Crap. Patty probably wanted to kill both of us.

I opened my mouth to tell him why I came in, but he waved me off.

“She wants five hundred thousand dollars to get an abortion,” Trent grumbled.

My mouth almost fell to the floor, and Vicious walked around his desk, tilting my chin up and pressing my lips together with a wink. He didn’t seem too worried about his friend.

“Well,” Vicious said. “I’m not the guy for moral advice, but everything about this offer screams fuck no to me.”

“I can afford it,” Trent said, but he groaned.

“I know.” Vicious placed one of his knees between my thighs and spread them apart, bending down to where I sat, and fingering the hem of my dress, watching my panties intently, like he’d never seen them before. “Question is—do you want to?”

“What, you think I should let her have the baby? Should I remind you that she’s a stripper with a weakness for coke?” Trent sounded like he was seething.

Vicious flipped my dress up completely, exposing my panties, and lowered himself so his face was pressed against my sex. My hands squeezed the armrest of the chair as he inhaled deeply with a wolfish grin and kissed my underwear.

“Sounds like a catch.” He bit my clit gently through my boyfriend shorts and slowly dragged his teeth across me, his hooded eyes on me the whole time, watching me squirm in pleasure. “So what did you call me for, exactly?”

He was losing his interest in Trent’s problems, his attention shifting to the spot between my legs.

“Legal advice.”

“I’m not a family law attorney, but my best advice to you as a friend is to use a condom next time and try fucking chicks who are more or less in your tax bracket. Best way to avoid getting dragged into baby-mama drama. Now, excuse me, but my snack for the afternoon has just arrived. Merry Christmas, bro.” With this, he snaked his hand behind him to his desk, lifted the receiver of his office phone and slammed it, his head moving back between my legs.

“I’m not in your tax bracket.” My brows raised and curved.

He flashed me a devilish grin. “You hate me too much to ever want to have my baby. There’s no better contraception than a woman who wants nothing to do with your sperm.”

I rolled my eyes and smoothed his dress shirt. “Listen, Patty wants to leave early to get a head start on the Christmas Eve meal she has to prepare.”

“Okay. Who the fuck is Patty?” he asked, in all seriousness.

My nostrils flared. “Your receptionist.”

“No one leaves early,” he snapped, resolute. He lowered himself back to my groin.

“Vic…” I dragged him by his tie to me and pressed my lips against his. He immediately reciprocated, sucking on my lip and licking every corner of my mouth. Our lips broke apart in a wet pop.

“Mmm?”

“Please. A little Christmas spirit wouldn’t kill you.”

“But going soft on my employees just might kill my company.”

“It’s not even your branch,” I argued. “She’s Dean’s employee, and not for long. She’s retiring next month.”

He pulled away and looked at me. That seemed to pacify him.

“Why are you so good?” His thumb rubbed my clit through my panties absentmindedly.

“Why are you so bad?” I retorted, teeth chattering with pleasure.

“Because it’s fun.”

“You should try being nice. It’s even more fun.”

“Doubt it.”

He was still rubbing me. I hoped he was going to let me come or stop talking, because I couldn’t have this conversation while he played with my body like it was his favorite toy.

“So can I let Patty know she can go?”

“Only if you let me fuck you in my Jacuzzi tonight.”

“That sounds like blackmail.” I bit my lower lip to suppress a moan.

“No. It sounds like fun.”

It was futile to try and sway him against the idea. I wanted it just as bad as he did, if not more. I had nothing to do when I got back home. It was the night before Christmas Eve, and it wouldn’t be difficult to abandon my original plans for the evening, which consisted of making myself Ramen noodles and painting until I passed out.

“I’ll tell Patty you wish her a Merry Christmas.” I got up while he did the same with a groan.

He leaned against his desk, his hard-as-granite cock pointing at me through his dress pants.

I swiveled my head one last time, my hand on the doorknob, and grinned. “You do realize everybody is going to look at me funny because you closed the blinds on us?”

“You realize I’ve never given two shits about what people think, and I’m not about to start now just because Patty and Floyd need something to talk about besides stuffing recipes.” He waved me off impatiently, going back behind his desk and plopping down in his chair. “Oh, and Emilia?”

“Yeah?”

“Make me another fucking cup of coffee.”

We broke his bed.

I don’t know how it happened, but we did. It was after we ordered a pizza and polished off two bottles of wine. I was tipsy, happy and giggly when I climbed on top of him. I thought his bed could take it. It was solid oak, after all. The bed cracked and the mattress sank to one side. We followed. He caught me by the waist and jerked me to his chest so I wouldn’t roll to the floor, but it still made my heart beat ten times faster.

“Even your bed wants us to stop.” I laughed, pushing myself off of him by flattening my palms against his scarred bare chest. This time he didn’t even twitch when I ran my fingertips over the long pink bumps.

I got up and strode to his bathroom. The door to the master bathroom was open, and the mirror in front of us revealed that he was propped on one hand, his eyes on my naked rear as I made my way to the shower.

“I told you we should’ve done it in the Jacuzzi.”

“And I told you two times was enough. I was getting prune skin. Hey, Vic?”

“What?”

I turned around and met his eyes. He smiled a real smile, and my heart fluttered because from him, these kinds of smiles had to be earned.

I basked in it for a few seconds, then took a risk. “Would you like to…come down for dinner tomorrow evening? It’s not a date,” I hurried to stress, my cheeks flushing. “I just figured we’ll both be alone here in New York, and I didn’t want…I mean, I thought maybe—”

“Sure,” he cut me off. “Seven sound good?”

“Sounds great.” I licked my lips, feeling oddly happy.

He turned away, grabbing his phone from his nightstand, probably checking his emails. His eyes were on the screen when he said, “I don’t eat mushrooms or any type of fish.”

“Duly noted.” I started running the water in the shower, waiting for it to get warm and padded back to get a fresh towel from the linen closet by the door.

“It can be a date,” he muttered from the bedroom, and my head swung toward him.

“What did you say?” I hated that it made my body feel like I’d just gotten off a rollercoaster.

“I said it can be a date if you want it to be.” He still stared at his phone hard.

I shook my head, smiling, and closed the door behind me. After I finished my shower, he wasn’t there. I padded my way to the kitchen, still wrapped in nothing but a towel, but he wasn’t there either. The apartment was big, too big for one person. I started peeking into rooms, looking for him. He couldn’t have gone out. I’d only spent ten minutes in the bathroom, and he looked tired and very much naked when I left him in bed.

Feeling wary, I got dressed before I started calling out his nickname around the house and dialing his number on my cell. Every call ended with his voicemail. What the hell was going on?

Finally, when I was about to give up and head back to my apartment, I spotted him behind the couch. On a plush silver rug, lying on the floor, fast asleep.

He was wearing his black briefs and nothing else, his thick lashes fanning his cheeks. He looked like a kid. A beautiful, lost, exhausted boy.

Oh, Vicious.

I wanted to help him into his bed. But I had a feeling he hadn’t told me the truth about his insomnia, and if I woke him up, he wouldn’t fall asleep again. I gathered blankets and pillows and covered him from head to toe. After I tucked him in, I hesitated, but the last thing I needed was for him to wake up and find me staring at him like a groupie while he slept.

Not that I didn’t want to. And that was an even bigger problem.

By the time I walked into my living room downstairs, it was three o’clock in the morning. The easel stared at me from across the room, a half-finished painting of a laughing woman with flowers in her hair, demanding my attention. Instead, I walked to my bedroom, pulled out an empty frame and a staple gun, and stretched a canvas before positioning it on the easel. I changed into my painting tee, tied my hair in an elastic, and stared at the white fabric.

And stared.

And stared.

And stared.

By the time I finally started working on it, it was morning. I didn’t stop painting until the early afternoon. I didn’t sleep. I didn’t eat. I barely breathed. And with every tick of the clock that passed without him around, I started thinking more and more about what we were. Who we were. He’d treated me horribly in the past, but right now…he brought color into my life.