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younger than you.”
    He wasn’t going to let her start regretting this because of her age hang-up. “But you know exactly what I want and that I’ve already got it. I’m where I want to be in my career. My military career, that is, not the other one I’ve been forced into. And you are exactly where I want you to be, which is with me.”
    “For now,” she agreed.
    He frowned. “What does that mean?”
    “This is one night, BB, maybe two. Then you’ll go back to your life and I’ll go back to mine.”
    He shook his head. “It doesn’t have to be like that. I want to see you again. Hell, that’s not true. I want what my family assumed to be true. I want you to be my girlfriend.”
    She laughed. “Girlfriend.”
    “Yes. Why not?”
    “What about the future, BB? What do you want say, ten years from now?”
    He shrugged. “Katie. In my line of work, you live every day as it comes and thank god for it. I don’t worry about the future. I enjoy the present.”
    She breathed deeply in and then out at his words. “Let me tell you what I think. One day you are going to want to marry, settle down and have kids. I’m almost forty, BB. In ten years, I’ll be fifty. Which means I can’t be that woman for you. And as much as I understand your ‘live for the moment’ philosophy, I can’t warm your bed until you leave me for a younger woman who can have your babies.”
    She looked away. He saw tears shining in her eyes, and his anger grew.
    “That was not fair, Katie. I would never use you then dump you. And I’m not interested in any younger woman. If that was what I wanted, don’t you think I’d be with one right now? I’m not here with you because you were convenient. I’m with you because I respect you professionally, I care about you personally, and I absolutely crave you physically. And as for kids, I grew up with eight brothers and sisters. Everything I owned was a hand-me-down. And now I have more nieces and nephews than I can keep track of, and although I love them all, what makes you think I want kids of my own? For your information, when I became special ops, I decided I probably wouldn’t start a family, ever.”
    The tears were falling freely on her cheeks now. “I know you believe what you’re saying.
    But I also think I’m right. You just don’t know it yet.”

    He shook his head. “You’re wrong. You know, I would have understood if you couldn’t be with me because of the nature of my job. But not because you’re assuming I’m going to trade you in for someone younger. If you really think that of me, then maybe you’re right. We shouldn’t be together.”
    He got up and threw on his clothes as quickly as he could while trying to ignore the tears streaming silently down her face. He paused at the door. “I’ll pick you up at five-thirty.”
    Katie watched the door close behind him and then burst out into huge sobs. All she could think was, thank god she’d held them in until he was gone.
    And he was gone. Totally. She’d managed to push him away. But better now then later. It would only hurt worse then.
    Her cell phone rang in her purse. She leapt from the bed, chastising herself for hoping it was BB. She couldn’t hope. Having hope would only devastate her further.
    She saw Emily’s name on the read out. She answered on a sob. “Oh, Emily.”
    “Katie? What happened?”
    She cried her way through the entire thing, knowing it wasn’t professional to lay this on her assistant, but unable to help herself. She worked so damn much, she didn’t have any actual friends.
    “Katie. You do realize you pushed him away because you’re afraid,” Emily observed patiently when the tale was complete.
    “Yes.”
    “So call him right now and tell him that. He’ll forgive you.”
    There was that damn hope again. “You think so?”
    “Yes, and if he doesn’t, you don’t want him anyway.”
    Such sage words from one so young. She’d really have to stop being such an age-ist. Katie