Becky smiled. “I can’t wait. We’re going on a cruise for three whole weeks. It’s been a dream my whole life.”

“Just make sure they don’t make you do time for your speeding ticket,” Ryan joked.

Sanders seemed to tense, his spine straightening over those words. “Course not. It was just speeding.”

“Let’s not talk about the trip to California right now,” Becky said in a quiet but firm voice that brooked no argument. She turned away, her shoulders rising and falling as she took a deep breath. Ryan glanced briefly at Sanders, who was rubbing his wife’s arm, then to his brother. Michael shrugged a shoulder.

Ryan had no clue why the speeding ticket had touched such a nerve for Sanders and Becky.

But the weird glances, the needy reassurance, the mix of worry and admonishment—those were all reminders of why he steered clear of relationships. They were trouble. Women needed soothing and tending to, and those were just not things Ryan was good at.

He was, however, quite good in other areas, and there was a woman who seemed fond of those skills. A woman he’d be seeing tomorrow.

He couldn’t fucking wait.

* * *

Ever dapper, always elegant, Holden played the final, jubilant notes in Beethoven’s ninth symphony on the grand piano.

Sophie tapped her fingertips against the black lacquer at Holden’s apartment overlooking the Mandalay Bay pool. Several stories below, hotel guests drank towering drinks and splashed in the cool water.

“Ta da!” Holden declared with a flourish as he finished the piece, then stood up and bowed deeply. Sophie clapped and shouted bravo, giving a one-woman ovation that was loud enough to be worthy of many.

“Thank you, thank you, to all my adoring fans,” he said, then blew air kisses to the fictional crowd.

Sophie wrapped her arms around him in a hug. “You’re going to be amazing. Though that’s not a surprise in the least.”

“You really liked it?”

“Liked it? I absolutely loved it. It was…” She let her voice trail off as she searched for just the right word to describe his musical talent. She brought her fingers to her lips like a chef pleased with a dish. “Magnifique.”

He sighed happily and beamed, placing his hand on his chest as he mouthed thank you. He wore tight blue slacks, loafers, and a crisp, striped button-down. Her ex-husband had achieved some sort of pinnacle in male fashion—he never dressed down.

He was a lot like her.

That was the problem in their marriage.

He was a tad bit too much like Sophie.

He liked clothes, he liked shopping, and he liked kicking back on the couch and gabbing over a glass of chardonnay and a pint of ice cream. No, he wasn’t gay. But he wasn’t entirely straight either. Which might not make sense to most people. In fact, Sophie hadn’t tried to explain the demise of her marriage to “most people” because, one, it was none of their business, and two, they wouldn’t understand.

Best friends in high school, she and Holden were perfect for each other. She was the computer geek; he was the music geek. Together, they were two peas in a pod, driven by their passion for machines or instruments. They connected, they laughed, and they had a grand old time. Their easy way together reminded her of what her parents had so nearly missed, if fate hadn’t drawn them together again twenty years later.

Sophie had seen the love her parents had, and she didn’t want to let it pass her by. Or to wait twenty years for it. So after college, she married her best friend.

It sounded like a great recipe for a successful marriage. Everything between them had gone swimmingly as husband and wife, except in the bedroom. They’d learned they wanted different things from a lover. Fine, lack of bedroom chemistry wasn’t the barometer for the success or failure of a marriage, but Sophie didn’t excite him, and he didn’t excite her, and the things they tried to spice up their love life fell flat.

For instance, the time she’d asked him to pull her hair and talk dirty to her, resulted in him calling her a hot bitch a he tugged gently on her strands. He broke into peals of laughter, clutching his belly as he said, “I’m sorry. I just can’t say things like I want you on your hands and knees now, woman.”

That was where she wanted to be, though.

And that was where he wanted to be, too, because he’d inquired casually one evening over their second pinot noir if she might want to try pegging. They could even go shopping right then, he’d suggested.

Her eyebrows had shot into her hairline as she’d uttered a resounding never.

A few weeks later, he’d wanted to know if she’d be willing to have a threesome with another guy.

“Would I be the sandwich filling?” she asked.

He shook his head and tapped his chest. He would be the middle man.

Yup. Her ex-husband went both ways, and when he went, he submitted. Which meant they didn’t, and wouldn’t, and couldn’t ever gel. There was simply no room for two submissives in a marriage.

But was that the right word for her? She didn’t really know if the term fit her since she’d never been in that type of relationship. Her experience was limited to Holden and to a college boyfriend who’d been rather “fratty” in bed.

Still, she knew what turned her on. She knew what she fantasized about.

Being dominated. Being taken. Being tied up. Even if she’d never fully experienced that type of lover, she was sure of what made her blood heat up and her body spark. Fantasies tripped through her mind late at night in bed, alone, and they often involved being pinned.

Bound.

Tied.

After struggling to make it work between the sheets, she and Holden had both agreed they’d be better off friends than lovers. The transition away from him wasn’t wholly easy, and there had been times when she’d felt unsure of herself and her femininity. But she and Holden made a pact to stay the close friends they had always been.

A talented pianist, Holden had both toured the world and played piano in recording sessions for commercials and jingles, and would be joining the symphony at the concert she’d arranged in two weeks to raise money for the community center. “Do you think Clyde will try to marry you off again at the concert?” Holden asked.

Sophie wrapped her fingers around the edge of the piano. “He’s bringing a boy-child to the event. I have no doubt he wants to pawn me off on his lawyer grandson, and he thinks if he can just get us in the same room that we’ll fall madly in love.”

Holden shuddered dramatically. “Being the glamorous divorcée,” he said, stopping to sketch air quotes as he used the moniker that a Vegas high-society blog had bestowed on her, “isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, is it?”

She swatted his shoulder. “You’re a glamorous divorcé, too.”

“Oh yeah. They’re lining up in droves for a piece of me,” he said with a wink.

Piece of me. Her mind flashed back to a few nights ago at Aria, and to the commanding way Ryan Whoever He Was had controlled her pleasure backstage. A frisson of longing raced through her. She craved his touch again.

“Hello? Did you just drift off to la-la land?” Holden asked, waving his hand in front of her.

She blinked, and grinned, caught in the act of remembering a hot encounter. “I did. Because I met someone the other night, and we had a fantastic time.”

Holden patted the piano bench. “Sit. Tell me everything.”

Sophie sat on the bench and recounted the details. Not all of them. Not the particularly naughty ones. But the tidbits about how they met, and how he showed up at the gala, and how she barely knew anything about him.

“Which I like,” she added. Perhaps she liked it so much because it was the opposite of her experience. She’d known everything about Holden, she’d gone in with her eyes wide open, and they hadn’t worked out.