She blinked. Right—the getaway. “Sorry. The rubber band?”

While Kyle went to look in the bathroom, Rylann slipped on her dress and left the bedroom. In the hallway, she found her purse—a small clutch that held her cell phone, keys, and, thankfully, mints. She popped one in her mouth and stole a look in a large framed mirror in the foyer.

Great. Crazy hair and no makeup.

“Try this.” Kyle came up behind her in the mirror and held out his hand.

Rylann looked down and saw a black hair band in his palm. “Something one of the models left behind?”

He threw her a look. “No, it’s mine. The freakishly lustrous, shampoo-commercial hair is a pain in the ass if I don’t pull it back while running.”

With a smile, Rylann took the band and began combing her fingers through her hair. “I can’t picture you with a ponytail.”

“It’s not a ponytail. I just pull back the sides and top.”

“Ah. Like a partial updo.”

“Remember the thing I said last night? About being a burr up my ass?”

Indeed, she did. He’d said it right after giving her two of the best orgasms of her life. And then had followed it up with two more.

Pushing the memories from her mind, she pulled back to inspect her hair, which she’d wrangled into a bumpy, messy ponytail. “Probably not as fancy as your updos, but it’ll have to do.”

Then she met Kyle’s gaze in the mirror. “Last night was great.”

His expression was uncharacteristically unreadable. “That’s supposed to be my line.”

And she had no doubt he’d said it plenty of times. But that was neither here nor there. She managed a coy smile. “You should feel free to say it, too,” she joked.

He turned her around, lowered his head, and softly kissed her lips. “Last night was great.”

Since there was nothing more to say, Rylann stepped back and headed toward the front door. She noticed now that he’d thrown on a pair of jeans after looking for the hair band, and she realized that this would probably be her last image of Kyle Rhodes—sexy, bare chested, and barefoot in his jeans, standing in his foyer as they said good-bye.

She turned and grabbed the handle, about to open the door, when he stopped her.

“Rylann—wait.”

Her heart skipped a beat as he crossed the foyer with a serious look in his eyes, reaching his arm out to—

—pull up the zipper of her dress.

“I just noticed that,” he said.

“Right. Thanks.” She unlocked the door and opened it. “So we’ll…talk.”

“You know where to find me, counselor.”

Then Rylann stepped out into the hallway and walked to the elevators. As she pushed the down button, she heard the soft click of the lock behind her.

Twenty-two

“AND THEN YOU just left?”

Rylann shrugged at Rae’s question. “What else was I supposed to do?”

They’d scored an outdoor table at Kitsch’n, a popular neighborhood brunch place a few blocks from her apartment. Naturally, she’d called Rae that afternoon for the post-sexcapades debriefing.

Rylann drizzled syrup over her coconut-crusted French toast, continuing on as Rae took a sip of her mimosa. “It’s not like we were going to run out for coffee and pancakes. Last night was fun, but that’s all it was.”

Rae raised an eyebrow. “How much fun?”

Rylann grinned mischievously. “Three rounds of fun. Including one in the shower.” She cheekily took a bite of her French toast, saying nothing further.

Rae laughed. “Wow. Clearly, I need to find myself an ex-con. Since prison is probably the only place in this city I haven’t looked for Mr. Right yet,” she added dryly.

“What about the guy at the bar last night?” Rylann asked. “You were talking to him for a while.”

Rae sighed. “He was nice, I don’t know…” She shrugged, discouraged. “I keep waiting for this magic moment where I meet a guy and just know. But maybe that’s not what my story’s going to be.” She looked at Rylann and waved this off. “Ignore me. I don’t want to talk about my nonexistent love life today.”

“Are you sure?” Rylann asked. Actually, she had an idea on that front—she’d been trying to come up with a sneaky way to introduce Rae to a certain single, good-looking, all-American male prosecutor at the U.S. Attorney’s Office—but she didn’t have the details worked out yet. She needed to tread cautiously on that front, since Rae hated setups.

“Very sure.” Rae said emphatically. “Let’s get back to the part where you hightailed it out of the multimillion-dollar penthouse of the gorgeous billionaire heir who obviously has the hots for you big-time. You bitch.” She smiled. “Whoops. Did I just say that out loud?”

Rylann pooh-poohed this with a wave of her own. “That gorgeous billionaire heir is doing just fine. Trust me, Kyle Rhodes is not pining away in his penthouse for me. The guy goes through women faster than I go through legal pads.”

“Yeah, but you heard what his friend Dex said. About how Kyle was grinning like a fool after walking you home the night you met.”

Rylann paused at that. That was a really cute story. But still. “That was nine years ago, Rae. A lot has happened since then. He’s not some unknown, charmingly irritating grad student in a flannel shirt and work boots anymore.” She looked around, lowering her voice. “He’s the Twitter Terrorist. And I’m an assistant U.S. attorney. There’s only so far this can go. My office prosecuted Kyle just six months ago. Called him a ‘cyber-menace to society.’ Do you know how awkward it would be at work if anyone found out that he and I were sleeping together?”