"Nick, I'm waiting. When are you coming to bed?" Angela's smokey purr drifting from my phone is filled with fuck-me demands. I can practically see her sultry lips purse to a cock-sucking pout.

"I'll be right there." I cut the call. Whipping back and forth in the swivel chair, I take a mouthful of brandy. Cutie's dossier is open on my computer screen. As usual, Tony has been thorough and I got most of the answers I was looking for.

Robyn Joy Sinclair.

Age twenty-nine.

Moved to New York only two weeks ago.

The rest of her life story reads like the plot of a novel. Pregnant at eighteen, she married her high school sweetheart, some prick who got lucky with a Silicon Valley start-up and became a self-made millionaire by the age of twenty-three. College and law school for Robyn, followed by three years of hustle in a boutique law firm before her dreams shattered when a drunk driver crashed head on into her husband's Porsche. He died on impact, leaving Robyn to raise their nine-year-old son. Financially, she is set for life, so the move across the country smells like a cop-out escape. All in all, she has complications written all over her. I neither have the energy to hold the hand of a grieving widow nor play daddy to a fatherless boy on the brink of adolescence.

But fuck me, she has been occupying my mind for hours. She is almost like a fatal addiction.

The sliding doors to my study open and Angela's heavy perfume wafts behind me. She snakes her arms around my neck. "Why aren't you coming to bed?"

"I'm working."

"But I'm lonely." She skates a killer nail down the smooth skin of my sternum. "Come on, baby, let's go to bed."

I tilt my head back and find her eyes. "Why are you running your mouth when you could put those lips to good use?"

A vertical crease forms above her nose. She hates it when I talk shit to her, but I couldn't care less. I raise my brows and the defiant spark in her cat-green eyes fades. She is one second away from being kicked to the curb. Permanently.

Walking around me, she drops to her knees; I angle the chair and manspread to give her easy access. She pulls down the zipper of my pants. My cock is soft and I lean my head back, closing my eyes. Her mouth captures my shaft and she sucks hard, but the usual pleasure fails to stir in my groin. If anything, her wet lips feel unpleasant. Exhaling, I look down at her submissive stance. It's usually a mega turn-on, but she can't even get me hard.

I pinch the bridge of my nose. "Go home, Angela."

"Awe, what's the matter, baby?" She strokes my cock, circling her thumb around the tip.

When she is about to lick my length, I fist a handful of her hair. "I. Said. Go. Home." It's apparent I'm not in the mood, so why do I have to spell it out? With the smudged lipstick and the smeared mascara, she looks more like a creep than an attractive woman. Not sure what I ever saw in her. "And make sure to get all your stuff because it's over."

"But Nick—"

"Shush and go." Getting off the chair, I step around her and pull out my phone to dial Fabrizio's number. His "hello" is lazy with sleep.

"Sorry, but you need to take me into the city."

A grunt evidences his annoyance. "Why are we going to Manhattan this late?"

My gaze flicks to the clock on the mantel. Fuck, it's almost two o'clock in the morning. "I have to check on something."

Angela is back to her feet, her face one mask of anger. Judging by the vicious spark in her eyes, she might trash my place without considering that this would be a death sentence.

I step into the foyer and jut my chin at the bodyguard loitering by the door. He's a new dude and I don't even know his name. "I'm gonna run an errand with Fabrizio, so make sure she's gone by the time I get back. And don't leave her out of your sight. If she brakes something, it'll come out of your paycheck."

"Understood, sir. Do you want me to call for another bodyguard."

"No, it's fine." My Glock is safely tucked in its holster under my armpit and I'm not intending to get into a confrontation. This trip is strictly geared to gather intelligence on a woman who has irked me for hours. Best case scenario, I don't even have to get out of the car.

~~~~

The drive into the city takes almost forty-five minutes; by the time Fabrizio pulls the limo onto the curb by Central Park, I'm so fired up that the muscles in my thighs twitch with tension. I stare at the building across the road. Dark windows glare back. This part of the East Side houses the rich and the famous, and people tend sleep in the middle of the night. Not sure why I expected any differently.

With a sigh, I drop my head against the back of the seat. What am I doing? I'm acting irrational and this trip was totally pointless. I crave to see her, just a glimpse will be enough.

"Fabrizio, do you think you can get to the backdoor?"

"I'm sure I can, but this is 5th Avenue. Every single door will be secured and blasting it open will set off an alarm."

I grin. That's the idea. A blaring fire alarm will force tenants to vacate the building. "I'll pay you five hundred bucks if you get it done in the next ten minutes."

He turns around in his seat, his brows raised. "You want me to set off an alarm and alert the cops?"

"Yep, and if you also smash in one of those small fire button windows, the better."

He smacks his lips, the money signs practically setting his eyes on fire. "You got it." Getting out of the car, he dashes across the street and disappears around the corner of Robyn's building.

The sudden silence and cramped space of the limo gets the better of me. I loosen the tie and open the top buttons of my dress shirt, but the cagey sensation remains. When I try to lower it, the window doesn't respond. With a sigh, I open the car door to let the cold night air clear my head. The tingling in my thigh muscles is now so strong that it's almost painful. I hop out of the car and stretch until my joints pop. Inhaling deeply, I jump up and down to kill the tension in my legs.

"Nice wheels."

I turn my head. Three youth who couldn't be older than sixteen glare at me from the shadows of the park; one pulls himself up to stand on the low wall. When he grins, his teeth glisten in the glow streaming from the red traffic light. Hunkering down, he drops onto the sidewalk on my side of the wall. One of his buddies follows, the last one is smart enough to stay far out of my reach.

When the first dude exhales, a cloud of cheap beer drifts my way. "You got a few bucks to spare for a subway ticket?"

Even in the dim light of the streetlamp, I can see his wide pupils. The kid is high as a kite.

"Bro, you picked the wrong guy. Fuck off."

When he flinches, I reach for the grip of my gun. The fucker has the audacity to take a step closer and gets all up in my grill.

"Gimme your wallet."

I pull the Glock and lodge it under his chin. "You got two seconds to walk away or I'll smoke your ass."

He actually laughs, though his chuckle is more like the cackling of a hyena. "Rich fucker like you won't shoot me right here in the middle of the street. You're too scared that one of your neighbors sees you and you end up in jail."

Boy, he really has no idea whom he's talking to. A fire alarm siren breaks the stillness of the night; it's the perfect background sound to drown out the crack of the discharging weapon. The bullet only grazes the youth's earlobe; hopefully it's enough to convince him that I mean business. For a beat, he stands frozen in place, blinking as if he couldn't believe I just shot him, but then he gets his ass into gear and takes off. His buddy stares at me with his mouth hanging wide open; when I point my gun at him, he yelps and drops to the ground.

I roll my eyes.

Idiot.

"Get the fuck out of here," I growl.

He runs down the street as if chased by the devil himself. I peek over the low wall to confirm that the third dude has disappeared. Sliding my gun back into the holster, I click my tongue. Motherfuckers who rob and steal loiter at every corner, and don't even get me started on all the scammers terrorizing the internet.

What is the world coming to?

Fabrizio rejoins me, just as the first tenants flood out of Robyn's building. Opening the car door for me, he frowns. "You okay, boss?"

"Yeah, why?"

"You got blood on your jacket."

I rub over the wet spot with my thumb, which makes it worse. This will need to be dry cleaned. Fucking hassle.

I get back into the car and slip out of the jacket, folding it and laying it next to me on the seat. Through the window, I watch as tenant after tenant walks through the front door. No Robyn. What is taking her so long?

Sirens blare in the distance. In this area of the city, the fire department and the cops will come to the rescue of taxpayers within minutes. It's very different from the neighborhood I grew up in. The whole residential block could be engulfed in flames and the fire squad wouldn't give a damn.

I crane my neck to scan the crowd—and then I see her. She had sense enough to slip on a heavy wool coat that hides everything including those magnificent curves, though her hair is open and cascades halfway down her back. It's wild and untamed and I'd pay big money to run my fingers through her curls to pull her mouth to my lips. My cock jumps. Fuck, the woman is gorgeous.

A boy of maybe nine or ten is chatting her ear off. That must be the son. Laughter and joy cling around their heads like halos and for the first time in my life, I'm jealous to be excluded from a conversation. I lift my phone and shoot a series of photos. Zooming in, I take a few more close-ups of her face. These will hold me over until I see her again.

I lower the phone. The sirens are now so close that the emergency vehicles will soon block the road. Risky since I could get discovered; a beyond embarrassing prospect.

"Let's go, Fabrizio."

He pulls away from the curb and I raise the tinted window that separates the front of the limo from the back. My cock throbs with need and I crave a release. Unzipping my pants, I free my erection from its confinement and angle the phone in a way that I look straight at her picture. I focus on her eyes, imagining her hand around my shaft. My breath comes out in shaky spurts.

Yes, baby, that's it.

Her grip provides just the right amount of friction and the heat is building fast. I exhale with a growled moan. A few strokes and I explode. The force of the orgasm ripping through me is so hard that I choke on my spit.

Shit.

Leaning back against the seat, I try to slow my ragged breath. My heart races in my chest and I close my eyes to indulge in the aftershocks. I need this woman in my bed. Pronto. Otherwise, those upcoming nights will be pure torture.

So Nick can't get Robyn out of his head while she is clueless that she has a stalker on her ass. Will he be able to win her over or will she find out who he is before he gets her between the sheets? All theories welcome, and let me know in the comments if you enjoyed the chapter. A vote would make my day. Thanks for reading and checking out the new chapter.