Just like that, Daniel felt any hope he’d allowed to accumulate burst like a bubble. She’d just confirmed his darkest fear. That a girl like her saw him as nothing more than a diversion. A rebound. Female faces and voices from the last decade rushed through his head, blurring together and making him nauseous. They had no place here. Not when the girl of his dreams sat just within his reach. Only, maybe she was really so far out of his reach, he couldn’t even see it. Perhaps he’d been in the process of losing her for the last ten years. Every time he’d engaged in anonymous sex, she’d slipped a little further from him. Only he hadn’t been blessed with the foresight to see her coming.

At that moment, Daniel knew with absolute certainty that not a single one of his conquests had been worth Story’s doubting his sincerity. Not by a long shot. He spoke around the iron band ringing his throat. “I can’t change what I’ve done in the past.”

“Of course not,” she said quietly. “I’m not asking you to change anything about yourself. I wouldn’t want you to.”

Daniel encompassed the room with his arms. “If that’s the case, then what are you doing here with me? Just having a little meaningless vacation fun?”

Face having lost all color, Story hastened to reply. “No. It’s not like that. Daniel…I just got out of a three-year relationship. I thought we were…this was…”

“A rebound.” With a sound of protest, she started to speak. Daniel, feeling something foreign and painful move in his chest, held up a hand that kept her silent. “Maybe I have no right to ask you to stay. That doesn’t change how I feel. I’m not asking you to stay in New York on a whim.”

Daniel watched as she processed his words, looking for any hint in her expression that might give away her thoughts. Mostly she just looked frozen in shock.

“You can’t just spring this on me and expect that I’ll agree without hesitation.”

“You’re right, I can’t.” Daniel reached down and took her hands in his. “I’m asking you to think about it. At the very least, give me until the end of the summer to convince you I can be more than a rebound. I’ll make it worth your time, baby. Just one more month.”

“And while I’m making this decision? What happens in the meantime?”

“I won’t continue seeing you without Jack’s blessing. Believe me, sunshine, this isn’t easy for me. But I don’t want what we have to be dishonest. That’s not us.” He released her grip and stepped back with a heavy sigh. “So in the meantime, I’ll give you some space. When we’re together, we don’t leave each other a lot of room to think.”

The idea of time apart seemed to rattle her, and Daniel could sense her growing panic. Her reaction reassured him that he was doing the right thing. If she didn’t feel something for him, the idea of him leaving wouldn’t bother her quite so much. “What if I decide not to stay? What if I call you tomorrow and tell you I’ve booked a flight home for next week?”

“Then I’ll have no choice but to let you go. We’ll leave Jack in the dark and you can chalk it up to a couple amazing nights,” Daniel bluffed. He would give her a few days, tops, to think about it. If she didn’t agree to stay, he would try a different approach. But he’d continue to fight for her until her plane left the ground. Even then, he wasn’t so sure he would quit.

She stared. “I wouldn’t even see you again before I left?”

The way she said it, with sadness and a hint of confusion in her tone, almost buckled him. Every instinct urged him to pull her into his embrace and reassure her that he would lie, cheat, and steal to spend as much time with her as humanly possible. But he didn’t. He had too much on the line. If he touched her, took her to bed now, everything he’d said in the last ten minutes would lose all meaning. She would never take him seriously.

You don’t seem like a one-woman type. She obviously thought of him as a player and nothing more. Until he met her, it would have been true.

“Spending time with you knowing it’s only temporary would be difficult.” Taking one last look at her, Daniel turned and walked to the door.

“Wait, that’s it? You’re leaving?”

If he wasn’t in actual, physical pain at that moment, Daniel would have laughed at the outrage in her voice. He would undoubtedly regret leaving her looking so beautiful and vulnerable, hell, he already did, but he needed to follow his gut. If she felt an even an ounce of what he did, she would make the right decision. He just needed to have a little faith and a shit-ton of patience.

He didn’t want to consider the alternative.

…

Story frowned at the door Daniel had just exited through. She felt blindsided. Exasperated. And more than a little impressed.

Having come to know Daniel intimately, Story knew he’d left wanting her. Yet he’d felt strong enough about his proposition to suck it up and walk away. He’d done it to send the message that he meant business. Her body, unfortunately, was having trouble moving past the no sex subtext of his message.

She flopped down onto the couch with a grumble. Memories of Daniel beneath her in the backseat of his car assailed her, but she reluctantly pushed them aside. Somehow, in the last ten minutes, the situation had completely gotten away from her and she needed to puzzle it out, make sense of Daniel’s request. Not to mention the fact that she’d nearly agreed to it just so he would stay and make love to her again.

How quickly he’d become an addiction. In the beginning, she’d known it would be wise to stay away, but not why. Now she did. Every touch of his hands, brush of his lips, made her system scream for more. She’d never felt less inhibited in her life. Without realizing it, she’d allowed his single-minded intensity to wear off on her and become an equal participant, rather than a conquest. Tonight, in the parking lot, she’d hidden nothing from him and rather than judge her, he’d eagerly encouraged it.

It didn’t stop with physical attraction, and therein lay the rub. Rub. Ha. She loved being with him. Stolen moments in stairwells, baseball games…even talking to him on the phone made her blush like a teenager. She’d soaked up every moment with him tonight knowing it wouldn’t last. That she would be leaving for California soon. He would go back to playing the field and she would return home to pick up the pieces of a life she’d never wanted. She would miss him a great deal. But knowing just how quickly Daniel would move on would give her no choice but to get over him. Right?

Wrong. He’d sunk her battleship. I want you to stay. Just one more month. There’s something between us. She hadn’t known how to react. If he’d really meant it and wanted her to stay, where would it lead? To a monogamous relationship? They’d just met. He couldn’t possibly be considering changing his lifestyle for her. Could he?

It had been so much easier when she’d seen Daniel as the ladies’ man with a craving for tan lines. Okay, definitely not easier, but at least the image had managed to keep her head out of the clouds. His declaration had her thinking dangerous thoughts, though. Dangerous, hopeful thoughts like maybe he really could be happy with just her. After waking him up from a nightmare, seeing the pain he hid behind his smile, and learning what she had about his past through Jack, she knew Daniel wasn’t just an overindulged bad boy used to getting what he wanted.

He was so much more. Thoughtful, generous, interesting. Daniel didn’t merely indulge her sense of humor the way Fisher had, he genuinely seemed to appreciate it. She felt safe with him, and not just in the physical sense. Safe from judgment. But she’d known him only a short time. Was it was possible he treated every woman with the same special care, and she’d been emotionally neglected for so long that she soaked up Daniel’s attention like a plant seeking water? A depressing thought, but a realistic one. She had no perspective. Her life had been completely thrown off-kilter over the course of the last week, and Daniel’s request for her to stay in New York had finally upended her.

It also tempted her. She and Daniel together. For just a little longer. Story pushed herself off the couch and stood. No more thinking tonight with

out the benefit of chocolate.

She went downstairs to the deli to buy a Twix bar and milk. Outside, she marveled over how crowded the streets were even at the late hour and decided the term “city that never sleeps” was totally accurate. In contrast, her building’s lobby sat empty and quiet when she pushed open the door to come back inside. Just as the elevator door closed, a male voice called for her to hold it. Her hand shot out to stop the doors from sliding shut.

A shiver of alarm passed through Story as her neighbor entered the elevator to stand across from her. If possible, he looked more disheveled than last time, when she’d helped him escort his mother to their apartment. His glasses sat slightly askew on his nose and his wrinkled shirt had come untucked from his pants on one side. Inconsistent with his appearance, he smelled as if he’d doused himself in cologne.

As the doors closed and the elevator began its ascent to the fourth floor, she felt him watching her closely in the confined space.

Story turned and smiled politely at him, trying to mask her unease. “How is your mother doing?”

He looked startled at her having spoken, but then his mouth twisted. “She’d be better if she was in the hospital. They practically kicked us out on our asses. I’m not a doctor, so I don’t really know how she’s doing, do I?”

She made a sympathetic noise as her panic ratcheted up another level. Her question had made him visibly angry and the elevator seemed to be taking forever to reach the fourth floor. Even then, he’d be getting off behind her, wouldn’t he?

Something about the man frightened her. Although his abrupt, vaguely confrontational answer did little to calm her jumping nerves, it served to reassure her that she wasn’t judging him based on appearance. After all the times she’d reminded her students not to judge a book by its cover, doing so would make her a serious hypocrite.

“Is he your boyfriend?”

She could feel her heart pounding in her chest. Breathe. “Who?”

He made an impatient hand gesture. “The guy who’s been coming to the apartment. This afternoon…a few days ago. There’s only one.”

“Um…” For him to know those details, he’d have been watching through the peephole. Spying on her? Story racked her brain, trying to remember if she and Daniel had ever kissed in the hallway, in view of his apartment. Oh yeah. They certainly had. “No, he’s just a friend.” She felt compelled to lie anyway, praying he hadn’t seen them.

His eyes narrowed at her answer. Thankfully, the elevator doors slid open then to reveal the carpeted hallway. Not wanting him to walk behind her, Story smiled and gestured for him to exit first, but he shook his head in refusal. With a nervous swallow, she left the elevator and walked toward her door. Had the lighting in the hall always been this poor, or had it merely escaped her attention before now?