“Mr. diPietro…are you—”

“Hope you have a quiet night,” Vin said as he strode to the elevator doors.

“Thank…you.”

On the way up the building, Vin got a good gander at what the security guard had gone penless over. In the darkened mirrors of the elevator, he stared at his busted nose and the scratch on his cheek and the beginnings of the shiner he was going to have in the morning—

All at once, his face started to pound with the beat of his heart. Which made him wonder if he hadn’t seen his reflection whether it would have stayed quiet.

Up on the twenty-eighth floor, he stepped out into the hall and got his key ready. While he worked the lock, he had the sense that his life had taken a beating tonight along with that college kid. Everything felt off. Dislocated.

He hoped it wasn’t the start of a trend.

Vin opened his door, took a listen, and got hit with a whole lot of exhaustion. There was no security alarm to deactivate, and from the second floor, he could hear the television mumbling: She was home. Waiting for him.

Shutting himself in, he turned the lock, engaged the alarm, and eased back against the wall. When he could stand it, he looked up the marble staircase and watched the blue flicker of whatever show was on.

It sounded like an old movie, some kind of Ginger Rogers–Fred Astaire flying-hoof special.

Guess he had to go up and face the music, so to speak.

As forties-era standards rippled out of the bedroom, he pictured Devina propped up on the Frette pillowcases, wearing one of her wispy chiffon nightgowns. When he walked in, she would be shocked at his face and would try to nurse him—and she’d want to apologize for bailing from the club in the same way she’d made up for being unreachable the night before.

Or she would try to. He didn’t feel like having sex tonight.

At least…not with her.

“Shit,” he muttered.

Damn him to hell, but he wanted to drive right back to that club, but not to try to rehab Marie-Terese’s opinion of him. He wanted to pull out five hundred dollars and buy some time with her. He wanted to kiss her and pull her against his body and run his hands up the insides of her thighs. He wanted his tongue in her mouth and his chest against her breasts and he wanted her gasping and wet. He wanted her to let him take her.

The fantasy got him instantly hard—but it didn’t last, neither the hot images nor the erection.

What killed the fantasy was the memory of her in that fleece. She’d been so small. So…fragile. Not an object to be bought, but a woman in a brutal business, leveraging her body for cash.