I hit reply, and told her it sounded like he wanted her back. Then I asked: what do you want? I wondered if anyone ever asked her that.

The Hellers went out to dinner and a movie, followed by a holiday-lights procession through gated neighbourhoods in the hills on the south end of town that were filled with grandiose mansions decorated by professionals. Bowing out to do laundry, I told myself I wanted to be alone. I made a cilantro lime marinade for the red snapper I’d caught yesterday, stuck it in the fridge and went for a run. Jacqueline Wallace was on a perpetual loop in my mind. The thought of her with Moore woke a violent part of me I thought buried and gone. It made sense to fight to protect her, but I couldn’t kick someone’s ass because she chose him over me. Fuck if I didn’t want to.

Joseph: Survive T-day? How bout them Cowboys!?

I’m not allowed to say that again to Elliott, upon penalty of something called kinky boots – not my kind of kinky btw – on replay all the way home from Cleveland.

It’s a long damn drive.

Me: Survived. Home. Go Cowboys. Your bf is controlling, dude.

Joseph: Tell me about it. I’m f**king whipped. :P

When my phone buzzed again, I assumed it was more from Joseph, but no. It was Jacqueline, saying: I’m back. So of course, I invited her over for dinner.

Preparing my own food was something I’d done for so long that it didn’t seem odd. As a child I’d played culinary assistant to my mother, to whom cooking was another art form. Once Grandpa died, I cooked for Dad and myself out of necessity. It was that or a steady diet of toast, fish and eggs. We’d have both contracted scurvy before I got out of high school.

Cooking a full meal for anyone but myself had become rare. I lived alone, and Carlie had been right a few months ago – I generally didn’t have anyone over. I didn’t have time for a circle of friends, and I didn’t do dates. I barely did hookups.

Inviting someone for a home-cooked meal boasts culinary confidence and encourages a level of expectation, but I was no chef. I bypassed gourmet recipes and anything with complex steps. I prepared simple meals in unassuming ways.

I had no idea what Jacqueline liked or didn’t.

‘I’ve never had a guy cook for me before,’ she said, leaning her elbows on the opposite side of the counter, watching me chop veggies and drizzle basil vinaigrette over them. Her inexperience with college-guy cooking boded well for the snapper and baked potatoes. Once everything was in the oven, I set the timer and led her to the sofa.

I wanted to know what conclusions she and her ex had reached, but I wouldn’t ask. She was here, and I couldn’t think about her going back to him.

Taking her magical hand in mine, I examined every millimetre of it. I traced the lines in her palm, the sensitive valleys between fingers and the arching whorls on the pads of each one. She kept her nails short so she could play her bass, pressing and plucking strings, without impediment.

Landon knows that. Lucas doesn’t.

I had to tell her. I had to tell her, soon.

Pulling her on to my lap, I leaned her into the corner cushions to tip her head back and kiss her neck, buzzing with need when she swallowed, tracing the path of those tiny quivering muscles with my tongue as her pulse and breathing sped. I unbuttoned her white blouse – one button, then two, following the path of each inch of newly gained territory with my lips, halting at the top of her bra. If I unfastened her any further, our dinner would be burned to soot.

One of her hands was trapped between us, splayed against my chest. Her free hand gripped my bicep, the thick knit bunched beneath her palm. When my tongue began to stroke the just-visible curves between her br**sts, she kneaded my arm like a kitten and purred like one, too. The weight of her was just right, her rounded hip pressing into the saddle of my lap. I fought to slam the door on my rampaging contemplations – like how her soft, naked body would feel in my hands. I wanted to turn her round, feel the heat of her pressed against me –

The timer began to beep, and Francis added his eager meow to the alarm.

I’d never been so turned on and willingly ready to starve in my life.

‘Time to eat.’ Those words discharged another surge of reckless, uninhibited thoughts concerning Jacqueline’s lovely body.

Her disorientated, frustrated groan was a mind-blowing sort of music to my ears – a refrain that told me, clearly, she wanted me. What she knows of you, my brain clarified. Even possessed with lust, I couldn’t break away from my conscience.

Over dinner, I mentioned that I’d cooked for Dad and myself before leaving for college.

‘You cooked? Not your mom or dad?’ Her gaze was steady below faintly creased brows.

‘My mom died when I was thirteen.’ I tried to make light of the fact that I did the cooking after that – like I was just making sure Dad and I ate something besides toast and fish.

‘I’m sorry.’ Her genuine sympathy surfaced in the quiet concern of her voice, and I felt pulled apart by contradictory desires – follow my characteristic restraint where the subject of my mother was concerned, or tell her everything. As usual, the words roadblocked in my throat. I nodded and said nothing.

While we ate, Francis consumed his body weight in snapper and yowled to be let out after. Bolting the door behind him, I imagined he’d need a jog around the neighbourhood rather than a hunting expedition tonight.

I walked back to the table and took Jacqueline’s hand. She rose and followed me to my bed, where we lay, eyes locked, like it was old habit to do so. I reached to touch her, to confirm that she was real and not a cruel fabrication of my heart. Her skin was so soft, and her face became more beautiful every time I saw her. She scared the hell out of me, but I couldn’t stay away from her.

I unbuttoned her blouse the rest of the way, slowly, eyes on hers, ready to stop the moment she signalled me to do so, regardless of what we’d done before. She swallowed thickly, nervously, as I bared the curve of her shoulder and leaned to touch my lips to it. Her warm breath in my ear, she shoved her cool hands under my shirt, palms sliding across my abdomen and wandering higher. I couldn’t tear my shirt off fast enough.

Sliding one leg between hers, I pressed my thigh against her firmly and drove my tongue into her sweet mouth when she gasped, my need for her overriding my need for oxygen. She rewarded me with a subtle moan and arched against me, her hands sliding over my skin, stroking over the poem inscribed on my side that I finally understood fully. My brain was a riot of want and fear. I’d never been so terrified of my own desires, because they went well beyond her body. I shook to my core, my soul curving round her protectively as my mind strove to determine the logical calculation that could make her mine. I wanted to be hers as much – more – than I wanted to possess her, when I knew damned well that neither was possible.