In the back of Zack’s mind, questions kept gnawing at him: What exactly did he want to get out of this? Did he just want to salvage John as a client? Or did he want something more?

He twirled the phone cord absently around his finger. “You still there?”

“Yeah.” John cleared his throat. “Sorry, I don’t really know what to say. I spent all day debating with myself, picking up my phone only to put it back down again. I was convinced you wouldn’t want to hear from me. You seemed horrified when I told you who I was.”

“I wasn’t horrified. I was just—”

“Surprised, I know. You said that. But . . .” Zack heard rustling fabric. “Well, you should have seen your face. There wasn’t even a tiny part of you that looked glad to see me.”

“I’m sorry,” Zack said sincerely. “I didn’t mean to react that way. I just—look, I’ll admit it: I’ve thought about what it would be like to run into you. Hell, I’ve fantasized about it. But to have it actually happen . . .”

“I get it,” John said. “I’ve thought about it too. It shouldn’t have happened, however. If we were smart, we’d act like it didn’t.”

Hope swelled in Zack’s chest. “But we’re not smart?”

John was silent for a long moment. Then he said, “I don’t want to lose what we have.”

Zack’s hope toppled like a house of cards. “Right. Me neither.”

“No, really,” John said, laughing under his breath. Zack got the impression he was laughing at himself. “You have no idea how hard today has been. I must have ordered myself to leave you alone a hundred times. I couldn’t though. Especially not—”

“Especially not?” Zack asked.

He heard John exhale raggedly.

“Especially not now that I know what you look like.”

A frisson of excitement slithered through Zack. “I take it you’re a fan.”

“As if anyone wouldn’t be. I mean, I always pretended you were hot in my head because it made the fantasy better, but I never thought you—”

Zack burst out laughing.

“What’s so funny?”

Zack composed himself. “Nothing. It’s just, I said the exact same thing about you. Almost verbatim.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Good to know.” There was a pause. “How bad would it be if I said I wanted to see you again?”

Zack’s mouth went dry. “Really bad.”

“Because I’m a client?”

Zack didn’t know how to respond. He knew what he should say, but what he wanted to say was that John made him feel things that scared him, and he had absolutely no idea how to handle that.

In the end, he simply said, “Yeah, can’t go breaking rule number one and all. No getting involved with clients.”