“Well…” He pushes off the wall and stalks toward me, disposing of the sandwich on the coffee table without breaking his stride. “Shagging her still, while we’re together, has never been the plan. Honestly, she was a bit of a one-off. I hadn’t…” He pauses, poking his lower lip out, trying to figure out how to say it. “I hadn’t been with anyone in quite some time. And even if I was that sort of person, I’m not a cheater.”

I shake my head. “Me neither, and I sure as hell don’t plan on starting now.”

“Oh…” His smile drops. “But darlin’, you already have.”

I blink at him like he’s crazy. Because he is. Completely mental, as they say in this neck of the woods.

“What the hell are you talking about?” I unzip my suitcase frantically, fishing for some clothes. I can feel my hands shaking, and I don’t know how to stop them.

He places his foot on the suitcase above me, slamming it shut with a thud and preventing me from getting dressed, and that’s when I realize he is still without pants. Just his shirt and briefs, and the mammoth erection pressing against them, pointing at me.

“You’ve already been in bed with me. Mostly naked. You’ve already had your wet-as-feck panties pressed against my cock—and yes, I noticed, thank you very much. You’ve already masturbated to the sound of me plunging into Maeve—imagining it was you, by the way, forever the romantic. Face it, Rory. Emotionally, you didn’t only cheat on Shiny Boyfriend, you basically fucked his entire immediate family, pet parrot, and rude neighbors.”

I rise to my feet, and angry blood whooshes between my ears. I’m no longer chilly. My cheeks are aflame with shame and mortification. He heard me coming from the next room. Of course, he did. The only reason he interrupted Callum and me in the first place was because his walls are paper-thin.

“Mal…” I take a step back, raising a finger in warning. “I don’t want you.”

“You don’t want me?” He takes a step forward, crowding me toward the kitchen. “Or you don’t want to want me? There’s a difference.”

“How is it different?” I play into his game, mainly so he’ll talk and not do something else to me I won’t be able to stop.

“Well, if you simply don’t want me, I have no choice but to respect that.”

He closes the distance between us, and my back bumps against the cold fridge. His bare body is flush against mine, and my heart is pounding so fast and hard, I think it’s about to leap out of my mouth, like a fish, if I open it to tell him not to touch me.

But Mal doesn’t touch me.

He almost touches me, knowing it frustrates me even more.