“I’m okay, but if I get too overheated or if you press me down, I’ll start to feel all dizzy and claustrophobic. Then the palpitations happen and I won’t be able to …” My private parts will shut up shop and I will not be able to release this agonizing lust.

He pulls away from me. Long and lush.

I scrabble with my legs. “Give it back. Have I just ruined the mood?”

“No, of course not. What about,” he says with a thoughtful tone, “this.”

“You don’t have to change a thing,” I beg, but he’s rolling me onto my side and he’s curling around me. It’s comfortable enough for sleep, just a pair of platonic naked spoons. The blankets are lifted away and cool air is on my skin. For a dreadful moment I think he’s given up on me.

Except I’m wrong. Like always, he’s found a solution. He’s kissing the back of my neck as he pushes into my body again. Now he rocks against me, a hand on my hip.

“Don’t you worry about anything,” he suggests, sliding his hand down. “Just relax and breathe.”

I would never have thought that concern could be sexy. I speak into the dark. “Can I confess?” I feel him nod against my shoulder and the silky friction eases. “Coming sometimes triggers off my heart. And this is gonna be a doozy. So, if that happens, do not take it personally.”

“I’ll try to not completely blow your circuit boards.” He groans when I squeeze him. “You want to try me out, see how I do?”

Have I ever had such a luscious offer? Tom’s voice is sounding more like a growl.

“I want you to get in me.” I press my cheek against his bicep to anchor myself as his touch gets me closer and closer to the edge. “Deeper. Harder. Not like you’re sorry for me, or worrying about me. I want you to put yourself in me like we’re doing this daily, from now on. For life.”

Heated blood is prickling under my skin but I’m prepared to deal with what might happen. He does exactly what I tell him to do. He gives me everything he’s got.

The orgasm hits me like I’ve just run face-first into a brick wall.

I contract and I hear my own inward inhale. Everything coils and I’m exhaling. Free-falling. And while I can barely hear over the noise inside my chest, I’m held safe in these arms, with someone who knows me, A to Z.

I don’t have to worry about pretending to be normal. Just as I’m thinking how nice that was, he puts himself so hard into me that I’m now shaking with aftershocks, and I sound like I’m crying. But he’s smart and doesn’t let up. Now I’m wrung-out spasming, tears on my cheeks, contributing a nonsensical string of more, yes, more. His arms have to hold me against him or I’d be halfway across the bed.

“Now, now,” I order, and he obeys me.

Tom is sharing this secret part of himself; I’m bitten, spread, gripped, and I have never been wanted this intensely. He will kill and live and die for me. It’s big, what he’s feeling. All I know is, I’m his now. I put a hand on the back of his neck as he presses a kiss to my shoulder.

“Now, that’s what I’ve waited for,” he says after several minutes of trying to breathe. “Turns out Loretta’s books didn’t give me unrealistic expectations.” He extricates himself from me with difficulty. In the dark, he says, “That’s what it’s like with you. Just … electric.” I feel him lean away from the bed.

Hands smooth over me. I’m not remotely tired. I need another kiss. I need his skin against mine, so I’m never hungry again. I hear a cardboard sound in the dark, and a soft scraping sound. Is he putting away the box of condoms?

“I said to you at the bar that being the focus of Darcy Barrett is intense. I had no idea what I was talking about. That was intense. Okay, I count four more of these,” Tom says about the condoms, and I thrill down to the marrow of my bones. “Shall we see how far we get?”

I can’t resist. “Don’t you have an early start?”

“Smart-ass. I’d better get to work.” His mouth touches mine, we inhale, and we begin again.

* * *

I’M WOKEN BY a Chihuahua scratching at the door to the studio. Tom’s gone, there’s barely any light outside, and the sheets are cold. I wrap myself in a black silk robe and my reset alarm clock flashes midnight, over and over. All I know is, the power’s on and it’s incredibly early. “Yeah, yeah,” I tell Patty. “Where’s Daddy?”

I’m disappointed. I’ve never woken up with a man, and I was looking forward to another first. With each step I take toward the door, I feel echoes of what he gave me last night. I’m wrung out, gloriously so. Last night was a rough, soft playfight.

Let me spoil Darcy Barrett a little. Let me get a taste of that feeling.

It was the best night of my life. I wonder if he’d be weirded out if he knew that? I’ve finally got the one person I don’t have to pretend to be cool with. If I told him, he’d smile. Then he’d use that boss voice that I like. Get that robe off.

I slide open the door. “Tom?” I call out. Instead of going to her usual patch of lawn, Patty sets off with determination in her stride. She’s heading for the side of the house, with finding her owner the only thing in her mind. “Patty, come back.”

The nearest shoes are a pair of heels I left against the wall. I jam them on. I inwardly shudder as the soles slip on mud and there’s a repulsive snail crunch. My thigh muscles stretch and cramp until I yelp.

It turns out Chihuahuas can set an Olympic pace. She’s now a tail disappearing around the corner of the house. She’s hammering up the drive when a car pulls in. Patty has the survival instinct of a lemming. My heart leaps in fright. I blink and my eyes trick me; I think I see her go under the wheel. I blink again and she’s fine, her tail waving like a flag in greeting.

“Watch out,” I call with the last of my breath, and wave my arm to get attention, and when the truck brakes I see it’s Tom. Where has he been this early? The sun’s not even up.

I put my hands on my knees. If I could just catch my breath … Huff, huff, huff. I’m not this unfit, surely. My heart is pounding strangely, faster and faster, until I know what’s happening. I feel like I could put my hand on my chest and take it out like a hamster. I press down on it, willing it to slow. The driver’s door opens, I look up, and Tom’s completely appalled.

The passenger door opens too, and there’s a blond haircut the same as mine, and I close my eyes and will myself to get it together, because this is the worst possible moment for this to happen.

I’d know my brother’s smell anywhere. Expensive cloth and a snooty Italian fragrance that smells like lemon peel mixed into window cleaner; it’s supposed to be attractive to women, and it is to most. He’s at my elbow and Tom’s at the other, both talking at once. Tom’s frantic. Fingers press on my wrist and when Tom leaves, I twist around to try to follow him.

“He’s getting your medication,” Jamie tells me, and I crumple against him. My heart? It still thinks it’s a twin, because it sticks to my brother like a magnet until Tom is putting a dose in my hand, a bottle of water, and I’m swallowing.

Everything’s gray. Everything’s gone wrong.