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“Blaire,” he says again.

“I’m fine,” I tell him.

His expression tells me he doesn't believe that. Ross reaches for me, and when he tries to kiss me, I turn my face slightly. The movement stops him immediately.

“I have to go,” I say.

“It’s late,” he says.

“I know,” I reply.

“I’ll get you a car,” Ross says.

“No, Ross.”

His brow tightens. “Let me get you back to your hotel.”

“I said I’m fine.”

I find my clutch and shove my phone inside before gathering the folio I came here for in the first place. Ross watches me with an openness that only makes the panic inside me worse.

He doesn't look embarrassed or regretful. He looks satisfied in a way that has nothing to do with sex and everything to do with the fact that, in his mind, something between us has just been recovered. That realization terrifies me because, for a few minutes, I felt it too.

I pull my coat around myself and head toward the door.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I say.

Ross looks at me steadily. “Yeah. You will.”

My hand closes around the handle.

“Blaire,” he says.

I pause but don't turn around. Whatever he wants to say, I can't hear it tonight.

I open the door and walk out. The corridor feels impossibly long on the way back to the elevators. I keep moving until I'm downstairs, through security and outside beneath the cold London night.

A taxi approaches before I have time to open an app. I lift my hand, and the driver pulls over. I climb into the back seat before Ross can appear behind me.

“Where to?” the driver asks.

I give him the hotel address. As the car pulls away, I sink against the seat and close my eyes. My body is still buzzing, my lips are sore, and Ross is still everywhere on me even after I've put myself back together.

But none of that is the part that frightens me. The worst part is how easy it became once I stopped fighting him.

I turn toward the window and watch London slide past in streaks of light. For one night, I let myself forget everything standing between us.

Now I have to remember it all.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Ross

Iwake up alone, which doesn't surprise me. It's the clearest confirmation I need of what last night already told me. For those few minutes in the archive room, there was no distance left between us. Then it was over, and I watched the walls go back up almost as quickly as they'd fallen. She dressed too fast, wouldn't let me kiss her again, and barely let me finish a sentence before she was out the door.

I lie still for another moment, staring toward the pale morning light filtering through the bedroom windows. What happened last night matters to me, but I'm not arrogant enough to assume it means the same thing to her. Blaire wanted me. There's no question about that. She made that decision herself, and I'm not going to insult either of us by pretending otherwise. But wanting me for one night doesn't erase what happened before it, and it certainly doesn't mean I wake up this morning with some claim on her. If anything, last night makes the next part more important.

By the time I'm showered and dressed, my calendar is already filling the screen on my phone. The morning starts with the Kensington Holdings board committee, followed by a New York acquisition update that has been moved twice already. Geneva is scheduled before lunch, and the afternoon is stacked with financing reviews and a call involving one of our European operating groups. There isn't much room to move, which is probably for the best. I don't need to spend today chasing Blaire around London simply because I finally had her in my arms again. What I need now is patience, and that may prove harder than anything else.