“No,” she said with complete honesty.

“Is it Summer?”

His instant panic radiated out to her and she quickly put her hand over his racing heart to calm him. “Summer’s perfect. I just dropped her off at school.”

“Then what?” His hands were in her hair as he pulled her closer to search her face for clues.

“I missed you,” she whispered, shyly dropping her eyes at her stark admission. “Friday night. Sunday night.” She lifted her eyes to his. “I felt like I was going to go crazy if I didn’t see you again.” She put her arms around him and reveled in the strength beneath her fingertips.

“I ran zigzags back and forth around this city all morning,” he told her in a raw voice as his gaze dropped to her lips and then moved back up to her eyes. “It was either that or use my tools to break into your apartment and climb into your bed with you.”

A moment later, he’d picked her up and was carrying her into his bedroom. Megan was thrilled that he was as desperate as she was to pick up where they’d started—and never had a chance to finish—that weekend.

“How long do you have?” he murmured against her earlobe, his tongue flicking against the sensitive flesh just behind it.

“As long as you need,” she told him as she pressed her own kisses against the curve of his neck, one side of his broad shoulders.

His eyes lifted to hers, dark not only with passion, but also with something so much bigger, so much richer that just physical desire. “Forever, Megan.” The two words rumbled from his chest, catching her straight in the middle of hers. “That’s how long I’m going to need with you.”

Megan gasped at his response to her offhand reply. She’d just been talking about making love this morning, about a few stolen hours in his bed away from the work she needed to do for her clients. But he’d answered her as if she’d meant something entirely different.

Which, if she were being completely honest with herself, she had.

She tried to catch her breath as he lowered her to the bed. She knew he loved her, but for all the times he’d said those three sweet words to her in the past week, he’d never pressured her to return them. He knew she was trying, knew being with him was the biggest risk she’d taken in years. But now, as she lay beneath him on his big bed and he looked at her as no man ever had—as though she were the sun, the stars and everything in between—she wanted so badly to give him back what he so effortlessly had been giving her.

“I—” The words got caught in her throat, jammed by the resurgence of the fears she’d been pushing away, one by one, every time Gabe was with her. No, not just then. Every time she thought about him. Every time Summer said his name and smiled.

She licked her lips, tried again. “Gabe, I—.”

His beautiful mouth covered hers just as she faltered again, his kiss telling her he understood...and that he wasn’t going anywhere. She lost herself in the love he poured into the kiss, wrapping her arms and legs tighter around him, needing him to be so much closer.

“I know you are, and I’ll wait for you, Megan. As long as I need to wait.”

Thankfully, he didn’t wait for her to respond, didn’t let there be any uncomfortable silences between them. Instead, he reached for the hem of her tank top and pulled it up and over her head.

“Pink is my new favorite color,” he murmured when he saw her bra.

Without realizing it, she’d put on the bra that matched the panties he’d seen in her laundry basket that day he’d surprised her by coming to her apartment. But before she could admit to herself that she’d worn them on purpose—hoping for just this response—he was lowering his head to her and running his tongue over the upper swell of first one breast and then the other, just where the lace gave way to sensitive flesh.

She was panting and arching her back into him by the time he lifted his head. “You should know, I’ve had more than one fantasy about those pink panties.”

“Me too,” she whispered.

His hands faltered just as he reached for the button of her jeans. A moment later, he was unzipping and drawing them down her legs, pulling off her shoes and socks while he was at it.

“Tell me one of them,” he said in that low, hungry voice that never failed to send heat and desire all through her, starting deep in her belly and radiating outward.

But she’d already had a chance to act out more than one fantasy with him. This time, she wanted to know his.

With his hands roving across her hips, her stomach, over her rib cage, it was hard to get the request out. “You already know one of my fantasies. I want to hear one of yours.”

His smile was so powerfully sensual she almost came right then and there, with nothing more than that look in his eyes and his large hands cupping her still-covered br**sts.

“One of my fantasies,” he said softly, as he lifted himself off her so that he could rake his eyes down her entire body, “involves surprise.” He paused. “And trust.”

Whatever she’d been expecting him to say, it hadn’t been this.

It hadn’t been his asking her for trust.

Of course she trusted him. She’d let him into her life, into Summer’s life. She had wild sex with him and knew that even though he was so much bigger, she’d never have to be frightened about what he could have done to her.

As if he was giving her time to think about what he’d just said, he got up off the bed and took off his clothes. When he turned back to her, he was gloriously naked and so hard his erection was standing straight up against his hard stomach.

It would have been so easy just to pull him down over her, to brush past whatever surprise, whatever fantasy he wanted to have come true, and make love without any more talk about trust. But she knew that wouldn’t just be cheating him of his fantasy...it would be cheating herself, too.

“Megan?”

The moment of truth had come. He’d given her time to think, to mull, to decide. He hadn’t forced the issue on the word love but she could see he wasn’t going to back down on trust.

Not trusting her voice, she nodded.

His answering smile was as encouraging as it was sexy. And then he turned away and reached into his dresser drawer. A few seconds later, he pulled out a tie.

Her heart raced as he approached her.

“Have you ever been blindfolded?”

She bit her lip, shook her head.

“Have you ever wanted to be?”