 
# Last Dance

Missed Connections #1

by Jeffe Kennedy
It was five minutes. His hand on the small of her back. His eyes watching like there was no one else in the crowded club. His body a breath away from hers. A kiss full of heat and need and promise.

But then the stranger disappears. And Charlotte Emory can't forget him. Worse, according to the dating Rules she and her four best friends swear by, all she can do is post an ad online. No names, no numbers. Just a missed connection – and the hope he'll meet her, and see where another dance leads.

Except Mr. Mystery has his game, too, and he isn't playing for only one night. He tempts Charley into a daring exploration of power, lust, and suspense, where even the most innocent requests sound indecent...and the indecent ones make her burn all night.

If she plays by the Rules, they'll never get past teasing each other. But rules were made to be broken...
Copyright © 2017 by Jennifer M. Kennedy

All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the author.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or business establishments, organizations or locales is completely coincidental.

Thank you for reading!

Credits

Content Editor: Deborah Nemeth

Production Editor: Rebecca Cremonese

Cover Design: Kellie Dennis, Book Cover by Design

## Table of Contents

Title Page

About the Book

Copyright Page

Acknowledgements

The Rules

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Epilogue

Titles by Jeffe Kennedy

About Jeffe Kennedy

## Acknowledgements

A number of people helped me with this book, filling in all the many things I don't know about my characters and their professions.

Many thanks to Elisabeth Lane for the section on making Bananas Foster waffles—both the idea and the execution.

Thanks to Shari Slade and Alexandra Haughton for providing excellent dance metaphors.

Elizabeth Ryann suggested using Damon's bathroom on Vampire Diaries and HGTV.

Nancy "One-Swing-Teichman" Bauer gets credit for help with Chicago details. And for being my sister in TTKE all these years.

Much gratitude to Sonali Dev for frank advice on an Indian woman living in the U.S. Now I know _never_ to say "cashmere pashmina." Any mistakes made by this fair-skinned Irish Catholic girl are mine. Sonali tried to keep me honest! She and Joan Bell Hanegan also get many thanks for suggesting the name "Anaisa."

You all may have noted Rebecca Cremonese cited in the credits. Not only does she copy edit my work, she builds style guides, nags me on consistencies and – in this case – told me All The Things about life in musical theater. I incorporated what I could. All improbabilities that remain are my fault entirely.

As always, thanks to my "team" – David and Carien, for all you do to keep the balls in the air and me herded. I'd be lost without you!

## The Rules

As women holding ourselves to certain standards (if not necessarily high ones), we of the Fabulous Five agree to abide by the following Rules:

1. It is permissible to dance or hang with any man once and once only in order to assess his fitness according to the following criteria: Looks, Rhythm, Taste, Touch, and Chemistry, with a maximum of one point per criterion.

Amendment 1a. Partial points are permissible, in multiples no smaller than a tenth.

2. A man must score at least a two out of five to advance to the second round—dating or dancing.

Amendment 2a. This must be a score of 2.0 or better. No rounding up from a score below 2.0 is permitted.

3. Cell numbers will be given only upon request, never offered, and only to those who've advanced to round three.

4. A score of four out of five is needed to advance to round three. No exceptions. This can include additional dances, dates, or making out, short of intercourse.

Amendment 3a. This must be a score of 4.0 or better. No rounding up from a score below 4.0 is permitted.

5. No sex with any man who has not advanced to round four, which requires maintaining a score of 4.0 or better following round 3.

6. Anyone who has agreed to abide by these rules and fails to do so will pay a penalty as determined by the group.

Amendment 6a. Rounding up from lower scores will elicit a more severe penalty.

Amendment 6b. (aka the Charley Amendment) Poor math skills are no excuse.

## ~ 1 ~

The problem with martinis is, although they look and taste fabulous—plus low carb, if done right—the steep slope of the glass makes them easy to spill. Disaster in the making.

Particularly on the second round.

Being a cautious sort, if only in this arena, I sipped at mine before taking another step and used the opportunity to survey the club's offering of masculine company. And to let them get a good look at me. _Take the spotlight when you can because there's always someone meaner ready to upstage you._ The bright bounce of lights glanced off a good set of shoulders here—and ooh, a very nice ass in black jeans there. A table of guys gave me a long look as I passed and I pretended not to notice, though the dark-haired one could be a possible.

"Any likelies?" Amy asked, taking the fresh drink from me as I got to our table, blowing me a kiss of thanks. She wore a lacy black sheath she'd designed in her spare time and made from remnants at her job—and she made it look like couture, the talented bitch.

I set down my own glass. "Nobody stands out as fabulous. But the table over your right shoulder might have potential."

"The night is young," Ice observed, scanning the dance floor below with dark eyes. She'd refused another round, as had Julie. Both of them still nursed their first drink, though Ice—Anaisa, though only her professors called her that—was theoretically not supposed to drink alcohol. She made a regular practice of doing all the things her family disapproved of, which was fairly easy since most of them lived elsewhere, some of them in India. Marcia didn't drink at all and she clutched her seltzer, clearly wishing to be at home. It was a rare Friday night that I didn't have a show, Julie wasn't slaving in her restaurant, and everyone else was free, too, so we'd talked Marcia into coming out with us instead of staying behind in our empty house. But no one could force her to have fun.

Believe me, I'd tried. My own personal sacred mission. Saint Charley, that's me.

"I gave the bartender Marcia's number though," I added, because I couldn't resist. The girl needed poking. "He said he wanted a virgin sacrifice for some shamanistic ritual."

"Oh, ha ha." Marcia at least transferred her black look from the seltzer to me. "There's nothing wrong with saving myself."

"Saving is economical." Amy nodded, making a serious face.

"A virtue, even." Julie licked off the end of the plastic gecko tail the Lizard Club used for drink stirrers. "Unless you count hoarding. Then it turns ugly."

"Oh my god. That show is riveting." Ice shuddered. "I'm horrified but I can't look away. Even in reruns."

"It's a disease." I deflected Marcia's glower of warning with my best Julia Roberts angelic smile. It's a good one. I've practiced it. "You can't judge people like that—just give them your compassion and try to help. Or refer them to social services."

"Charlotte Emory, I'm going to crawl across this table and strangle you if you don't shut up," Marcia growled.

I batted my lashes at her. "What? I'm just trying to help."

"Well, you're not. I'll find the right guy sooner or later."

"Sooner is more likely with you pried out of the house," Ice noted.

"And later than anyone we know," Amy toasted her with a martini already half gone.

"Than the rest of the known universe." Julie poked Marcia with the gecko tail, which at least diverted Marcia's attention onto her.

"I hate all of you." Marcia folded her arms. "Why don't you go dance already?"

"Hello, ladies." Ooh, right on cue, Mr. Dark Hair had come through. His gaze fell on me and I returned his very charming smile. "Wanna dance?" he asked me.

Yes. Yes, I did.

I took a buzz-sustaining swallow of my martini and pushed it over to Marcia for guarding. She wrinkled her nose at me, but she took her duty seriously, no matter how much she grumbled. We kept talking about getting those coasters or maybe the nail polish that changes colors in the presence of roofies, but in the meantime we employed the tried and true designated table-sitter system. Someone had to stay and guard the drinks and valuables. Ideally we rotated duty, but since Marcia wouldn't ever dance, she usually got stuck with it. We all knew it wasn't fair, but I figured she'd eventually get on the dance floor out of sheer misery, if nothing else.

What can I say? If I was good at math I'd be a brilliant medical student like Ice, not a poor man's Taylor Swift.

"I'm Jeff," said Mr. Dark Hair, offering his hand as we walked to the dance floor.

"Charley," I told him.

"Cute."

I pursed my lips in a little kiss. "Thank you, slick."

"I meant the name, but so are you."

Charmer.

Taking the high road, I overlooked his buddies giving him the thumbs-up as we passed their table. _Boys._ Hopefully some of them would ask my girlfriends to dance, too. With the one glaring exception, we all loved to dance and the Rules allowed us to say yes to pretty much any guy who asked, barring major red flags. But only once.

After that, it seriously depended. A guy had to hit two out of five criteria to earn a second dance. Those standards, doncha know. Gotta have 'em or we're tempted to let them slide.

Especially then.

We reached the dance floor and the music drowned out all possibility of conversation, which was just as well as it's not one of the five criteria for a reason. Soon Ice and Amy were dancing nearby. Julie, always considerate, had probably stayed behind to keep Marcia company. I'd have to take a turn next or she'd feel too guilty to have fun. I'd have to anyway if Charming Jeff didn't up his game and at least meet a two. He had a solid zero for Rhythm and it wasn't looking good for the rest. But I couldn't backslide into rounding up again. Ice would cut off my toes.

Really, I could stop with a zero for Rhythm, as it's the most important for me. There's that joke about whatever conservative religious group prohibits sex standing up—because it might lead to dancing. _So true._ Seriously, you could tell a lot about a guy by the way he danced, both how he'd be in bed and out. But not everything is about sex—alas for that!—and I'd had some good times with guys who bottomed out on Rhythm, and still hit solid overall four from the other categories.

Thus Ice and I had developed our original five-point criteria.

1. _Looks._ Not how he looks, though it's a factor, but whether he pays attention to the woman he's with or has to scan the room for other possibilities. This cannot be overestimated. A guy who always looks at other women? Will always look for other women. Been there. Not doing it again.

2. _Rhythm._ Okay, even though this is critical for me, even I know not everyone has the moves. We make fun of white-boy dancing for a reason and that particular ethnic group does not have a corner on the market. But a guy who doesn't use his hips on the dance floor to a rocking groove won't move them in bed either. Takes a lot to make up for that. It can be done, but... yeah.

3. _Taste._ This is subjective, but key. A guy has to have a certain amount of class. He's out at a club, he can dress decently. Don't get me started on the corporate drone look. Take a change of clothes to work already. Along with this, he can have the manners not to attempt dirty grinding on the first dance. Making an effort to be charming is always a plus.

4. _Touch._ Depending on the song, this aspect can't always be assessed on the first dance. That makes it a bye for most guys on the first, an automatic point, like getting credit for putting your name at the top of the test paper. Still, there are opportunities. How and how much a guy touches you can give critical clues. If you don't like his clammy handshake or attempt to cop a feel too soon, it does not bode well for later action. And mushy kisses? Just no. No, no, no.

5. _Chemistry._ The elusive chemical element that trumps all the rest, even for me. It can be tempting to advance a guy to the next round who fails on the first four criteria, based entirely on the zing of chemistry. Major no-no and part of why we have the Rules. Conversely, a guy can ring up just fine on one through four, bomb on this last and still advance. However, it's the difference between kissing your brother and kissing your lover. Cannot be faked or redeemed. Regrettable, but there it is.

Now—some of the more serious-minded, less shallow members of the Fabulous Five will argue that the guy's personality goes here. Things like humor, honesty, integrity, and whatever all. But I figure that stuff comes in later. Like planning marriage and babies later. So not what I'm interested in. Call me shallow and frivolous—I'm at peace with that.

Charming Jeff scored fine on three and four and did okay on chemistry—but totally bombed the rest. Big fail on keeping his attention on me, as he kept scanning the room for other, possibly better partners, not to mention looking to his buddies for approval, yet again. Spare me. Then the stiff hips thing. Still, he had a solid 2.5 when the song ended, and I would have given Not-So-Charming Jeff another chance to raise his score, but he tossed off a thanks and went over to high five one of his buddies.

Tanked his score right there.

So I spelled Julie at the table keeping Marcia company, then rotated off with the other gals through the evening. All of it blurred into that ideal high-frequency whirl of breathless dancing, the sweet buzz of the drinks, the laughter of my girlfriends, and the hot gazes of guys.

My sweet zone.

None of the guys present really did it for me though. Not enough to give them a spin for the more intimate kind of dance. A seriously meh evening when 2.5-Jeff pinged the high score. Too bad, because the music thumped in my blood and I simmered under the skin to get laid. I'd been too busy performing, auditioning, and rehearsing lately. I never had time for a boyfriend. Or the inclination, because who needs that crap? But hot monkey sex on my night off would have been a lovely treat. No such luck for our heroine. The waitresses had already circled for last call and the prospects looked worse than dim.

The song came to a close, shifting into the final slow dance. The Guns N' Roses cover of "Knocking on Heaven's Door." Nice. The crowd groaned, with some people leaving and others sliding in for the clinch. I like the song, but my latest partner—barely a two anyway—dashed off to snag one last drink before they closed the bar. Good to know where _his_ priorities lay.

I tell you—the Rules work.

I headed off the floor, ready to round up the others and blow the place, when a warm hand caught my elbow. I looked over my shoulder. And up. Into lovely warm brown eyes set in a square-jawed face, framed by tousled dark-blond hair. More corporate than I usually went for, but hello Chemistry.

"Don't go," he said and tugged me back onto the floor. "Dance with me."

_Okay then._ I didn't usually go for pushy, but the way he coaxed me into the rhythm of the music—folding my right hand in his left and resting his other at the small of my back in a perfectly polite, smoothly mannered way—totally suckered me in. He led with practiced form and confidence, ringing up a very solid four in the first fifteen seconds, hitting full marks on Touch, Rhythm and Taste, along with that delicious zing of Chemistry. Wow.

Now, beer-goggles—or, in my case, martini-spectacles—are a very real thing. Usually I can count on my scores going up toward the end of the evening, particularly if I haven't gotten laid in a while. It's like food or alcohol portions—if you don't measure them they creep up on you. Particularly when you're hungry, which I pretty much always am. I know this about myself.

More important, the rest of the Fabulous Five know it and hold my feet to the fire.

Which is why it's a solid rule none of us sleeps with a guy unless we've danced with him at least three times. This precludes any bad decisions arising from last-dance desperation.

I seriously considered breaking that rule.

This guy. He danced like a dream. Yeah, it was a slow one, but he didn't succumb to the clinch-and-sway solution. He carried me into a lovely modified two-step, starting simple, his generous mouth curving when I followed easily enough, our bodies finding an immediate groove, slow and savory.

And he kept his gaze locked on mine. I might have been the only woman in the room. Girls, we have a five. Ding ding ding! Heady stuff after the evening I'd had. His hand burned at the small of my back, the music throbbing between us. Expertly guiding me away from an oblivious couple, he pulled me closer and I went with it, letting my breasts press against his chest, loving the flare of heat in his eyes as I did, the way he focused on my mouth.

I didn't care if it was the last dance—I was so doing this guy.

The music wove us together, bodies in sync, the hook drawing us in. His lips brushed mine, a whisper of a question. _Oh yeah._ I sank in, letting the kiss from a stranger brew through my blood, dreamier than any drink on the planet. He kissed like he danced, with slow, confident care. Offering a rhythm and running with it once he knew I'd followed. He tasted of peppermint—a candy he'd sucked on to cover the hint of whiskey, which still wound beneath, a waft of wood smoke on a crisp autumn day.

I melted. Gave myself over to the satiating crash of the music and the sweep of sensual delight that was this man's mouth. His shoulder muscles strong beneath his silky shirt, his fingers caressing my spine and his clever tongue tracing the inside of my upper lip.

Magic.

The lights flared bright as the final chords faded. A protest went up from the dance floor as we all cringed, vampires caught by the light of dawn, nightclub makeup too harsh on pale faces. The lovely dream of music and casual desire abruptly crashed.

## ~ 2 ~

"Night's over—everybody out!" The big bouncer boomed the order cheerfully enough, herding people to the door. "Let's move it along, people."

A drunk girl crashed into me, protesting that it couldn't be that late. In her righteous though misguided conviction, she rocked me back on my heels. Worse, she dragged her date along as she pursued her case with the bouncer, wedging between me and Mr. Mystery. It shouldn't have been possible, tall as he was, but he disappeared into the crowd. A steady current carried me to the doors, though I fought it valiantly.

So, I'm not the one who does the chasing typically. Okay, really ever at all because I have my pride. But a girl does _not_ let a five-pointer get away.

"Wrong way, honey," another bouncer barred my way. "Doors are behind you. Let's go."

"I have to find my date!" God, I sounded as bad as Drunk Girl.

"Find him outside." He made an implacable wall of his body.

"Charley." Ice grabbed my arm and tugged at me. "There you are! Let's go already. Pancakes!"

My lips still tingled from the amazing Mr. Mystery, but he'd vanished. Kill me now if I'd lost him. "I need to find someone."

"Who—the guy you liplocked?" Amy joined us, Julie and Marcia behind her. "Who was he anyway?"

"I don't know." _Dammit._ "I didn't get his name."

"Well he sure got your number, judging by the way you were all over him." Julie waggled her eyebrows.

"Ladies!" The big bouncer glared at us and pointed. "Out already."

"Let's go. We have your stuff." Marcia took my other arm and they hustled me to the doors, not letting me drag my feet.

"We'll spot him outside," Amy reassured me, craning her neck and helping me search like the good friend she was.

"How can you kiss a guy without knowing his name?" Julie asked.

"Did he at least get yours?" Ice threw a glare at Julie as we emerged into the night air of Chicago's Loop.

"No. We only had the one dance." I turned in a slow circle, scanning the crowd streaming away in all directions, coming back around to meet four stern faces.

"Only one dance—and the last one at that?" Julie shook her head. "You can't go home with him anyway. You know better than that."

"And you kissed him!" Amy, no longer such a great friend, said it like I'd admitted to killing puppies.

"This is fate intervening," Ice agreed. "You were in danger. Total backslide, Charley."

"You guys—he was a five pointer!"

"Immaterial." Julie offered her verdict and the others nodded in agreement. "Any guy can be a five-pointer for one dance. And _you_ know the last dance is particularly perilous for you. You have to pay a penalty for intimate contact before the third dance."

"This doesn't count." I wanted to stomp my foot, which does not work in stilettos. "This is guy is an exception."

"That's what you said with Jan—remember him? He's why we have the Charley amendment."

"That's for math," I fumed. Also why I didn't do smaller increments than a point-five, because I got confused somewhere around the point-threes. And because martinis.

"Really all of the amendments are Charley amendments," Julie said.

"Penalty time." Amy folded her arms. "I vote dishes all week."

"Oh my god—you people are unreal."

"It's a reasonable penalty. You'd say the same to any of us." Ice looped her arm through mine. "Now I want pancakes."

"You thought up the Rules in the first place," Marcia added. "No changing them because you feel the pain." She looked entirely too pleased with herself.

The crowd had dispersed with no sign of Mr. Mystery. I wanted to weep. How could the universe do this to me? "I don't want to take him home." _Necessarily._ "We got pulled apart by some drunk chick and that's why he didn't get a chance to ask for my number." Because he would have. Except why had he vanished like that?

"Cheer up, Cinderella." Ice steered me down the street to our favorite all-night breakfast place. "Maybe Prince Charming left a shoe on the stairs."

* * *

Not only did he not leave a shoe—the guy left no trace of himself. Anywhere.

Though I talked Julie into going back to the club with me the next night, there was no sign of him. The following Friday heralded the end of my dish-washing sentence, but did not bring Mr. Mystery to back to the dance floor. Though I danced with a few guys, nobody scored above a 1.5—my worst record ever—and I ended up spending a lot of the time at the table with Marcia.

Much more of that and I'd become a virgin again myself.

Too much sitting, moping, and not-dancing conspired to give me a vicious hangover the following morning. Which sucked, as I had an audition that afternoon for a new musical that I really wanted to be a part of. Julie, taking pity on me, made me her special Bloody Mary cure—just enough vodka to be anesthetic, lots of spice to clear the brain. A bonus for her that I'd gotten stuck with dishes all week because it had let her indulge in cooking that much more. I might have my flaws, but I cleaned like a demon. No smudges on _my_ dishes.

"I don't understand how he just disappeared like that." I adjusted the pillows so I could drink my Bloody Mary and give Julie room on the couch. "I mean, _he_ grabbed _me_ for the dance. _He_ went in for the kiss. How could he be that direct and then just walk away, never to be seen again?

"Maybe you scared him," Marcia suggested, coming down the stairs of the house we shared, wandering through the living room on her way to the kitchen. "Did you call him 'slick'?"

"I call all of them slick." I'd developed the habit on purpose. Made me feel kind of like Greta Garbo. And it reminded me not to take any of them too seriously. Not that I mixed up names—all that often—but, you know, throes of passion and all that.

"Marcia could have a point," Julie reflected.

"She doesn't because I barely had any time to scare him."

Marcia snorted, returning with her herbal tea. "You're just miffed because he got away."

"That's not fair."

"She's got a point, Charley. If you'd banged him, you'd probably already be over him and on the lookout for a new guy."

"I'm not that bad."

"You're not? When was the last time you dated a guy longer than a week?"

"It's not always me. They move on, too." Though everyone knew being the dumper ruled over being the dumpee. That isn't hard to figure out.

"I'll give you that." Marcia sat down and swiped on her tablet. "That it's not always you. But you've already pined over this Prince Charming ditching you at the ball longer than you date most guys. You have to admit something is going on with that."

"He was a fucking five-pointer!"

"Who you didn't fuck," Julie added.

"Yes!" I pointed at her. "If I'd been able to fuck him as God intended, then I wouldn't be all torn up about this. Now I'll never know and the curiosity and suspense are going to kill me."

Marcia handed me her tablet.

I stared at it stupidly. "Why am I looking at Craigslist? Is there a psycho sex killer I've missed dating?"

"No," she shook her head. "Don't you ever read the Missed Connections ads?"

Julie laid her head on my shoulder to look with me. "Never heard of it."

"Me neither." I picked one at random. " _Amanda – m4w (Chicago) I know online dating is weird, but I'm not an ax murderer, I swear. I'd still like to ride bikes._ " I peered at Marcia. "I don't get it."

"It's for when people don't know how to contact someone. So, the m4w means this guy is looking for this girl named Amanda, but he doesn't have her number. He's hoping she'll see the ad and get in touch. Give him another chance."

"It's stalker-y."

Against my shoulder, Julie nodded. "Look at this one," she said. " _Guy cutting grass on 91 south of bluemound – m4m. We talked as you cut your grass....you had a blue shirt on......we found out we had a common connection. This is a long shot....you are smokin hot.......if you have any interest in safe play email me back. I am similar in body type to you, let me know if we can get together some time.......tell me your name so I know you are real, starts with M, also your line of work._ "

"Don't say 'm4m,'" Marcia corrected her. "Man for man."

"Or 'creepy stalker dude looking for hapless neighbor guy for kinky sex.' Scary."

"It's romantic." Marcia snatched the tablet back. "I read them all the time. So many stories there. Plus—it's not against the Rules. It's less than a dance. Like round zero. Pre-scoring."

We considered the import of that in silence. A door thumped upstairs and Julie rolled her eyes at the ceiling. "Ice is awake. She brought one home last night."

"What score?" I asked, angling to see the stairs better.

"Dunno. Didn't get a look at them. Just _overheard_." Julie shared a wall with Ice, who brought men home more than the rest of us. Her family expected her to marry "within the community," as they put it. Short of arranged marriage, but not necessarily true love. Which she didn't believe in more than any of us—except Marcia—but she combatted her dread of the future by doing as many men as humanly possible, like she could bank it all up for a lifetime of marital woe and abstinence.

I'd constructed the initial Rules especially for Ice when we were freshman year roomies at Northwestern, to at least keep her from scraping the bottom of the barrel. Then she'd gotten all science-y with me and added scores because of an unfortunate sliding-scale incident of mine at a fraternity party.

Of such incidents history is made.

He clattered down the stairs, still buttoning his jeans, shirt open to show a considerable dough-boy belly, and halted in consternation to find himself the focus of three assessing gazes. Ice, glam in her sequined emerald robe, followed behind him barefoot, rolled her eyes, and shook her head.

"Good morning, ladies," he said with a half-hearted wave. and we all waved back. He grabbed his cowboy hat—seriously?—and scooted out the door, giving Ice a kiss, which she dodged by turning her cheek. That bad then.

"A fat cowboy. Seriously?" Julie drawled, echoing my thoughts and making me giggle. We high fived and Marcia shook her head at us.

"Hey, don't fat-shame," she said, pulling her sweatshirt down and scowling at her hips, which were seriously not fat at all. Not that she believed us when we said so.

"We're not fat-shaming," I said somberly. "We're hat-shaming."

Ice picked up Julie's feet, sat, and draped them over her lap. "Okay, okay. My turn to do dishes. He was only a two and I did him anyway." She glared at me. "It's Charley's fault for dragging us to the damn Lizard Club again, searching for The One That Got Away. That place is played out."

"Oh yeah, blame me for your restless hoo-haw."

"Besides," Marcia inserted, ever the peacemaker, "we're trying something else to find Mr. Mystery. We're trying a Missed Connections ad."

"Oh!" Dark eyes glittering, Ice clapped her hands. "I'm totally addicted to those."

"How have you even heard of them?" I demanded.

"Some of us read more than _Playbill_."

"Have you ever placed one?" Julie asked.

"No. But I've thought about it and I figure it's not against the Rules. Who knows? Maybe someday one will be for me."

"To My Future American Bride." I assumed an over-the-top Indian accent, undaunted by the mean look Ice slanted my way. "I saw your passport photo. I am a virgin but I have many cows. Come home and bear my hordes of ungrateful children so you can be my barefoot kitchen slave for life. Tell me which number wife you'll be, so I know it's you."

"Ha ha, Charley. You'd be sorry if I roofied you and shipped you there in my place."

"Hmm. I'm not sure I want my abducted-into-a-harem fantasy to be that real."

"Besides, you know it's not like that. My family just has... strong preferences for my choice of husband."

Marcia swiped at the tablet. "No fighting or I send you two to your rooms. Let's compose Charley's. Woman for Man. Lizard Club, a week ago Friday."

"We're not doing this." I shrugged Julie off my shoulder and stood, draining my Bloody Mary. "Only sad and desperate people do that."

Marcia narrowed her eyes at me. "Are you calling me sad and desperate?"

"No," Ice said glumly. "That would be me."

Julie and I exchanged glances and Marcia huffed out an exasperated sigh. "None of us are. But _you_ , Ms. Charley, could have any guy you wanted."

"Pretty much has." Ice ducked the pillow I threw at her.

"It's true," Marcia agreed, typing. "You're like the fairy princess of good fortune. So if _anyone_ is going to come out well from a Missed Connection ad, it's you."

"No ad," I decided. "It's too much like chasing the guy."

"Stalking the Lizard Club isn't?" Ice demanded.

"That's different." It really was. I groped for a good reason that it was. "That's just, like, putting myself in the way of serendipity."

The front door opened and Amy, blonde hair in a ponytail, face bright from her morning run, bounced in. "Hey guys! Whose fat cowboy?"

I made a grab for the tablet. "Don't do it, Marcia."

"What isn't Marcia doing?" Amy wanted to know.

Marcia ducked me, turned the tablet off and smiled smugly. "Already done. I'll watch the replies for you. You're welcome."

"How did you even know what to say? You need the little code in there—like the other ones. You'll know it's me if."

"Missed Connections?" Amy nodded. "Great idea. Maybe Charley's Mr. Mystery will see. And not against the Rules, right?"

"Do you all spend your time thinking up ways around the Rules? Give me that tablet, Marcia."

Amy grinned cheerfully. "Pretty much."

Marcia slid the tablet under the couch cushion and sat on it, looking stubborn.

"Dammit." I grabbed my phone and plugged in the URL, found the new posting. " _To the mystery man who kissed me at the Lizard Club – w4m. A week ago Friday, last dance. We knocked on heaven's door, exchanged a passionate kiss, the clock struck the witching hour and you disappeared. No glass slipper to be found. Give me another clue? Tell me what I was wearing and I'll meet you. –Cherry Bomb._ Oh my God—I can't believe you gave me that name."

"Wow." Julie whistled. "That's really good. _I_ want to answer it."

"Thanks." Marcia beamed. "Like I said, I've mentally composed thousands."

"Cherry Bomb? No."

"Oh yes," Ice agreed.

"Besides, how do you know so much about what happened?" I frowned at Marcia. _Cherry Bomb._

"I saw it all go down."

"We all did." Amy swigged her fruit juice. "It was exceptionally romantic. Sexy, in that smeared lens way."

"It's true," Ice said. "He watched you for a while—for several dances—and then made his move. I think he planned to kiss you all along."

That kind of stopped me. "Really? Why did he wait so long though?"

Marcia looked into space, playing it back in her head, a memory reel I wished I could see. "I don't know. He was maybe making up his mind."

Ice frowned. "He came in and stood by the side of the dance floor, watching you, like he'd expected you to be there. I thought maybe you knew him from the theater or something."

"No, I'd never seen him before."

"But you locked lips anyway." Julie rolled her eyes.

"I didn't plan to. I just sort of... got swept up."

"That's how he looked." Marcia curled a lock of her hair around her finger, eyes dreamy. "Completely swept up. Mesmerized. And then the way he just kind of wooshed you into the dance, seducing you into that kiss."

"Like I said," Amy pulled out her ponytail tie and shook out her blonde hair. "Very sexy-romantic."

"Did he say anything at all?" Julie asked.

I had to shake off the spell Marcia had created. _Seducing you into that kiss._ Oh yeah, that was how it had felt all right. "He told me not to go, and to dance with him, so I did."

"Of course you did." Now Ice rolled her eyes.

"Hey—dance with anyone once. It's in the Rules. Bringing home a less than two-points cowboy is not."

"Ohh, he was yours?" Amy turned wide brown eyes on Ice. "Did he redeem?"

Ice only snorted. "I'm doing dishes, okay. Leave me alone."

"Maybe he's seen you on stage or something," Julie said, raising her eyebrows significantly, doggedly pursuing the subject. "An admirer. You do make an impression, all that red-haired gorgeousness."

Eww. "And now we're back to stalker. Take down that ad, Marcia."

"No." She thrust out her lip mulishly. "It's my experiment now. I want to see what happens."

"Nothing I bet, because nobody else looks at those things." I wanted it to be true. Didn't I?

"Nobody but me, Ice, and Marcia, out of the five of us," Amy pointed out with cheerful logic. "That's 60% right there."

"You would have to drag math into this," I muttered.

"Don't worry." Ice took my glass. "We're a skewed sample."

I hoped so. But I also didn't stop thinking about it.

## ~ 3 ~

Truth be told, I'd had admirers/stalkers before. That slash between the two can be a very thin line.

It goes with the performance life. That whole "actress is just another word for prostitute" thing. Also, with my age and body type, I tend to play sexy characters—thus the flashy hair. Dyed, thank you very much. Not that you can tell. I get it done at a pricey salon, even though it's often a budget stretch, because good color is worth paying for. Especially if you don't want to look like rebellious teen or last season's Halloween costume gone desperately wrong.

Plus it's tax-deductible. Great job, or what?

Still, I had not at all gotten the vibe from Mr. Mystery that he'd seen me before, and usually my creepdar for that sort of thing is pretty good. Of course, I also hadn't noticed him watching me. Scary or flattering? Hmm.

A good workout burned out the last of the hangover dregs and a blistering hot shower cleared my system enough that I went into the audition feeling pretty damn powerful. A good place to be for standing out from the mobs of girls trying out for the same part. My secret weapon? I always audition with songs written for tenors, if the director offers the choice. They show off my voice and help demonstrate my range.

This time I went with "Pure Imagination" from _Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory_. Along with a short skirt to show off my dancer's legs and a tight top for the other assets. They have it right in _A Chorus Line_ —you can be a singing/dancing/acting ten, but if your looks are a three, no one is going to hire you.

A sad reality, but there it is. You have to sparkle in every way. Even Meryl Streep can sing and dance. And don't try to tell me she's not a total knockout.

I rocked the singing audition, a good thing since a text from Marcia gut-punched me like finding out I'd won a role I really wanted and suspected I couldn't pull off.

He replied! :-)

No fucking way! How do you know it's HIM???

She didn't text back right away and I shook the phone in frustration. _It's not the Magic 8 Ball app. Get a grip._

"Hey Charley—you sounded great." Jack, a guy I'd been in a revival of _Guys and Dolls_ with, gave me a smile and a wink. He'd hit as high as 4.3 at one point, and I'd slept with him a couple of times. Decent abs. Fabulous dancer. And het! But meh technique. A sorry point of contradictory data for my whole "they fuck like they dance" theory.

"Thanks, slick! They call for the dance sets yet?"

"Ten minutes."

My phone sang with Marcia's text. She'd sent me the link.

" _Hi CB. You were wearing killer red heels, a backless dress, and earrings shaped like stars. Meet you at the Bean, five o'clock."_

"Oh right," I muttered at the phone. "Because I have nothing better to do. Maybe I have a life, asshole."

Tell me you're going. You HAVE to go.

I didn't answer Marcia. Less than three hours from now, post sweaty dance audition. Why did he get to choose when and where? Though I did happen to be only a few blocks from Millennium Park. Suspicious, right there. My phone chimed.

Charley!

Maybe.

For good measure I added a series of tongue-sticking-out emojis. Then turned my phone off again to warm up for the dance sets. It would just depend, wouldn't it?

There. I felt better already.

* * *

I very nearly replied with an alternate meeting place and time. Just out of principle. It wasn't spelled out in our Rules, but we all agreed—let's call it a corollary that had never made it to actual amendment status—that letting the guy unilaterally set the dating schedule often red-flagged controlling behavior. And wasn't this exactly that? Pulling me onto the dance floor, being all mysterious, disappearing and then coming off with the orders in the Missed Connections reply.

I didn't like it. Like my tempo had gone all wrong and I wasn't sure of my steps.

However. Call me an idiot, but I also really wanted to see this guy again. If that chemistry hadn't been a one-time deal and he wasn't a creeper, then maybe I'd get something more than meh technique. He had my attention all right. All through the dance audition, memories of that smoking kiss ran through my head and sang through my body. I wanted his hands on me for real. Enough that I even showered in the nasty public stalls, praying that the antibacterial green goo they called "body wash" in the dispensers wouldn't give me a rash. A narrow toss-up between smelling like a stinky dancer and looking like a leper, but odds were slimmer that he'd see me naked than that he'd smell me from a couple feet away.

He should _be_ so lucky to get me naked today. That last dance really couldn't count as round one, even if I had paid the penalty, and the missed connections conversation didn't meet the criteria for round two, either. Amy might try to cheat, but I usually adhered to the Rules for my own damn good, if nothing else. I wouldn't cancel on principle, but I'd certainly hold out for that reason. See how _he_ liked the hard-to-get routine. I played that role much better, regardless.

I backed off the audition makeup enough not to look like a total ho walking down Miracle Mile. Fortunately my audition look is much lighter than full stage makeup because it doesn't have to be seen from the back row. Still, it's a little much for broad daylight. And my hair would just have to stay in the dance-appropriate ponytail because I had zero time to wash, dry and make it look remotely cute.

Actually, I had less than zero time because I got to the Bean ten minutes after five. Schoolteachers will tell you that a negative number is imaginary—which makes no sense to me, but whatever. Us chronically late types know that the concept is very real. Fortunately, along with math not being my thing, I lacked the gene that made me feel guilty for keeping people waiting. Particularly guys, because it keeps them appreciative, if you know what I mean. Besides, since I have a limited store of punctuality energy, I save it for work, not boys.

Tourists and locals alike tend to throng around the Bean, particularly on a warm evening with the light just right to make funky reflections of the people and skyline in the curved reflective surface of the sculpture. Not exactly an intimate choice, but maybe my boy picked it so I'd feel nice and safe out in the public eye. Thoughtful of him, if so. The crowds of people screwing around, chasing kids and taking photos made it more difficult to pick him out, however. Especially as I'd seen him just the once, in the late-night flashing lights of the club, well known to skew many a person's perceptions of physical appearance.

Beer-goggles, martini-spectacles, hell—the whole ambience messes with your head.

He was tall. Taller than I was in my four-inchers, so probably 6'2". Kind of browny blond, I thought. Jesus—what the hell had he looked like? I'd know his mouth in a heartbeat. As much as it amused me to imagine trawling the men in the crowd asking for sample kisses—not unlike asking them to try on some glass slipper I'd found on the steps, ironically enough—it would be impractical. Not to mention unhygienic.

Dammit, _he_ should recognize _me_. I wandered around the Bean like a lovesick schoolgirl hoping to spot her current crush—something I'd given up at thirteen after I found out said crush had told all his friends I followed him around, which made me a loser. Nothing like having all the boys in seventh grade laughing at you to teach a lasting lesson.

A tinge of that humiliation seeped back. Ugh. I'd rather be pissed off.

If he didn't show, I would totally take this out on Marcia. Her and her stupid missed connections concept. I wouldn't put it past her to have faked that reply just to punk me in retaliation for giving her shit about the virginity thing. We were totally having words.

Pissed off—and, okay, sour with disappointment—I headed back toward Michigan and the nearest El stop.

"I always seem to catch you right as you're leaving."

Ah, that voice. It caught and stopped me with a hook through my gut, the words as warm and vibrant as the mouth they came from. Excited delight overrode all of my various annoyed emotions and I had to work to bury it. _Don't make this too easy for him. Don't be that loser._ I paused deliberately before turning, composing my face into my best Joan Crawford arched-brow disdainful stare and glancing at my phone before looking at him. I'm a hell of an actress, too, did I mention?

"Twenty minutes late," I noted coolly. "You're lucky I'm still here at all."

He smiled, not at all abashed, and tucked his hands into his pants pockets, sweeping back the suit jacket as he did so. A good suit with sleek, expensive lines. It fit, too, which is a thing far too many men screw up. Solid point for taste, dammit, even if it oozed corporate drone. Normally I'd burn at the first glimpse of the white collar. Suits are boring. But I already knew better about this one, so I'd give him a temporary pass. Five points counted for something. I had kind of hoped he'd be less appealing in the bright light of day—or the rosy dimness of gloaming, in this case—so I could regain a bit of the upper hand. But no.

Solidly handsome.

And damn, that chemistry.

"Am I lucky?" He cocked his head, looking me over with an appreciative glint that petted my ego just fine. "You don't look happy to see me."

I made sure he saw me glance at his crotch. "Likewise, slick."

That smug smile of his split into a grin. "From the mere sight of you? Possible. Though leg warmers aren't really my fetish. Didn't that look go out in the 80s?"

I narrowed my eyes at the attitude. "I'm a dancer, and I was at work when I received your summons."

He moved a little closer, eyes fixed on my mouth. "You're a good one. I liked watching you dance almost as much as dancing with you."

"I might not like that, you know. Lurking. Watching me." I did, though. It gave me a decided shiver to think of that intent, appreciative gaze on me while I danced. You don't survive in theater without a healthy ego and being a slight attention whore. I'm at peace with that.

He gave me a look like he knew it. "You're the one who listed the missed connections ad. Who does that?"

"This from the guy who clearly peruses them."

The corners of his eyes crinkled when he smiled. Not really brown after all, but lighter, with goldy flecks. And a chocolate rim. Mmm—gorgeous. "Maybe I had a reason to look on this particular occasion."

"Because of me? Or do you have a bevy of women you've seduced and abandoned on the city dance floors out there looking for you?"

His amusement darkened into something else, something intent and sensual. "Did I seduce you?"

Totally off the charts chemistry. He'd get all the points for that alone, if that wasn't strictly against the Rules. That's why we have the Rules in the first fucking place, so one enticing aspect of a guy can't blind you to the rest.

I was feeling pretty damn blinded. His lips curved, making me realize all at once that I, a) hadn't answered yet, b) hadn't noticed that he'd moved even closer while I floundered and, c) wanted to kiss him again with an unholy desire.

"Is your lack of reply an affirmative or have I lost your attention?"

In fact, I'd become oblivious to the existence of anything else. Impossible for him to have lost my attention. He had all of his on me, in that singular way he had. No looking at anyone else. Another point. How many was that? More than five, probably. Fuck it—I didn't care.

"Why don't you kiss me again and see what you think?" My voice had gone all husky, which was fine. Far better than losing my words entirely.

He stood near enough that we nearly touched, though his hands remained in his pockets. "Is that what you want?"

"Yes. Every experiment requires confirmation."

"You don't talk like a typical dancer."

"I'm not a typical anything." Really, I just spent way too much time with Ice and her med student buds.

"I knew that the first time I saw you." He leaned in, inclining his head and I tipped mine back. Picking up cadence, my heart tap danced into a faster beat, setting my nerves into an anticipatory jangle. A lovely rhythm, set by him. Those so-sexy lips brushed mine, warm in the cool evening air. No peppermint this time, nor whiskey, but still that smoky spiced flavor like the dark notes of cedar—a taste that must be all him. He kept the kiss light, tantalizingly so, still not touching me with anything but his lips. He didn't need to—he scored a five-plus with only his clever mouth. I opened mine, encouraging him in, and his tongue touched mine, a bare caress before he withdrew, leaving me yearning and hard-pressed not to show it.

"You're shorter this time." The words on his breath brushed against my lips, he stayed so close.

"No heels."

"I liked the heels. But I find I like this, too." He stepped back a pace, giving me that long, assessing look. "Leg warmers are rapidly climbing my fetish charts."

"What else is on these charts of yours?"

He nodded slightly, as if awarding me points of his own, giving me a wicked smile. "Mystery."

"Is that what this is about?"

"Not entirely. But it adds a spice. Is it one you like?"

Had I thought myself blinded? Totally befuddled, more like. I blinked at him, not flirtatiously, but in an attempt to clear my mind. Did I like the mystery—that he'd run out on me like that? That we still hadn't had a real conversation? That I didn't even know his freaking name? No.

Of course not.

Did I?

I settled on my first answer. "No."

"Ah." He seemed genuinely sorrowful about that, shaking his head a little as he gazed at the toes of his shoes. "Oh well. It was enchanting to see you again, Cherry. Maybe we'll run into each other sometime."

"Wait. You're leaving?"

"You just said you didn't like this. That seems to be my cue."

"Is this all a game to you?"

He lifted his gaze, stared into me with such intensity I nearly stepped back. I didn't. I held my ground even when he closed the space between us and took my mouth in a hot, hungry kiss. No polite waiting for my invitation this time. No gentle caress of the tongue, but ferocious feeding, almost savage, that threw me into a startling crescendo of need. I made a ragged sound—of what, I didn't know—and reached to embrace him. He tore away.

"Not a game," he said in a rough breathless voice. "This is much too important."

He turned and started walking away.

"Wait!" _Dammit._ "Is that it?"

Glancing over his shoulder, hands still in his pockets, he gave me a long, smoldering smile. "That would be up to you. You know how to find me."

## ~ 4 ~

"No fucking way am I placing another ad."

Marcia pushed aside my Barbra Streisand teddy bear and situated herself at the end of my bed, tablet in hand. "You _have_ to do this. It's been three days! How can you stand not to?"

"Because I refuse to be jerked around like that." I straightened my legs under the covers and poked her leg with pointed toes. "Go away."

"You're just sulking."

"What am I, five?"

She raised her eyebrows and took in the paused screenshot of _Pride and Prejudice_ on my own tablet, the rehearsal clothes I'd yet to change out of and the damming pile of crumpled mini-peanut butter cup wrappers on the bedside table. Defying her to comment, I sucked on the straw of my iced herbal tea. I'd rather have wine, but I couldn't afford alcohol calories along with the candy ones. Chocolate had been the clear winner for my possibly sulky mood.

Wrinkling her nose, she said, "If so, you're pretty stinky. I can smell you from here."

" _You_ could smell Baltimore from here, and no one invited you. Remember the 'go away' part of our conversation?"

"I'll just put it in for you again," she threatened and swiped open the site.

I shrugged _Godfather_ style. "Suit yourself. But _if_ he replies, I won't go."

"Charley!"

"Marcia Marcia Marcia!"

"How the hell am I supposed to study for my practicum with you two screeching?" Ice lounged in the doorway, sloe-eyed and looking more like a goddess of love in her elaborately embroidered robe than a frazzled med student. "Ooh! You're watching Matthew and Keira? Me too!" She wriggled onto the bed next to me and made herself comfortable.

"The BBC version is much better," Marcia sniffed, scanning her screen. I could have told her Mr. Mystery wouldn't have left anything. He wanted me to come crawling to him and that was so not going to happen.

"Colin has his merits, true." Ice pressed play for me and sighed as Elizabeth ran across the bridge in the rain. "But this version has intensity."

"And rain," I added. "Nothing suits a declaration of love like a pouring rainstorm. I thought you had to study."

"Shh." Ice drew out the sound, not quieting us so much as shushing us like you would a fretful baby. Unable to resist, Marcia leaned over to watch the scene, too. Darcy's impassioned proposal, Elizabeth's furious refusal. We all sighed a little when it ended.

"Such good acting—that moment when they're both so pissed off and they're in each other's faces and they almost, _almost_ kiss. Kills me every time." It reminded me of that snap and sizzle between me and Mr. Mystery, all three kisses. And the fraught moments before and after.

"The angry fuck," Ice agreed.

"There's no place for anger in lovemaking." Marcia frowned at us.

"I'd argue that there's no place for love in fucking," I countered. "Just confuses things."

"Charley, sweetheart, you think that because you're an emotional cripple." Ice smiled placidly at my glare. "Which why you're holed up salving your wounds with chocolate and theatrical romance instead of risking something with this guy."

"Why is everyone in Charley's bed?" Amy peered into the dim room.

Julie pushed past her and wedged onto my other side, grabbing the half empty container of candy. "Because that's where half the population of Chicago has either been or wants to be?" she suggested.

"Oh ha ha. Mine." I snagged the container back and gave up when Ice took it from me and helped herself.

"Ooh. Still sulking?" Amy made a sympathetic face and dropped gracefully into a yoga stretch on my rug.

"Can't I want to spend a quiet evening on my own relaxing without it being about some dipshit guy who only wants to play head games with me and can't just operate like a normal human being?"

They all stared at me, trying—to give them a little credit—not to laugh _right_ in my face. Which gave them all really twisty expressions like someone trying not to sneeze with a mouthful of milkshake.

"You're Darcy." Ice nudged my shoulder with gentle affection. "That's your problem."

"I thought I was Prince Charming ditched by the fickle Cinderella."

"Ice has it." Amy nodded at me. "You are the sexual equivalent of ten thousand pounds a year. You can't believe a guy wouldn't snap up any offer you made him."

"Which means he's special," Marcia insisted, returning to her earlier enthusiasm. "Elizabeth of the feisty personality and fine eyes."

"Or an asshole," I pointed out in my driest tone, which daunted none of them.

"It's romantic, you have to admit." Julie unwrapped one of her handful of my peanut butter cups and handed it to me. "The mystery. No names or phone numbers. He knows how to get under your skin."

"Just like Lizzie got to Darcy. He respected her more for sticking to her principles." Amy agreed. "Did you already watch the proposal in the rain scene?"

"You guys—this is ridiculous. You can't be seriously suggesting I meet up with him again."

"Let's take a vote." Marcia said. "All in favor?"

"You guys don't get to vote on _my_ love life!"

Too late. They'd all put up their hands, grinning sunnily at me.

"That's four votes in favor and one abstention," Marcia informed me. "Will you place the ad or shall I do it for you?"

"I want to register a nay vote," I grumbled.

"Too late. The vote's already on record." Ice tapped her temple. "No changing the past. Now place the ad, already."

"I am _not_ chasing this guy!"

"Then it sounds like I will be doing it—yay!" Marcia was having way too much fun with my pain.

"You want control of this?" Ice grabbed my attention. "Then set the terms. Tell him when and where. That's what you always told me."

"Traitorous bitch."

She snuggled against me, rubbing her cheek on my shoulder. "That's me. TB and CB. Besties forever. It won't kill your rep to chase this guy a teensy bit. That's all we're saying."

"We're giving you permission to do this thing." Julie poked me and Marcia nodded.

"Fine," I said, crumbling in the face of their combined will and my own lustful leanings. "But I'm setting a challenge for him. If he doesn't make the grade, this is over."

"Ooh—a new Amendment? I like it." Ice's eyes glittered with speculation. "We haven't added one since Junior year."

"High time, then. No," I told Marcia, who held out her tablet. "I'm going to come up with something good and post it myself."

"Now can we watch the proposal in the rain?" Amy asked in a plaintive tone.

"Yes. As often as you like. Come get in my bed with the rest of Chicago."

* * *

I thought about the terms I wanted to set, occasionally making notes, while I transcribed and outlined research notes. Ice had set me up with the freelance work back when we were at Northwestern and it served nicely to bring in the rent money that theater—so far—did not. Having a McJob that I could fit in around the crazy hours of auditions, rehearsals, and shows made all the difference.

Plus, I sucked at waiting tables. Words I can do.

The orderly nature of the work, the experiments and mundane details, monotonous though it was, oddly soothed me. Hard to find something more diametrically opposed to theater, with all the glitz and drama. The mental discipline, too, helped keep my brain in shape for memorizing scripts, lyrics, and choreography.

I finished the job with a good hour left over to compose my missed connections message before I needed to get ready for the callback audition. Total _squee_ on that, though I wouldn't let my hopes get too high. For either thing, really. _Give your best and offer it up to the universe._ That's all you could do, really. Dazzle 'em with all you've got and if that doesn't work, move on. Goes for men, too.

As carefully as I'd prepped for the callback, I crafted my message.

" _Mr. Mystery. First lizards, then a bean. When will you stop running away? I'm not the typical kind of bomb either, so you don't need to be afraid. I'm changing my answer. I could like it. Convince me. My turn to set the stage. Navy Pier. The Ferris wheel. I'll buy the tickets. 3pm Sunday. I'll require a penalty for every five minutes you're late. ~CB"_

Even if I got this part—fingers crossed!—I'd have Sunday off. If things went well, maybe I'd finally get laid after this dry spell. If not, I'd have the rest of the day to sulk and get him out of my system so I could cheerfully tell my roomies to drop the subject already.

Two days away. Hell, he might not even see the ad. I hadn't asked for a reply, so I wouldn't necessarily know, especially as I had no intention of checking for one. Better that way. Either he'd be there or he wouldn't.

Just like I'd get the part or I wouldn't.

I posted the message, humming Cinderella's song from _Into the Woods_ , and went to polish my sparkle. One day I should audition with a sexy version of _The Good Ship Lollipop_. Wouldn't that just knock 'em dead?

Maybe I would do it someday, when I had a little less to lose.

* * *

It takes more work than you'd think to dress for a guy without him twigging to what you're doing. This is a mistake a lot of girls make. They think they need to go over the top to get attention. But men are trickier to play than that. Like Amy's point with Mr. Darcy—they don't like what they can obviously have. Caroline Bingley tried _way_ too hard. At the same time, men need a little whiff of promise. Don't go all Jane Bennett on them, either.

Subtle temptation is the key. Don't wave around tons of boobage or threaten to flash your crotch with a too-short skirt. Yeah, you run the risk of being slut-shamed, which is bullshit, but more than that, it's way too obvious. They start thinking they've seen the goods already. If you want to lure a skittish guy into bed, make sure he only catches glimpses of what he might get, if he's luckier than he's ever been in his whole damn life.

And I already knew my guy put mystery high on this fetish list of his.

Okay, yeah, that was clever. He was too charming and sure of himself by half. Time to rock the foundations of his world.

Ice whistled long and low from the doorway of our shared bathroom. "Look at you, pulling out the big guns."

"But not obvious, right?" I studied myself in the mirror. I'd left my hair down, barely brushed after blow-drying it, so it looked sexily tousled and like I hadn't worked on it. With the predictable breeze off the lake, that was just good planning. I went with smoky eye make-up, enough to be casually seductive without looking wrong for daylight. The star earrings, since he'd mentioned them, a scarlet push-up bra under a black crop top that buttoned up the front—makes them think of how easily it could come open—and low slung, faded jeans that showed off my belly button jewelry, also a dangling star, just for him. The jeans had that old, soft feel that let them cling to my hips and thighs attractively, while communicating a casual, dressed-down look that said it would be some work to get inside them.

And my killer red heels, natch. Because.

"The heels might be a little much," Ice mused. "Can you even wear them on the Ferris wheel?"

"It's not like I have to pedal."

"True." She gave me an approving nod finally. "It works. Just the right amount of girl-next-door date to the carnival who could be seduced on the fun house ride."

"Do me a favor, Ice? Don't tell the others how much work I put into this."

She twisted her long hair into a rope and pinned it to the back of her head with one of my big sparkly barrettes, looking thoughtful. "Why do you even care? If our positions were reversed, you'd be lecturing me about how stupid it is to lose your head over a guy. Do I have to remind you that's why you made the Rules?"

A flutter of panic trilled through my already hyped system. "Is that what you think? I thought you were all in favor of me giving this another shot."

"No." She tried on my lipstick, that perfect red that matched my bra and heels. "I said you want this and that, and if so, you should set the terms."

"You voted! And that red is all wrong for you. Try this plummy one."

"Also I like that you upped the stakes for him. The penalty thing is good."

"You looked?"

She gave me a sympathetic pat on the shoulder. "Honey, Marcia texted us all the link as soon as it went live."

"She has an unhealthy obsession with my love life. Especially with this missed-connections deal."

"Can you blame her? You're her hero. All the brave things she isn't. Be nice."

"I'm _always_ nice." Then I had to laugh at the bug-eyed face she made. "Fine. Fine. If I can't be nice, I'll act that way. I'll be Melanie Wilkes."

"Ha! You make a much better Scarlett—and you're going to have penalties of your own because you're running late."

"Fiddle-dee-dee." But I hurried because, as usual, she was right. I just hoped she wasn't right about the losing my head part.

## ~ 5 ~

I made it by only five minutes after three—mostly because I forgot how long it takes to walk all the way down the pier to the Ferris wheel, particularly in heels that high. Besides, in Charley-date-time that counts as like an hour early. Besides, he'd been way more than five minutes late to the Bean. My plan of waiting in a bored pose, tickets in hand, fell apart when I spotted him already there. I almost felt his intent gaze before I saw him. A new role for him today. Rather than the silk shirt of the club or the businessman's suit, today he wore faded jeans and a black t-shirt. In fact, we matched.

Charming or uncomfortably weird? Too early to call it.

Then he smiled, slow and pleased, in that way that gave me the immediate sensation of his generous mouth on mine and chased all other thoughts out of the mind I surely was losing.

"Looks like you owe me a penalty," he commented.

"No, that was my rule for you, slick."

"The rules should go both ways or it's not fair. Or as much fun."

"Is that what we're doing—having fun?"

"We will be, once I get you in one of those gondolas."

"Promises, promises." I meant to sound airy and challenging, but the sexual undertone of his teasing words had me heating already. Who was I kidding? The jeans wouldn't stop him from getting anywhere he wanted to be. And this was solidly round 3. Totally within the Rules.

"I never promise what I can't deliver. Shall we?" He set a hand at the small of my back, touching my skin. The brush of his fingers in that sensitive spot sent a sensual frisson through me, which he clearly felt, since he glanced over at me with a very slight smile, much more eye-to-eye with me in my four-inchers. Deliberately he traced my spine with one finger down to the low line of my jeans, then back up to the dip and rested it there. "I'd like to kiss you, right there. Will you let me?"

"Is that my penalty?" I breathed.

"Something so easy? You wish." He leaned in, brushed my cheek with his lips and stroked his fingers over that innocently erotic point on my back. "Say you'll let me. On the Ferris wheel."

Looked like I could be seduced on rides other than the fun house. But not just yet. I stepped out of his reach. "Maybe. The gondolas hold six, you know. Crowded as it is today, we might not be alone." I'd pretty much counted on that when I made the plan, wary of being alone with him until I'd gotten a bit more of the upper hand.

A wicked look made his hazel eyes sparkle. He pulled out two tickets.

"I said I'd pay for those."

He smiled easily. "I don't mind treating you. After all, you've been an exceedingly cheap date so far."

"Don't count on that to continue."

"Duly noted. Also, I already bribed the operator to let us ride alone. Are you up for the challenge?"

_How does this guy see right through me?_ I lifted a shoulder and let it fall. "Whatevs."

He grinned at me and guided me over to the line, once again setting his hand on my back, a gesture that had always gotten under my practiced flirtations to a foolishly romantic, soft part of my heart that found it protective and chivalrous. Turned out it could drive me crazy with anticipation, too.

Sure enough, with a lascivious wink the operator bundled us into the gondola alone and ignored the protests of a pack of college guys waiting to board behind us. Mr. Mystery helped me sit and turned back to the guys, handing them a twenty. "Beers on me, gentlemen. I'm sure you understand."

They hooted and I would have blushed if I hadn't learned long ago to control that particular reaction. Never reads well on stage. Kind of shocked me that I even had to think about it. Maybe this had been a bad idea. I wasn't setting the terms at all. So far he'd called every shot. But two could play at this. A little Sharon Stone action would work. I turned on the bench, put my back to the grate and set my heel on the seat, then casually draped a hand over my knee. A very seductive pose, as most guys simply can't resist the invitation to look at a girl's open crotch, clothed or not.

Not this guy, of course. He met my eyes steadily, even managing to make it seem like he'd rather be looking there than anywhere else. Without breaking eye contact, he wrapped a hand around my ankle, holding it in place while he slid along the bench closer to me as the gondola surged up into the sky. "Sorry about that. I hope you weren't uncomfortable."

"It takes a lot to embarrass me."

"You're bold, I'll grant you, but I think not as hard-shelled as you like to come across." His fingers flexed on my ankle. "Do I get my kiss?"

"Sure." I brushed my hair back and leaned toward him, but he didn't meet me halfway.

"Not that kind. Not yet." He caressed my ankle, sending little shivers up my leg. "I want the other one first."

"It's against the Ferris wheel rules to stand. What you want may be out of your reach."

"And you're so into following rules."

"You'd be surprised. Besides, maybe I'm not into making things easy for you, slick."

"Now _that_ I believe. Kneel up on the seat and face out." He stared me down, that challenging glint daring me to call him on giving me orders like that. Or to chicken out.

"What is this all about? I don't get your game." I said, to cover up that I'd gone abruptly breathless.

"Yes, you do or you wouldn't have posted that message, wouldn't be here now. Will you let me kiss you the way I want to or not?" He asked the question in a serious, intense way. Like you might ask someone to marry you in a gazebo while the rain poured outside.

No wonder I couldn't quite catch my breath.

With a sense of being in an enchanted bubble, I pulled my ankle from his grasp and he let his fingers caress along the top of my foot as I did. They'd loaded the Ferris wheel and we spun in unbroken circles, sweeping up and plunging down, my nerves following the same giddy cycle. He steadied me with hands on my hips and I grasped the holds beside the window, looking out and away from the crowds, over the lake, the shoreline, and the city.

"This line is so beautiful." He slid his hands, hot on my bare skin, from my rib cage down my waist and over the flare of my hips. "I imagined touching you exactly this way. Fantasized about it."

Wait. "Since when?" I managed to ask.

"Since the club. That backless dress."

I made a sound of acknowledgment, my words not quite there, stolen by the disconcerting sense of having him behind me, the mesmerizing sensation of his finger now trailing up my back, under my shirt to the nape of my neck and down again to rest in that place where my spine dipped the deepest.

"I thought about asking you then. Seeing if you'd agree to let me kneel down and kiss you. Here." His lips, cooler than his hands, replaced his finger, pressing against my skin. I went wet, as suddenly as I'd lost my breath at his demand that I turn around.

"Why didn't you?" Impossible how rattled everything about this made me.

"I didn't want you to think I was crazy."

"I do think you might be crazy."

His soft laugh whispered across my skin followed by a longer press of his mouth before he spoke again. "Yes, but you're intrigued instead of afraid, which works better."'

He had me there.

"So beautiful." His kiss became open mouthed, and his tongue licked me there.

I moaned as the sensation arced straight to my clit and my nipples throbbed against the tight lace of my bra. His hands spanned my waist, holding me still as he lavished attention on that one small circle of my skin. Part of me no one had ever noticed or touched before except in passing, that I barely knew I possessed, much less that it wired so directly to sex. I wriggled in his grasp and he held me tighter, kissing and licking, scraping with his teeth so my breath came ragged, and he murmured his approval in a voice blurring with the same lust that threatened to swamp me.

I kept expecting his hands to sneak up or sink lower, for him to grab my tits or fondle my ass. Despite the fact that we weren't completely screened from view, I felt wild enough, desperate enough to have his hands on me that I would have let him. But no. Not Mr. Mystery. Instead he finally leaned his forehead against me and said the ride was almost over. He helped me sit down again, while my brain spun and my body sang with the crying need for more, more, more. When the door opened and he held up a hand to help me step down, I took the opportunity to scan his face. Not so much glittering gold in the brown now, his eyes had gone darker, but still gleamed with lazy, lambent sensuality.

"Worth the wait and the trouble?" I sounded throaty, but better that than breathless.

He drew me over to the low wall that borders the pier and leaned against it, shifting his hands to my hips again and giving me a slow smile. "And more." Pulling me closer, he eased me into a long, sense-numbing kiss. I braced myself on his shoulders, so as not to entirely succumb to rubbing against him like a cat. Even so, someone yelled at us to get a room. Which made me laugh.

"My place or yours?" I asked him, managing a flirty smile for the cliché.

"Not yet."

"Really?" Torn between annoyance and bemusement, I raked my nails lightly over his shirt. "How long are we going to play this game of yours?"

"As long as it takes," he replied. Mr. Cryptic. "Besides," he interrupted when I opened my mouth to point that out, "you owe me a penalty still."

I sighed with all the melodrama I could muster, which is a significant amount. In all truth, he had me hot enough to be intensely curious about what he might ask for. "Fine. What?"

"Come with me." He set me back a step, straightened and took my hand. "If you don't want to do it, just say so and I'll pick something less..." He slid me a glance full of consideration.

"Punishing?" I suggested. "Painful? Life-threatening?"

He laughed, a deep, hearty sound I hadn't heard before. He laughed like he kissed, all in, fully, and with enthusiasm. I pondered what Rule category that would fit into and realized I hadn't thought about the Rules or points in a while. Probably a bad sign, but I would think about that later.

We arrived at the carousel. He glanced at it significantly and raised his eyebrows. "Exhibitionistic."

"Well, well," I murmured, the arousal thrumming to a higher level. What did he have in mind? Judging by his track record so far, probably something that hadn't occurred to me.

"You like to be watched, don't you?" He studied me in his serious way, eyes slumberous with erotic promise.

"It goes with the territory." I cocked my hip and gave him a glossy smile. "Performers are shallow and vain that way."

"You'd like me to think that." He tipped his head to the carousel. "Game?"

"I'm not taking my clothes off in public." Those photos can haunt you forever.

"Nothing like that. And you can always say no."

"Okay." No one had ever accused me of being shy. "Try me."

He bought tickets and I didn't object, since this appeared to be his party, and it gave me a moment to steady my nerves. _You like to be watched, don't you?_ Mr. Mystery certainly had a way of getting, and keeping, my full attention. I followed along as he took his time picking out the perfect steed. The carousel doesn't date back to the 20s, but they did a damn fine job of recreating it to look that way. The horses prance around in three rings, some fixed, some that go up and down, painted in jewel tones, pastels, like zebras, tigers, and even a winged dragon.

Mr. Mystery—so odd to still not know even his first name or anything else about him—picked a horse for me in the center ring, one that would go up and down and helped me onto it, settling my heeled feet into the stirrups. He stood at my knee, hand around my ankle once again. He indicated a fixed horse in the outer ring and slightly behind me. "I'll be on that one. I want to watch you ride." Putting a hand on the small of my back again, his favorite spot, he urged my hips forward until my pubic bone pressed against the center pole that speared the horse's saddle. I gasped at the shock, the zing as my swollen, sensitive clit rubbed against the seam of my jeans from the pressure. He lowered his voice. "Like this."

"Seriously?" I glanced around at the tourists, the happy families.

"You don't have to, if it's too much." He gave me that slow smile, the glint of challenge. "But you get bonus points if you make yourself come."

Points? The surprise of that and his outrageous suggestion kept me from replying. By the time I recovered my wits, he'd mounted his own steed and the carousel slowly glided into motion. I looked over my shoulder at him. "What do bonus points get me?"

He considered the question soberly, tapping his fingers on his knee. My horse rose up, and pitched down, pressing harder against my crotch. Climaxing would be dead easy if I had the guts to let it happen. "A favor of your choosing," he offered.

I tossed my hair. "You're on."

I don't know if I could've done it if my inhibitions weren't already lowered by being so damn aroused. It helped, too, that almost no one rode the carousel, and none of them close by, as my mystery man had chosen carefully. Apparently the old-fashioned ride paled in comparison to the Wave Swinger and other more exciting attractions. I wrapped my arms around the pole and closed my eyes, letting the sensation sweep me over, feeling his eyes on me. Yeah, being watched worked for me on a profound level.

The cheerful music played and kids screamed in the distance, but all that faded behind the building tension of orgasm as the horse's mechanical gallop pushed and pulled me along the pole.

Tightening my thighs, I ducked my face, letting the long fall of my hair hide my expression, and gave into the release, blowing out my breath with the long wave of it, my palms sliding slickly on the spiral grooves of the polished brass. Sitting back from the pole, I rode more circumspectly, letting the rhythm of the carousel horse bleed off the aftershocks. When I felt a bit more composed, I looked back at my watcher.

His face set in rigid lines of desire and—oh yes, admiration, my catnip—his eyes practically burned me with their intensity. Moving slowly, he touched a finger to his temple and gave me a insouciant little salute.

## ~ 6 ~

"I _cannot_ believe you did that," Marcia huffed, aghast and—despite herself—enthralled. She'd waited for me, along with Amy, sprawled on the living room couch watching some horrible reality show. Julie had the Sunday shift at the restaurant and Ice was at the anatomy lab, as it was her night with the cadaver. One of the many reasons _I_ had not gone into medicine.

Now that I'd come off the high, I kind of couldn't believe I done it either, but it would spoil the story—not to mention my image—to say so. I settled for lounging sideways in the wing-back armchair looking smugly satisfied. Though I was truly anything but, as I still hadn't gotten laid. One tiny orgasm hadn't been anywhere near enough. The sexual craving buzzed in the background of my brain with a low-level insistence. It hadn't abated past that in the last hour and showed no indication it would. Worse, I began to suspect only my mystery man would be able to free me of it, since he'd created it in the first place. Dammit.

"Ice is going to be so disappointed she wasn't here to hear this firsthand," Amy said, not shocked at all.

I was frankly relieved not to have to face Ice's reaction—whether she pulled out vicarious glee or the conservative censure that sometimes bubbled up from the depths of her psyche. Ice knew me too well. Amy might believe this was simply one more of my sexual adventures, and Marcia might chalk it up to my fancy-free ways, but Ice... yeah, she knew better.

"So why are you home and not out with Mr. Mystery?" Amy asked the ten-billion-dollar question.

I tried to look casual. "He said he had to go."

"But you're seeing him again?" Marcia persisted.

_Yes, because he owes me a favor, to be redeemed at my convenience._ That was how he'd phrased it, right before he gave me a leisurely and thorough kiss that about blew the top of my head off and left me shaking with need, then paid a cabbie to take me home. Just like that. "Probably," I answered breezily. "I have a busy week though."

Marcia picked up a throw pillow and screamed into it. Amy and I exchanged looks, then she patted Marcia on the foot. "Honey, you really need to get a life. Or obsess over someone else. Charley is a bad, bad role model."

"More like a great cautionary tale," I agreed and kicked off my heels. God, I hoped that wouldn't prove to be the case.

"Tell me you exchanged phone numbers." Marcia's demand, muffled by the pillow, still sounded a little too strident. Amy's hopeful expression crashed into exasperation when I shook my head at her.

Really, I couldn't blame her. I wouldn't keep doing this after I got my favor. And the favor would be sex. Sex and done. There. "Nope," I said, trying to make it sound like I wanted it that way.

Marcia dropped the pillow and scowled blackly enough to make me feel a little chagrined.

"What?" I scowled back. "He didn't ask. You know it's against the Rules for me to give it unless he asks for it."

"You're allowed to ask for his. You know that."

I didn't reply to that. One of my personal unwritten corollaries to the Rules—never be so desperate that you ask for his number. No begging for me. I had no intention of being a laughingstock again.

"Whose turn is it to place the ad then?" Marcia sounded resigned to it. "Yours again or his this time?"

"None of your business."

She rolled her eyes. "You'll tell us that you humped a carousel horse while he watched, but not this."

"Because Amy is totally right that you're unhealthily obsessed. I'm not saying."

With a pout, she muttered, "I'll find it anyway."

"Just...don't." It came out too sharply and, to my shock, I felt abruptly on the edge of something. Not tears. Maybe rage. Goddammit, I needed to get laid. Amy and Marcia both gaped at me and for once I had no idea what expression showed on my face. I spun in the chair and snatched up my discarded heels. "I'm going to bed."

"It's seven o'clock," Amy pointed out in a mild tone.

"Bite me."

* * *

I checked the missed connections—how the mighty had fucking crashed and burned—several times a day for the next three days with no sign of Mr. Mystery. Nobody, not even Marcia, said a word to me about it, which meant they knew how I felt. The more time passed, the more pissed off I got. He was playing me, expecting me to come crawling to him. Again.

Ice had been totally wrong. I hadn't taken control and set terms on the last encounter. I'd made the fatal mistake of showing weakness. Not again.

On top of it all, I hadn't heard about the callback, which was a bad sign. Which I really hated. They string you along for _days_ , or even months, like with some guys I could mention. At least in theater, though rejection is part of the gig. I didn't need it in the rest of my life, too.

Though I promised myself I wouldn't, I checked the missed connections Thursday morning, and nearly screamed to find nothing there. Fine. Fuck him and his favor. I didn't need this aggravation. I had a full day, including an evening show. Though I wasn't hungry, I made myself a smoothie, knowing I'd need the energy.

And wouldn't you know it? The blender went crazy, the lid flying off like a shotput hurled by some manic Russian, and green gloop sprayed the kitchen, including me. For an endless moment, I wrestled with the incredulous rage that the universe had to add _this too_ , then lost my shit entirely and hurled the fucking thing to the gloop-covered linoleum.

"Wow. Hulk smash blender." Julie commented from behind me.

I whirled on her. "Don't start with me."

"Because I won't like you when you're angry?" She dropped the smile at my expression, whatever the hell it was. "Hey, it's no big deal. You didn't even break it."

I stomped my foot and screeched, like the tantrum-having toddler I was, perilously close to tears. Always a bad sign. I never cried, unless a scene called for it. Real tears meant a devastating loss of control. I knuckled my temple, forcing them back.

"Okaaayyy. Let Auntie Julie help you." She pulled over a barstool and made me sit, dampened a kitchen towel and handed it to me, then began wiping up the floor.

"You don't have to do that," I sniffled, feeling beyond pathetic.

"I know. That's what makes me so nice." She shook her brown curls, perfectly imitating Galinda from one of my favorite musicals and eliciting a watery giggle from me. "You need real food, not this crap. I'm cooking you an actual breakfast."

"It's energizing, and I have rehearsal in two hours."

"Plenty of time." She got out a waffle iron, a couple of bananas and an assortment of her witchy chef supplies. I never recognized half of what she cooked with. "And, honey—energy you've got in spades. Now, what has you so worked up—is it the guy?"

"No." I sounded sullen, even to myself. "My life is a nightmare."

"Oh well, if that's all." She shrugged, tossing garlic or something to sizzle in butter, then laying banana slices in it. Maybe garlic was wrong. She turned back to wiping off the backsplash. "I can see that, though. It must suck to be gorgeous, smart, enormously talented, and have men panting after you. Maybe we should have a GoFundMe for your pity party."

I scrubbed at the green gloop in my hair—I'd just washed it, too—and glared at her. "I thought you were being nice to me."

"I am. I'm cooking for you. This is how I show my love. The rest is all come to Jesus."

"Oh goody. Because all this day needed was a lecture."

"Right?" Not in the least bothered, she continued to cook, filling the air with scents that set my stomach rumbling in a way the green gloop never did, and wiping the surfaces clean with enviable multitasking efficiency. "So, here's the deal. It's obviously driving you crazy, the way this guy is playing the missed connections game, but you have to admit, not only has he rocked your world, you pretty much deserve the payback."

"That's just mean."

She wagged a wooden spoon at me. "Shut up and listen. You and Ice came up with these Rules—and I'm not saying they're not useful. God knows I abide by them for a reason—but having them has made dating into a game for you. All this guy is doing is meeting you on your own field."

_Bonus points if you make yourself come._ "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that you go through men like I go through olive oil. None of them last and you're always in a rush to move on to the new flavor. Any guy who paid attention, who figured out anything about you, would have nailed that pretty damn quick. You've been interested in this Mr. Mystery for, what, three weeks? Isn't that some kind of record for you?"

"I'm not that bad." Though she might be right. It wasn't like I kept track.

"Yes you are. You're a total diva and we love you for it, but not everyone wants to be used and discarded by the goddess." A sharp flash caught my attention as she lit the pan on fire.

"Ah, Jules—I think it's burning."

"Hush. Don't interfere with the master."

She slid a plate in front of me, a waffle with bananas in some kind of golden syrup she'd created out of thin air. "Eat. Answer me this—if he'd gone to bed with you right off, would you even be thinking about him still or would you have moved on?"

"I don't know, it would depend on his technique and how many points he got for...never mind." Instead of admitting she might be on to something, I took a bite. "Oh my god, Jules—this is outrageously delicious."

"Good. Okay, here's my final point. Either you're in or you're out. You want to see more of him or you don't. If you're interested, contact him and see if you can't date him like a normal person. Have dinner. Give him your fucking phone number already and get his. Introduce him to your friends."

"I can't give him my number because—"

"Isn't it worth it to do some dishes instead of being full of pride and misery?"

"If I wasn't having a food orgasm, I'd hurt you."

She grinned. "A good cook knows how to play to her audience."

* * *

I swallowed that considerable pride—which went down easier with that carb-y, sweet, and—even better—somewhat alcoholic something warming my gut, and posted one more ad.

" _Need a favor from a friend. Reply with place and time. Not the Bean. Not the Pier. –CB_ "

I input my email and set that to the only reply method possible.

There. That should keep Marcia off my trail. I might get creepsters with that one, but Mr. Mystery ought to be able to come up with a way to let me know it was him. Promising myself I wouldn't look again until after my, I packed my bag for the long day ahead.

## ~ 7 ~

Once I got over myself, I had to admit that Julie was right, I had an amazingly good life. Not many people got to eke out a living—marginal as it was thus far—doing what they loved to do. I might bitch about my schedule, but I lost myself in the joy of it. Time flew the way it only does when you're immersed in your passion.

Sex and theater. That pretty much summed it up for me. I might be a diva, but my needs were pretty straightforward. I might be high maintenance, but I wasn't complicated.

I almost hated to check my email, having a decent idea of the kind of trolls crawling out from under their bridges at the scent of my post. With resignation, I scrolled through the—Jesus, 153!—new messages suggesting places, times and what kind of disgusting favors might be exchanged. It takes quite a bit to trip my squick trigger, too. I'd nearly given up when Javier, a nicely muscled dancer walked past where I sat in the hall with my phone. The communal dressing room had been way too distracting.

"Hey princess." He paused and gave me that sexy grin that had racked up enough points to get him laid in the past. "Plans tonight?"

"Why, is your bed empty?"

"Doesn't have to be."

I deleted another email and looked him over. Bird in the hand and all that. But my usually reliable libido failed to leap. Or even flicker. "No hard feelings, but pass."

"Nothing ventured." He walked on. Paused and looked back. "Was it that bad? I only got one shot."

Frankly I barely recalled the details. I deleted another email and looked up to find him looking a little hurt. God, I was a diva bitch. I smiled. "No, sweetie. I'm sorry. I met someone is all."

"Oh!" He flashed a happy grin. "Lucky dude. Tell him I send a high five. In a totally respectful way, of course."

He made me laugh. "Thanks. You know, Tina's been mooning after you."

"The little blonde next to you in the chorus?" Javier's face lit up. "Solid. I owe you."

He swaggered off, male ego happily restored, and I bit back a sigh, hoping that I _had_ met someone. With all the emails reviewed and sent to recycle bin hell where they belonged, I tried to be philosophical. Maybe he hadn't seen the message. Could be he had more of a life than I did and hadn't been checking Craigslist forty times a day.

Oh my god, I needed more of a life. Maybe I should run after Javier.

Bracing my back against the wall, I levered up, about to pocket my phone when a yet another new email notification flashed up. I thumbed it open.

Hi CB. How about now? ~MM

P.S. Have had carousel music earworm for DAYS.

I laughed, the sound echoing back and making a couple of girls from the chorus look at me like I might be a crazy person. Let 'em. Dammit, I was happy.

I emailed back, thumbs flying.

Now is possible. Fair warning tho—I'm sweaty. If you're in despite dancer glow, text me a place. In the vicinity of Randolph & Dearborn makes "now" a LOT more realistic. Just saying.

And, pretending like it was no big thing, I sent him my cell number. Dishes for a week it was. Totally worth it.

Plunging back into the chaos of the communal dressing room, mostly so I wouldn't stand in the hall like an idiot waiting for the text, I checked myself out in the mirror. Thinking I was done for the night and going home, I'd scrubbed off all the stage makeup and put my hair in a ponytail. I had the street clothes I'd worn and that was it.

My phone whistled and three other girls with the same text alert grabbed their phones. I held mine up in triumph.

Sweaty...does that mean leg warmers?

I snickered. Him and his fetish list.

Yes. I'm not remotely glam. Tomorrow better? Or I'm off all Sunday.

It would be okay if he said so. I could wait. Look at me—all Zen and shit.

Not if I can see you now. Hungry?

Yes. Oh yes.

Starving.

Waiting for you at Petterino's.

Weren't we swank? The man had nice moves, for sure.

On my way!

How did you like that? Right down the street and already there. Suspicious, but that could be part of the conversation I intended to have. Over dinner, no less. Scoring points right and left with Julie's exacting criteria.

I might have been not-glam, but that didn't mean I couldn't take a minute to add a bit of makeup back on. When one's workplace overflows with cosmetics, that's just a given. Otherwise...well, he got what he got. _Not if I can see you now._ At least he had his priorities straight.

Feeling like running—after all, I wore my cross-trainers—I dashed down the street to Petterino's. A lot of after-theater people go there, so it's got great food in a fancy atmosphere, but enough post-show performers hit the place that I didn't feel too self-conscious about being grungy. People don't dress up for theater that much anymore, especially not on a Thursday.

The hostess was a dancer I knew from other shows, and she smiled in greeting. "Hey Charley. There's seats at the bar, but we're otherwise full up. Thirty-minute wait."

"I'm meeting someone. A guy. I mean—" I flapped my hands at my own giddiness and she laughed.

"Lucky you. Go look around then."

With a nervous flutter—why the hell did this feel like a first date?—I stepped past her and scanned the room. And there he was. Mr. Mystery, in full business-suit mode, standing up to catch my eye from a rear booth. He should not have looked sexy in that corporate crap, but... damn. He didn't wave, didn't have to, just snagged me with the intensity of his presence and waited, watching me cross the crowded bar. God, I loved the way he looked at me, like a physical caress on my naked skin. The spot at the small of my back tingled, as if attuned especially to him. His intent gaze went to my feet and cruised leisurely up again, a slow, salacious smile spreading over his face.

"Not-glam is working for me," he said when I reached the booth. "But then, you're gorgeous no matter what."

Tempted to fall into the game, I hesitated. Then held to the bargain I made with myself. I held out my hand. "I'm Charley. Charlotte, actually. Charlotte Emory."

I'd taken him a bit by surprise—at last, a taste of the upper hand for me and through honesty of all things—but he took my hand, not shaking it, but enfolding it in both of his, like something fragile. "Daniel Holt."

The moment stretched out, a hum of anticipation between us. He looked at me as he had when he'd put me on the carousel horse and told me he wanted to watch me come. Was he remembering that moment, too?

"Okay then." I had to shake off the erotic tension that settled on my skin like steaming mist. "I want to have a real conversation with you."

He hesitated, as if he was the nervous one. Then flicked a glance at our joined hands. "This instant or would you like to sit? Order food?"

"Yes." I blew out a breath, feeling ridiculous. Look at me, still holding onto his hands. Idiot. "Of course." Like normal people do.

"Wait a second." He didn't let go, but tugged my hand to pull me closer, and brushed my mouth with a lingering kiss. Perfectly chaste but it burned straight through me. "Hi."

"Hi," I breathed, reminding myself that it would be wrong to bundle him into a cab and fuck him then and there. Why, I couldn't quite recall. But I knew I had reasons. Good ones.

Right?

He let me go then and I slid into the booth, downing the water waiting for me. I hadn't hydrated nearly enough post-performance.

"I would have ordered a bottle of wine," he said. "But I don't even know what you like. Or if you drink after you perform." He had only water sitting in front of him, also. Waiting for me. Such an interesting mix of chivalry and kink. Perfectly polite and considerate until he tells you he wants to watch you come on a carousel horse.

"Yeah. You know, most people start with drinks and dinner and _then_ move on to the fetish list." I expected to make him laugh, but he looked away, smoothing off the condensation from the outside of his glass with long, graceful fingers.

"On the other hand," he said in a careful tone, "you have a pretty good idea of what to expect with me."

"Do I?" I meant the question to be flirtatious, but that sense of being out of control skidded over my nerves. I couldn't decide if I liked it or not.

He smiled slightly. "Would it be too mysterious to say to expect the unexpected?"

"I like surprises."

"Good."

"But not mystery so much."

"Ask me anything." He sipped his water, watching me over the rim.

"How did you know I was performing? And then you just happened to be in the neighborhood."

"You said 'sweaty' and all the shows let out around now, so it was logical. And I live nearby."

Hmm. Somehow I didn't quite buy that as the whole story. I opened my mouth to challenge that, but the harried waitress skidded up, and Daniel raised inquiring brows at me. My abortive waitressing days had scarred me enough that no way would I waste her time.

"Glass of house chard. Buffalo burger, rare, with avocado, grilled mushrooms, blue cheese, carmelized onions."

Looking amused, though I wasn't sure by what, Daniel changed it to a bottle, specifying a wine I didn't recognize, and said he'd have what the lady was having. Then we looked at each other, the noise of the bar filling the space between us.

"So," he said. "Other questions? Real conversation?"

I should have planned this out because I wasn't sure what all we should say to each other. Frankly the games had been easier. Which was Julie's point. He looked good. Kind of end-of-day rumpled, his tie loosened. Fair enough at nearly eleven. _How was your day? What do you do for a living? Who the hell are you?_ None addressed what I really wanted to know.

"How about I go?" He reached across the table and took my hand in both of his again, studying my nails. "I like the red. They were pink on Sunday."

"One of my housemates did them for me." And, okay, I had chosen the red because he liked it and he had been rattling around my brain, making me crazy.

He lifted my hand and kissed one of the glossy nails, flicking the bare tip of his tongue against my skin, making me catch my breath. Letting his gaze drift up, he met my eyes. "I was really happy to see your post. I'd started to think I wouldn't hear from you again."

"You could have posted one to me." I didn't sound as sure as I'd been in my mind, before he'd resumed his ongoing seduction.

He was shaking his head. "I promised myself I wouldn't. That I'd leave it up to you."

"Why?"

"Can I just say it was important to me to set that rule for myself and leave it at that?"

"That's not exactly a real answer."

"Let's try this." He rubbed a thumb over my palm, deepening the sense of sensual connection. "I'm seriously into you, Charley. From the first moment I laid eyes on you, I wanted you like..." He laughed a little. "Okay, I'm going there—with this almost physical pain. Maybe that sounds over the top. But that's how I felt. On edge. Enough that I discarded some of the social niceties to get your attention."

"Like wooshing me onto the dance floor and kissing me."

"Like that, yes. Not something I normally do. Have ever done. I excused it by rationalizing that at least I hadn't grabbed you off the dance floor, pushed you face-first against a wall and pinned you there so I could kiss the small of your back."

I gaped at him, floored by the image. Both aroused and a little uncomfortable.

His mouth twisted into a rueful smile. "Exactly. I didn't do that—and I promised myself that I wouldn't pursue you further. That it would be up to you from there on."

"That makes it sound like you were worried about becoming a scary obsessed stalker." I tried to say it lightly, but my always well-controlled voice failed me by wavering. Maybe I was being stupid. Wouldn't be the first time.

He met my gaze levelly. No excuses from him. "I wouldn't blame you for walking out on me. This wasn't something I could figure out how to disclose without sounding exactly like that."

"Then why _are_ you telling me?"

He tightened his hands. "Because you asked, and you deserve an honest answer. I don't know if there's anything you could ask for that I wouldn't give. Because now that we've spent time together, I want you more than ever."

The words worked on me like he'd put his hand between my legs. I pressed my thighs together, very aware of how I ached for that very thing. Needing to lighten the mood, I said, "With an almost physical pain?"

"Yes." He said it simply, nearly grating out the word, so the moment only intensified.

The waitress brought the wine, went through the business of opening the bottle and the whole cork ritual. Releasing my hands and sitting back, though his gaze barely left me, Daniel nodded to me when she offered the taste. "See if you like this one. If you don't, we'll get something else."

"I don't have what you'd call a sophisticated palate." Hoping my hand wouldn't shake, I sipped it and raised my eyebrows. Every once in a while, Julie brought home the remnants of a really good bottle that customers at her restaurant didn't finish. Whoever those people were—I didn't understand that kind of behavior. This was smoother and—what? Rounder and more full bodied somehow—than any of those. What great sex would be if you made it into wine. "Wow."

Daniel visibly relaxed and told the waitress to pour. "I hoped this one would please you."

I studied him, assimilating this new side of my otherwise pushy mystery man. "I won't claim that I'm not high maintenance in many ways—that should be on the table—but I'm a starving actress. I drink cheap wine. I'm betting this isn't."

With a look of chagrin, he raked a hand through his hair, ruffling the waves. "Am I screwing this up?"

"I haven't decided. Tell me something about yourself, Daniel Holt."

"Is that your favor?"

"Oh no." I sipped my wine and unzipped my hoodie, knowing the tank beneath would show off my cleavage nicely. "This is your opportunity to convince me."

He eyed me, trying to discern what I had in mind, then shrugged as if it made no matter to him. "There's not much to tell."

I raised an eyebrow at him and he grinned ruefully. "That wasn't being mysterious—I just can't ever think what to tell people about myself that would be interesting. Particularly when I'm nervous."

"Are you nervous, Daniel?" The possibility intrigued me, made me feel a little better.

"It's...important to me that this go well, so yes, and I feel somewhat out of my depth with you. Which is maybe not the right thing to say. Stop me from babbling and ask specific questions, please." He huffed out a breath and sipped his wine, shaking his head at himself.

I kind of loved that he felt off balance, too. "Age?"

"Twenty-nine. Thirty in November."

"A Scorpio—I should have known."

"You don't seriously believe in that stuff?"

I narrowed a glare at him. "Yes. I know when Mercury is in retrograde, I never say the name of the Scottish play in a theater and I say 'rabbit rabbit' as my first words on the first day of the month. I'm a Leo, which means I'm fine as long as you pet me, tell me I'm pretty."

He took my hand and stroked it. "Pretty? You're gorgeous. And I'd love to."

Oh boy. Questions. "You work in an office?"

"A law office, yes."

"Ambulance chaser? Noble public defender? Terrifying litigator?"

He tilted his head. "Nothing so dramatic. Corporate law. Boring."

"Lets you buy expensive wine, at least."

Wincing, he spun the glass in his hand. "That and it's the family corporation."

Ah. Holt. As in the Holt Corporation. "Don't you own a whole skyscraper?"

"Not personally, no."

"But you have a trust fund."

He stared me down. "I can't tell if you're laughing at me. Maybe we should talk more about you."

"Blue collar family. Pure white trash one generation back. No skyscrapers or trust funds, but I will someday inherit a spectacular money pit of an old mansion in Louisiana. I figure that's what you're after."

"A Southern girl? You have no accent."

"Relentless speech lessons. Girls with bayou drawls do not become major stars."

"Is that what you want?"

I lifted a shoulder and toyed with the end of my ponytail. Not that I was shy about my ambitions, but it always felt like bad luck to say them out loud. "Right now I live on bit parts, callbacks that don't usually don't pan out, cheap wine and hope."

That sounded a bit more plaintive, if dramatically noble—and unusually forthcoming for me—than I'd planned on. The waitress brought the burgers and I took time to doctor mine the way I liked it, and to cut it in half, to make it easier to bite into. When I finished, I found Daniel watching me with that steady interest.

"Let's put it this way," I continued, since he seemed to be waiting for more, "I'm a few years younger than Taylor Swift and I don't have her running scared."

"Only because she doesn't know about you—yet."

It made me smile. "You've never seen me perform, so I'm going to take that as general flattery. Which works for me, but..."

"But you think I don't know what I'm talking about."

Well... yeah. "Most people don't. I don't hold that against you."

He'd picked up his burger and set it down again. Wiped off his hands and set his elbows on the table. "I'd better fess up to something else."

Uh oh.

## ~ 8 ~

I almost told him not to.

Call me chicken. Tell me denial ain't just a river in Egypt. Point out that I was thinking with my pussy—that last was Ice's voice in my head, by the way—but I didn't want to hear him say anything that would make me not like him.

Because I did like him. Not only because he had me jonesing for him sexually or because he had a knack for hitting all the right notes in making me feel admired. I admit it—I'm horribly vain and he did pet me in all the right ways. I'm at peace with that. Beyond catering to my shallow faults, however, he interested me. I wanted more of his sly humor, his self-effacing remarks about his career and family. And I really wanted him to take me to bed already.

I took a deep breath. Big girl panties and all. If this confession was a dealbreaker, I'd rather know it now. "Hit me."

"I wasn't completely forthcoming before."

Shit. I knew it.

"I saw your show tonight," he said in a rush. "That's how I knew you were finishing up and why I was so close by." He covered his mouth with his hand and rubbed his chin. "So before you yell at me and tell me to get lost for being a creepy, star struck stalker, let me put it out there that I think you're amazing. Gorgeous singing voice. You dance like you don't have bones. You're a hell of an actress. Also—you have that quality, that charisma, that's absolutely riveting. Taylor Swift should be scared."

Yeah. Okay. I was done for.

I tried to think about it logically, but my inner Sally Fields was too loud, jumping up and down screaming _He likes me! He really likes me!_ Some girls tumble for money, for looks, for a solid five-pointer across all categories. Which, right, that was me, too. But compliment my talent and I cave faster than Lindsay Lohan coming out of rehab.

"So," I asked while he visibly braced himself, "do you want me to be your sex slave for life or just for tonight?"

He let out a surprised laugh. Stopped himself and then laughed again, more softly, shaking his head. "You're unbelievable. Does nothing rattle you?"

"Oh yes. Director's notes, struggling to get _en pointe_ , the price of organic chicken. Math. Going to the dentist." I shuddered dramatically. "Good thing you're not a dentist. _That_ would have been a dealbreaker."

" _En pointe_ —you dance ballet, too?"

"I did when I was young. It's hard on the body, and I'm built wrong for ballet." When his brow creased in puzzlement, I straightened my shoulders and thrust out my C-cups. "Top heavy. I would have had to get a breast reduction. My mother wouldn't let me."

"I think I love your mother."

I laughed. My mother would probably love him, too. A disconcerting thought as she and I rarely agreed on much. "You haven't even seen them. Maybe you should reserve judgment until you do."

He stilled, watching me carefully. "Does that mean I still have a shot?"

I'd finished my burger as we talked, assuaging one hunger, and nodded at his barely touched meal. "You better eat up, because I'm fixing to cash in my favor, and I think you're going need all your strength."

* * *

He didn't even try to finish. Just had the waitress box it up, paid the bill—without letting me see it—and hustled me out the door with gratifying impatience. As we walked, he put his hand on the small of my back, working his fingers under my shirt until he found _his_ spot. The spot that was rapidly becoming my "on" switch.

"Your place, since it's so close?" I asked, part of me braced for him to have fudged that detail, even though I knew nothing would stop me from having him now. Hell, if it turned out he lived in Evanston, I'd just pull him into an alley.

"Would you feel safe coming to my place?"

"Yes," I answered, very seriously and responsibly for a girl who'd been liking the alley concept better and better with each passing minute. "I'll text my housemates with your name and address."

"In case they have to report you missing?" He sounded amused by the idea.

"Or send the EMTs to resuscitate us, if this goes as I think it might."

His step hitched, his hand hot on my back. "Hold on a minute. I need something."

Condoms? I started to say I had some—a Girl Scout is always prepared—but he backed me against the wall of the building and took my mouth with his, fast, hard, and with such ferocity that he stole my breath in a flash. I moaned and he seemed to drink the sound in, hands vising on the bare skin of my waist. My whole body strained to get closer to his and if I thought for one second that he might be contemplating ditching out, I would have cheerfully murdered him on the spot. He tore his mouth away and leaned against me, breathing raggedly.

"Is your place far?" I managed to get out.

"Two blocks."

"There's an alley right here."

He laughed, more a semi-hysterical gasp for air. "You're killing me."

"Oh, not yet. I've barely started on you."

"I'll die a happy man," he muttered and kissed me again, drawing it out, much as I downed water after dancing. "But no. I want you naked. In bright light."

"I thought this was about my favor." I hustled to keep up with his impatient stride, propelled by his hand at my back.

He glanced down at me, then grimaced, reining his pace and softening his demanding hand. "Dammit, you're right. Any way I can talk you into indulging me and saving it for another time?"

Admirable, the way he pulled himself back like that. Sad thing was, I couldn't think of anything I wanted from him more at that moment than exactly what he'd been giving me. His hunger, his driving desire. We reached his building and entered the elevator.

"Okay," I said, and he waited politely, hands tucked in pockets, ready to abide by my terms. Delicious. Too much to squander. "I'm saving my favor. Tonight I'm interested to see what you'll do with a free pass."

"A free pass?" The elevator dinged, the doors opening directly into his place, but he didn't move. Simmering on the leash. "Does that mean what I think it means?"

"Probably." I sidled closer and put my hand over his crotch, happy to find a straining—and hallelujah! Very impressive—erection. Ecstatic agony creased his face most enticingly as I squeezed. Oh yeah, I'd be letting him off that leash. "It means you get to do whatever you want. _Surprise_ me."

He moved me out of the elevator and let the doors close, then unzipped my hoodie very slowly, watching what it revealed. Then he studied my face. "Are you sure?"

"I know how to say no. Try me."

He eased the sweatshirt off my shoulders, leaving me in my tank and bra. Not a sexy one as I wore it for support, but my nipples had gone hard and that seemed to occupy his riveted gaze. Slowly he slid his hands down my back, arching me and nuzzled the spot where my neck meets the shoulder. My blood cruised up to a coursing tempo, fuzzing my brain. "Tonight you smell different," he murmured.

"Grease paint and dance sweat. I warned you."

"I like it." He dragged his teeth along my skin. "A different side of you."

"A pungent one. Let me take a shower."

"Only if I can watch."

I shivered a little at the thought and his hands flexed on me. He bit me lightly, in that same juncture, the one that wires straight to the atavistic female brain, making me want to purr and spread my legs.

"I didn't hear a no." He didn't phrase it as a question, more like a challenge. There was the lawyer in him.

"Nothing wrong with your hearing."

The next thing I knew, he'd picked me up and carried me down the hall. Mostly only dance partners ever carried me like this and at least I know how to make myself easy to lift. Still, I'm not tiny. His strength impressed me. And made me more than a little swoony. The moment also afforded me the opportunity to indulge in nibbling on his neck, loving the way his step hitched when I scraped him with my teeth and the moan that followed the stroke of my tongue.

He set me on my feet in a bathroom straight out of HGTV and turned on the water in an open-fronted shower with multiple heads on all three sides. I started untying my sweats.

"No," he stopped my hands. "Let me." He held my gaze until I acceded to the...not quite a request. Not exactly a demand, either. But that way of his took me over, sapping my will and leaving me curiously pliant.

I let go.

Taking up the hem of my tank, he fingered it, gathering it up slowly as he watched my face. "I've been waiting for this," he said, in a soft tone that nevertheless thundered through my skull. Dropping his gaze, he watched as he revealed my skin, inch by inch, drawing the cloth over my head and tossing it aside. For an endless moment, his gaze glided over my cleavage. Unable to stand the tension and feeling surprisingly exposed even though the bra covered quite a bit, I moved to kiss him, but he put his hands on my shoulders and firmly turned me around.

His hands caressed my back, from the nape of my neck exposed by the pony tail to the flare of my hips. His eyes snagged mine in the mirror. The catch on my bra gave, making me start, and he drew the straps down my arms, watching my reflection. I saw myself tremble as my naked breasts came into view, full from desire and my nipples drawn into tight points.

He stared hard, but made no move to touch anything else. Instead, his seductive caresses continued down my bare back, both gentling and arousing me further. With a wicked smile, he pressed a kiss to my shoulder, hands trailing down my arms, then wrapping around my wrists. The faint trembling turned into a throbbing and I squirmed a little against his grip. He smiled, not amused, not the polite gentleman now, but almost a hungry baring of teeth. Leaning me forward, he lifted my hands and placed my palms flat against the mirror. I whimpered and he held me there, covering my hands with his and placing a kiss just under my ear. "Let me," he whispered and the mantra somehow calmed me.

He stroked back up my arms, tracing every line of my forearms, triceps, and biceps, over my shoulders and tracing down my ribcage. Starkly untouched, my naked breasts rose and fell, my brain rattled by it all. He sank out of sight behind me, hot mouth following the path of his hands, disappearing from view to leave me gazing at my own wide eyes and flushed skin as he found that same spot at the small of my back. Unreal how he savored these non-key points and made them somehow more erotic than the rest.

"Daniel." I groaned his name and he murmured some response. With his hands gripping my hips, I couldn't move much, but I began to feel frantic to do so. "Oh please."

"No," he answered. "Not yet. Let me."

The bright-eyed panting woman in the mirror would do anything at this point. He left off kissing me and picked up my foot, unlacing my sneaker and tugging off my sock, then the leg warmer. With smooth, firm caresses, he learned my foot, ankle and calf muscles. Dancers don't have pretty feet. The one thing I'd given up being vain about. Yet he touched me there as he had everywhere, with a dizzying reverence that worked its way under my skin and into places I thought I'd walled off.

A sound came out of me, almost like a sob, and he shushed me, moving to the other foot and stripping that one, too. With him kneeling behind me, I couldn't see anything but my own desperate face in the mirror, now fogging, my hands sliding against the glass slick with sweat and steam, as he pulled the sweats over my hips, taking my panties with them.

I'd never been so naked.

Pressing my thighs tightly together, the slick heat there making me crazy with need, I nearly screamed when he traced the outside line of my thighs. Then lifted my feet one by one out of the sweats.

And kissed the back of my knee.

"Fuck the shower," I gritted out, trying to open my legs. "Do me now."

He laughed, the sound a tormenting demon might make and held my knees together, licking the back of one and then the other. "Not yet."

"I'm serious!"

Hands smoothed over my thighs, containing my struggles and stroked over my ass. I stilled, hoping he'd relented and would finally touch me where I needed it most. Then squealed when his teeth nipped me there.

"So am I." He sounded serious, too. "I said not yet and I mean it."

His hands left me and he moved back. The mirror had totally fogged over, so I couldn't see exactly where he went. But I was totally naked and more aroused than I'd ever been, shaking from it, and from the dire certainty that he had come nowhere near to being done playing with me.

"The shower is waiting," he said.

Wondering if even my strong legs would hold me, I straightened and turned. He leaned against the wall, hands in pockets, sweating a little in the steam. His gaze, alert in a face all savage gentleman, took in my every movement. Acutely aware of him, I stepped under the hot spray of water, gasping as my wired nerves sang with overstimulation.

I took a moment, closing my eyes and letting the water calm me. Then I reached back and wound my trailing ponytail into a knot on the top of my head, to keep my hair dry. Daring a glance at Daniel, I found him watching the rise and fall of my breasts as I moved. He dragged his gaze up and his lips twisted into a wry smile.

"There's soap."

Taking the suggestion, I found a bar and sniffed it. "Very manly."

"I'll get you something for next time. Magnolia-scented, to match your skin."

I raised an eyebrow, taken aback by his odd mixture of command and poetic romanticism and by his certainty. "You're so sure there will be a next time?"

## ~ 9 ~

His jaw clenched and eyes glittered dark. "I warned you about how I am. But the deal stands. I'll leave it up to you. You know how to find me. If you come back, there will be soap you like."

"I like this one." I began stroking it over me, dragging his gaze with it, directing his eyes where I wanted them to go. Soaping my breasts, I caressed and lifted them, loving how he licked his lips. I'd never done anything like this, but it turned me on to perform for him this way, a kind of sexual dance. One that I controlled now, the way he ostentatiously stood back, following my lead.

Taking my time, just as he'd done undressing and teasing me—paybacks are hell, my friend—I soaped myself thoroughly, making sure the foam covered my bits for the water to sluice away again. A lot of young dancers get into stripping, just for the money. I'd never gotten that desperate, thank God and a mother who never criticized when I asked for a loan, but that didn't mean I hadn't thought about how I'd do it—and that I'd be damn good at it.

Dance is dance, after all.

Moving to the music in my head, I made the soap, the hot water and the steam into my partners, twining with them for my rapt audience of one. I put the soap away before I opened my thighs to rinse the water through my pussy. A girl has to be very careful about what chemicals touch that area and most soaps will only irritate. The feel of my own hands shocked me and I gasped, knees buckling a little. Holy hell. I almost couldn't stand it and had to brace myself against the wall. My clit had never been harder, my labia never slicker or more swollen.

Abruptly self-conscious, I searched out my watcher. He'd moved closer, eyes glued to my hand at my crotch, then flicked that avid gaze to mine. "Bonus points if you make yourself come."

Mesmerized, unable to look away, I stroked myself for him. Something I'd done thousands of times, but always in the loneliness of my bed. Getting myself off had always felt like a Band-Aid, the poor man's second best to the real thing. I should know the feeling well, as I'd been doing myself quite a bit lately, with this particular face in mind. Keenly aware of my own touch, the twin sensations of my slippery flesh under my fingers and the sheer, delicious build of orgasm, I experienced the act as never before. As something truly sexual and not merely the scratch of yet another itch.

Leaning back against the slick wall, I spread my thighs and cupped my breast, rolling the nipple as I imagine he'd do. Tension riding his body, Daniel took in the show, the hands in his pockets clenched into fists. My thigh muscles tightened and I let out a thin whimper, which became a full throaty cry as the climax exploded.

I might have collapsed, head swimming, but no—that swirling sense of dislocation came from him lifting me. Sweeping me into his arms, my hand still buried between my legs, Daniel carried me wet and naked to his bed. He'd soaked his suit and his loosened tie clung to my breast even as he slid down my body and opened my legs.

"The water is still running," I said, grabbing a hold of the sopping silk tie and winding it around my fist.

He yanked it out of my hand and pushed my knees back. "Shut up, Charley."

"Okay, I—oh God." I lost the thought as, impossibly hotter than the shower had been, his mouth fastened on my pussy. As if I hadn't quite finishing climaxing before he abducted me from the shower, my body went straight into another orgasm. Unable to reach him, I clutched at the comforter, staring up blindly as he worked me with teeth, lips, and agile tongue, flinging me from one shuddering orgasm to the next.

I became aware that I was begging him, a kind of senseless chant as I surged with the rhythm of his ravishment. He slid a finger inside me, then another, and I went wild, arching my spine as I screamed, my heartbeat a relentless crescendo.

Thankfully, he slowed, letting me come down a little while I stared blindly at the ceiling. Limp and totally drained. He rose and returned with a towel, wiping me down. He'd finally turned off the shower, which made me feel better though I doubted stuff like utility bills troubled him much.

Gradually energy seeped back into my body and I sat up to watch him carefully dry between my toes. He looked up, gaze traveling the length of my body, absurdly sexy in his half-soaked suit, ruined tie askew. With the kind of leisurely gesture that seemed to blow his mind, I lifted my hands to the knot of my hair. Despite my efforts, it had gotten a little damp and would dry badly if I left it up. Taking it all down, I shook my hair out and let it fall down my back.

I smiled at Daniel and tilted my head. "Don't you want to get out of that suit?"

"Not yet." His own smile bloomed when I frowned at him.

"I'm beginning to hate that phrase," I advised him. "Enough teasing."

"Oh no, gorgeous. There's never enough teasing. Can I have that?" He held his hand out for the elastic band I'd pulled out of my ponytail. Uncertain what diabolical thing he planned now, I hesitated. Until his amused and challenging stare got the best of me. I handed it to him and his smile turned smug.

Pushing my knees apart, he moved between them, still kneeling on the floor so his head was level with my breasts. I ran my fingers through his hair and he leaned into the caress, then cupped my breasts. Wrapping my legs around him, I tried scooting closer, but he maintained some distance, weighing my breasts and caressing them, learning that part of me, too.

I murmured encouragingly when he dropped kisses onto the upper curves, enjoying the more gradual rise of arousal. This was a dance I knew well. The opening notes of touching my breasts, sucking my nipples, followed by the increasing tempo of intercourse and the predictable male climax.

Indeed, he drew one nipple into his mouth, doing a lovely job of licking and lightly nipping. My vulva clenched, aching for penetration and I wriggled, sliding my hands down his back to tug up his shirt.

"No," he said. "Let me."

I froze at that, nerves and arousal spiraling into a sudden, unexpected crescendo. Just as he'd somehow already taught my body to respond to a brush of his hand on my back, when he uttered those soft words, I viscerally anticipated something that would drive me wild.

"I don't think I can take much more." I sounded desperate, even to my own ears.

Still cupping my breasts, he studied my face. "Would you rather go home? We can stop."

Bastard. "Are those my only choices?"

Thoughtfully he licked my nipple, sucking harder until I squirmed. Then nipped it so I squeaked and dug my nails into his shoulders. "You have three. Call in your favor, call it a night, or let me do what I want to." His gleaming gaze challenged me and my stomach fluttered.

"You owe me two favors. I assume the bonus points for making myself come in the shower earned me the same prize."

His hands tightened on me and he transferred his mouth to my other breast, holding me in place while he applied the same treatment, even down to the piercing bite of his teeth. "Very true. Going to call in either one of them?"

He waited now, stroking his hands down my ribs to my waist, expression full of polite attention, no sign of the savage inside. For the moment.

"What are you going to do if I say I'm in?"

With an immaculate poker face, he considered the question. Then shook his head. "If you want to know, you have to let me do it."

_Well shit._ My breathing started to get ragged again. "You're killing me here."

He didn't look the least bit sorry. "All according to plan then. Take your time to decide. I'm a patient man."

"That much is obvious. What if I can't stand it, whatever it is?"

"You know how to say no," he taunted me with my own words.

Like he knew I couldn't back away from that. "Okay. Do it."

He smiled with a feral edge and I nearly reneged at the sight of it. Taking my left breast in his hand, he kissed and licked, drawing my already taut nipple into a hard point. Then with that wicked glance at my face, he held up the elastic band and eased it over my breast. My breath caught painfully, both in shock and arousal. He watched me intently, holding my nipple pinched as he wound the elastic tighter around the hard point, taking in my expression, his own growing more savage with whatever he saw in me. By the time he had it so tight my nipple throbbed, I was nearly frantic, making light mewling sounds that I couldn't quite make into words.

He observed his work and flicked his tongue against my tormented nipple. The sensation went through me like a lightning bolt and I didn't recognize the noise that came out of me.

"Too bad there aren't two," he commented, squeezing my other nipple.

"In the pocket of my hoodie." I stared back at his widening grin, aghast at what I'd suggested.

"Stay just like that." He went to the bathroom and returned with one of the many spare elastic bands I keep on me at all times. Coming back, he stopped, giving me one of those long looks, and seemed about to say something. Then shook his head at himself and kneeled in front of me again. He tapped the nipple he'd already banded and I drew in a breath. "Does it hurt?"

"No, just tight."

"Good." With meticulous care, he coaxed my other nipple into a point and wrapped it in elastic, too. I tried to absorb it, that I was here, letting him do these things that were so much less invasive than sexual acts I'd indulged in with near strangers, and yet that felt so much more intimate. As if he'd found a way to crawl inside my head and affect my thoughts, turning me inside out.

"What are we doing here?" I didn't realize I'd asked the question out loud until he met my gaze seriously.

"We're having sex," he replied, as if it were a profound answer. "You're letting me do what I like to you, and I'm giving you intense pleasure in return."

"Oh." Bizarrely it made sense. Or, at least, I couldn't find an argument against it.

"Aren't I?" He asked, putting hands on my thighs, stroking towards the juncture, kissing one sensitized nipple, then the other.

"Yes," I gasped, clutching at him.

He laid a gentle finger on the hood of my clit and rocked it back and forth. "And now?"

"Yes. God yes."

"I want to watch you come this way. Will you let me?"

As if I'd stopped him from doing anything so far. Maybe later it would bother me the way I'd uncharacteristically let him take the lead. For the time being, I only nodded, moving my hips with the rhythm of the one finger, lightly stroking my clit, taking me up with shuddering intimacy. _I want you naked. In bright light._ He had me that way, keen gaze taking in every flicker of my expression, searching my face and adjusting the speed, pressure and tempo until he found the exact right one, then backed off.

"Please," I whispered.

"Yes, gorgeous. Take your time. All for you."

"I need."

"I know."

It took me fast, for all the slow build up. I convulsed, tipping my head back and clamping my thighs hard around his hand. He cupped me, holding my mound as I writhed on his hand, crying out as his teeth scraped off one rubber band and then the other, driving me over the brink and up again. The aftershocks of it rumbled through me, raking me with their busy claws before finally subsiding. I opened my eyes to find Daniel crouched over me, mouth laving my aching breasts.

"Okay, that's it," I declared with a reasonably steady voice.

He lifted his head, giving me a politely inquiring smile, as if his hand weren't buried between my thighs. Firmly I moved it away and sat up.

"Had enough?"

"Not even close. Time for payback." And to get a grip on myself. "I'm calling in a favor."

## ~ 10 ~

"What terms?" He asked, eyeing me as if I'd surprised him. He raised his brows as I unknotted and pulled off his tie, then began unbuttoning his dress shirt, soaked here and there with shower water still. Somewhere along the way he'd taken off his jacket.

"You're going to let me do whatever I want to you." I scraped my nails down his chest. "And you're going to like it."

"I see." He'd gone breathless now, then buried his hands in my hair when I pushed him back. "Wait."

"Let go. You can pull my hair all you want later. I'm in charge now." I pulled free and worked open the fastening of his trousers.

"Charlotte, I—" He lost the words in a strangled noise when I took his cock in my hand through his cotton boxers. I paused, giving him my own polite smile. "Did you say something?"

He had his hands over his face, digging into his forehead like a man in pain. Did I mention paybacks are hell? Working slowly, I peeled away the cloth, freeing him, stroking his shaft until he was shuddering in my grasp. He sat up and seized my wrists. "Don't do this. Not yet."

"No?" I licked my lips, dragging his gaze with the movement and gave him a malicious smile. "I think I can change your mind about that." Holding his gaze, I licked the head of his cock, happy with his groan of despair and that he couldn't seem to look away. "Don't worry, Danny Boy—I'll see to it that you rise to the occasion more than once. Trust me on that."

He laughed, shaky, then drew in a long hissing breath as I sucked him into my mouth. To my surprise he stroked my cheek. "I'm having trouble believing you're really here," he murmured.

I let him go and regarded him thoughtfully, leaning my cheek into his caressing hand. An oddly tender gesture for that particular moment, and given our relationship thus far, if you could call it that. Not how most guys treat the girl they've obsessed about and who's currently blowing them. The look in his face both moved and frightened me. "Relax. We're having sex, you're letting me do what I like to you and I'm giving you intense pleasure in return."

He smiled, almost sadly, at hearing his words thrown back at him, and stopped me when I moved to take him into my mouth again. "I know this is your favor, but—for the first time I come with you—I'd really like to be inside you. Let me have you that way."

That took me aback. Pretty much no guy turns down a blow job. A less confident girl than I might doubt her technique, but I happened to be quite certain mine was excellent. "Is there a problem?"

"No." He urged me up and laid me on my back, hands stroking down my body, gaze following their path as he outlined my curves. Not meeting my eyes. "I just...let me do this."

Him and his 'let me' thing. I felt strangely irritated by the shift in energy, though I couldn't pin down why. "Whatever."

Now he searched my face. "I've annoyed you."

"No. I'm not mad. I'm just not entirely sure what to make of you, of all this. I feel like I'm having one of those dreams where I'm in a play and I don't know the script."

He leaned down and kissed me, cupping my breast and taking me into that sensual haze he created so effortlessly. "No script," he whispered against my lips. "Let me make love to you."

"Okay." My voice wobbled, the romance of the phrase hitting me in that unexpectedly revealed soft spot. Unthinkingly, I undulated under his hand, a cat purring at the affection in his caress. Had any guy ever used that term with me? No. In fact, I don't think _I_ had ever spoken those words in real life, certainly not unironically. That kind of idealization belonged to the world of Marcia and her virginal longing for Prince Charming. I pushed at Daniel's bare chest, needing to assert something, anything. "But if you're going to fuck me, you're wearing a condom and you are _not_ wearing your shoes and socks. Get naked, slick."

He raised his head and looked right through me, making me want to squirm a little at the certainty that he knew I'd deliberately meant to change the tone of things between us. Without commenting, he levered himself up and stood, toeing off his shoes and sliding off his pants. I propped myself on one elbow to watch, admiring his lean physique. Not a dancer's body, but I didn't expect that of a desk jockey. Good muscle tone, though. Decent abs, very nice thighs. Seriously excellent cock.

"You have a majorly hot body—do you work out?"

He cocked his head at me, opened the bedside drawer, pulled out a handful of condoms and tossed them next to me on the bed. "Care to discuss my gym routine?"

I considered him and the glitter in his gaze, the set of his jaw. "Now it seems I've annoyed you. I'm sorry."

"No, you're not. You meant to annoy me."

"That's not true, I—" My indignant words died a breathless death when he pushed me back, pinned my wrists to the bed on either side of my head and kissed me senseless. Sudden, vicious arousal punched through me, from slow dance to sweat-drenched salsa, and I writhed against him, the utter deliciousness of his naked skin against mine sweeping me up and making me forget what we were arguing about. Maybe it was waiting so long to get him here, or the extended foreplay he seemed so devoted to, but I wanted him with a desperation that chased every other consideration out of my mind.

Off-the-charts chemistry. Definite high score. I couldn't quite recall the scale or the other categories. Rules of some sort. Fuck it, I didn't care.

"Oh my God." I gasped out the words when he let me, groping for some grounding, straining to touch him but having to settle for wrapping my legs around him. "Fuck me. Fuck me now."

"Shh." He rained kisses over my face. "Hold on."

He let go of my wrists to grab a condom packet and I seized the opportunity to run my hands over his back and the taut ass I hadn't even seen yet. "Hurry."

Laughing in what sounded like exasperation, he rolled the condom on and settled back between my legs, resisting when I tried to pull him into me. "No."

No? No what?

This time he took my hands and laced his fingers with mine, easing his hips back so his cock just nudged my entrance. He laid the line of his body against me, kissed me in that leisurely, unhurried way of his, then smiled, smooth and sensuous. "I won't let you rush this."

He eased partly into me and I moaned at the sensation, greedy for him, for more. Watching me with that discomfiting intensity, he slid deeper into me, and I had to close my eyes.

"No, look at me, Charlotte." He held still until I did. "Be with me. Let me."

Mesmerized, I did as he asked, watching him in turn as he stroked in and out of my body, invading me at that intimate level he seemed to be able to reach whether he touched me or not. With our bodies and gazes joined, I couldn't escape it. As the precursor to orgasm bloomed, an odd sense of panic fluttered through me. Too soft. Too sweet somehow. Too something.

"Harder." I lifted my hips in demand, pushing up against him.

"No." He kept the rhythm gentle, his grip unrelenting, expression rapt as he watched my need build.

I sobbed a little, thrashing my head from side to side. "I can't stand it."

"Just feel."

"Daniel..." I struggled against the climax, instinctively, not knowing why, just somehow profoundly overwhelmed by it all.

"I'm here. I'm with you. Let me have you."

He undid me. With a thin cry, I broke, crying out his name and coming apart at the seams. It wasn't the strongest orgasm I'd ever had, but it ravaged me, continuing on in endless ripples, circles expanding outward and spreading through my body and mind, emptying me and leaving me clinging to him.

Gasping, completely shattered, I became aware that I held his hands in a death grip and had my face buried in his shoulder. Daniel pressed kisses to the side of my neck, his weight relaxed against me as he murmured soothing, cherishing words.

Jesus Christ, was I weeping?

So not cool. I mean, I'm a dramatic girl and I can cry when the script calls for it, but I am _not_ a weeper. Definitely _not_ during sex, of all things. I'd heard of women who cried when they orgasmed and it always sounded so... tawdry. Weak, silly, and stupid. And now that was me. I'd lost my sense of direction on some deep level. I had no idea if Daniel had even come, I'd been that far out of it.

Either way, I needed to deal with the tears before he noticed. Nothing like reducing a brand new lover to a sopping mess of emotion. If there was ever a reason to ditch a girl fast, that had to be it. _Run, Daniel. Escape while you can._

Except I was the one desperate to escape.

I tried to slip my hand out of his, but he tightened his fingers enough that I had to tug in earnest. He started to lift up to look at me and I managed to duck my face away and push at his shoulders. "Ugh—get off of me you lout. I can't breathe."

Obligingly, he rolled to the side, but he snagged my hand when I sat up and swung my legs off the bed. At least I'd gotten so I faced away from him and could scrub away the evidence with my free hand.

"Where are you going?"

"To clean up. I'm disgusting and sticky. Let go of me."

"Charlotte..."

"I'm going to take another shower. Alone, this time. Just...leave me alone."

* * *

Such a stroke of luck that my clothes were still in the bathroom. I ignored the images their scattered pattern evoked, the way Daniel had slowly stripped me. To the bone, apparently.

Or whatever the hell had happened.

I locked the door, just in case he took it in his head to check on me or something. If he tried the knob and got offended that would fall into the realm of his own damn problem. I took my time, making the water uncomfortably hot to scour the too-recent memories of all we'd done and how I'd responded.

I could not believe I'd fucking _cried_.

Because I'd forgotten to tie it up and, hell, I needed the time, I went ahead and washed my hair, then blew it dry. I never carried makeup with me, since I was pretty much always either at home or at a place with piles of it, so no armor for me there. Oh well. The day had not come when I couldn't face down one humiliating sexual encounter and brazen my way out of it.

He was waiting for me when I opened the door—no shocker there—leaning against the wall just outside the bathroom. He'd put on clothes, old jeans and a long-sleeved shirt. I couldn't tell if he'd tried the handle or not, but I kind of thought he hadn't. Probably part of his peculiar code of honor or whatever drove him. Giving him my best sunny, I-don't-give-a-shit-about-anything smile, I smacked him lightly on the pec above his folded arms and delivered a fast smooch.

"See you, slick. This was great. I'm out of here."

I wasn't quite fast enough, because he caught my wrist, eyes dark. Oh wow, was he pissed.

"What's going on?" He asked in a quiet, level tone that didn't fool me for one hot second.

"Which part was unclear? I'm going home."

"Just like that?"

"Well, yes. Seeing as how I'm a free human being and all that." My temper rose up, a relief after those dangerously soft emotions that had threatened to carve me open. I tugged against his grip, but he held on.

"You're not walking out of here at four in the goddam morning, taking the El all alone and leaving things between us this way."

Was it that late? Er, early? He'd totally scrambled my brains. I needed to get clear in the worst way. "You're going to want to knock off the Neanderthal shit."

"Not until you agree to sit down and tell me what's going on in your head. What did I do?"

"Nothing!" I turned up the wattage on my superstar smile. "You fucked me sideways, it was awesome, you're the best I've ever had, your cock is bigger than anyone else's, and I have other things to do."

## ~ 11 ~

He actually growled, his jaw so tight I thought he might crack a tooth. Then he let go of me, very deliberate, opening his fingers wide and dropping his hands. I ducked around him and headed down the hall, resisting the urge to run for it.

"I'm calling a car for you," he said from close behind me. I picked up the pace.

"Not necessary. I'm a big girl, slick."

"Funny, because you're acting like a spoiled teenager who's running scared."

Okay, that made the steam whistle in my ears. I stopped and turned to confront him, very slowly. All the emotions of the night boiled in a sizzling cloud pushing against the bones of my skull and I locked my own jaw to hold back the worst of it. "Don't you dare speak to me like that."

"Why not?" He put hands on hips, eyes sparking with frustration. "Afraid to hear the truth as much as you were afraid to face how you felt when we made love?"

"We _fucked_!" I screamed it at him. "That's all it was. I got my rocks off and I sure as hell hope you did, too, because you're never getting in my pants again."

"Is that so? Is that one of your famous rules?" He spat the words at me, then blanched. It would have been comical except I had gone from enraged to incandescently pissed. Which, for me, means very quiet and still.

"What's that about rules?" I asked softly, nearly vibrating with the effort to hold still.

He opened his mouth, tried to brush it off. "Just—you know. Rules. People have them, that kind of thing. That's all I meant."

"Oh no it wasn't. You're lying to me. What do you know about the Rules?"

Unable to take it—way too honest for his own good apparently—he flung up his hands. "Sue me. I heard some stuff about how you and your housemates have dating rules, so I made it my business to find out what I could and stacked the deck in my favor."

"You 'made it your business' to find out about the Rules." Unreal. Totally fucking unreal.

"Yes. _Mea culpa._ This was important to me. I can't regret that it worked."

"You 'heard some stuff.' That means you had to talk to one of my friends."

He set his jaw. "Yes."

"Marcia. That's why she insisted on the Missed Connections ad. You planned this." The treacherous bitch. I struggled with the wounded sense of betrayal. They'd played me and I'd gone right along with it.

He scrubbed a hand over his face and sighed. "She works for one of our branches. I found that out and visited her at her office. She gave me some friendly advice."

"Let me get clear on this—one of my closest friends helped you stalk me."

"Helped me get to know you."

"Because you were obsessed with me."

"Because I am _interested_ in you, yes."

"That's not how you put it before."

He pushed the heels of his hands into his eyes. "Okay, yes. I fell for you without really knowing much about you. I couldn't get you out of my head, so I did what I could to find out who you were, whether you were single, what might give me a shot at actually getting a fucking date with you."

It made much more sense now. The pieces falling into place. "Before we danced at the club."

He dropped his hands and held them out, as if offering me something. His weak-ass excuses. "I saw you in _Wicked_. That small role you had and you lit up the stage. The woman I'd taken to the show broke up with me on the way home, because I paid so little attention to her. I went back on my own, every night I could, just to watch you. And every other show I could find that you performed in."

"That was months ago."

"Nine weeks and three days. I know how it sounds."

"It sounds pretty fucking bad, slick."

"I know." He curled his fingers and stared at his hands. "I know. But it was—I had this crazy, intense, unrequited love thing and it wouldn't let go of me. I finally had to do something, anything, to at least have a conversation with you. Find out if what I felt was real or..."

"Or what?" I felt coolly jagged. Instead of wrapping my arms around myself the way I wanted to, I folded them and stood tall, going for judgment. "A crazy obsession with someone who isn't even real?"

"You _are_ real. What I feel is just as real and so is what you feel. We have something, dammit."

I laughed, relieved that it sounded mean and not hysterical. "I don't even know you, slick."

"Is that why you came apart in my arms? Why you wept? Because what's between us is so huge, so fucking good that it's like bathing in fire?"

"Fuck you," I whispered. Horribly, the tears pushed up again and I ruthlessly shoved them down with every shred of skill I could muster. "Don't you ever think you can use that against me."

His face softened and he took a step closer, hands still spread as if he wanted to embrace me. "Charlotte," his voice snagged. "Not against you. I want to be here for you, be with you. Every minute I spent with you just solidified how I felt. I know it's crazy, but I think I'm in love with you, and I want to find out if that's true. Give us some time to test it, that's all I'm asking. Let us get to know each other. Let me prove myself. Just..." he dropped his hands, his face falling at whatever he saw in mine.

"Just what? _Let you_?" I hissed it at him. His catch phrase. "I don't think so. Give me your phone." Pressing his lips together, he pulled the phone out of his pocket and keyed in the pass code. I found our texts, erased them, then deleted my number—which he'd already labeled as "Charlotte" because of course he knew my name before I told him—and I nuked the email exchange for good measure.

Resisting the urge to hurl the phone at him, I handed it back. Cool and composed. Greta Garbo, saying goodbye. "You know your self-imposed deal—that you wouldn't seek me out?"

He nodded miserably.

"I'm holding you to it. Don't seek me out. Don't post ads—because I won't look. Don't come to my shows. If you see me in a club, you're going to turn around and leave. Because if I catch the least whisper that you're nearby, I'll file a restraining order so fast the paper will burn."

"Don't do this. Please."

The quiet words were worse than anything else he'd said and they seared me. I steeled myself against him, relying on my cold anger to kill the pain.

"It's done."

"Okay." He took a deep breath. Blew it out. "I accept that I screwed this up. Maybe I should have gone backstage that first time and introduced myself. At the time, that seemed creepier. I thought about engineering an 'accidental' meeting—even worse. In retrospect...God! I don't even know. I'm a driven person. I couldn't _not_ at least try to get your attention. If you condemn me, remember it's because I wanted you more than I could bear. Any bad choices I made, I made for the best reasons."

I clung to my righteous anger, unwilling to feel the least bit sorry for him. "Such a bullshit line. You lied to me."

"By omission, yes. Never in fact."

An incredulous laugh escaped me. "Fucking lawyer. You should have told me before you slept with me."

"I was going to. I nearly did over dinner, but..." He rubbed his face. "I got caught up. We were clicking, just as I'd hoped—as we did from that first dance and you know it—and I thought, oh there will be time and one day we'll laugh about this."

"A story to tell our grandchildren?" I sneered.

He gave me a cold glare. "I accept your anger. Don't laugh at me, though, for thinking that you might be the one for me."

I didn't know what to say to that. "I'm going."

"I'll walk you down and pay your cab fare."

"You don't—"

"It's that or I follow you home to make sure you're okay and then you'll have to file that restraining order."

"Whatever."

We rode down in the elevator in silence. He got the doorman to call a cab and we waited on the dark and silent sidewalk. Nothing like a couple of hours before dawn to empty out a city even as busy as Chicago. The cab arrived and Daniel gave him way too much money for the distance I needed to go, then opened the door for me to get in.

I tried to yank it shut but he held it.

"If you ever think you can forgive me, you know how to find me. We can go slow. I know you think I'm a crazy man, but I'm not. I've never done anything like this before."

"I can't imagine how you thought it would turn out."

"Not like this," he said and let me go.

## ~ 12 ~

Not everyone in city was asleep. By the time the cab dropped me off, Amy was heading out the door on her morning run, blond ponytail bouncing with grating perkiness.

"Nice cab ride of shame!" She called out. "Still a five-pointer? I'm guessing yes and that you haven't slept. So jelly."

"Don't be," I replied. Okay, I snarled it, and her brown eyes widened.

"Whoa—what happened?"

"What happened is that I'm going to kill Marcia. You might want to stay out of the line of fire."

"Uh, no. I think I'll stick by and help mop up the blood."

"Suit yourself. That's apparently the M.O. in this house."

I stalked up the stairs, not even trying to be quiet. Everyone would be awake soon regardless. Marcia's door was open and she blinked sleepily at me, then smiled. "You just got home? That's amazing. How was..." She trailed off, the smile crumpling. "What's wrong?"

Down the hall, Amy told Julia to move faster and Ice's irritated voice asked what the hell was going on.

"Traitor," I hissed and Marcia paled.

"What's this?" Julie put a hand on my arm. "Charley, you need to calm down."

"Stay out of my way. Unless you were all in on this?"

"In on what?" Ice demanded, pushing into the room, throwing sparks of light from her sequined bathrobe. "I was up until three studying for that goddamn practical, so this better be important."

"They didn't know," Marcia said in a small voice. "It was only me."

"I could kill you." I meant it. Apparently Julie believed me, because her hand on my arm tightened.

"Explain." Ice used her voice of reason, which I always imagined she'd one day use to inform her patients what they would and would not do, and propped her butt on Marcia's pink and gold dresser.

"It turns out that Marcia here works with Mr. Mystery and—"

" _For_ him," she muttered.

"Does that excuse anything?"

"No." She started crying and sniffled a little.

I had no mercy in me, especially for the weakness of tears. "I don't think it excuses anything, either."

"Charley," Amy ventured, "maybe you should cool down a little and we—"

" _Anyway_ ," I interrupted her, "he sees me in a show, freaking months ago, stalks me, finds out Marcia _was_ my friend and she informed on me. She set up the whole damn thing."

"He really likes you," she pleaded. "I thought it was romantic and he's an amazing guy. It wasn't like he was some creep. He just wanted a chance to meet you, get to know you."

"She told him about the Rules!"

Ice leveled a long look at me. "You're conflating, darling. I agree with Amy that you need to take some time to chill."

"I'm perfectly chill," I shrieked. "She told him about the Rules so he could use them to seduce me."

Amy and Julie exchanged a glance. "It's not against the Rules to talk about them," Julie said.

"Right," Amy added with a weak laugh. "It's not like Fight Club or something where the first rule is not to talk about the Rules."

My nails cut into my palms. "It should be! I'm making that rule number one, effective immediately."

Ice shook her head. "Charley, sweetheart, you might be a drama queen, but you don't have executive authority. The Rules are something we all agree on and there are reasons for that, but you don't get to impose martial law. That said," she leveled a somber gaze on Marcia, "while we might all indulge in a bit of recreational matchmaking, no one likes being manipulated."

"It wasn't manipulation," Marcia protested. "It was..." she trailed off, uncertain.

"Trickery," Julie supplied.

"That's a strong word." Amy frowned. "I don't see what Marcia did that was so terrible."

"She played me! She conspired with this guy to help him seduce me."

She rolled her eyes. "Because being seduced by a hot man who's into you is a crime against humanity."

"It's sneaky and a betrayal of trust. You could have arranged an introduction." I turned my wrath back on Marcia, who quailed.

"I did," she squeaked out, then buried her face in her stuffed unicorn and sobbed.

What?

"See?" She clutched the tattered creature with its lopsided gold Lamé horn, white knuckling the thing. "You don't even remember. When you came by my office to meet me for coffee I introduced you in the hall. You blew him off and said corporate drones automatically get no more than one point." She glared at me through her tears.

"Oh, burn," Amy whispered.

I vaguely remembered that, but not Daniel's face. Or his name. Had I even paid attention?

"That does sound like you," Ice observed and met my glare without backing off. "I'm not saying what Marcia did was right. I'm validating the likelihood of that scenario, given the evidence at hand."

"Oh, shut up," I muttered, not liking the way my righteous anger was sputtering out. What would be left if it did? A weak female sobbing after sex. Next thing I'd be using the key he'd give me to let myself into his place and wait on his sofa for him to come home, watching TV and eating my emotions. _Get a grip._

"It sounds to me like all Marcia did was help connect you with someone you'd overlooked." Amy sounded tentative enough that I could grab onto that.

"She was underhanded," I grated out.

"Agreed. Probably not the best way to handle it, but she meant well," Julie offered.

Any bad choices I made, I made for the best reasons.

"I did mean well." Marcia grabbed a tissue and wiped her face. "I'll do dishes, clean the bathrooms for the rest of the year, whatever. Maybe I was living vicariously, but Daniel is seriously one of the good ones. He's smart and successful. Hell, he's one of the Holts, so he has money and—"

"I don't give a fuck how rich he is!"

"Wait," Julie clutched my arm. "Mr. Mystery is Daniel Holt? He's been in the restaurant."

"He was one of _Chicago_ magazine's fifty most eligible bachelors," Amy said, her voice veering dangerously near a squeal, then wilted when I shot her a furious look. "Just saying."

"So, what happened, honey?" Ice asked, much more gentle. Her cancer diagnosis voice. "You slept with him?"

"I don't think there was any sleeping," Amy inserted, recovering her cheer.

"Was he mean to you?" Ice continued, working up her ire. "Fuck you and kick you out? Did he hurt you? He better not have hurt you, because you know we'll all help you kill him and dispose of the body."

"The restaurant has those barrels for grease," Julie pointed out.

"And I can get lime from the med lab," Ice agreed.

"This is not a fucking joke!" I yelled at them, infuriated. It would be easier if he _had_ hurt me. He did hurt me, only in this impossible, invisible way I could never explain to anyone. He'd broken me open and I'd never be the same. "I just had the worst, most horrible night of my life."

Ice straightened, sobering. "He did hurt you. Let me see."

"Not like that." I'd been reduced to waving impotent fists in the air. It would have been better if I'd just gone to bed and plotted my revenge in secret. "But it wouldn't have happened at all if not for Marcia and her jealous, vicarious, repressed virgin complex."

"Yes!" Marcia shouted back. "Crucify me, but of course I'm jealous of you, Charley! You toss aside men I only wish would look at me. And then this great guy falls for you and isn't daunted when you blow him off without even _noticing_ him. He only wanted to meet you! You didn't have to go along with any of it. I didn't make you fuck him! All of that's on you. And you know what? You can still walk away and leave him in your dust, like you always do. Do you know what I'd _do_ for a chance to have love like that? No—because you don't even appreciate what you're throwing away. You make fun of me for being a coward, but at least I know it. At least I own it."

My retort caught in my throat. Far too close to home. Marcia sat on her bed, clutching her pathetic stuffed toy and sobbing as if her heart was broken. Amy sat beside her, rubbing her back. Suddenly I felt like shit. Was I a coward?

"Tell us what happened," Ice insisted.

I just couldn't. I wanted to crawl into bed and pull the covers over my head. "I can't talk about this anymore. I'm out of here."

Ice blocked my path. "Nuh uh. You wanted to have this out now, we're all awake and listening. Finish it."

"Let me go, Ice."

"If it were any of us, would you let it drop? If it were me?" She stared me down and I lost all of my fire, sagging onto the other end of Marcia's bed, on her rosebud-sprigged comforter. A poster of a fairytale castle in Germany stared back at me. "I don't even know what to tell you."

"Tell the story in order." Julie sat next to me and put an arm around me. Ice watched me with a mixture of compassion and speculation.

They listened without interrupting—I omitted the humiliating crying-jag thing—staying silent for a long minute after I related what Daniel had said before the cab pulled away.

Finally, Ice said, "I can't believe you gave him your phone number unsolicited."

"Right?" Amy pointed at her and then at me. "Now _that_ is definitely against the Rules."

"Shut up," I muttered. "Jules made me do it."

"Because you were letting your pride get in the way of a potentially great relationship," Julie returned evenly. "Which, I might point out, you are still doing."

"This isn't about pride." Maybe the bit where I left out the weeping was, but no way in hell would I tell them about that. _Coward._

"Isn't it?" Ice asked. "Be honest."

"What are you saying, Ice?"

"I'm saying you made up the Rules for me, to save me from myself, and I'm grateful for that. They're good standards, which is why Amy, Jules, and Marcia also signed on." They nodded in agreement, even Marcia, who blew her nose loudly. "But now you're hiding behind them and you're using all of this as a reason to run away."

"I didn't run away!"

"From your story, you were already upset when you picked the fight with him," Julie said, squeezing me a little.

"Because he got to you." Amy nodded solemnly. "That's what makes him so eligible."

"He's on that stupid list because he's the right age, single, rich, and photogenic," I informed her. "That's all."

"Ohhhh." She rolled her eyes. "Is that _all_?"

"You fell for him," Marcia finally spoke up again, wrecked and accusing both. "You totally fell for him, like you've never fallen for anyone. He said he thought you could be the one—now he could be it for you, too."

"There is no such thing as one right person for anyone." I truly believed that.

"Maybe not," Marcia said, shredding her tissue. "But there aren't millions either."

"Thousands?" Amy wondered.

"More like hundreds," Julie decided. "Maybe less than a hundred."

"What if he's one of your less than a hundred?" Marcia's reddened eyes glowed with renewed romantic fervor. "You wouldn't have gotten so emotional if he hadn't been different."

"Sure sounds to me like you fell for him," Ice said. "These last few weeks you've been having fits about this guy."

"I don't have fits over guys." I sounded sullen, even to myself.

"You haven't _before_ ," Julie said. "This one is special."

"A five-pointer," I said. "Special by definition."

"More than that," Marcia corrected, in a surprisingly firm tone. "That extra sixth quality."

"Like extrasensory perception?" Amy sounded dubious.

"Personality," Julie said. "Charm. Compatibility."

"That falls under chemistry," I insisted.

"Even chemistry doesn't cover everything." Ice shook her head. "You can put all the chemicals together for creating life and still nothing happens. There's more. You found more with this Daniel. _That_ , my friend, is why you freaked. He doesn't fit the Rules. The rest is an excuse."

_Shit._ I had freaked. Was still totally sidelined by everything. I sagged, then gave in and fell sideways, burying my face in Marcia's pillow. It smelled like lavender. Who had lavender-scented pillowcases? "I don't know what to do. I fucked everything up."

"I know what you'll do." Ice yawned and looked at Marcia's bedside clock, a pink and blue castle with tiny gold fairies. "It's already six-thirty, so none of us are going back to sleep."

"I am." Julie stood and stretched, grinning at us. "I don't have to be at the restaurant for prep until three. Booyah, bitches."

"I hate you." Amy glared at her and then me. "Not only did I miss my run, I have to be at the studio by seven-thirty. I'm first in the shower." She hugged me on the way out. "I'm so happy for you. I get to design your wedding dress, remember."

"Ha ha."

"At least I can study a little more." Ice sounded resigned. "Charley, go glam yourself up. You're going to work with Marcia."

"Work with Marcia?" My brain wasn't firing on all cylinders. Coffee. I needed either coffee or sleep.

Marcia was nodding. "Yes! I can do that. I have to leave by seven-thirty, but once I check in I can take you to Daniel's office."

_Whoa._ "No. No fucking way. I am _not_ going to Daniel's office."

"Yes you are." Ice stared me down. "You're going to talk to that man and apologize for being a freaky bitch and ask him to give you another chance. You know I'm right."

No. Oh no. I could _not_ face him. "I'll think about it."

"No you won't. You start overthinking and you get paralyzed."

"That's why I leave the thinking to you," I shot back.

"Good. Then this is what I think you should do. You don't have to marry him—though, if you do, we know Amy means it about the wedding dress, and I'm calling Maid of Honor right now—but you owe it to him, yourself, _and_ Marcia to give him one more chance."

Marcia wouldn't look at me. _Do you know what I'd_ do _for a chance to have love like that?_ Yeah, I was still mad at her, but I had also been a bad friend. I hadn't really thought through why she made the choices she did.

"I have his number still. I'll text him," I said.

"After you subjected him to your full diva meltdown?" Ice snorted. "No, you're going in person if I have to skip my exam and drag you down there myself. Think of it as payback for the Andy Incident."

"Think of it as practice for when you get to play Scarlett O'Hara," Marcia suggested.

"You don't have to look so pleased about this. You're still in the doghouse."

Marcia tried to look repentant, but she still shimmied a little. "I can't help it—I love a happy ending."

"We don't know that's how this will end," I grumbled and glared at Ice. "This could end with me on landing on my ass when he kicks me out."

"If he does," she said softly, "then you won't have to be scared of it anymore. You'll know what it's like and that you can survive it."

My heart clutched. "How did you know I'm scared? I didn't know it."

She smiled and hugged me. "We're all scared—just in different ways. You saw it in me and made up the Rules. Time for me to return the favor."

"You could have just given me your crimson pashmina."

"You can borrow it on your next date with him, if you pull this off. Now, put on your big-girl panties and deal with the mess you made."

I laughed. "I _cannot_ believe you're making me do this."

"I love you, too, honey."

## ~ 13 ~

I dragged my feet walking through the lobby of the gleaming Holt building, only partly to punish Marcia. I might feel guilty about having been blind to her pain, but she'd screwed up by manipulating me and I would not let her off easily. A perfect plan for restitution and revenge brewed in the back of my mind. Mostly though, I really did hate the whole business environment. It gave me hives just being there. There's a reason I didn't do the corporate thing. _You said corporate drones automatically get no more than one point._ I winced at the memory of that.

"Come _on_. I'm going to be late."

Raising my brows at Marcia, I gave her a cool look and she subsided.

"Okay, okay. I deserve to be punished. But your share of the rent will go up if I lose my job."

"You could always start a match making service."

"How long are you going to be mad at me?"

"I don't know. It depends on how quickly I can take my revenge."

"Oh God. My life is over."

"You wish."

Glumly she stopped in her cube and turned on her computer, waving to her supervisor. She worked in the perfume division of Holt and hoped to be a "nose" someday, which meant the person who helped sort out the scents and what-all. Total niche work. Until then she mostly did research and support.

"Okay, his office is in the other tower. I'll take you."

"You could just point the way."

Marcia gave me a hopeful grimace, a strange combination on her round face. "Ice made me swear that I'd see you got there."

"Oh. My. God." I planted my hands on my hips. "Do I have to march down to the corner grocery and tell kindly old Mr. Jones that I shoplifted a lipstick too?"

Her mouth rounded in horror. "Charley—you did not do that!"

"I was twelve. What you've never stolen anything in your whole entire life?"

"No." Then her pious smile dissolved. "That's your plotting face. Remember that the punishment should fit the crime."

"Oh, it will. Believe me, it will." I let her continue to think I was plotting my revenge as we walked to the other tower, but mostly I concentrated on not being nervous. Okay, not being so fucking _scared_.

I hated that Ice saw through me and called me on it. Daniel had that knack, too. Did he know? _Afraid to hear the truth as much as you were afraid to face how you felt when we made love..._ Oh yeah, he'd called it and I hadn't listened. Hell, I didn't remember half the things I'd said to him.

Which was fortunate, since the things I did recall made me cringe. He was going to throw me out and I'd deserve it.

Maybe he wouldn't be in. He hadn't slept either. Surely he'd have wised up and called in sick.

A pretty receptionist glanced up as we walked through a set of glass doors and smiled. "Hi Marcia! Here to see Daniel? He's got a nine o'clock, but he's free now. Head on back."

"Aren't you two just besties?" I muttered under my breath, and Marcia had the grace to look chagrined. She knocked on the frame of an open door while I hung back out of sight and considered making a run for it. What could Ice do to me? Nothing if she couldn't reach me. I could move to New York. Or, hey! Los Angeles. Hollywood could be good to me. I edged back a few steps.

Stop being such a stinking coward already.

"Daniel?"

"Marcia! I was going to stop by your office. Have you seen Charlotte—is she okay? We, ah, didn't part well."

"Um, yeah. About that..."

It felt like the first time I made myself walk onstage. The first solo performance. Like every time I wasn't sure of my lines. At least the gut-wrenching nerves were familiar. I'd done all that; I could do this.

I squared my shoulders so I wouldn't look like the scaredy-cat I was, pushed past Marcia, and walked into Daniel's office with my best Vivien Leigh sashay.

I'd taken him by surprise, so there was that. He gave me a bemused stare, rubbed his eyes, and looked at me again. I smiled, giving him the full glamour. _Still here, slick._

"Charlotte." He looked significantly over my shoulder. "Brought the cops personally, did you?"

"What? No. Oh right—cops. Ha ha." Jesus, I was no damn good at this. I should have researched groveling roles. Scarlett, indeed.

"Look, Daniel—I"

"Charlotte, I—"

We both broke off at the same time. Tempting as it was to let him plow ahead and make it easier, I knew I shouldn't. My mother never apologized for anything. Always with the excuses. All the hair dye and singing lessons in the world wouldn't keep me from becoming that woman on the sofa. Who knew—maybe I'd build some character doing this.

But it wasn't going to be a public performance. For all I knew, Marcia was hanging out in the hallway wearing a wire.

"Hang on," I told him and shut the door. "Is that okay? You won't get in trouble with the open-door hall monitor or anything?"

He cocked an eyebrow at me. "I _am_ the owner's nephew."

"Yeah, I've heard some things. Mr. Eligible Bachelor and Holt scion. You'd think they'd give you a better office."

"My family believes in working your way up. I'll earn a better office on my own, in good time."

"Because you're a patient planner like that."

He sighed, scrubbed his face, and sat behind his desk again. Yeah, he hadn't slept either. "Is that why you're here—because you found out I'm not a psycho, that I'm more eligible than you originally thought?"

Ouch. Did I seem that shallow? Well, yeah. Probably. "Why didn't you tell me Marcia introduced us? Before."

"She told you that, huh?" He swiveled back and forth in the chair, contemplating me. "Because you barely noticed I existed and it seemed inadvisable to remind you of that, as you so clearly didn't remember me."

"I thought you seemed vaguely familiar."

He huffed out a laugh. "Oh no, don't pander to my ego now, especially since you've demonstrated that you tell it like it is. I know there wasn't even the faintest glimmer of recognition. Do you really tell all the guys you sleep with that their cocks are the biggest?"

I winced. Resisted the urge to fidget with my hair. "I'm sorry for that. I was pissed off, which I know is no excuse, but..."

"Why were you so angry?" He asked softly. "One second we're basking in the most amazing afterglow. the next you're locked in the bathroom and growing an extra head."

I wandered over to the window and looked out. Decent view of the river. I wished I had better lines than Scarlett's. Stupid example anyway. After all, look how that ended. I didn't want to hear how Daniel didn't give a damn, richly as I might deserve it. I made myself face him where he'd turned in his chair to watch me.

"Okay, I have a confession to make. First off, I'm going to lay it out there that this isn't easy for me, and I'm adlibbing, so cut me some slack."

"Not everything is a role, Charlotte."

"Tell that to Shakespeare." I took a steadying breath. "I wasn't pissed. You had it right—I was scared. Am still. Scared shitless. I'm not proud of my behavior and I'm here to, well..." Shit, turns out you really _can_ choke on a word. My voice wavered and everything. "Apologize."

"All right." He waited. I scowled at him, and he made an encouraging motion. "Don't you have to actually say that you apologize, not simply reference the possibility?"

"You know what? I take it back. I don't apologize." I pointed at him. "And your cock is not the biggest."

He threw his head back and laughed, that full-throated deep full-of-life one I'd heard at the Pier. Standing up, he advanced on me. "Now you sound more like my Charlotte."

"I'm not your Charlotte."

"No?" He settled his hands on my hips. "Would you like to be?"

"I don't know." I wet my lips, totally not deliberate but because my mouth had gone dry. What had he said to me? "I'm out of my depth here."

"Gives us one more thing in common." He leaned in, but I put a hand on his chest to stop him. "No?"

"You'd just let me off the hook, wouldn't you?" I said. "Give me another chance and forget all those things I said, how I freaked out."

"I would," he replied solemnly. "I was sitting here trying to figure out a way to corner you again, then back-tracking and realizing that's what got me into trouble in the first place. I should have been straight with you to begin with."

"No, you shouldn't have." I sighed out a long breath, my chest tight. "I am sorry, Daniel. I'm sorry that I was too caught up in my own shit to see you properly and I apologize for being a freaky diva bitch. Would you.... go out with me sometime?"

He smiled, tender and warm, like he had when he was inside me, and I felt like the Grinch, my heart popping open those bars I measured it with so carefully.

"I would love to." He leaned in again, paused to see if I'd pull back, then kissed me when I didn't. It felt good, pulling on that gooey soft center I'd thought I didn't have. So many times I'd pretended at love on stage without knowing it had equal parts pain and misery mixed in with the warmth and starry eyes. Look at me, getting all grown up.

"I might suck at this," I warned him.

"That's okay. You don't have to be brilliant at everything."

But I liked it that way. I hated being a loser. "Let's just practice some first."

"Okay." He slid his hands around my waist, fingers brushing his spot at the small of my back. "As much as possible."

"I'm pretty sure I'll be a terrible girlfriend," I warned him. "Very high maintenance."

"I'm a demanding guy with obsessive tendencies and a fairly long fetish list."

"To which you recently added leg warmers."

"Oh yes. Who would have predicted?"

"Anyone who saw you had a thing for slutty dancers. They should have put that in your profile for the Most Eligible Bachelors."

"I'd have told them to, if I'd thought you'd read it."

"You say the nicest things." I kissed him. "What next?"

"There's no script. We make it up as we go along."

I pretended to pout. "No grand plan? No wonder you're on that list. You won't get anywhere with women if you leave things up to fate like that."

"But I'm not on the list." He pulled me in and kissed me deeply, sending my head spinning. "I'm officially off the market."

"You don't say," I managed on a stolen breath.

"So are you. Shall we go back to my place and let me prove it to you?"

I wanted that. I really did. But I knew about points one through five. I needed to get better at number six. "You have a nine o'clock appointment," I reminded him, all responsible like.

His eyes unfogged. "Shit. Right. I'll cancel."

"No. I'll meet you later. For lunch. A date, with conversation."

"No games at all?" His smile canted just a bit wicked.

"Okay, I'll think up a challenge for bonus points." I danced out of his arms, feeling curiously light. A weight off. This could actually work.

"Charlotte?" He caught my hand. "This will work. I'll make sure of it."

" _We_ will," I said. "We'll make it up together."

## ~ Epilogue ~

Out in the hall, Marcia made herself walk away from the door and back to her sterile cubicle. True love won out in the end. At least for some, for the beautiful princesses of the world like Charley. The ugly stepsisters who plotted against them got to live out their sad and lonely punishments. But she'd done it in Charley's best interests, right? That ought to count for something.

Okay, she'd also done it because of Daniel. If only he'd been the least interested in her. But no. Of course it was Charley he wanted. Guys like him always wanted the beautiful ones, the flashy, sexy ones, with the long legs and showy figures.

_Revenge_. Charley's voice resonated still in her head, those thickly lashed, gorgeous eyes full of... not malice, but determination. Still, what could Charley do to her?

A lot. A heck of a lot.

Waving goodbye to Nancy, Marcia hurried back to her own desk, hoping Charley would forget all about it in the blush of true love.

Fat chance of that.

## Titles by Jeffe Kennedy

* * *

#### FANTASY ROMANCES

A COVENANT OF THORNS

Rogue's Pawn

Rogue's Possession

Rogue's Paradise

THE TWELVE KINGDOMS

Negotiation

The Mark of the Tala

The Tears of the Rose

The Talon of the Hawk

Heart's Blood

The Crown of the Queen

THE UNCHARTED REALMS

The Pages of the Mind

The Edge of the Blade

The Snows of Windroven

The Shift of the Tide

The Arrows of the Heart

The Dragons of Summer

The Fate of the Tala

THE CHRONICLES OF DASNARIA

Prisoner of the Crown

Exile of the Seas

Warrior of the World

SORCEROUS MOONS

Lonen's War

Oria's Gambit

The Tides of Bára

The Forests of Dru

Oria's Enchantment

Lonen's Reign

THE FORGOTTEN EMPIRES

The Orchid Throne

The Fiery Crown

#### CONTEMPORARY ROMANCES

Shooting Star

MISSED CONNECTIONS

Last Dance

With a Prince

Since Last Christmas

#### CONTEMPORARY EROTIC ROMANCES

Exact Warm Unholy

The Devil's Doorbell

FACETS OF PASSION

Sapphire

Platinum

Ruby

Five Golden Rings

FALLING UNDER

Going Under

Under His Touch

Under Contract

#### EROTIC PARANORMAL

MASTER OF THE OPERA E-SERIAL

 Master of the Opera, Act 1: Passionate Overture

 Master of the Opera, Act 2: Ghost Aria

 Master of the Opera, Act 3: Phantom Serenade

 Master of the Opera, Act 4: Dark Interlude

 Master of the Opera, Act 5: A Haunting Duet

 Master of the Opera, Act 6: Crescendo

Master of the Opera

BLOOD CURRENCY

 Blood Currency

#### BDSM FAIRYTALE ROMANCE

 Petals and Thorns

#### OTHER WORKS

Birdwoman

Hopeful Monsters

Teeth, Long and Sharp

Thank you for reading!

## About Jeffe Kennedy

Jeffe Kennedy is an award-winning author whose works include novels, non-fiction, poetry, and short fiction. She has won the prestigious RITA® Award from Romance Writers of America (RWA), has been a finalist twice, been a Ucross Foundation Fellow, received the Wyoming Arts Council Fellowship for Poetry, and was awarded a Frank Nelson Doubleday Memorial Award. She serves on the Board of Directors for the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) as a Director at Large.

Her award-winning fantasy romance trilogy The Twelve Kingdoms hit the shelves starting in May 2014. Book 1, The Mark of the Tala, received a starred Library Journal review and was nominated for the RT Book of the Year while the sequel, The Tears of the Rose received a Top Pick Gold and was nominated for the RT Reviewers' Choice Best Fantasy Romance of 2014. The third book, The Talon of the Hawk, won  the RT Reviewers' Choice Best Fantasy Romance of 2015. Two more books followed in this world, beginning the spin-off series The Uncharted Realms. Book one in that series, The Pages of the Mind, was nominated for the RT Reviewer's Choice Best Fantasy Romance of 2016 and won RWA's 2017 RITA Award. The second book, The Edge of the Blade, released December 27, 2016, and was a PRISM finalist, along with _The Pages of the Mind_. The next in the series, The Shift of the Tide and The Arrows of the Heart came out in August, 2017, and October, 2018. A high fantasy trilogy,  The Chronicles of Dasnaria, taking place in _The Twelve Kingdoms_ world began releasing from Rebel Base books in 2018. The novella, _The Dragons of Summer_ , first appearing in the Seasons of Sorcery anthology, finaled for the 2019 RITA Award.

She also introduced a new fantasy romance series, Sorcerous Moons, which includes Lonen's War, Oria's Gambit, The Tides of Bàra, The Forests of Dru, Oria's Enchantmen _t, and_ Lonen's Reign. She's begun releasing a new contemporary erotic romance series, _Missed Connections_ , which started with Last Dance and continues in With a Prince and Since Last Christmas.

In September 2019, St. Martins Press released The Orchid Throne, the first book in a new romantic fantasy series, The Forgotten Empires. The sequel, The Fiery Crown, will follow in May 2021.

Her other works include a number of fiction series: the fantasy romance novels of A Covenant of Thorns; the contemporary BDSM novellas of the Facets of Passion; an erotic contemporary serial novel,  Master of the Opera; and the erotic romance trilogy, Falling Under, which includes Going Under, Under His Touch and Under Contract.

She lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico, with two Maine coon cats, plentiful free-range lizards and a very handsome Doctor of Oriental Medicine.

Jeffe can be found online at her website: JeffeKennedy.com, every Sunday at the popular SFF Seven blog, on Facebook, on Goodreads and pretty much constantly on Twitter @jeffekennedy. She is represented by Sarah Younger of Nancy Yost Literary Agency.

jeffekennedy.com

facebook.com/Author.Jeffe.Kennedy

twitter.com/jeffekennedy

goodreads.com/author/show/1014374.Jeffe_Kennedy

**Sign up for her newsletter** here **.**
