Goes to show just how steeped in routine we are. Same restaurant, same food, same wine every third Friday night. Sometimes we mix it up and try the specials rather than our usual filet, but that’s as risky as we get. Which is good considering that I’m throttled into constant chaos Monday through Friday for twelve hours a day, as well as weekend galas, press junkets, and premiers.

Routine is good. Constant is good.

And Tucker . . . Tucker is the king of constant. And he has been for the last ten years.

“Any exciting plans tonight after dinner?” Bilal asks, making small talk.

“Exciting? No,” I answer. “But I do need to have a late meeting with a band that’s in town tonight for a concert. Business as usual, of course.”

“A band?” he inquires with a raised brow as he uncorks the wine bottle. “Anyone I know?”

I glance over at Tucker with a tinge of nervousness. He hates when I talk business at dinner. It was the one concession I allowed him considering the other twenty-three hours of the day I eat, drink, and sleep all things work related. “Ransom. Heard of them?”

His face is saying, Are you shitting me? but he’s much too polite to ever utter those words. “Yes, definitely. I was hoping to get tickets to tonight’s concert, but, of course, duty calls.”

“I’ll let them know you’re a fan,” I offer before Bilal tips his head graciously and returns to the kitchen.

“Awfully kind of you,” Tucker muses as he brings the rim of his wineglass to his lips. “And blasé, considering how much of a Ransom fan you are. Admit it, you’re dying to meet them. Or should I say, him?”

And there he goes again. Shrinking me.

See, Tucker is good at that. Better than good. He’s a goddamn walking mind fuck draped in a charcoal Brooks Brothers suit and Tom Ford readers. He looks like he’s itching to pick you apart just for the fuck of it. Only you’re too enthralled with the pretty packaging to realize it, let alone attempt to stop him from rummaging around in your head like a back-alley scavenger.

To the untrained eye, he appears as the regally handsome man that he is. But to me—the woman he’s loved since I was just a jaded undergrad and he a young, ambitious psychiatric resident—he’s a high-paid emotional coddler.

Of course, I’d never say that. To his face, at least.

I roll my eyes before downing what’s left of my martini, the sear of the liquid stifling the anxiety rising in my gut.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Lies.

“Oh, come on, Heidi. Isn’t he on your list?”

“It’s business, Tuck. I’m not going there tonight to live out some crazy fantasy that was merely meant to be a joke. Come on, you don’t actually think I take that stuff seriously?”

He shrugs, giving me a knowing smile. “Your list, love. This was your idea, not mine.”

I look down at my empty glass, already missing the burn of vodka on my tongue.

He’s right. It was my idea.

Some time ago, I asked Tucker who was on his Fuck-It List—women he could have a free pass with without repercussion from me. There were rules, of course. It’s not like he could include his hot, busty secretary or the young, perky shop girl at our favorite gourmet cupcakery. They had to be unattainable women that would be virtually impossible to meet, let alone sleep with. And the same would go for me.

It started off as just pillow talk—playful banter as we kissed and flirted between the sheets of our bed, tucked away in our tiny shoebox of an apartment on the west side. This was when our marriage was still fresh and new. Before reserved date nights, scheduled sex, and secret eye rolls behind menus.

“No one,” he’d said. “I could never imagine being with anyone but you.”

I’d known he would say that. Tucker had always been furiously devoted to our marriage and me. “But come on,” I’d urged anyway. “There’s got to be some sexy model or actress that you wouldn’t mind spending a wild night with, no strings attached.”

“Nope.” He’d smiled, causing the little crinkles at his eyes to only make him seem even more charming. “You’re all I want, Bunny.”

I always softened when he used my childhood nickname, which I inherited from my family, along with two front buckteeth that stood so far out of my mouth they practically had their own zip code. Dr. Sawyer and two years of braces were able to fix the chompers, but the nickname stuck.

“Ok, fine. You don’t have a list. Then what’s your fantasy? And don’t say me.”

“I can’t say that I have any besides you. You have and always will be the keeper of my deepest desires. There is no one else.” He gave a passive half shrug before turning my words right back on me. He was good for that. “But since you brought it up, how about you? That list of yours must be pretty notable.”

I gave a wave of nonchalance. “Not at all. Hardly worth mentioning.”

“Oh, I seriously doubt that.” Tucker eased up on one elbow so his face hovered over mine. He looked genuinely interested. Maybe even a little fascinated.

“I don’t know about this, Tuck.”

A slow, lazy smile spread across those too-full lips as mirth danced behind his heavy-lidded eyes. “Come on, Bunny. Tell me. I promise I won’t judge.”

I took a deep breath in an attempt to muster up some courage. He didn’t realize what he was asking for. But if honesty was what he needed, I’d give him just that.

“All right, fine. Mark Wahlberg.”

Deep, baritone laughter filled our modest bedroom, loud enough that I was sure Mrs. Epstein from downstairs could hear. Any minute now and she would be jabbing the ceiling with the blunt end of her broom and yelling Yiddish obscenities.

“Marky Mark? You want a hall pass for Marky Mark?”

I scoffed with feigned outrage and smacked his bare shoulder. “Hey, this is my list. And you promised you wouldn’t judge!”

“Awwww, baby.” He pulled me into his arms and made quick work of dotting soft kisses along my neck and shoulder. “I’d never judge you, I promise. Go on, tell me the next one. I won’t even laugh.”

“Ok, ok. Fine.” I’d surrendered with a heavy sigh, peering at him with one eye closed, bracing myself for his condemnation. “Gerard Butler.”

Brows raised to the sky, Tuck peered down at me in surprise. “Wow. You really have a thing for older men.” Which had been a valid observation, considering he had more than a few years on me.

But instead of agreeing or shrugging my shoulders, I gave him the third and final name on my list. The one that was sure to shock those tiny smile crinkles right from his handsome face.

“Ransom Reed.”

And like I had imagined, Tucker didn’t disappoint. “Ransom Reed?” he scoffed. “That little rocker punk? Sheesh, babe, what’s he, like, nineteen?”

I waved off his disdain. “He’s legal. And it’s only a foolish fantasy. No way in hell I’d ever actually meet him.”

That was before the PR agency I worked at put me on the fast track, letting me take the lead and prove myself with a couple of their elite clients. Before Tucker’s hard work and diligence had truly paid off, and word of mouth had tripled his annual intake. Back then we were just two bright-eyed, viciously determined professionals, working our fingers to the bone to try to just . . . make it.

And we’ve made it.

I look across the table at my husband—the man who had literally force-fed me bites of grilled cheese at my desk when I’d get too focused on work to stop and eat. And when I’d fall asleep at my laptop, my face pressed against the keys, he would carry me to the bed and strip me out of my work clothes. I’d feel him gently kissing the little square indentions on my cheek, his lips coasting across the phantom letters as if they were the sweetest braille.

I never have to wonder if he loves me, if he cares for me. If he’ll be waiting for me when I get home, lounging in his favorite chair, a book in those massive hands and his readers pushed down to the bridge of his nose. And even when the media paints me as ruthless and opportunistic, he still manages to see the woman within—the one he fell in love with despite all her reasons why he shouldn’t.