I pause and Brand doesn’t say anything.

He simply waits.

The silence between us is charged and I rush my next words…I let them tumble from my mouth before I lose the nerve.

“I want you. Without any strings at all. At the end of the summer, we’ll probably never see each other again…but I want this summer. With you.”

I have to know what’s its like.

I stand on a wall and protect what is mine.

I need to know, even if it’s just an illusion, what it’s like to be his.

To be safe.

To be good.

Please.

Brand stares at me, stunned.

I’m stunned too.

I did it.

I did it.

I’m fucking brave.

I watch his lips slowly part as he breathes out in a rush.

I watch his tongue dart out and lick his lower lip.

I feel the heat from his hand as he slightly moves it.

Then I watch the word form on his mouth…right before he says it.

“No.”

Brand

Nora stares at me, stunned. Her blue eyes are wide and clear, and I see hurt in them. Hurt that I put there without meaning to.

“No?” she repeats shakily, confused. She wasn’t expecting that answer. I wasn’t expecting to say it, to be honest. If I were smart, I’d take her up on her offer and have a summer-long sex session.

But as I look at her now, she seems more vulnerable and sad than confident and commanding as she’d want the world to think. A part of me knows that strings-free sex is the last thing she needs.

“No,” I answer again. “Jesus, Nora. You’re worth more than that.”

She flushes bright red and yanks her hand away as if my skin were on fire. “You don’t know me,” she snaps as she gathers the sponge bath supplies. “You don’t know what I’m worth, or what I want, Brand. Get over yourself.”

She grabs my towel off the floor and tosses it back to me. I grasp her elbow, holding her still as I sit up.

“Nora, I didn’t mean to insult you. You’re a beautiful, sexy woman. I don’t know why you feel like meaningless sex with me this summer would be smart, but I get the feeling that it’s the last thing you need. You’re worth more than a hollow fuck.”

She flinches away at my words, but that’s something about me. I’m always honest.

“It wouldn’t be meaningless,” she murmurs, looking into my face. “I’ve wanted you for years. Being with you now would be like fulfilling my oldest fantasy before I have to immerse myself in my father’s business. What’s wrong with that? Don’t I deserve to do something that I want to do before I have to hand my life to my father?”

I’m the one recoiling now as I stare at her in shock. I’m her fantasy? What kind of nonsense is this? If the situation weren’t so tense, I’d laugh.

“I’m not exactly fantasy material,” I tell her instead, fighting to keep from smiling. “I’m just the son of a mechanic who joined the Army and got out of this one-horse town. Not really the stuff of fairy tales, Nora. And besides, you aren’t handing your life to your father. You’re going to work for him. Your life will still be your own.”

She shakes her head. “You don’t know anything about me, Brand. Or my life.”

With that, she walks out, leaving me alone in the room with only a towel covering my dick.

I feel like I’ve been steam-rolled.

What the actual fuck was that?

I roll off the bed, put my clothes back on, and hobble out to follow Nora, but when I reach the hall, I hear water running. She’s in the shower….where she’s wet and naked.

I need a beer.

Fuck not being able to drink a beer and take a pain pill at the same time.

It takes five minutes to get to the kitchen, but when I do, I take the pill with a swig of beer, raising the bottle in Nora’s direction.

Cheers.

I gulp down the rest of the icy liquid, letting it trickle down my throat and chill it’s way into my belly.

As I’m internally patting myself on the back because I’ve gotten one over on Nurse Nora, her phone buzzes on the kitchen counter. I lean over and look out of idle curiosity.

I suck my breath in at what I see.

Four new texts from someone named William.

Answer your fucking phone.

Goddamnit, Nora.

I know where you are.

You don’t know what I’m capable of. I want your word. If you’re smart, you’ll give it to me, and you’ll keep it.

I stare at the harsh words and try to reconcile them with the Nora that I know so far. She’s clearly someone who is driven and ambitious, but that’s who she is on the outside. I also can see that on the inside, she’s vulnerable and soft. I have no clue what she might’ve done to set this guy off.

Is he a business associate? Someone she’s dealing with at Greene Corp? A business deal?

But he’s threatening her. I know where you are.

What kind of colleague would threaten over a business deal?

I set her phone back down, just in time for Nora to walk into the kitchen, in only her towel.

I turn, and then freeze when I see her.

Creamy white shoulders, soft skin, long legs.

I swallow hard and meet her gaze.

“Who’s William?” I ask simply. Her eyes grow guarded.

She leans around me, purposely pressing her towel-clad front against me. Her soft curves fold into me, sexy and warm. I feel her nipples poke me through the towel and my groin reacts.

The corners of her mouth turn up. “Does it matter?”

She looks up at me, grinning impishly now, her face inches from my crotch.

“Is there anything you need while I’m down here?”

My dick twitches.

“No,” I tell her firmly, pulling her up by her upper arms. “Who’s William?”

She sighs. “Someone from work. It’s fine.”

But it’s not fine. I can see it on her face, I can tell by the way she drains of color at the mere mention of his name. But her shoulders are back and her chin is out. She’s determined not to talk about him.

That’s fine.

We all have our secrets.

She smiles triumphantly when I drop the subject and she grabs her phone, spins around, and drops her towel. It falls at my feet.

She walks confidently out the door, as naked as the day she was born.

Her legs flex as she walks, and her ass is round and firm and my dick reacts once again.

Fuck.

I groan and look away.

I can hear Nora chuckling from the other room and I roll my eyes.

I also hear her turn off the shower.

Apparently, she’s changed her mind about taking one.

She pops her head back into the kitchen.

“Want to go skinny-dipping?”

Yes.

“No,” I tell her firmly. “I don’t swim.”

“So you said,” she nods, then struts through the kitchen naked, opens the back door, and makes her way across the lawn in the broad daylight to the private beach behind the house.

I shake my head, unable to prevent the smile from spreading across my face.

The girl is something, that’s for sure.

I limp to the window and watch her.

She’s unconcerned that someone will see her. She simply doesn’t care as she puts on her show for me.

And it’s for me. I know that.

Nora isn’t the kind of girl to strut outside nude in the daylight for any other reason than a means to her end. For whatever reason, she’s made it her goal to get me this summer.

I don’t know why.

But suddenly, it feels good.

It feels fucking good to be pursued like this, after being the one who was on the giving end of unrequited affection for so long.

She wants me.

Through the glass, Nora’s eyes meet mine and holds my gaze. She swims on her belly for a while, her eyes just above the surface of the water, never looking away from my own.

She splashes and kicks at me, flipping onto her back.