Something was, in fact, forcing me to be with her. My lack of ability to keep away from her. Ignoring her was manageable before we fell into bed, before we spent time together, before I found out things about her. Pussy was pussy, and with my eyes closed, it was easy to imagine fucking Aisling when I was deep inside someone else.

But no one else was going to cut it now, no matter how much I wanted to turn around and walk away from her.

It was going to be difficult and maddening and definitely take me out of my comfort zone, but I couldn’t not have her, however how much I tried.

Nix: Are you going to elaborate?

Sam: No.

Sam: Have dinner with me tonight.

Nix: Not until you apologize. You moved my things into your apartment, Sam. Without asking. Who does that?

Sam: I’m assuming this is a hypothetical question.

Nix: We’ll do things my way now. And my way might be frustrating to you. It’s about what I’m comfortable with, not about making you pay.

Sam: You’re already making me pay. I’m not accustomed to not getting what I want.

Nix: Life is hard.

Sam: So am I.

Nix: You sound like Hunter.

I was.

I finally realized why Hunter was so obsessed with my sister. Why Cillian couldn’t tear himself away from Persephone. There was something addicting about a woman who gave you her everything. Something that was hard to walk away from once you’d tasted it.

Sam: I will have you, one way or the other.

Nix: We’ll see about that.

That was what she didn’t take into account.

It took a monster to destroy a monster.

And I was going to devour her whole.

Sam and I spent the next two months playing this chess game.

Whenever he’d make a move too bold, I’d retreat.

I made him work for it. Work for it like he hadn’t in an entire decade. There was something to be said about unrequited love. It taught you resilience and bravery and strength. Now, the tables had turned, and I wanted him to show me I wasn’t the flavor of the month. That I was worthy of his attention, his affection, his everything. I couldn’t allow him to take what I had offered for free for ten years.

I had to put a price tag on my absolute devotion.

And that price tag was love.

I wanted to feel loved.

As with everything he did, Sam brought his A-game to the table.

He would corner me in places, follow me, steal dirty kisses when no one was watching. Maybe another girl would have been alarmed by it, but I relished his attention. His new desperation for my touch.

He waited for me outside a Thai restaurant when I went out with Persy, Sailor, and Belle, snatching me into a dark alley and kissing me roughly, his hands between my legs pushing my skirt up.

Three days later, he ambushed me outside the clinic, dragged me into his car, and fucked me raw in the backseat, giving me a small heart attack and a raging orgasm.

Four days after, I visited his apartment to grab a dress I wanted to wear for a charity event. Most of my clothes were still at his place, and even though he’d left me the code for his apartment lock, he refused to let me take my things back to Avebury Court Manor.

One day, I caught him sitting on a stool by his kitchen island, catching up on some work on his laptop. When I trudged in and yanked my desired Armani dress from the closet, he raised his eyes from the laptop coldly. I expected him to stop me and have his way with me before I made my way out of the apartment, but all he did was salute me with a touch of his fingers to his forehead, bidding me goodbye.

I stopped by the door, confused.

“Aren’t you going to try to sleep with me?”

The subtext was obvious: I am going to sleep with you, but I’m not going to move in with you. I will not commit to you. I will not give you more than I am ready to give.

Sam kept his eyes on the screen.

“Do you want me to try to sleep with you?”

“No.” Yes.

He smirked, his eyes still on the screen. “Seems like we don’t have a problem, then.”

“That’s a change I didn’t see coming.”

For some reason, my feet were glued to his floor. I couldn’t leave without figuring out what had changed.

Had he finally given up on us? Maybe he decided I was simply not worth the effort. I wanted to punch my own face for putting him through so much. But then again, I didn’t regret any of it. He deserved to repent for what he’d done to my family, and I wasn’t sure he was done paying.

“Maybe I decided to save myself for marriage,” he murmured, taking a sip from the glass of brandy sitting next to him.

Staring at him dumbly, I shifted the dress on the hanger from one shoulder to the other.

“Usually you do that before sleeping with enough people to break a Guinness World Record,” I pointed out.

He finally lifted his eyes from the screen.

“Well, I’m an unorthodox guy. Better late than never.”

“I guess this is where our journey ends, then.” I put on a brave face, forcing myself to smile. Internally, I was shouting, “Merde, merde, merde” to the moon.

He was dumping me. I knew I was making things hard for him, but Sam never showed any signs of looking tired or distressed. If anything, he took our new game in a stride and always had that dangerous, mischievous glint in his eyes of a man entertained by having to work for it for a change.

“Guess so.” He took another sip of his drink, his eyes never wavering from mine. “Unless we get married.”

I threw my head back and laughed hysterically.

Get married. Us. Good one.

“Never gonna happen,” I provided.

“Unlikely,” he agreed. “You can still suck my cock every now and again, but sex is off the table.”

“That’s something I can live with,” I said with more conviction than I felt. “And thanks for the offer, but I’ll pass.”

He’d nodded.

“Have a great night at the Fishers’ charity ball.”

“How do you know that’s where I’m going?”

“I know everything about you, Nix, including where you take your lunches at work—the little backyard on a white bench—and what you eat—hope you enjoyed your oatmeal bar today.”

I didn’t dance with anyone at the charity ball.

I was nailed to my seat, punished, thinking about one thing—marriage.

After that night, Sam did seek me out again and we never went all the way anymore. Never clawed at each other’s clothes or had wild sex.

He showed up in places I went to but only enjoyed heavy petting and kissing. Every time I tried to stir him into full-blown sex territory, he would clap his hand over my wrist and say, “You can’t sample the goods anymore, Nix. You break it, you pay for it. Move in with me.”

“No.”

It went on and on and on, week in and week out, to a point where I wasn’t sure if I was not done hating him for what he’d done or if I was just enjoying the chase too much. It was entirely possible I lost myself somewhere in our game, and I didn’t know how to find my way back to what we were.

The truth was, I did want to move in with him.

I wanted to move in with him very badly.

Not because taking care of Mother was daunting—on the contrary, she had actually been quite okay, everything considered—but because I missed him terribly every time we were apart.