Dirty Ties

Hours passed, days, a lifetime. With my body draped over his, strong arms around my back, and his fingers combing through my hair, time didn’t exist. Nothing existed outside this room.

But as soon as I had that thought, it made everything real. My job. My gay husband. Our contract. Time.

I glanced at the clock beside the bed. 3:36 AM. Time to pull away from this dream and walk out that door. And never see him again.

I slid my cheek from his chest and blinked into his heavy-lidded eyes. “Stay another day, two, whatever. Just stay.”

The hand in my hair tightened. He yanked, jerking my head back and bringing my face to his. As he stared at me, the gold in his eyes oscillated with a million thoughts. Was he considering it?

His fist tightened. “I asked for one night, Kaci. You said you could handle it.”

A swallow hung in my throat. I’d meant what I’d said, with a tiny amendment. “I don’t want to be your one night. I want to be your best night.”

His sculpted face, shadowed with whiskers, softened. “You already are.”

His response incapacitated me as the hand in my hair loosened, lowering to brush a wayward lock behind my ear. The caress trailed over my jaw and lingered on my lips. Not in a seductive way but in a final way.

Unspoken words shifted through his eyes. But their depths locked down, preventing his thoughts from escaping, shutting me out. Everything not said formed a black hole between us, dense and unknown and inevitable.

Time to go.

I swallowed down the clinging lump in my throat and climbed off the bed. Without analyzing, without peering over my shoulder, I collected my phone from the chair by the door and sent a text to Collin.

Me: Send a car. The Bells Hotel.

I hated waking Collin, but he knew which driver would be the most discreet about retrieving his wife from a hotel at this hour. A moment later, his message popped up.

Collin: 15 min

I dressed in silence and, thanks to my shitty willpower, stole glances at the bed.

Logan lay on his back with the sheet gathered around his waist, his eyes tracking me. His arms folded behind his head, the curvature of his biceps on mouth-watering display. Even now, exhausted and sore, I couldn’t help but trace the bunching muscles in his abs with my gaze. Committing them to memory.

Something I’d never done before. My usual post-coital awkwardness was a naked walk back to my room, avoiding the feel of the man’s gaze.

But standing here, dressed and anxious with my purse tucked beneath my arm, I searched his unreadable eyes for…something. Anything.

In a mesmerizing glide of masculine nudity, he rose from the bed and closed the distance between us. Cupping the back of my head, he touched his mouth to my lips, my forehead, and kissed the part in my hair.

“Unforgettable, Kaci.” He leaned back, a small smile creasing his gorgeous face.

I nodded and returned his smile as a desperate plea crawled up my throat.

One night…Can you handle that?

I bit down on my tongue and stepped away from his hold.

My insides fluttered as I walked to the door. My gut twisted as I shut it behind me. By the time I crossed the empty lobby and stepped outside, my stomach roiled with the ugly pangs of goodbye.

My gait quickened at the sight of the shiny, black limo waiting on the curb. The passenger door swung open as I approached, and a familiar hand reached out for mine.

Collin tugged me inside and closed the door. As the limo rolled forward, his arm looped around my shoulders and tugged me against his side.

I set down my purse and rested my hand on his thigh. “You didn't have to come.”

But I was glad he did. We could gossip like schoolgirls all the way home about the dirty things I did with a totally hot stranger. I let my head relax on his arm.

His denim-clad legs sprawled in the aisle, and leather house-slippers covered his feet. “We were still awake.”

We? I leaned up and squinted at the shadowed end of the limo. Sure enough, there was Seth with his head back and eyes closed.

My insides constricted. Collin trusted him, but my gut didn’t. It was one thing to sleep with a married man, but to witness his wife crawl from another man’s bed? He knew too much about our lifestyle, and he could make a killing off the sordid details.

Collin pressed his lips to my temple. “Don’t worry about him. I wore him out.” He leaned back to look at me under the flicker of the passing streetlights. “You look pretty worn out yourself.”

For the first time in hours, I considered my appearance. Tangled hair, wrinkled dress, smudged mascara, no panties. Hickies and swollen lips.

The backs of my eyes burned with an achy sense of loss. I had dreamed about a night like this so many times, had longed for a man like Logan for so long. A man exactly like him, in fact, with a dark helmet and a commanding presence. And now that it was over, now that he was gone, I wasn’t even sure it had been real.