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Mom’s gonna immediately guess where I am, but that can’t be helped. I set the notepad on the counter where she can’t miss it. Oh, and I have to tell Sabrina because she’s expecting me the day after tomorrow. I promised to come out to Wyoming, just for a few days, before heading back to Mom’s again, and I hate being a disappointment.

Thinking hard, I frown with my fingers over my phone before shooting off a text to Sabrina.

Hey, I’m postponing my flight a couple days. Had a couple things come up.

I hit send, and she sees it instantly.

That’s fine. Everything okay? she replies.

My shoulders sink. She’d tell me if she was upset.

Nope, all good. Just wanted to get some stuff done first. Promise I’ll be back ASAP.

Headlights flash through the front window. After shoving my phone in my purse, I unlock the door and slip out, setting the alarm from my phone. The last thing I want is the system alerting Mom and her texting me while I’m busy.

Tonight, it’s cooler than it has been, and the sprinklers put up a fine mist as I cross the drive to the gate. It’s a hired car of some kind, not an Uber, with dark windows. I slip out of the gate, and a driver appears, coming around to open my door.

“You’re Miss Maxwell?” he says.

I nod, intimidated. “Yes, sir.”

“Alright, hop on in, and we’ll get you where you need to go.”

Nonplussed, I do as he says. There’s a barrier between the back and the front of the car, so I don’t have to make conversation. But that plunges me into my own thoughts.

I am doing exactly what I said I wouldn’t. I’m letting him use his money to bring me to him so he can sleep with me. No warning, just summoning me like an asshole. My forehead scrunches. I lean it against the cool glass as we leave the neighborhood and head toward the city. He said we were going to the Whitehall Hotel, at the periphery of the city. It’s a private hotel that a lot of celebrities stay at because it’s easy to keep the paparazzi on the other side of the huge iron gates surrounding the gardens.

My stomach clenches.

The last time he saw me, I was walking away from him at the airport. He has a lot of nerve, texting me like this. I have a lot of idiocy in falling right back into his arms and his bed.

Won’t stop me, though.

I squeeze my eyes shut and open them, but they won’t focus. It’s the way my heart pounds, it has my ears roaring, too. Through the haze, city lights glimmer in the distance. It feels like it’s taking forever, until all at once, we’re pulling through the front gates and around a sleek parking lot to an arched doorway leading to a marble lobby.

The driver is parked and out, opening my door before I can move.

I freeze, swallowing.

“You alright, miss?” he asks.

Am I?

“Yeah,” I say hoarsely.

He steps back, and I scoot out, standing on shaky legs. All I have is my overnight bag, with a change of clothes and some toiletries, so he doesn’t need to get my luggage. I smile, and he dips his head. Then, I’m alone on the curb.

I take a step in and the automatic door swings open. My body tingles, and I stumble, half inside the doorway.

He’s walking down the hall. Striding, more like, on his long legs. He doesn’t see me because he’s on the phone, distracted, but I get a good, hard look at him.

God, he is gorgeous.

It’s only been a few months, but it looks like he’s been working out. I swear those goddamn enormous shoulders are somehow broader. And the way his clothes are disheveled, but still a nice dress shirt and pants that sit perfectly over his body…it’s enough to make my mouth water. His hair is all tousled, as if he’s been running his fingers through it.

I enjoy the thought I’m frustrating him enough to make him do that.

He glances up and comes to a screeching halt. I forgot how pretty his heavy eyes are, so hard to read. His lips part, he takes a step, then hesitates.