“With the house. Are we rushing into this?” I asked, running my hands through his hair and making it stand straight up. I twisted it this way and that, making Mohawks and no hawks, bowl cuts and bangs. I worried his hair around every finger, feeling the silky strands as he kissed my cle**age.

“You’re still thinking about this?” he asked, sighing. “If I thought it was too soon, I wouldn’t have made an offer.” The barest hint of tongue now wet the tip of my breast. “If I thought it was too soon, I wouldn’t have told the Realtor that I wanted that house no matter what was wrong with it.”

His hips bumped mine, slipping between my legs, which automatically cradled him. I could feel him, hard and wanting and insistent. “If I thought it was too soon, I wouldn’t be giving you an obscene design budget to turn that house into our home,” he whispered, his voice husky and thick. And speaking of thick . . .

He nudged inside, just barely. “Heated floors, Caroline.” My back arched. “Marble countertops.” My legs fell open wide.

“Carrara?”

“I don’t know what that means, babe,” he said, panting, now hovering over my body. He rested his full weight on one hand, letting the other dip down below to begin drawing those perfect circles, exactly where he knew would send me flying.

“It’s a kind of marble that—mmm. . . .” I moaned, my head falling back onto the pillow as he slid inside me entirely.

“Anything. You can have anything you want. Don’t you know that?” He groaned, scooping under my back and pulling me closer into him, tilting my hips so that each thrust hit me right smack dab on the Carrara. “I just need you.” His eyes burned into mine, stormy and full of want. “You—I need you,” he repeated, thrusting deeply, stringing me out right on the edge.

It was those eyes that pushed me over that edge. And when he followed, it was epic. We lay together, tangled and out of breath. Holding him closely, I whispered in his ear how much I loved him, and how great this house, this home, would be.

I only hoped I could make it what he needed.

chapter seventeen

The next morning, I got an e-mail from Jillian. They were coming home in three weeks.

And in those weeks, my entire world turned upside down. I’d been running things for months now, and I’d pretty much gotten the swing of things. But not these last two weeks. No, sir. It was like the design gods all gathered, rubbed their hands together, and said, “Let’s see how we can f**k up Caroline Reynolds.”

And in case you’re wondering, there are in fact design gods. And in case you’re wondering, yes, they’re fabulous.

The new job I’d agreed to take on in Sausalito was initially supposed to be a kitchen remodel. Which turned into a living room remodel. Which turned into “Couldn’t we maybe add French doors out to the patio?” and “I think we could use a new patio, don’t you?” and “I saw something called a pergola on HGTV the other night; could we put one of those over the patio?” This was all very good for the pocketbook, but it was way more work than I had planned on. We revised the timeline, revised the hell out of the budget, and I began work on the almost total renovation that this project now required.

We had a sprinkler malfunction at the office, resulting in the entire third floor being flooded. The sprinkler just went bananas one afternoon and sprayed for fifteen minutes until we could get it shut off. Offices had to be aired out, a team brought in to dry out the carpets, and some of the year-end tax forms now were blurred beyond comprehension. Luckily I had backup copies, but the panic I felt when I saw those forms? Might have caused my first gray hair ever.

The damned art installation was finally installed in the lobby of the Claremont. Max Camden took one look at it, pronounced it all wrong, and demanded we find something else. Which we did. All parties agreed that the new art was better for the space, but now everything else needed to be reconfigured to accommodate it. Which made me question the lighting placement. And the lighting in general. It was like pulling one loose thread on a sweater, and suddenly, poof, no sweater! And you’re standing naked in a new hotel with terrible lighting.

I don’t have time for naked.

Because the next blow to fall was that our building was indeed going condo. After Jillian forwarded an e-mail from her landlord, I learned they’d be going on the market in thirty days. Thirty days—is that even legal? During which the building owner would be coming in to make repairs and updates to all the units.

Simon took it all in stride, saying that it was a sign reaffirming that we were supposed to move to Sausalito. Sign or no sign, I was now faced with a new home that we were going to renovate top to bottom, and we’d lost the apartments we were going to live in while it happened. And with Jillian due home, I was losing my house-sitting gig.

So now on top of everything else, we had to pack up both our apartments in the city and move everything into a storage container until we were ready to move into the new house. Seriously. I hired help, of course, but I still needed to sort through things, purge things, and pack a few things on my own. There are certain things in a woman’s apartment that she wants to pack herself. You know what I’m saying.

Nobody was getting their hands on my KitchenAid.

So, to recap. My already hectic work life was ramping up instead of slowing down. My boss was returning in a few days, and there were box fans all over the third floor of her office space in a historic Russian Hill mansion. And I was stealing a few hours I really didn’t have to pack up my glorious apartment, to move into a nonglorious home going through a gut rehab.

I was going to be living on-site during a gut rehab.

Laugh all you want, design gods. I could handle it.

Right?

Brain laughed. Backbone curled up like it had scoliosis. Heart was still drawing her own image all over the imaginary mirror in her new master bath.

And Simon? Simon was . . . a pickle. A pickle who was packing up his apartment next door as we speak, and making a helluva lot of noise while doing it. I was in my bedroom, purging my sock drawer, when I heard a very distinct thumping coming through the wall. A banging, if you will. I smiled, remembering the first few times I heard that banging.

Clive jumped up on the bed, looking curiously at the wall.

Pretty sure that sometimes he still listened to see if Purina was going to come meowing through that wall again. Fat chance.

I crossed to the shared wall, placing my hand on the spot I imagined was right above his bed, and sure enough, I felt another thumpity thump. What the hell was he doing over there?