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