To torment himself, probably.

This was a no-client, no-woman zone, a place where he went to get normal in his head. How was he going to set his mind straight when things ended if he had memories of her sitting on his bed, waiting for him, smiling in the way that was just for him?

He escaped to his walk-in closet and stared at his suits and shirts, letting the sight remind him of a time when he hadn’t lived with a noose around his neck. He mentally picked out which garments to bring to Stella’s and retrieved a black sports bag from the top shelf. On his way out of the closet, he deliberated over the number of socks and boxers to pack. A week’s worth should—

Stella was curled up in his blankets, burrowing into his pillow with an expression of pure ecstasy on her face. It was strange as hell. It shouldn’t have aroused him.

But it did.

He dropped his bag to the ground and leaned over her. “Now that you’ve found my pillow and sheets, you don’t need me anymore. Is that it?” he whispered.

Her eyes popped open, and she blushed. “They smell so good.”

“Aren’t you concerned they’re dirty?”

She widened her eyes and tossed the blankets away from her chest. She looked like she might be sick, looked almost betrayed.

Before she could start hyperventilating, he lay down on the bed and gathered her against himself. “I’m the only one who sleeps here, Stella. I was kidding. And I shower at night.” He had to wash his clients away before he slept. No way would he bring them into his bed.

Well, except for this client. None of his rules had ever applied to Stella.

She pounded her fists against his chest without force. “That’s not funny, Michael.”

“I’m sorry.” He smoothed the hair away from her face and straightened her glasses for her. “I was only teasing you, and I didn’t think about . . . the others . . . until you reacted that way.”

“You really haven’t brought any of them here?”

Was she jealous? Did he want her to be jealous? Fuck yes, he did. “Never.”

She pursed her lips like she was biting the inside. “I should leave. I barged my way in here, didn’t I? Thank you for showing it to me. I like it. I should get a plant.”

She prepared to get up, and he told himself to let her go. This space was not for clients, and he didn’t need more memories of her in his bed.

Let her go.

His arms refused to listen. They pulled her close so their bodies lined up in that perfect, custom-made way.

“In my mind, I don’t group you with them, Stella.”

“You don’t?”

She looked so hopeful, Michael couldn’t stop himself from saying, “No. You’re not just another client to me.”

“In a good way, right?” she asked with a wobbly smile.

“In the best way.” He stroked her loose hair, and she shut her eyes as she leaned into his caress, trusting him in a way that humbled him.

When he slipped her glasses off and set them on the nightstand, she opened her eyes and swallowed, drawing his attention to the wildly beating pulse point beneath her jaw. Her cheeks bloomed with color. She wanted him. He’d never loved being wanted this much.

“So pretty, Stella.”

He brushed his thumb across her bottom lip, and she sighed and kissed it before she surprised him by sucking it into her mouth. She stroked her tongue over him before she bit him, sending a sudden fire burst of sensation directly to his cock.

“Where the hell did you learn that?”

She released his finger. “I just wanted to do it. But I plan to research erotic finger biting tomorrow.”

“You could ask me, you know.” He lifted her small hand to his mouth and bit the base of her palm.

Her fingers twitched, and her breath came out in a long, ragged exhalation. “I want to know all the things you love most.” She captured his hand and brought it to her mouth. White teeth nipped at his skin, and the hairs on his body stood up.

“I love kissing you,” he admitted.

She trailed her fingertips lightly over his lips. “Does that mean I can kiss you?”

“You don’t have to ask.” She was the only one who ever did. Maybe that was why he was so crazy about her.

“I have permission to kiss you whenever I want?” She watched his mouth like what he said was too good to be true.

“Yeah.”

She brought their lips together and kissed him like he was oxygen and she was short on air. He ran his hands down her back to her hips, cupped her sweet ass, pulled her into his hardness. She struggled to get closer, threaded her fingers through his hair as she poured herself into the kiss.

So soft, every part of her. But covered by clothes. Michael loved clothes, but they locked Stella away. He’d never felt the urge to tear at buttons like he did now. Breaking the kiss, he captured a hand and loosened the cuff around her elegant wrist.

“Clothes off,” he growled.

After he’d unbuttoned her cuffs, she wordlessly went to work on his, and he realized this was her first time undressing him. He’d been undressed by hundreds of different people. In that moment, he couldn’t remember a single one of their faces.

There was only Stella.

They worked together, their arms crisscrossing and intertwining as they unbuttoned each other’s shirts and his vest, tugged the tails free. She stroked pale hands over his chest and grazed the disks of his nipples, making his skin burn.

He trailed his fingers from her collarbone, down the valley between her bra-covered breasts, over her flat belly, to the waistband of her skirt. After he undid the hook fastening at the side, he eased the zipper over the sweet curve of her hip.

“Skirt off, Stella. If I can’t touch you, I’ll go crazy.” He needed his hands between her legs, needed to taste her.

She sat up on her knees and lowered her skirt. Sitting back down, she pulled the skirt all the way off and set it on the nightstand. She peeked at him from beneath her eyelashes as she curled her legs under herself and fiddled with her open cuffs. Her unbuttoned shirt exposed her skin-tone bra and panties and flawless creamy skin.

“You’re still wearing too many clothes,” he said.

She drew her shirt off with a shy shrug of her shoulders and unhooked her bra, letting it fall from her breasts. Michael almost groaned at the sight of her stiff nipples. When she ran her palms over her breasts and rubbed the tips with restless motions, he did groan. That was fucking hot, and she had no clue.

“It makes them ache when you look at them like that,” she whispered.

“Like what?” he rasped, wondering if she’d say it.

“Like you want t-to . . .”

“Lick them? Suck them?”

Her face went bright red, but she nodded.

“Come here.”

She crawled to him and pressed herself to his front, nuzzling his neck as her hands snuck behind him under his shirt and grasped his back. The hard tips of her nipples grazed his chest, and Michael couldn’t resist cupping her tits and tweaking the pebbled flesh with his fingers. Her breath was a ragged sigh against his throat before her teeth scraped at his skin.

“You’re wearing a lot more clothes than I am, Michael.”

“Then take them off for me.”

Her eyes brightened, and a smile curved on her lips. As he’d known she would, his Stella really liked the idea of undressing him. She brushed her hands over the black silk of his vest before she pushed it over his shoulders and set it on the nightstand carefully—because it was his work, and she respected that. Such a simple thing, but it made him want to wrap her up and never let her go.

His shirt came off, was draped over the nightstand as well, and when her attention returned to him, she lost her focus. She ran greedy hands over his arms, chest, and abs, traced his tattoo. She kissed the dragon’s eye, licked it.

“I love your tattoo.”

“You don’t strike me as a tattoo girl.”

“It’s yours, Michael,” she said simply.