A Bossy Roommate (Next Door to a Billionaire #2)

15. Eden

15

EDEN

C upcake in hand, I let him pull me toward the hallway and lead me to his bedroom. My mind is in overdrive, eager and pleasantly surprised with how the events of the evening have turned. Part of my brain starts to scold me for changing my mind, but I tell my responsibilities “To please frickin’ hit the hay so I can play the night away.”

Not to mention, seeing the same Carter I’d met at the ice cream place has me beyond excited. I’ve missed that Carter, that excited, playful “Mr. Fun Time” side of him that’s nowhere to be found once we step foot in the office.

Inside his bedroom, one large California king-sized bed greets us.

Carter undoes the knot of his tie, letting the fabric hang loose around his neck. His eyes never leave my face.

I barely have a chance to admire the beauty of his eyes before he picks me up and turns us. He sets me down on one of the narrow cabinets that only hold a few thick magazines.

“You won’t be needing this now,” he says, taking the cupcake out of my hand and placing it somewhere on the shelf above me.

He pushes himself between me, wraps my legs around his waist, trapping me between his strong body and the cool wall.

My arms anchor themselves around his neck.

“Never had just-the-tip sex,” I mutter between kisses, more to myself than to him.

“Me neither. We’ll change that tonight.”

“It’s definitely something I’ve wanted to try, so please, continue,” I say, as if we aren’t all over each other already, and still have the physical and emotional ability to suddenly stop. We don’t.

Carter kisses his way to my throat, teasingly, torturously, and my head falls to the side, giving him better access. I suck in a deep breath when I feel his teeth drag teasingly. My skin rises with goose bumps when he breathes into my ear.

I’ve been craving this, I think. Or maybe I even say it out loud. I can’t tell. Going from hot and heavy to hotter and heavier makes my head spin. Granted, it’s already spinning from the rush of endorphins, but the additional dose doesn’t help.

“I know, I’ll make it worth your while,” he rumbles into my ear.

I squirm, laughing, needing more, wanting everything. “Honestly, as long as it ends with orgasms, I’m up for a lot of things.”

“Orgasms. Plural?”

I nod, breathless. “Yeah…”

His whiskers graze across my skin from my ear to my mouth, and I think he’s going to kiss me again. But he doesn’t, letting his lips hover just over mine. “Perfect.”

I enjoy his touch breathlessly, my lips softly touching his.

He teases my lips with featherlight brushes with each word, growling, “Just. Like. You.”

I gasp, and Carter pulls me into another knee-buckling kiss. Lips on mine, he places me into position, both hands clutching my waist, pulling me closer, and pushing my legs wider with his hips. He devours my mouth like he can’t get enough. I meet him enthusiastically, making up for all the kisses we didn’t have before.

His hips roll forward on their own, grinding against me.

My skirt rides up, and I go along, grinding myself against his hard bulge.

After minutes of him devouring my mouth, and simulating rhythmic thrusts, my panties are soaked all the way through, and I’m sure he can feel it through the layers of clothing between us.

Dear heavens, I’m so turned on that it almost hurts. I need more. I need to feel him inside me—his tip, that is. Only his tip. Not his thick, long, full shaft.

“Let’s take these off,” he growls and pushes my skirt all the way up, leaving it bunched around my waist and sliding my wet panties down. I lift myself and maneuver my panties off, tossing them over the side onto the bed.

The sound of his belt and zipper fills the room, and there’s rustling as he takes the time to lower his jeans. Once our offending garments are out of our way, he positions himself back to where he’d been and grabs my legs to straddle him. Hot desire shoots straight to my core.

“Better. Much better,” he growls.

The smooth shaft of his dick slides between my legs, and I gasp in delighted pleasure. Grinding against him now, I bite my lip in excitement. I’d hoped we were beyond teasing, but that’s not the case. His rhythm meets mine, dragging his dick through my folds tantalizingly but making no effort to enter me. He begins simulating deeper thrusts.

“Carter, you’re torturing me.”

His hands leave my waist when he leans forward, latching his mouth onto the back of my neck, the head of his cock teasing my entrance. “Don’t worry, we’ll get there.”

He grabs my wrists, bunches them in one hand and pins them against the wall, forcing my arms above my head. With one hand, he reaches for his tie and folds it around my wrists, locking me in, still holding my arms up. Then he draws nearer. His hips push my legs farther apart, letting air hit my pussy and clit. The new angle forces me to stay still, trapped between his chest and body, unable to move. It would drive me crazy if his free hand hadn’t started to unbutton my blouse, his strong hand eager to cup my breast through the material of my bra. Once my blouse is unbuttoned, he pulls my bra down, fingers closing around one of my nipples and pinching just enough to draw another moan out of me.

After making sure my nipples are the hardest they’ve ever been, his hand leaves my breasts to lightly brush down my belly over my waxed pussy and deeper down between my folds. I gasp when he brushes right over my wet clit, just once. A firestorm of sensations rushes through my body at that one touch.

“Carter,” I moan as he denies me more of the pleasure I desperately need.

“You’re so fucking wet. Perfectly ready for me.”

“Please do that again,” I beg.

He doesn’t listen. Instead, he grabs his cock, now harder than steel, strokes himself a few times, distributing the wetness his tip has collected. He gives himself time to connect his eyes with mine, watching me squirm, enjoying how badly I want him inside of me. Then he positions himself back at my entrance, pushing more eagerly this time.

I gasp, my nerves getting the best of me, moaning at the feeling of his soft skin against mine. Never in my life have I been happier to be on birth control.

Slowly—excruciatingly slowly—he pushes his tip inside of me, stretching me open.

“Ohh…” The suddenness of feeling about one inch of his crown in my body is so intense I can’t help but release a moan.

I want to push myself against him, pull his hips against me, taking all of him at once to bring our bodies flush together.

But I’m not physically able to do so. I’m trapped and my movements are limited. In a protesting response, I try to lower my arms, but remember they’re still tied. I need them to push myself against him, but a shake of his head forces my arms back into their original position.

“Stay still,” he whisper-orders.

He can be such a boss sometimes.

In defiance, my muscles clench around his head, too overwhelmed by the intensity of the situation. He moves his hips slightly, hardly even a quarter of an inch, causing his tip to slide out and back in. Every thought leaves my brain except for Carter, me, and the torturous way we’re connected. The position is hotter than I thought it would be. Feeling his tip inside me is hot enough, but the way he’s trying to control himself and not push into me makes me want to force him against me with every fiber of my being.

“Do not move your hips,” Carter rumbles. “Stay like this. Keep your arms up.”

“Okay,” I rasp, feeling almost dizzy from arousal.

Even though I want to immediately sling my arms around his head to his shoulders for support and pull my hips against his, I remain in position. Yep. Frustratingly obedient, I keep them up and my hips still as he ordered. His strong hands are digging into the flesh of my hips. Everything in me hopes he will pull me closer, but instead, he prevents us from moving. It’s hard enough to leave a mark on my skin. But I want him to mark me, to claim me, and leave a reminder of what we’re doing. No one would know if he thrust into me completely. I wouldn’t tell. It would be our little secret, and the thought thrills me more than it has any right to.

“Carter,” I moan, squeezing down on him. “You feel so good. Please. Please go deeper.”

He groans and pushes himself in a tiny bit more, barely, maybe half an inch, if that much, but pulls back out to where he was, absolutely preventing his hips from gyrating and keeping him only the one damn inch deep and not all the many, many inches he could possibly be inside of me. Anytime I try to somehow pull myself forward, he holds me tight, keeps me flush, not even giving me one fraction more of his cock.

“Just one more inch,” I beg. At this point, I’m happy to get anything.

“I can’t. I won’t be able to stop,” he rasps. “I want to fuck you so badly I can barely think.”

This is hard enough , his eyes tell me.

With his forehead leaning against mine, his hands run from my hips up my naked belly to my breasts. My blouse had fallen closed when I’d lifted my arms, and he folds it back open. He cups my breasts, and his thumbs graze my nipples, teasing and pinching them over and over, while his lips find mine.

Doing all this, he doesn’t move his hips. He remains perfectly still.

Except for his hands. One hand circles my throat while his other drops to my sensitive clit. When he brushes it with his fingers, I moan into his mouth. Relentlessly, he starts playing with it, circling it, and I’m lost in the sea of sensations that overtakes me, clenching onto his tip, relentlessly.

He was right, and I was wrong.

This position isn’t subtle. This is in no form or shape subtle sex.

This is agony.

Pure torture.

But I’m perfectly happy staying right where I am, arms up, feeling his fingers where I need them most, gearing up for the impending Big O explosion that’s rapidly sneaking up on me. By rapidly I mean I’m drawing nearer too quickly, remarkably close…almost…there—when Carter suddenly moves.

His hands leave my body. He pulls out of me. Wait, what, no. Noooo. The sudden loss of him drags a whimper out of me, but when I glance back to see what he’s doing, I’m greeted by the sight of him tearing his shirt off.

Oh, good thinking .

His inked torso is fully naked now. On either side of his chest are designs that wrap around his arms and shoulder, made up of bold, black lines. The sight is mighty impressive, to say the least. Cool, manly strength. Uncontained energy. That’s what I see. But when my eyes focus on his chest, my jaw drops open. Carter’s torso boasts a tattoo of a fierce hawk in a moment of unbridled ferocity, exuding a primal, untamable spirit with muscles rippling beneath its dark feathers. I blink. A predator. The hawk’s piercing eyes lock onto me, its wings spread wide, a warning in its gaze and a threat in its poised talons, ready to unleash powerful strikes at any moment, daring any challenger to cross its path.

“Arms down for a second,” he growls.

Oh, finally. I let my tired arms fall, and Carter undoes the tie that binds them, then slides his hands down my shoulders to lower my blouse. With quick work, he unclasps my bra, which I happily toss away with the rest of my clothing.

His cock is swollen and pointing straight at me from above his jeans.

Being completely naked now, I make a move to get him closer again, but he stops me with a firm hand and pushes me back to where I was.

“No, you stay like this.” He grabs a pillow from his bed and shoves it under my ass, then pushes my legs apart with his strong hands.

His stubble nuzzles my hair as he kisses the shell of my ear.

“I like it this way. You completely naked, wet, eager to be fucked. That’s what you are, ready to be fucked. Am I right?” he rumbles, his fingers teasing the sides left and right of my clit, denying me another direct hit of pleasure. “Tell me.”

At this point, I can’t even think straight. I want his touch so badly. “Yeah.”

“Good. Let me fuck your tight hole with my tongue. Arms back up.”

I gasp, obeying.

Since my wrists aren’t bound this time, my hands hit the shelf above me.

The cupcake he’d placed there earlier tumbles down between us. With a thump , it lands on my belly and rolls down, leaving cream in its wake. I tremble. The cupcake stops on my pussy, creamy side down.

I start to snort-laugh.

There’s a cheeky grin in Carter’s gaze, and when his eyes take me in like that, my pelvic muscles squeeze.

“Stay still, don’t move,” he orders. He leans down, grabs the end of the cupcake, pushes my legs farther apart and smears the vanilla cream between my pussy lips, right on my clit and entrance. He takes the plump, ripe strawberry that had been jumbled into the cream through the fall, between his teeth by its stem and places it among the cream at my entrance.

“ Carter , wha…ohhh .”

With the cupcake that has now lost all of its vanilla swirl (and its strawberry too), he stands, and removes the luxurious cupcake liner that helped to keep it fresh (and typically also prevented them from getting crushed or damaged). Putting the deliciousness between his teeth, he leans in.

Take a bite , he gestures with his eyes.

And I do. I bite into our wedding cupcake. While I savor the goodness, vanilla and strawberry smell invading my senses, he leans in to allow me another bite.

The taste isn’t too sweet. There’s a nice vanilla and orange citrus flavor that I love and could bathe in, as I savor the small pieces of strawberry and real vanilla in my mouth.

Our lips graze, and not only does my heart jump, but my pussy releases electric shockwaves.

Feeling the softness of his lips on my mouth and the softness of the cream on my sensitive clit, my pussy clenches. He finally indulges in a bite. Sharing a cupcake with Carter in the sweetest—and hottest—way possible, only heightens the significance of the rare moment. I can’t help but feel a flutter in my chest.

Pleasant surprise is written all over Carter’s face, even though I’m not entirely sure if it’s caused by the taste of the cupcake and its subtle sweetness or by the whole situation in general. All I know is that he isn’t into sweet things—except for me, ha! —but the delicious flavoring seems like a treat, even for him.

With a sexy gesture, he offers me the last bite, his lashes lowering in a moment of quiet intimacy.

The warmth of his touch lingers on my skin as he leans in closer and whispers in my ear, “Ready to be fucked by my tongue?”

I nod, eagerly, desperately, as I realize that I’m about to fall for him harder than I ever expected.

“I’m going to devour that pussy.”

He begins kissing down my neck, to the top of my breasts, over my nipple that is basically poking into his mouth. He sucks it in eagerly, first my left one, then my right. Doing all this, teasing both my nipples, licking from one stiff bud to the other, he takes his time—knowing full well that his announcement is already creating havoc in my mind. He proceeds to trail his tongue down my belly, licking up the vanilla cream spread on my naked skin.

This experience sure gives “getting your pussy eaten” a whole new meaning.

He licks through my folds, eating the cupcake cream, eating my pussy, no, feasting on my pussy, feasting on everything, but evading my swollen clit (so frustrating, no, irritating!) and glides to my entrance. There, he sucks the strawberry in and holds it by its end with his lips, then he begins to fuck me with it.

Don’t ask me why, but it’s so hot—life’s sweet surprises!

Finally, I can take “getting fucked by a strawberry” off my bucket list.

He stands, strawberry (slightly mangled) in his mouth, a small smile playing on his lips. The strawberry is covered in cream and my wetness. Slowly, he places the fruit against my lips. We remain like that, looking into each other’s eyes.

“Lick it,” he grumbles, without dropping it.

I lick over the skin. The cream is delicious. It tastes like vanilla, and me. He watches me lick it and eat it, as the warmth of his touch lingers on my skin.

“Atta girl.”

I swallow.

He leans in, growling, “I bet you want my attention on your clit, don’t you?”

With a happy nod, I whisper, “Yeah…”

“I got you, baby.” He smirks, his long and stunning eyelashes framing his eyes. “You know exactly who this sweet pussy belongs to.”

“You. Only you.”

Nodding, he traces his tongue back down to my pussy, licking off the remains of the cream on the way, evading direct contact with my clit again, torturing me, running to my entrance, and licking across it.

“Damn right,” he growls and fills me with his tongue.

I gasp. With thrusting motions in and out, he tongue-fucks me, making me clench, making me moan, until I’m a breathing mess. He licks his way back up, hovering his wet tongue just over my clit that’s still covered in cream. I try to push my hips up, but to no avail.

I can feel him grinning at my despair.

When I whimper his name in agony, he gives in and—oh, so lightly—brushes over my clit, licking parts of the cream off, causing me to jerk. He brushes over it again. And again. He proceeds to circle it in soft lazy circles, cleaning me, eating me, as I continue to gasp and moan and jerk and feel the orgasm building with each caress.

“You taste delicious,” he growls in between another set of delicious licks.

“Carter…” I somehow manage to respond.

“I’m not talking about the frosting. It’s your taste that I love.” Just when I’m about to stumble over the edge, Carter gets up. “Don’t come just yet.”

“Whoa….”

“I want you to come on my tip.”

His idea stops any lingering protests. In fact, my entire being likes his idea. He hovers in front of me, placing his inked arms on either side of me against the wall, caging me in. His shaft is teasing my clit as he moves his hips against me in rhythmical motions, getting us both off, causing my orgasm to start knocking at the door.

“I’m so close…”

His eyes connect with mine. “Not yet. Hold on a bit longer for me.”

He’s such a controlling jerk. A hot controlling jerk.

“Okay.” Obviously, I’ve lost my mind, simply agreeing to that, especially now that I’m teetering on the edge, poised to erupt with the slightest touch. “Please, Carter, I can’t…”

I moan even louder at being suddenly filled with his tip again.

It’s just as intense—and just as frustrating—as it was before. If not more. He simply refuses to push himself all the way in. I spread my legs farther apart, hoping to cause him to slide in deeper. Carter’s mouth is all over my throat and shoulders, nipping and sucking on the sensitive flesh. I grip the sides of the pillow I’m sitting on, twisting it each time he pushes and pulls in and out of me by just a fraction of an inch.

I’ve never been this frustrated and never this turned on. Yes, we’ve had sex before, but his control brings a new level of intimacy, closeness, and horniness I haven’t experienced before. My pussy is drenching his hard tip and squeezing it uncontrollably. Wetness is pooling on the pillow under my ass. With shaky movements, I try to rotate my hips, and try to steer his tip deeper.

“Stay still,” he orders.

“ Carter… .”

“The last fucking time. Stay fucking still,” he grumbles sternly. “Don’t move, or I will have to fuck you. I only have so much willpower.”

Carter’s hands and mouth are all over me, his tongue inside me, his cock not inside of me (enough), one hand clasping my throat, the other brushing over my drenched clit, but all I can do is be there and take it. Or not take it. I have to accept all he’s doing to me. And what he’s not doing to me.

Sensing by my uncontrollable moans that I’m at the brink, ready to tumble over the edge, he continues his teasing, his thumb circling my clit. I’m beginning to lose it. “Yeah, come for me, baby. Come on my tip.”

I explode hard and loud, squeezing his tip over and over, chanting his name as I ride out my orgasm, coming and moaning and squeezing.

I have barely come down from that high when his fingers release my swollen clit, while he sucks on the junction between my throat and shoulder.

There’s definitely going to be a mark.

“Carter,” I moan when his hands are on my breasts, caressing my nipples, stiffened from my orgasm. “Give me more. Push in. Please. I’m serious, please.”

His head draws away, and he raises his eyebrow, watching me beg while his hands are still playing with my hard nipples, now plucking and twisting them, his hips moving in those agonizing tiny thrusting movements.

I can’t take it anymore. I want Carter to take me, hard and fast.

I want to get stretched by him, feel painfully full of him. Full of his cock.

I want the air filling with the sounds of our moans and skin slapping skin. I want to feel him thrusting, pumping his long, steel-hard cock into my willing body.

“Take me…please, Carter,” I plead, my voice cracking from the intensity of the desire coursing through my veins. I want to be his, and allow him to do all the dirty, unimaginable things to me, to be fucked and used by him as he pleases.

Carter must be just as eager as I am because he doesn’t say anything.

His stormy eyes bore into mine, more intense than ever. Piercing. Dangerously fierce.

He lowers his hands from my breasts and firmly grips my hips and ass.

He’s ready to thrust in.

I want him to.

Badly.

Desperately.

Ding-dong. Ding-dong.

We freeze.

“Fuck,” Carter grumbles through clenched teeth.

“Who’s that?”

“My lawyer. Vance. With the NDA.”

“ Now ?”

He glares at me. Carter doesn’t have to explain. He already mentioned on the plane that his lawyer would stop by this week. Like with anything else, Carter doesn’t want any loose ends, and his attorney had interrupted his vacation to fly out to see us.

Apparently, that’s not all he has interrupted.

The timing couldn’t be worse. Did his attorney have to come at this exact moment? Despite a flood of frustration crashing down on me, I can’t help but find the situation a tiny bit amusing. Okay, I find it hilarious, especially now that my body has released all those happy “O” hormones, and they’re having a dance party within me.

“Let’s ignore him,” Carter rumbles darkly when he sees my grinning face, and leans back in.

“We can’t, we have to answer.”

“No, we don’t,” he urges, one hand now on my throat and jaw. “We don’t.”

Ding-dong. Ding-dong. Ding-dong.

“I doubt he’ll leave. The best lawyers are the most relentless ones,” I argue.

“ Fuck .”

Carter brushes his thumb across my jaw, retracts his hands, slides his tip out of me, slowly, attentively, then straightens and pulls up his boxer shorts and jeans. Next, he puts on his shirt, and after making sure that his arousal isn’t visible, he rushes out to answer the front door, while I try my best to get back into my clothes and cover up my rumpled, disheveled appearance that’s a dead giveaway of me just having had cupcake cream smeared all over my naked body, complete with a delicious strawberry, not on top, but inside of me.

You know, the usual night at the Bancroft residence.

“So, does this happen often? You know, people signing NDAs in the middle of the night?” I ask after saying hello to the lawyer, trying to inject a touch of humor into the circumstances and smooth out the awkwardness.

“Let’s just say it’s part of the job,” Mr. Vance Lombardi says matter-of-factly in a thick Italian accent. I can’t tell if he’s being serious or joking.

Just like we had with Carter’s family lawyer, we both put on our game faces and get down to business. Despite seeing the humorous side in all this, I can’t help but feel acutely aware of the situation. The lawyer had interrupted a very, uh…intimate moment between me and Carter. Mr. Lombardi seems unfazed, though, as he starts explaining the terms of the agreement—in excruciating detail. I try my best to pay attention, but all I can think about is how I’d almost broken my promise, and gladly so.

Signing the papers, I feel a tightening in my heart. While our physical connection is strong, our emotional connection is almost nonexistent. It’s just a business arrangement, and as much as I’m enjoying the oh-so-hot physical aspect of it, I know I can’t allow my heart to get any closer to him.

“I should get some sleep,” I say through a pretend yawn when Vance pulls out more papers, related to different projects he wants to urgently discuss with Carter.

Carter doesn’t look too happy, at least I think that he doesn’t, but what can he say? Sorry, Vance, get out, I have to go fuck?

“Good night, Eden,” Carter says instead, his tone of voice back to boss-mode, and Vance gives me a polite nod, immediately taking back Carter’s attention.

Once in my bed, I check my socials. More people have unfollowed me on Insta. “Good riddance.” I reassure myself that they were never true friends to begin with, though I can’t entirely dismiss the twinge of pain in my chest knowing they believe the false stories Rob is spreading about me. After he robbed me and distorted the truth about what had actually occurred, Rob simply vanished. He’s nowhere to be found, as if he has been swallowed by the earth itself.

I try to reach my sister, missing her voice. Informing her about the uplifting news Carter had conveyed over dinner will not only brighten her evening but also improve my own mood, which has been negatively affected both by finding out how many people continue to believe Rob, and by the lack of a response from the legal aid I reached out to last week.

As always, my sister’s phone rings, and rings, until it jumps to voice mail. I leave her a quick message, telling her to call me back, that I have good news. Two minutes later, she calls back, telling me that she’s packing for a short trip to see her husband’s granny who has broken her leg.

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that!” I say.

“No worries, she’s going to be fine. Just needs a helping hand for a couple of days. So how’s New York?”

In light of the NDA I have just signed, and my sister being busy packing, I opt to provide her with just a brief response. I tell her that NYC is fine, and that I’m enjoying my job at Legacy.

“How’s your boss?” she inquires with a mischievous tone, fully aware of her own tough nature.

“Carter Bancroft is determined, relentless, tough, but also so?—”

“Wait, what? Did you say Carter Bancroft? The Carter Bancroft? The construction king of New York?”

“Yeah. How do you know him?”

“I might be a small-town girl from tiny Ellsworth, but they do have Internet here, you know? He was featured in several articles for having catapulted that Legacy Construction firm from the million-dollar mark into the billions in record time. They say he’s a force of nature, that he faces challenges head-on, moves with precision, never backs down with his unbreakable spirit, and overcomes obstacles that would make others throw in the towel. Is all that true about him?”

Oh, you have no idea .

For some crazy reason, immense pride fills my heart. On top of that, hearing the excitement in my sister’s usually much more serious demeanor gives my mood a little boost. “Yep.”

“Oh, my gosh! Why didn’t you tell me earlier? Getting to work for him, that’s like winning the jackpot!”

Wait ’til you find out that I live in his apartment , I think. And that he’s my fake husband . And that I know what he looks like naked . And what it feels like to orgasm on his tip . I’m itching to reveal that, but: NDA. However, once the contractual obligations are met, she’ll be the first person to receive the information (excluding, perhaps, all the tantalizing details—certain berrylicious aspects are best kept between two sets of minds).

“And Carter Bancroft is expecting your call.”

“Say whaaaat?”

“I told him about your fire-resistant landscape design approach. He wants to help the company expand.”

“Are you telling me I need to hold on to my gardening gloves because we’re about to see green and witness that company bloom brighter than a garden in full springtime splendor?”

“Uh-huh, yep.”

“Sweet heavens! How do I best get in touch?”

“Great question. Via me.” I give my sister the best contact info, and she promises to reach out promptly. “Okay, happy packing, talk to you soon!”

“Waitwaitwait. How are you holding up?” she asks. “How’s the heart?”

Keeping things vague, I tell her, “I might have met someone.”

“What?” There’s silence. “Spill! When? How? Who?”

“Eh…it’s complicated. And special. And impossible. And I want to break promises that I made to myself because of Rob…and I know I shouldn’t…”

“Sweetie, listen. You can’t let the fuckface get to you any longer. That’s how you got into trouble after he left you. And you sound like you did then. I know you don’t openly display your emotions for everyone to see, not even me. But promise me something. If it gets like it was before, you’ll call me.”

It had been a bad time when Rob broke it all off. A really bad time. “I promise I will. I’m all right. Don’t worry about me.”

“Just take your time. Don’t rush into anything. But if you like this guy you’ve met, don’t let the experience you had with the fuckface ruin it for you. Don’t let the fuckface wreck the rest of your life. Or stand in the way of the possibility of a new relationship.”

I love my sister. I’d hated when she’d called him fuckface back then. I love that she does now.

“You deserve to find love,” she continues. “I’ve been saying this forever. Now, I may have been a tiny bit hesitant about you using New York as an escape plan, but if—by some crazy chance—you have happened to stumble upon that special man who’ll show you the moon in the Big Apple, I’ll be the first one to bust out the party hats and celebrate like there’s no tomorrow. Got that, sis?”

“Got it.”

“Good. Be ready for this epic chapter in your life. See you in six months!”

Oh, I’m ready for an epic chapter, but I’m not sure if I can turn the page. “Love you, Diane.”

“Love you too.”

An hour later, I hear the front door close, and half a minute later, there’s a soft knock at my door.

“Are you awake, Eden?” I hear Carter ask.

I don’t answer. It wouldn’t be right to invite him in. We have to be up early to get to the airport.