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allowed another moment of disgust. This wasn’t a pity party she was indulging in this time, it was a reprimand. One she fully deserved from her superior but wouldn’t get because she hadn’t mentioned this new development to him. While she wanted the safety net of work, her mind really wasn’t on the case she needed to build.
    It was on the man.
    He’d caught her trying to break into his computer and instead of tossing her ass out, firing her, and/or pressing charges, he’d kissed her.
    And what a kiss it had been. Words could not describe … it was beyond sensual, more than erotic, a step past intoxicating. She wanted more. Her body had practically begged for it. The strength with which he’d grabbed her leg, wrapping it around him, still had her center pulsating. The warm-shower-and-vibrator-assisted release she’d indulged in the moment she arrived home wasn’t nearly enough.
    How long had it been since she’d felt the touch of a man, welcomed it, in fact? A little more than two years. About a month before the attack. She’d told her shrink that she was okay with it, that the violation that piece of crap had imposed on her wasn’t that big a deal. She’d survived. And yet, she really hadn’t. Because as much as she enjoyed sexual release, the thought of another man touching her intimately had made her sick. The mere consideration over the past few months would send her into a panic attack that should have had her on medication. Had she dared to ever tell anyone about it.
    Instead she’d stocked up on sexual toys and movies that would give her everything she needed without the physical presence of a man. The dark haunting of a memory.
    Until tonight. Until Roman Reynolds.
    *   *   *
     
    Her apartment was minutes away from his office, on the top floor of a corner brownstone. The front entrance had a wrought-iron gate and matching screened door that wasn’t locked. The mailbox showed her name and apartment number. The steps leading up to her were unguarded as he walked up slowly, predatorily.
    A black door with a shiny gold number two on it was all that stood between him and her. Placing his palms on the door, Rome rested his forehead against it, inhaling deeply, painfully.
    He wanted her.
    There was no doubt about that and no real concern. Sex was sex and with Rome it was good sex. He’d been told that before, wore the honor like a soldier’s Purple Heart. But this was different. He was smart enough to know and to admit that this wasn’t just sex. It wasn’t a normal urge. His blood heated, coursed through his veins like a raging stream at the proximity to her.
    Not only had he picked up her scent the moment he’d crossed the threshold to the building, but he sensed her physically as if she now occupied a small space within him. She was here, just beyond this door. He could knock and she’d let him in. They would sleep together, no doubt about it. The sex would be wild, dangerous, alluring, just like their kiss. But what else?
    There was definitely something else. Rome was wise enough to know that as well. It bothered him, this knowledge coupled with uncertainty. It was unusual for him not to know exactly what he wanted to do, when he wanted to do it. Taking precautions and planning was a natural part of him, the human him. Second-guessing wasn’t.
    Who was Kalina Harper and why did she have this effect on him? Why was he here, tonight, at her apartment? And why had he been there, that night two years ago, in the alley to save her?
    His mother would say there were no coincidences in life, there was only fate. A destiny mapped out for each and every breathing being. Rome didn’t believe that; he refused to believe in a plan that included someone’s death. His mother’s death. That wasn’t fate. She wasn’t meant to die and neither was his father. They weren’t meant to go, but Rome had allowed it, because he hadn’t been strong enough to stop it.
    Turning away from the door but still