As soon as the conference wraps up, I do what girls do best in awkward situations - I hide in the bathroom. It’s easy to hear the press tromping out and I wait an extra five minutes, then stick my head back inside. Patrick is sitting on the table, swinging his feet in an otherwise empty room.

“Hey.” He uses his hands to push off the table, dropping to the floor in front of the stage. I expect him to wince at the pressure on his wrist but he doesn’t even flinch. He just stops where he lands. “You came.”

I nod, bobbing my shoulders too. A full-body nod. Now that I’ve done it I’m not sure what to say about it. He looks nice, clean cut; dressed like a regular guy going to an office job. I stop alongside the front row of chairs, it’s close enough.

“Thank you,” Patrick says.

“You were doing so well,” I shrug. “They should know it.”

I can tell he wants to walk toward me - his heels lift and he bounces on the balls of his feet.

“I could do well again.”

Thank God for the chair beneath me or I might have sunk to the floor. I drop into it like a balloon collapsing. Patrick steps forward and hesitates, unsure of which seat to take - step, stop, step. He settles on three chairs away and turns toward me. His arm extends along the top of the chair backs, just shy of touching my shoulder.

Just out of reach.

“What can I do? Please, Kristen. I want this.”

His fingers twitch in the last empty inch of space between us. Patrick hangs his head a little as he talks, like he doesn’t want me to get a full view of the pain in his eyes.

“I know, Patrick but for how long? And under what circumstances? I can’t be afraid to let you out of my sight. You’re on the road so much and....”

“All the time. I want this all the time and I need to be more in control all the time. On road trips the guys will back you up - Tazer already wants to kill me for what I did.”

He tries a smile and I give him half back. The idea of Toews badgering Patrick like a school principal is funny in any situation. But it’s not enough.

“But I can’t rely on them. You talk about being in control, well you have to be the one doing this.” My voice gets a little quieter before it asks for a lot. “I have to be able to trust you, Patrick.”

The movement ripples down the row of chairs, one jostling the next, shaking the seat I’m in as Patrick slides across until he’s right next to me. I can’t look at his face, so he leans in a little and speaks closely.

“I know I hurt you, Kristen. I know I did the worst possible thing and I don’t deserve another chance.” He uses his healed left hand to tilt my chin up, then brings his other hand up to my cheek. It’s the first time he’s ever really touched me with both hands.

“But remember the night we met? When you already knew I was a fuck-up and for some crazy reason, you decided to try anyway?”

I want to tell him that’s exactly why I can’t do it again. That limb was precarious enough and it broke, I’m not willing to climb again when I don’t even know what I was after.

But that’s a lie. I was after the chance. The chance that I could take a chance, that it might work, that maybe it wasn’t me after all. I was after something that felt like this does: solid. Even when it hurts.

“Please,” he says so softly that I’m surprised to find him right against my ear. His face is alongside mine and turned down. Heat radiates from him like it’s trying to pull me under, the hypnotize me. My body aches.

“Patrick. I don’t know.”

“That’s okay.” He brings his eyes up to mine - they are clear as water, nothing to hide. “Just try. We can go all the way back to the beginning and I will prove it to you, Kristen. I will earn your trust back.”

“I disappointed you, and I let myself down too. I promised you the bad things were over and I was wrong. Let me try to make it right.”
____

Kristen sits so still I think she might be made of glass. She may as well break a piece off and stab me for how raw and bloody I feel.

There’s nothing left for me to say. I could keep talking, keep apologizing for hours but it would mean the same thing. If I had any balls I’d leave now and let her think, the way I did this morning. But I’m too scared she might not turn up again. So I hover there, close without touching, and wonder if she can hear my heart pound.

She looks down; long eyelashes flutter against her cheeks. Please don’t cry, I think. Anything but that. She blinks once and lifts her eyes slightly. I let everything show on my face, every ounce of apology and hope. Kristen will see me and she’ll know what I mean every word.

But her gaze only moves to my lips. And then her mouth follows.

It’s a hard, panicked kiss. She’s forcing herself to do it. She’s dropping everything and stepping over it to reach this point. I slide my hands - both of them now - into her hair and hold on to that.

“Baby,” I say when she finally lets up on the pressure. There are tears in her eyes, our foreheads almost touch. I press my lips back to hers, intending to be quick but sure. Only Kristen is more sure. She opens her mouth and pulls me in to a real kiss. It’s like a tidal wave and I swim, hauling her right into my lap as if she weighed nothing. Her arms slide around my shoulders and we are hot and heavy, instantly.

“Go,” I croak. “We gotta go.”

Without a word she takes my hand and we fly down the hallway. The place is nearly empty now. Three minutes later my tires squeal against the pavement. Kristen holds my hand on the gearshift, but looks away out the window.

“Do you have to go back to work?” Please say no. Please say no.

She smiles to herself. “I’ll have to make it up to my boss.”

“We’ll get Tazer to bring her coffee tomorrow.”

Her laugh is magic. “Yeah, that’ll do it.”

I take us home as quickly as I can. In the elevator, we both squirm instead of touching. Even this security camera footage could end up somewhere - Old Me was warned once or twice by the building management. That little ding takes a hundred years to sound our arrival.

I have every intention of throwing her against the wall inside the door. But she’s quick - all that running paid off - and three steps ahead. As she moves through the living room, she pulls her blue silk top off and throws it across the room. By the time I have my tie off, she’s hopping out of her pants while maintaining forward motion. Right into the bedroom.

At the door, I stop. Kristen stands at the foot of the bed in just her dark blue bra with pink polka dots and plain blue underwear. Her hair is tousled, her posture playful. Then she smiles. Someday, maybe long from now, I will tell Kristen that I love her. This is the moment I’ll be referring too.

With a little ‘whoop!’ she dives onto my bed. I’m right behind her. We roll around giggling and grappling for a minute until we go still, breathing hard. Kristen tilts up onto an elbow and sets her chin on my chest, looking at me.

“I’m not giving up this easily,” she says with just enough seriousness in her voice.

“I would be disappointed if you did.”

“I want to believe in you, Patrick. I want you to be worth it.” She gives me wide eyes that leave no room for mistakes. “Please be worth it.”

It’s so easy to move her with two good hands. She lands atop my body with her lips to mine, already kissing before she’s come to a stop. I turn us over and take advantage of every soft curve she has to offer. My thigh slides between hers, then presses her legs apart as it slides home. She hooks her calf over and grinds her hip against my growing need.

“Baby,” I say, working my mouth down her neck, across her chest. I unclip her bra and lift that softest of skin to my lips. The nipple tenses quickly beneath my tongue, not half as hard as I am. The soft round shape traces away before I slide my kiss down her ribcage and into the hollow at her side. She smooths her fingers over my short hair, tracing the hairline across my neck, around my ears. Her fingers grip at my tendons and pressure points. Every touch reverberates through my entire body.

Gently, I hook fingers into the soft fabric of her panties. I have to grind my lap into the mattress to keep from coming as the cotton slides free of her hips. She lifts her butt and lays naked before me. Feels like our first time all over again.

“Kristen,” I kiss the inside her knee, then a little higher. She giggles. My thumb rubs deeply at the arch of her foot, so small in my hand. “I think I owe you one from last time.”

“You owe me a lot of ones.”

“Well, please,” I move my mouth higher along her creamy thigh, “make sure I pay you back.”

She is silky under my tongue. I slowly draw it along the length of her slit and revel in the hissing sound she makes, the way she bucks toward my mouth. Her hips fall back to the mattress and before I can go again she says, “With interest.”
____

Holy fuck.

Patrick has me seeing stars in seconds flat. He flicks my clit with his tongue before rolling it against my groove. When he does it again, one finger slides inside me. I’m so surprised I moan like a whore. Of course he does it again, with two fingers.

His slightly rough fingertips find the most sensitive places. That tongue does the rest. When he moves them in unison I can’t help but roll my ass against the bed. With a twist of his head, Patrick is licking across me instead of along and I squeeze against his hand. The vibration from his laugh nearly makes me scream.

The rhythm is quick - I don’t think he’s going to make it very long either. But he pulled that trick on me last time and is doing a fine job of making up for it now.

His short hair is bristley under my palms. Wide shoulders work my thighs open. Patrick stops with his fingers, leaving me empty, and goes hard for my little button. My hips flick and grind. I am so close, if he’d only...

“OhGodplease,” I hear in my own voice.

That laugh again, so evil, tears across my body like wildfire. One more of those and I’ll be screaming his name instead. But Patrick keeps licking and sucking and rolling until I’m shaking. My eyes close themselves. My hands lock onto his scalp.

I’m going over. Just hanging in midair waiting for gravity to arrive when he thrusts those two fingers back inside me and I drop like a rock. I come so hard I wail. His fingers and mouth catch it all, still working for every last drop of my orgasm. Finally I float the last foot to the ground, shuddering, as he pulls from from my body.

Patrick presses his lips to my forehead and uses his knees to spread mine wide. I am not going to get the chance to catch my breath.
____

I can’t help myself - I’m scared and exhilarated, buzzing like a live wire. Kristen is gasping for air with my name on her tongue and I taste the sweetness of this one small victory.

There have been a lot of girls. Everyone knows it. But what they don’t know, what even the girls don’t know, is the way I am with other girls. They all think they’re special, working so hard and showing off. It’s fun. It’s empty.

This is different.

I look at Kristen - actually look into her eyes. There’s life there, and confusion, relief, fear. She’s a real person in three dimensions; maybe four if you consider how lucky I feel. I can’t tell her how rare she is, but some twisted part of me hopes that she knows.

Her dark eyes never leave mine, just pool with heat as I lower my body into place. My tip grazes her slick spot and we both draw a tiny breath. Then I push just enough to open her door. Her head nods slight permission, so I take another step instead. Already my head swims.

With her eyes still open, Kristen kisses me the way she did in the conference room. The kiss that says do this now. Before I talk myself out of it. I want this more than I want to be right or sure or anything other than here with you.

Slowly I sink into her body. The dark heat and the tight squeeze are exquisite, the height of sensation. All the blood in my body fights to be closest to her and I feel lightheaded as I come to rest inside her. She sighs quietly, letting out the breath she didn’t know she was holding. My body draws earns another inch from her, and then there’s no more.

Kristen strokes my back with open palms, over my hips and sinks her fingers into my backside. It’s time.

I slide myself along her lower body, coming out almost all the way, before ringing back in like a cash drawer sliding closed. It’s the perfect combination of push and pull, I can’t decide which feels better. Her hands pull me back in against.

“Oh God,” Kristen whispers as she raises her hips to meet me. She wasn’t kidding. That one little swing runs her body over my cock like two hands twisting. I bury my face in her neck and moan. She does it again, twisting harder, then again, twisting the opposite way. I sink my teeth into soft skin to stop the sound

Together we move faster, then harder, then both. She sobs out tiny breaths as I ramp up speed, driving them from her lungs every time our bodies crash together. The slap of her ass against my thighs rings out. Her hands move to my biceps and she does her best to bruise me where everyone can see.

I hope she does.

My chest falls against hers and my arms wrap behind her back, holding her upper body off the mattress. She holds me too, and nips at my earlobe as I drive my need home at a new angle. Her ass is wedged beneath me, her legs spread wide and I’m holding her down onto my cock. She breathes in my ear.

“So good.”

I want to pull her on top. I want to flip her over and flatten her down. I want to stand her up, tie her up, lift her up. But I can’t bring myself to do anything other than hold her down and ride her hard. Her hips buck faster, shortening their stride, and her pussy pounds against my shaft. Thank God, I almost say out loud.

Instead I grunt, “baby” and encourage her my hammer home the deepest thrusts yet. Two, three and she’s moaning low. Using her arms around my waist, she holds herself as still as possible and gives me a great big target. Six, seven...

“Patrick.” It’s all breath and maybe she doesn’t even say it, because it curls from her throat into a noise that’s half-pleasure, half-pain. The sweet suck of her body goes slack, then locks down tight and twists the roof off.

“Ohhhhfuck.” I don’t make it through the first wave of her orgasm before mine bursts so hard I nearly faint. With another muffled obscene comment into her neck, I drain three hot loads of every emotion I’ve ever felt right into her core.

Beneath my lips, her pulse races. My own heartbeat throbs through my entire body. The edge of sleep is right there, blissfully pulling me over, but not yet.

I grin up at Kristen and she smiles back. There’s a tiny hint of hesitation in the way her lips draw tight. You’d only know that if you’d see her real smile before. If you’d had that, once, and screwed it up. This smile is my second chance, my hill to climb.

I kiss it, and the smile that follows.
_