Chapter Four
The Fall
Two Years Ago, four months after The Meeting
Jordan followed meinto my townhouse after work Friday night. The wind that cut through Dallas was bitter cold, a rare occurrence this close to spring and meteorologists promised snow and ice over the weekend.
When I’d heard the forecast earlier that day, I’d found myself calling Jordan and inviting him to spend the weekend keeping me warm.
Considering this was not the first time he spent the night with me, nor would it likely be the last, it was clear that I’d fucked up. Big time.
In my experience, casual sex meant you met up, enjoyed your orgasm, and went home. Apparently, my expectations didn’t line up with Jordan’s. After our first night together, I thought that would be the end of things. Especially since we were opposing counsel in what was promising to become an incredibly acrimonious divorce.
While I was disappointed there wouldn’t be any more of the incredible, mind-blowing orgasms, I knew it was for the best. That kind of chemistry could lead to all sorts of trouble if we kept sleeping together.
Two weeks after our first night together, I discovered that Mr. Browning had fired his legal representation. Then I received a text from Jordan.
My place. 7 p.m. tonight.
Like an idiot, I’d gone. To my utter disbelief, the sex had been even better the second time around.
From that night on, he and I fucked like rabbits. There was no other way to describe it. Several times a week, I would go to Jordan’s and stay for hours, wandering home in the wee hours of the morning.
Then I invited him to my place. Unlike me, he didn’t leave after we were done. He slept in my bed with me, usually spooned against my back or with me sprawled across his chest.
From there, it was a slippery slope that led straight to a monumental fuck up.
I knew it as I watched Jordan set his laptop bag by the front door and shrug out of his long winter coat. Though he still wore his suit jacket, he’d removed his tie and unbuttoned the top button of his shirt after he left the office. He smiled at me and headed toward the kitchen.
“Red or white?” he asked over his shoulder as he went.
His words broke through my reverie and I removed my coat as I answered. “Red.”
A knowing chuckle came from the kitchen. “I thought as much.”
“Why do you say that?” I asked as I kicked off my shoes and left them by the front door.
I walked toward the kitchen, rounding the counter in time to see him select a bottle of pinot noir from the rack on the counter.
“You always want red wine when it’s cold outside.”
He was right. I preferred the rich warmth of a red wine on chilly evenings and the crisp coolness of white wine during the spring and summer. It also surprised me he recognized it. Were casual sex partners supposed to notice things like that? I didn’t think so.
While I’d dallied in the entryway, removing my coat, Jordan had shed his suit jacket and draped it over one of the chair backs at the kitchen table. I watched the lean muscles of his shoulders move as he uncorked the wine and poured a healthy amount into two glasses.
God, I loved to watch him move. There was something subtly sexy about the way he held his body, the set of his shoulders and the tilt of his head. Then there was the smirk that he typically wore when he said something witty or self-deprecating. I knew as soon as I saw it that whatever he had to share would make me laugh.
In the last four months, the strong attraction I’d initially felt hadn’t faded in the least. In fact, it had grown hotter, sharper. I didn’t just want him. Icravedhim. Not only his body and the pleasure he invariably gave me but his company, his humor, even his sullen grumpiness early in the morning. I loved it all.
I loved him.
If it had been physically possible, I believed every cell in my body would have frozen from the unexpected realization that gripped me.
I loved Jordan Hawke. He was nothing like my past sexual partners, yet exactly what I wanted in every way. I teased incessantly about his name and how he must have been named after the hero in a bodice-ripper romance. This sophisticated man who whispered dirty things in my ear in that delicious accent as he made me come over and over again was exactly what I’d been looking for, even if I hadn’t realized it.
I knew I’d blurred the lines between a fling and a relationship too much with him, but I hadn’t realized how badly until now. What in the hell was I going to do?
“Tanya?” he asked, halting in front of me with two glasses of wine in his hands. “You okay?”
