I don’t hide. That’s the other thing. I make deliberate choices and I live with them, and this is a choice.
It’s a bad one. I know it’s a bad one. I get out anyway and click the locks. Once inside, the hallway is secluded, the carpet absorbs the sound of my heels. It’s approximately twenty-nine steps from the elevator. I count every step. My brain runs its arguments the whole way. But I’m standing in front of his door. So. Decision made. My pulse is still wrong. Too fast. Too loud. Like I never actually left the dock. Like I’m still sitting on that plastic armrest with his hand wrapped around mine, hearing him say I’ve got you now like it meant something.
It didn’t. That’s the second problem. I lift my hand.Knock. Three times. I almost walk away before the sound finishes echoing. The door opens.
And there he is.
Max, dressed and composed in that loose way that isn’t careless at all. His eyes land on me—and the air shifts. Recognition. No surprise. Like he expected me. That bothers me more than it should.
I’m mute. Because if I say anything, it will be irretrievable. The door shuts. There's a second, one fragile second, where I could still stop this. Turn around. Say I made a mistake. Rebuild the wall before it collapses completely.
I don’t. I reach for him. Not graceful. Just decided. My hands find his shirt, grip, pull, and his body moves with mine like he’s been waiting for the direction. My mouth meets his. Hard. Decisive. No room for interpretation or thought. If I stop to think, I will stop.
And I don’t want to stop. That realization cuts sharp, and I shove it down.
This is not about want. This is about control. Taking it back. His hands find my waist, and heat spreads too fast, too easily. That’s the third problem. I make a sound I didn’t authorize. His grip tightens. He reacts. Of course he does.
Max reacts to everything. I push him back a step, needing movement, needing friction, needing anything that keeps this from becoming still enough to examine. He lets me. Always lets me lead first. I hate how much I notice that.
So I change it, placing my hand on his chest and pushing him. He changes with it, more focused. Like he’s paying attentionnow. He understands this isn’t casual. That this means more than I am actively trying to deny.
That’s the fourth problem.
My breath catches. I hate that he hears it. I meet his eyes.
If I say anything or let him talk, this shifts into a situation I can’t control. Rules established. Temporary. Fragile but necessary. He gives me one last second. I feel it. The pause. The choice. I don’t take it.
Everything after that fractures. Overwhelming in a way I don't have a category for. I am used to structure and intention. To understanding why I do things before I do them.
This? This is reaction. Impulse. The exact thing I have spent two years training myself out of. And yet. My hands don't stop. My body doesn’t hesitate. I respond to him like I remember him. The memory of that night in Rockford never dimmed. That realization hits mid-breath. Terrifying.
I push closer instead of away. Because distance would mean thinking. And that would end this. I don’t want it to end. So I don’t. I stay in the heat, the noise. In the way he whispers my full name once. Rough, like it matters. I pretend I didn’t hear it.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Max Stevens
Chase and Piper’s housekeeper, Wanda, came to take over and put the kids to bed. So I left. I’m halfway through a beer when there’s a knock on my door. Three knocks.
I’m off the bed before the third one lands, because I’ve been awake for forty minutes, lying on top of the covers in the dark, knowing she was awake too, and running the same math I’ve been running since the dock.
She doesn’t knock as if she’s asking. She knocks like she’s already decided. I already know. I don’t rush it. I should. Every instinct I have says move, go, don’t make her wait. I don’t. I set the bottle down. Walk to the door. Open it.
Toni stands in the hallway, no clipboard. No blazer. Hair down. Slightly wind-tangled. Composed is her default. I've spent eight weeks learning what it looks like when neitherversion shows up. This is that. Her eyes are on mine and they don’t move, and she is not saying a single word, and I understand the terms immediately.
No greeting or explanation. My heart in shifts hard. “You okay?” I ask. I step back. She steps inside. Doesn’t answer and she presses closer as if she can outrun her own thoughts. There’s no rhythm to it at first. No buildup. Once, she breathes my name under her breath, almost as if by accident, and then deliberately refrains from saying it again. I catch it anyway. Cherish it. Because I understand its significance for her. It’s a release, reset, and a mistake she’s already planning to file away.
And me? I’m already past that. That’s the problem.
The door shuts behind her with a small click, and before I can say anything else, she’s in front of me, fingers fisting in my shirt, pulling me down to her. It’s urgency. Weeks of tension snapping tight all at once. She pushes me back a step. Then another. I go easily, watching her, trying to read her face, but she won't let me, won't slow down enough for it. Her mouth hits mine. It is warm and certain. No hesitation. She’s past that, she left it somewhere on the walk between her door and mine. I feel the absence of it immediately. I pull back. One inch. I need to see her face. Her eyes are open. That’s her answer. Decisive. And I? Yeah. I’m gone.
She puts her hand flat on my chest and pushes. My legs find the bed. I sit, and she follows me down, and the part of me that has spent two months respecting every boundary she drew goes completely silent. I slow down. Deliberately. On purpose.
She came here to burn off some energy, and I understandthat. If I let her go at her own pace, she’ll be done quickly, and then it’ll be over. It won’t matter, and we can resume our professional relationship the next morning. So I don’t let it be fast. My hands take their time on her. I take my time with the zipper. No destination, no dawn approaching. My hands come up automatically to her waist, pulling her closer, and she makes this small, sharp sound against my mouth that goes straight through me. Not a word. Just the exhale of release. I memorize the sound. I’m going to need it later.
She straddles me, and I answer by pulling her dress over her head. The heat radiating from her is scorching through my shorts. We move together without a single syllable exchanged, and it is the clearest she has ever communicated with me. Her bra is history across the room and those perfect tits that I’ve jacked off to so many times are in my face. My hands find them both as I sit up to follow with my mouth. She takes that opportunity to pull my shirt over my head. And then arches her back in response to my sucking at her breasts. I flip us over, step back, and get my shorts off. Her hair fans out on the white bedding; she spreads her legs, moves her thong aside and dips her hand to her pussy. Her fingers aren’t shy as she rubs her clit, staring at my cock while licking her swollen lips. There’s my An-ton-i-a.
I’m so fucking lost at the sight of her I rip off her lace panties, pull her to the edge of the bed by her ankles, and kneel to taste her sweetness. I trace my fingertips along her slit. Every sweep of my tongue and inch of my fingers, she trembles and tenses. Her legs close in more forcefully the higher I go, pressing against my shoulders. Every sweep of my tongue, she tremblesand tenses. Beneath my touch, she contracts around me. Her pussy glistens, so wet with need. Even when her mouth can construct an airtight case for the opposite, her body doesn’t lie.
