Then show him. Show him what it would really be like.

I scoffed at the thought.

That was my desire talking. I wasn’t going to continue this with Aidan so I could have sex with him and prove to us both that it was all going to be average in the end.

No. But we could have sex. Friends with benefits. Until he grows bored and realizes we are not meant to be.

That was the most fucked-up thing I’d ever thought.

My eyes locked with his as he waited for me to answer his question when he chased after me. “What is going on in your head?”

Maybe there was something in the whole friends-with-benefits option.

Maybe we would tire of each other.

“I can’t be in a relationship with you, Aidan. But if you want, we could have this,” I gestured between us, “for however long we both want it. But only sex.”

Funny, but I didn’t know what I was more scared of, that he’d agree or disagree.

He glared at me incredulously. “Are you suggesting I be your fuck buddy?”

I flushed. “Well, I wouldn’t put it so bluntly, but yes.”

“Are you insane?”

“There’s nothing insane about it. It’s my offer. Take it or leave it. But it is all I’m willing to give you.”

“Sex?” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Just sex.”

“I thought that would be easy for you considering you have a Nicolette on every continent.”

His eyes flashed with smugness. “Jealous? Because last I checked, jealousy usually means you care for more than just sex.”

“Don’t taunt me.”

“Aye, I had Nicolette and a few others that meant nothing to me. I can’t take that back. But I can say I used to hope to hear from nearly every woman I’ve ever been with that all they wanted was just sex. But it was always me saying those words and them agreeing, hoping somehow, I’d change my mind and give them more. How ironic that the first woman to propose it to me is the only woman I’ve ever wanted to try permanency with.”

Feeling guilty, I couldn’t hold his gaze. “I don’t know what to say,” I whispered.

“Aye, I can see you don’t.” The bitterness in his words hurt my chest. Aidan sighed. Heavily. “Fine. If it’s the only way I can have you, then I agree. I don’t understand it. But I agree.”

I looked him in the eye now, hope blooming. “Really?”

He nodded.

And I allowed myself to smile. “This is a better idea than what you had in mind.”

Aidan didn’t respond. Instead, he marched across the room and bent, lifting me up onto his shoulder, causing the breath to escape my body. “Aidan!” I wheezed, in shock as I found myself being carried to the back of the apartment.

“If this is all I get, then hear this,” he said, dumping me on the bed and pulling me toward him by my ankles. His green eyes gleamed with intent. “Tonight, you’re mine and I intend to make the most of it.”

“You’re a total and utter bastard,” I muttered, swatting at the air above me as he pressed a kiss to my bare shoulder.

The sun streamed in through the blinds on his bedroom window, a natural alarm clock that raised the lazy curtains on my eyes.

I felt him shake with laughter against me, heard the delicious rumble in my ear. “You say such sweet things to me.”

I smiled sleepily, my vision adjusting from blur to focus, and took in the clock on Aidan’s bedside table. Ten thirty blinked up at me. Ten thirty. Ten thirty! I shot up straight, hearing him make a disgruntled sound at my back. “Is that the right time?”

“Aye, what of it?”

I whipped around to glare at him, wishing I could shield my eyes against the gorgeous sight of him sprawled on the bed, one arm above his head on the pillow, the other on his stomach. The bed sheets stopped below his navel, and I could see the man was already half ready to go another round. As earth-shattering as last night had been, I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to walk if he touched me again. Plus, I was late.

“I have classes. You know, commitments. Don’t you? Have commitments, I mean?”

“I can work later.”

“I can’t do my classes later.”

Aidan sat up, sliding an arm around my waist and pulling me against him, bare skin against bare skin. His eyes moved over my face with such intensity, I wanted to dive back under the sheets. “Surely, you can miss a class or two.”

I could miss a class or two without the world coming to an end, but that wasn’t the point. “I don’t like to.”

“So, what you’re telling me is that you would rather have gotten up early for class today than have the multiple orgasms you had last night?”

I huffed. “No.”

His hand delved beneath the sheets.

“Uh-uh.” I reached for it, dragging it back into the light. At his raised eyebrow, I flushed a little. “I’m sore.”

The boyish grin that spread across his face was almost irresistible.

“Cocky bastard.”

“That’s the second time you’ve called me a bastard.” He tickled my ribs, and I squealed, trying to get away. He was persistent, though. Giggling and begging for release, I found myself flat on my back on the bed with a brawny, amused Scotsman braced over me.

Not exactly a bad way to greet a new day.

“Okay, okay!” I laughed. “I’m sorry! Stop!”

His tickling ceased. His kissing commenced. I wasn’t surprised when my skin grew hot, and my thighs automatically gripped his hips. Despite my complaints of feeling tender, I was lost to the addiction of his touch. Last night we’d kissed and touched each other everywhere, passionate sex mixed with tender lovemaking. Afterward, I’d drifted to sleep only to be awoken sometime later by Aidan’s searching mouth and hands on my body. To my complete befuddlement, rather than growing tired of one another as I’d hoped, each touch increased our addiction.

And I couldn’t stop myself from tasting him again.

Aidan paused briefly to put on a condom and the whole time I lay there panting for him, not even thinking about putting a halt to it. Then he was inside me, and I was sore and tender, crying out in discomfort.

“Pixie,” he murmured, kissing me to soothe me, as he stilled to allow me to adjust to him again. “I can stop.”

“Don’t,” I whispered.

So he didn’t. He moved and I clutched his sexy, sculpted ass in my hands as he glided in and out of me.

“Aidan!”

At first I thought maybe I’d called out his name.

But then …

“Aidan!”

He stopped moving, looking down at me, puzzled. “Was that—”

“Aidan, are you home?” The voice was closer now, heading toward us.

Aidan pulled out of me, yanking the bed sheets to cover us both as the door burst open.

To my complete horror and confusion, Laine stood in the threshold.

“Oh my God,” she said, looking more horrified than I felt. “Oh my God.”

“Laine, get the fuck out!” Aidan snapped, trying to shield as much of me as possible.

“Oh my God.” She spun around, almost walking into the door before she hurried out of sight.

We waited a moment.

But the sound of the apartment door opening and shutting didn’t come.

I immediately glared up at Aidan. “She’s still comfortable enough to walk into your bedroom. That really must’ve been some falling out between you two.”

He glowered back at me. “I haven’t spoken to her since.”

“Well, I guess you better get out there, then.” My tone was ugly. I knew it. However, the cold, hard bite of jealousy had returned as if the last almost twenty months had never happened.

“I will. And you’re coming with me.” He got off the bed, striding across the room in his glorious nakedness to the adjoining dressing room. When he returned, he was wearing sweat pants.

I sat up. “Uh … where’s your T-shirt?”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Really.”

He grinned at me. “Feeling possessive again there, Pixie.”