She began to fall into the ritual of measuring and mixing by hand, of flouring and kneading. Her panic smoothed after a few minutes.

Brody flipped on the CD player and PJ Harvey growled through the speakers.

“I’m leaving the connecting door open. If you want to sing, you know I’d love you for it.” He kissed her forehead and looked her over. He knew the storm had passed and so backed away.

She worked as Dry played. Played until “Fountain” came on and she stood near the door and sang part of the lyrics, ending with the line about what to do when everything’s left you.

The noise from the room next door had stilled to utter silence until Brody cleared his throat.

“Thanks, baby girl. You know I love that one.”

She did too.

11

He pulled into her parking garage and headed up to her condo. The doorman let him straight up on her orders. Standing orders apparently. Todd liked that a lot.

He’d spent the last three days listening to her CDs. Christ, her voice on those few songs she sang lead on was burned into his brain. There’s a hole where you used to live

Dead inside and I can’t hide

I smoke and I drink and I still can’t stop

Thinking of you

Absent and there’s no going back

Absent and I hurt

Can’t hide from the hurt

Ben hadn’t been wrong about the song he’d recommended. Listening to Erin’s low, smoky moan as she poured her grief out, the gasp at the end where her tears were close to the surface, had nearly driven him to his knees.

He’d wanted to do some Internet research on the incident, but he’d been called out on one client meeting after the other, stumbling home to fall into bed, calling her or texting her if it was too late and he didn’t want to wake her.

He knocked, and when she opened up, she stood in a short, pretty dress, flowy at the leg and tight at the breast part. Perfect.

“Pink Floyd.” He smiled as he went into her place and heard “Wish You Were Here” in the background.

“Thank god. I was worried, you know. This Toby Keith thing has been keeping me up at nights.”

Laughing, he swept her up into a hug, craving more of the way she felt pressed to him.

“Hello there, my gorgeous little freak.”

She paused for a moment and then snorted laughter, kissing his nose. “Only you could get away with these things.”

He could. Which is why, he supposed, he liked to do them so much. She made him feel special even when she did something as silly as making him a plate of food or laughing when he teased her.

“How hungry are you?” he asked.

And then she dropped to her knees, looking up at him after setting her glasses aside. Her hands rested in her lap, her back was straight as she waited.

He had a fleeting thought that she had no idea what she looked like kneeling there, how she moved him, but he knew she did, and that made her actions undeniably arousing. She did it on purpose because she knew what it did for him.

“Suck me. You know what I like.”

She murmured, licking her lips as she slowly unbuttoned his jeans and pulled his shorts down to free his cock. She breathed deep, sliding her cheek along him, the cool of her skin a contrast to the heat of his.

She palmed his sac with one hand and gripped his root with the other before sucking tightly on him, inching down, bit by bit, until she’d swallowed a good portion of his cock, her lips touching the top of her fist where she held him.

Her hair was down, leaving him free to run his fingers through it, gaining enough purchase until he grasped tight and guided her—up and down, up and down—over his cock.

“Are you wearing panties?” His voice had lowered, neared a grunt as her mouth surrounded his prick with wet heat.

“Mmm,” she said, shaking her head with him still in her mouth.

“Christ,” he hissed as the image of her wet, sweetly pink cunt flashed through his head. “Take that hand off my balls and finger yourself. Don’t come yet. That’s mine. But I want you primed for when I shoot down your throat.”

Each time he gave the words up freely, each time he did what he wanted, what he craved, it got easier the next time. It wasn’t as if there was a manual for all this stuff, but with her it wasn’t necessary. With Erin on her knees before him, Todd knew they’d work it through, find ways to pleasure each other, keep each other wanting more, without pain, without disrespect, with . . . love.

There hadn’t been a single moment, a time when the clouds had parted and the angels sang that he loved her. He just knew he did. Maybe he’d loved her a long time, tucked away in his mind for all these years. Maybe it had been when she leapt into his arms moments before. What mattered was that he felt it, and even better, he knew it.

Thought skittered away as her left hand slid between her thighs and she gasped around him. Her fingers were touching her cunt, he knew. He wished he could see more, but at the same time what he could see only forced him—ha, forced—to imagine it. Which, actually, was just as good.

He heard the wet sounds of her fingers playing through the juicy folds of her pu**y; the scent of her arousal teased him as he continued to f**k into her mouth.

She pressed the tip of her tongue down the center of his c**k each time she swallowed him, a line of pleasure, something new and entirely delightful.

He was close to coming, and the increasingly jerky movement of the hand between her thighs told him she was as well. He let go, coming in a hot rush, filling her.