For over a decade, he had been formulating his delicious slap of vengeance … a righteous justice in his mind. He had planted it, nursed it, fed it, watered it, sheltered it from the cold, and given it relief from the heat. He had watched it grow and blossom into something mean and unstoppable. It had consumed his thoughts. How he’d make her pay for what she had done. And now that his chance for retribution was so close—so, so very close—all he could feel was the rapid beating of his heart, pounding not with revenge but with excitement.

He really, really wanted her back!

The thought of sex with her even after all these years was making him pant like a dog. He had at least a thousand fantasies about it—some benign, some dark and cruel—all of them HD vivid in his brain. To see her face again … to feel her body. To hear her voice. It was her voice that had haunted him the most. Her voice that had kept him awake at nights and dreaming through the days. Sometimes she’d talk to him so clearly, he’d turn around only to find empty space.

After she left him for the third time over a decade ago, it had taken him years to recover. But he had finally, finally gotten his shit together. He had gotten off heroin, had weaned himself from cigarettes, and had significantly cut down on the booze. Now he exercised regularly. He ate a healthy diet. He had reformed while slaving away at his business—a multimillion-dollar playground for rich men of any sexual persuasion. He had spent years building his own little fiefdom. Lord of the manor, where no one dared to get in his way. He had tons of money, he had loads of sex, and he had respect. Most important, he had control over everything in his life.

Now that same everything was about to blow up in his face.

And even though he just knew it would end in disaster—like it had three times before—he also knew that he’d take the plunge into the deep end without a second thought, idiot that he was.

Fool me once, shame on you.

Fool me twice, shame on me.

Fool me three times, and someone’s a moronic dumbass.

He flipped hair out of his eyes, then walked out of his inner office into the fray he was hosting, thinking:

Here we go again.

Here we fucking go again.

AT SIX FEET four—well, maybe six three and a half now, allowing for shrinkage—Decker had always dreaded flying, cramming his oversize body into seats unfit for someone as tall as he was. The flight to Israel was long, and each time after he arrived, it took him hours to unfold. This time maybe it would be different.