Right now I am searching the computer for a picture of the Vineland Drive-In, because that is a memory I want him to keep, though I don’t think either one of us had any idea what movie was playing. Instead, we made out like teenagers in the backseat, kissing and exploring, touching and groping. And when Damien finally thrust hard inside me—when I came in sudden release and exultation—I am certain that my cry was at least as loud as the movie soundtrack.

The hairs on the back of my neck prickle, and I know without turning around that Damien is here. His walk, his scent, his presence—I don’t know what it is, but there is something in him that calls so profoundly to me that I am never unaware of him. If he is in the same room, my body knows—and wants.

I gently close the scrapbook, then tuck it into a drawer before turning to him.

“I don’t like waking up without you,” he says.

I smile. “Now you know how I feel.” Usually it is me who wakes up to find the other side of the bed cold and empty.

“What are you doing?”

“Just working on something.” I lift a shoulder. “I couldn’t sleep.”

“Oh, really?” He lifts a brow and eyes the desk.

“Don’t even think about it, mister. You’ll see it on Saturday.”

“Saturday,” he murmurs, the hint of a smile playing around his mouth. “Seems like there’s something I’m supposed to be doing on Saturday.”

I laugh, and fly out of the chair to smack him playfully on the chest. He pulls me into his arms and kisses me, gently at first and then with increasing fervency. “I reached for you,” he says. “You weren’t there.”

The words are matter-of-fact, but to me they seem thick with meaning. I lean back so that I can see his face more clearly. “What’s wrong?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” he says, deflecting my words but not my worry. There is something on Damien’s mind. He tucks my hair behind my ear. “Tell me what’s keeping you awake.”

“Bourbon,” I say. “Bridal jitters.”

“Not your mother?”

“That, too,” I admit.

“Whatever you want to do, you know that I support it. All I ask is that you remember this is your wedding, and it’s the only wedding you’re going to have.” He strokes my cheek, the touch melting me as much as the words. “Consider that when you decide how to handle your mother.”

I nod. “You’re right.” I take his hand. “And you? Is it wedding jitters that are bothering you? Is something going on at work?”

He turns, looking out toward the rows of polished bookshelves now standing like sentries in the dark. He doesn’t answer right away, and I’m starting to suspect he isn’t going to answer me at all. Then he says, “It’s Sofia.”

I try not to react, but I have no control over the quickening pace of my heart, and I’m certain that my eyes have gone unnaturally wide. “What about her?” I ask carefully. Sofia is so far off my list of favorite people, it isn’t even funny. Still, she was important to Damien when he was growing up, and despite a lot of recent shit, I know that she’s still important to him.

“I got an email from her. I saw it right after we got home. She wants to come to the wedding. She thinks that it could be arranged.”

The words hang in the air, like one of those cartoon anvils that is defying the laws of gravity and simply hovering, waiting for the moment when it will drop and crush the hapless coyote.

I open my mouth, close it, then try again. “Oh,” is all I can manage.

“That pretty much sums it up,” he says. He’s wearing pajama bottoms tied loosely around his waist, and he slides one hand into a pocket. With the other he massages his forehead with his thumb and finger.

“Do you want her to come?” I finally ask.

He lifts his head, looking at me as if I’ve gone insane. “No.”

A moment passes, and then he lets out a soft curse. “No,” he repeats, “and the not wanting makes me sad.” He meets my eyes. “But I meant what I said in the limo, about our choices and the people in our lives leading us to this point. To each other.” He steps closer to me. “It saddens me—hell, it angers me—but I have no regrets.”

“I don’t, either,” I say, thinking of my mother. Of who she is, what she’s done, and what I want. It’s all a turmoil inside me. A storm. I know what I should do, what I want to do. But I’m not certain it’s what I can do.

And though he hides it better than I do, I know that a similar storm is raging within Damien. How can it not be? He thrives on control. It is his lifeblood, his sustenance, and yet just the mention of Sofia’s name conjures the specter of everything that spun out of control, cutting a path of destruction through his life as effectively as a spinning propeller breaking loose from its axle.

“Damien,” I say, and I hear both longing and helplessness in my voice.

I see the heat flare in his eyes as he moves even closer to me. I take an automatic step backward, but am foiled by the desk. I stop, breathing hard, as he cages me in. I am wearing the button-down shirt that he abandoned on the floor when we went to bed. The tail hits me mid-thigh, and he uses his finger to trace the line of the hem, slowly easing it up, higher and higher.

My pulse quickens, and I feel the effects of his touch shimmering through me, hot and electric and alive.

Without thinking, I shift my stance, widening my legs. I want his hands upon me. I want his cock inside me. I want everything he has to give, and I want him to take everything he wants.

His hand slides between my legs and cups my sex, finding me desperately wet. “Tell me you want me,” he says, sliding his fingers inside me. I almost melt with pleasure.

“Always,” I say truthfully, and I know with absolute certainty that there will not ever be a time when I don’t respond to Damien’s presence. To his proximity, his heat. When I won’t open like a flower to him. When my body won’t crave his touch.

He thrusts another finger inside me and I grind down, shamelessly wanting more. But he denies me, and I hear myself whimper as he pulls his hand away. And then my whimper changes to a gasp when he grabs either side of the shirt and tugs it open, baring my breasts and sending buttons flying.

“Beautiful,” he murmurs, and I close my eyes in expectation of his mouth on my nipple. But the touch doesn’t come. Instead, he turns me around, then pulls the shirt the rest of the way off so that I am naked in front of him. I am facing the desk, my ass pressed against his erection, now hard steel beneath the thin pajama bottoms.

“I wanted you in the limo,” he says. “But I need you now. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“You know I do.” I turn to look at him as I speak, but he shakes his head.

“Eyes forward. Bend over. Hold on to the far side of the desk.”

I do as he says. I feel vulnerable. I feel him.

“I don’t think we ever took care of that little issue of punishment,” he says.

I lick my lips, my body already tight with anticipation and my sex clenching with desire.

“Is that what you want, Nikki? Shall I spank your ass? Shall I punish you with the sting of my palm, turning your ass pink and sweet, making you hot?”

“I’m already hot,” I say honestly. “And yes. Please, yes.” We both want this. Hell, we both need it. He needs to take back some of that control, and I so desperately need to give it to him. Because I need the storm to settle inside me as much as he needs my submission.

I do not turn around, but I can hear the soft rustle of material as he slips off the pajama bottoms. He steps closer, and the tip of his cock rubs along the crack of my ass. “Maybe I should just take you, fast and without warning.”

“Yes.” There is no hiding the need in my voice, and Damien chuckles.

“Soon,” he says, and then lands his palm sharply against my rear.

I cry out, more from surprise than pain, and then brace for the second blow. It comes fast, and then Damien’s palm is caressing the point of impact, smoothing out those brilliant red sparks, making them flow inside me, shifting from pain to a vibrant pleasure that pulses through me.