The room seemed to grow darker, the sun dipping behind the horizon just as I’d finished my sentence. Chloe watched me, face smooth and practically unreadable.

Well, unreadable to anyone else. Anyone who hadn’t seen that face a thousand times, the one that told me she wanted to smack me, kiss me, scratch me, and then f**k me.

“Don’t smirk,” she said, eyes narrowing. “I see what you’re doing.”

“What am I doing?”

“Trying to build me up. Being a hardass, yet also my lover. Damnit, Bennett.”

“You’re going to f**k me in your office!” I crowed, my words colored with surprise and glee. “God, you’re easy.”

She stood quickly, walking around the desk and reaching immediately for my tie. “Damnit.” She unknotted it, wrapping it around my eyes and tying it behind my head. “Stop studying me,” she hissed into my ear. “Stop seeing everything.”

“Never.” I closed my eyes behind the silk fabric and let my other senses take over, inhaling the delicate citrus scent of her perfume, reaching to feel the soft skin of her forearms. I moved my hands slowly down her body and turned her around, pulling her back to my chest. “This better?”

Her quiet huff wasn’t for my benefit; it was a sound of genuine frustration. “Bennett,” she murmured, leaning back. “You’re making me crazy.”

I gripped her hips, pulling her to me so she could feel the hard line of my c**k against her ass. “At least some things never change.”

I blinked up to the flight attendant, who bent low to catch my eye and had obviously just said something.

“I’m sorry?” I asked.

“Would you like a beverage with your meal?”

“Ah, yes,” I said, pulling my brain from the memory of Chloe’s body, tight and coiled around me as I’d f**ked her over her desk. “Just some Grey Goose and a cup of ice, please.”

“And for lunch? We have filet mignon or a cheese and olive plate.”

I ordered the latter and glanced out the window. From thirty thousand feet up, I could be anywhere. But I had the distinct feeling I was headed back in time.

I hadn’t been back to France since my return to the States, when I met Chloe in person. For what felt like the hundredth time, I registered how that old Bennett didn’t feel familiar in the slightest.

Thanksgiving had been a revelation in part because, before Chloe, I would have also said yes to George’s demand without even a thought. Chloe was so similar to me in so many ways, it was actually a little frightening.

I smiled as I thought back to my mother’s advice:

“Find a woman who will be your equal in every way. Don’t let yourself fall for someone who’ll put your world before theirs. Fall for the powerhouse who lives as fearlessly as you do. Find the woman who makes you want to be a better man.”

Well, I had found her. Now all I had to do was wait for her to get here, so I could make sure she knew.

The path leading to our borrowed villa was covered in small, smooth stones. They were brown and uniform in size, and although they were clearly selected for their appearance and how well they fit the landscaping, it was refreshingly obvious that the grounds were meant to be enjoyed, not treated as a precious museum piece. Flower beds and urns lined both sides of the path, each spilling over with bright, colorful blossoms. There were trees everywhere, and off in the distance was a little seating area, screened from the rest of the yard by a wall of blooming vines.

Truly, I had never seen a more beautiful country home. The house was a soft red, the color of faded clay, and weathered to an absolutely gorgeous effect. White shutters framed the tall windows on the first and second floors, and more vibrant flowers lined beds against the doors. The perfume in the air was a mixture of ocean and peony.

Bougainvillea crawled up a trellis and framed the French provincial-inspired narrow double doorway. The top step was cracked, but swept clean, and a simple, soft green mat lay atop the sun-bleached concrete.

I turned, looking behind me at the yard. In the far corner and beneath several fig trees, a long table was covered in a brilliant orange tablecloth, the tabletop decorated simply with a narrow line of tiny blue bottles of different shapes and sizes. Clean white plates were spaced at even intervals, waiting for a dinner party to appear. A green lawn stretched to where I stood on the narrow porch, broken only by the occasional inground planter bursting with purple, yellow, and pink flowers.

I pulled the key from my pocket and entered the house. From the outside, it was clearly large, but it almost seemed to expand like an optical illusion inside.