“How recent?” Nico asked.

“The last time was the night before I flew to France to find you.”

If that hurt to hear, Nico’s eyes did not betray it. She must have known somehow that once she met Nico she could never be intimate with Kingsley again. They’d had one last dark and beautiful night together. And now … never again.

“And while Kingsley may not seem like a father to you—yet—in his eyes, and in his heart, you are his son. He’ll never touch me again.”

“Never touch you again? Because he’ll be angry?”

“No. Because he loves you.”

“Is this why you didn’t want to let me in?”

Nora looked back into the dying fire.

“Kingsley has secrets that he shares with very few people. You can count the number on one hand, and I was one of them. Not anymore.” She hadn’t merely been Kingsley’s lover, she’d been his domme as well those nights he’d needed pain. She’d also carried his child once, if only briefly—not that she could tell Nico. In time she would, but not yet.

“You paid a high price to let me in.”

“Very high. Kingsley and I have made a habit of hurting each other for twenty years the way only two people who are like family to each other can. But even if Kingsley would want me again, I couldn’t do that to you—be with you and then go back to him. This night means too much to me. You mean too much to me.”

Nico raised her hand and held it to his chest.

“You’re grieving,” Nico said. “So I won’t ask you to make any decisions. I will only say that if it were my decision, you would stay with me.”

“And what? Marry you? Have your babies? That’s not who I am. I’m selfish like that.”

Nico scoffed. “Selfish is the name the jealous give to the free. I’m free, too.”

“You are, aren’t you?”

“I am. And if I wanted marriage, children, why would I chase women with children my age? I have a little sister now. Why would I need any other heirs?”

Nora leaned forward and rested her head on the center of his chest. He kissed her hair.

“Don’t make any decisions yet,” Nico said, caressing her back. “But know this—you will always be welcome in my home and in my bed. And I won’t make you pay any price.”

Tucking her head into the crook of his shoulder and neck, she breathed his scent, quieted her heart.

“But you aren’t the one who sends the bills.”

Reluctantly Nora pulled away from Nico’s embrace. She’d rarely, if ever, felt this weak around a man. Grief had brought her to this point. She’d rarely known such deep sadness. Her loss had left her lost. Loss? Such a misnomer. Nothing was lost. Something was taken. She felt robbed, like someone had broken into her life and stolen her valuables. It wasn’t a loss. It was a theft. And she knew she would never get it back.

Nico crawled out of bed and walked to the fireplace. He threw a log onto the ebbing flames and stoked the fire back to life. He worked quickly and efficiently, wasting neither time nor effort. Since he was a child, he’d told her once, he’d worked in the vineyards. School all day. Work all evening. Sleep all night. The result of such a life—intelligence, strength and a clear conscience.

He came back to the bed and slid in next to her. Gathering her in his arms, he pulled her to him, pressing her back to his chest and dragging the covers over both of them.

“What happened after your father died?” Nico asked, perhaps sensing she couldn’t and wouldn’t talk about their future anymore.

“Like I said, I got into NYU. I had a future and the money to pay for it. And then the moment I’d been waiting for happened.”

“What was that?”

“I turned eighteen. I got my driver’s license finally. And Søren and Kingsley started training me. Kingsley took me to my first BDSM club—a little one a friend of his ran. It wasn’t like coming home. It was better than that—like when you go to a new city and feel like ‘yes, I could live here the rest of my life,’ and you mentally start packing your bags.”

“I know that feeling,” he said and she saw something flicker in his eyes. Was he packing her bags for her so she could stay with him?

“Good feeling,” she said, trying not to fall under Nico’s spell. “I was so eager to join that world. And yet, there I was, still a virgin.”

“Tell me. I want to know what you were like when you were a virginal teenager.”

“I was a teenager but never virginal. Even when I was a virgin.”

“When did you lose your virginity?”

“I was twenty. Barely twenty. And you?”

“Fifteen. She was thirty-six.”

Nora pursed her lips. “That sounds familiar.”

“Hard to believe someone with your passion waiting for so long. Was it worth the wait?”

“It was,” she said, her mind falling far back into the past. “But he was right to make me wait that long, as much as I wanted him sooner. I understand that now.”

“What do you understand?”

“I was ready for sex long before my first time. But I wasn’t ready for him, for what he would want from me.”

“And that was?”

“Everything. I had a lot to learn before we became lovers. And Søren had some interesting teaching methods.”