Total pages in book: 56
Estimated words: 54572 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 273(@200wpm)___ 218(@250wpm)___ 182(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 54572 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 273(@200wpm)___ 218(@250wpm)___ 182(@300wpm)
Last night had been unparalleled. There was no other word for it.
I had good sex before. Passionate sex. Connected sex. But this? This had felt like something breaking open. Like years of restraint burned off in a single night. He touched me like he was starving, like he was memorizing me in case this was all he got.
Maybe that was why it had been so intense.
Maybe he somehow knew this wouldn’t work and it was a one-time thing.
I shifted carefully, testing my body. Sore. Used. Satisfied in a way that made my lips curve despite myself.
And that right there was the danger, it was me playing with fire.
Because I could do this. I could take this night, file it away under unexpected but excellent, and go to work in an hour or so like life was normal. I was good at compartmentalizing. No one survived my line of work without learning how to put everything in the appropriate box.
One night stands weren’t my thing. They never had been.
But this wasn’t a one night stand.
This was unfinished business finally catching fire.
Dante stirred beside me, breath hitching as consciousness crept in. His hand moved first, sliding over the sheet until it landed on my hip, heavy and possessive even in sleep. I stilled, not ready for him to wake just yet.
Too late.
His eyes opened slowly, dark and unreadable until they focused on me. There it was, the moment recognition hit. Relief. Want. Something softer that made my chest tighten.
“You’re still here,” he whispered, voice rough with sleep.
“For now,” I replied lightly.
He pushed up on one elbow, eyes skimming my face like he was checking for cracks. “Stay.”
It wasn’t a demand. It wasn’t playful. It was a naked truth, an honest request.
I took a breath, already feeling the familiar shift inside me, the part of me that stepped back, that evaluated risk. “I can’t.”
His jaw tightened. “Your flight? You could reschedule.”
“Leaves in four hours,” I finished calmly. “I won’t be missing it.”
He sat up fully then, the sheet pooling around his waist. God, he looked like sin in the morning light. Scratches on his shoulder. A faint bruise at his collarbone that I’d put there. Evidence.
Last night echoed between us.
“I could drive you,” he said. “We could get breakfast. Talk.”
I smiled, small and controlled. “No.”
That stopped him.
I turned onto my side, propping my head on my hand, forcing myself to meet his gaze. “Dante, last night was,” I paused because I wanted my words to be just right, “incredible. Truly. And I’m grateful for it.”
His eyes flicked away at that. “You sound like you’re thanking me for a favor. Come on, Nita, we’re better than that shit.”
“I’m thanking you for a moment,” I corrected. “That’s what it was.”
He laughed once, sharp. “You don’t believe that.”
“I do,” I said evenly. Because I have to. I didn’t share that with him.
Silence stretched. I could see the gears turning behind his eyes, the part of him that planned, that controlled chaos instead of letting it control him.
He reached for my hand, thumb brushing over my knuckles. “We don’t have to make this small.”
I pulled my hand back gently. “We aren’t going to make it anything.”
That hurt landed clean. I saw it. The flicker of something wounded before it disappeared behind that familiar stonewall. But I kept going, because if I didn’t say it now, I ran the risk of becoming weak to the sheer allure that was all things Dante Verdone.
“We aren’t this,” I stated. “We aren’t going to do the long-distance thing. We aren’t going to do the late-night calls or the maybe someday promises. I’m going to go back to my life. You’re going to go back to yours. Back to reality where you call me the night before my birthday to tell me first before the flowers come the next morning. The one where I send you a text on your birthday and we see who will reach out first on Lamonte’s. We’re gonna go back to the way things were where my sister mails you a Christmas card and it always has a picture of me with my nieces so you always call to tell me how big they are getting and how beautiful the Banks women are. We aren’t anything more than what we have been, check the box friends holding onto something from many moons ago.”
He frowned. “You don’t know what I’m offering.”
“I know exactly what you offer,” I stated quietly. “Space. Silence. Waiting. Worry. I’m not doing that.”
He leaned forward, forearms on his knees. “You think I’d make you wait?”
“Yes,” I confirmed without hesitation. “Because you always have. Even when you weren’t here. Even when you lived in Maryland. You make people wait until you’re ready. And Dante, I am on no man’s schedule or timeline.”
That landed harder. At least my point was getting across. I swung my legs over the side of the bed, standing despite the protest of my body. I wrapped the robe around myself, hiding away my insecurities that my traitorous body would show him how much I still wanted another round. Yes, my robe, a garment to cover, a way to put something between us.