I snorted out a wet little laugh at that. “I’m not that hard up for outfits … but I really just …” I took a deep breath to tell another massive lie. “I really, really like him, Ezra, and he’s taking me to Stella! I have to make tonight special!”

“OMFG Jemma! I know what you have to wear!” Ezra leapt from the bed and sprinted from the room, returning a moment later with a garment bag.

My eyes almost fell out of my head. “No … I can’t Ez! It’s too special!”

“You just said you wanted tonight to be special, so what better dress?” The zipper came down with a trill that had my nerves jangling, and he pulled the dress from the bag. My heart leapt into my throat.

“I always forget how beautiful it is!”

“And it’s sexy as hell, too,” Ezra confided, nudging the hanger towards me. “It screams ‘You’d be lucky to take me out of this dress’, not ‘I’m desperate for you to take me out of this dress’.”

I giggled wetly, forcing back the tears. “I wonder if that’s how Dad felt when he saw Mum in it?”

Ezra’s face softened. “He would have. I know he would. And SJ will, too. Your mum would want to know that you’re enjoying it.”

I held my breath, and, as if something might strike me down, I took the hanger from Ezra. “Okay. I’m going to wear it.”

Ezra grinned. “Perfect. Now, I’m gonna text Humphrey and tell him that I’ll cook for him at his place tonight.”

I was too busy admiring the dress, and feeling sentimental and sad, and missing my parents like hell, that his words didn’t immediately register. But then they did, and my head jerked in his direction.

“Wait. What?”

Ezra winked, tapping away at his phone. “If you’re planning ‘the night’ with SJ, then I don’t want either of you to feel weirded out about that by having me and Humphrey here. So, I’ll go to his, and you’ll have the place to yourself … and maybe we’ll both have ‘the night’ to remember tonight.” He flashed me a lopsided grin just as the whooshing sound of his text message disappeared into the ether.

Well, crap. I hadn’t thought about having to actually do the deed with SJ.

Well, that was a lie. I’d thought about it far, far too many times. Like last night, when I’d had one of the strongest orgasms of my life, imagining gripping those big black horns of his devil form while he … well, let’s just say we didn’t even get to the dick tricks because he had some serious oral game … in my imagination, anyway.

But what if this worked? And I brought him home? And then I had to actually … really, truly sleep with him …