“John,” I say on a sigh. “The closest I’ve come to taking a woman to dinner is when I wanted to screw the captain of the school hockey team and gave her a piece of my fucking chewing gum. You know I don’t do dinner. Besides, she’d only refuse.”

“Maybe because she’s not attracted to you, you dumb motherfucker.”

I balk at him, and he rubs at the wrinkles on his forehead. The cheeky bastard. Every woman is attracted to me. “She most certainly is, and not even you can argue that. You were here. In this office when she showed up.” He stood there, observing, watching. He probably even had to duck out of the way of the sparks that were flying. I’m taking drastic measures, but it’ll be worth it. I know it’ll be worth it.

“What is it about her?” he asks out of the blue.

I pull up, startled by his question. “Apart from not being able to get her out of my head?” I hit my temple with the ball of my hand a few times, demonstrating, like I’m trying to physically knock her out.

“Yes, apart from that,” he says, reconciling himself to taking a chair opposite my desk and settling in.

I try to locate the words I need, but I’m struggling to find a way to explain. Plus, I’m a little shell-shocked by the whole situation myself, still trying to navigate exactly what the fuck is going on with me at the moment, so I really don’t have much hope of enlightening John. But I must try. I sigh. “On Friday, for the first time in as long as I can remember, I felt my heart beating, John.” He recoils, and I laugh lightly. Yes. It was weird as fuck. “There was the initial attraction, of course, but after that, I found my mind focused on one thing, and it wasn’t alcohol. It was her. She set something off inside, and I’m fucked if I know what to do with it.”

“Maybe don’t corner her in your private suite in your exclusive sex club. And perhaps, maybe, tell her it’s a motherfucking sex club.”

Tell her? Is he mad? If Ava O’Shea is deflecting me now, she’d run for the hills if she knew what this place is. Not an option. “I’m not trapping her. I’m making her see.”

“See what?”

“I don’t know,” I grate, my hands going into my hair. “All I know is she makes me feel good and, like the drink, it’s becoming a bit addictive.”

“Becoming?”