The answer was easy. There was only one thing she needed. "I need to come, Colin. Please, I need to come so badly."

In a flash he rose, lifted her, and set her on her feet. She turned around and skimmed off her panties. He sank down on the end of the chair.

"Unzip my pants," he told her. With greedy, eager fingers, she bent forward and did as he asked, tugging his pants to his thighs, then his boxer briefs, freeing his c.o.c.k. Her mouth watered as she stared at his erection-hard, heavy, and so f.u.c.king long. So many glorious, gorgeous inches that she loved to take deep inside her.

He pressed a condom into her hand, and she quickly opened it then rolled it on him, stopping only when she spotted the new ink on his hip. A simple black phoenix, akin to a stencil design. It matched the lotus, like he'd said. Matched it in symbolism.

"For new beginnings," she whispered softly, tracing it with her fingertip. It mesmerized her, the art and lines, the placement on his body, but she shook off her reaction because she didn't want to think of beginnings. She wanted to think only of ending this epic ache in her body.

She straddled him. His fingers grasped her hips, and she lowered herself onto his shaft. She was ready to build a shrine, to make holy offerings, because he was divine. Anyone who said size didn't matter had never experienced the unmitigated erotic joy of this kind of c.o.c.k filling her up. Yeah, the motion of the ocean mattered, but so did the size of the boat. Long, thick, and steely, his d.i.c.k operated like a precision-timed machine of pleasure.

She moaned, stilling for just a moment to savor that delicious stretch of taking him all the way in, her slippery heat coating his c.o.c.k. "I almost forgot how good you feel," she said as she started to move on him.

"That would be a d.a.m.n shame. We shouldn't let that happen," he said, thrusting up into her.

She clenched around him. "No, we shouldn't because this is..."

Words stopped forming as he drove into her. Gripping her hips, he jerked her down harder, filling her deeper.

"This is what, Elle?" he asked, his voice a s.e.xy taunt, urging her on.

"Intense," she said on an exhale, as he filled her so deliriously she nearly screamed. She was vaguely aware that there could be people nearby-workers, waiters, bartenders-and she somehow found the will not to sing and shout her pleasure to the stars. But she felt it. The intensity thrummed in her bones, sizzled across her skin. "Incredible. It's so incredible," she said on a moan, as he thrust into her.

Then, because he was a f.u.c.king expert, because he'd studied all the shortcuts to her pleasure, he looped his fingers in her hair and pulled hard, exposing her throat to him. That was like an electric burst of ecstasy.

"f.u.c.king you is the best," he said, layering kisses onto her skin. "You get so wet, and I love how it feels to slide into you over and over."

"Tell me how it makes you feel," she said, losing touch with the earth as he talked to her, his dirty words sending her into a tailspin. The way he spoke to her was such an insane turn on, and she was already aroused beyond her own comprehension. He kissed the hollow of her throat and drove his c.o.c.k deep into her.

"It's f.u.c.king extraordinary. Being inside you is extraordinary. And I love it when you come on me." He slid a finger between her legs, brushed it lightly against her c.l.i.t, and her lips parted, forming an O. A silent, glorious O, containing all the pleasure in the universe. He'd flipped that switch, pushing her from chasing an o.r.g.a.s.m to falling apart in his arms. She shuddered, pleasure wracking her cells, racing through her to flood every corner.

Helpless to stay quiet, she felt her silent cry turn to an audible moan as she shouted the beginning of his name. He clamped a hand over her mouth, covering her noises as he thrust up into her like a mad man on a frenzied ride, desperate to follow her to the other side. He f.u.c.ked her as aftershocks rippled through her, the sensation spreading to her fingers and toes.

As her moans subsided, he dropped his hand from her mouth and gripped her waist. She opened her eyes, watching him, loving the way he looked when he came. Nothing was s.e.xier, nothing was hotter than watching the man she wanted lose control.

All for her.

She didn't understand why, but somehow she was his undoing.

And he was hers.

He f.u.c.ked her into his own release, his eyes squeezed shut and his face contorted in pleasure. He grunted, and groaned her name before biting her collarbone, holding in all his sounds, too, as he came.

"We can't stop," she whispered, voicing the most dangerous words. Words she shouldn't say. But her body had the reins, making decisions for her, seeking more bliss.

"We can't and we shouldn't," he murmured, layering soft kisses on her neck.

Soon, as they came down from their high and her senses reattuned to the world around her, the tinkling of gla.s.ses reached her ears. The after party was starting...

Which meant.

She was about to become a pumpkin.

From inside her clutch purse, the alarm sounded on her phone.

"I have to go. My mom has a shift at eleven. I told her I'd be home by ten-thirty."

"I'll walk you to your car," he said.

In the parking garage, he cupped her cheek gently, pressed his lips to hers, and gave her a sweet good-bye kiss that would linger on the whole way home.

He whispered, "Go."

In three minutes, she was on the road, rushing to return home to her son.

CHAPTER FIVE.

Her mother's head was bent over the kitchen counter, her fingers swiping in a wild blur across her phone screen.

"Gotcha, flesh-eater!"

"Saving the world, Mom?" Elle asked, as she closed the front door to her apartment.

"Somebody has to fend off the infected," her mom said with a final slide before she looked up and closed the game.

Elle laughed. "I thought you were giving it up. You said it was giving you video game thumb or something."

Her mother shook her head, her bouncy ponytail swinging with her. "I tried. Oh lord, you know I tried. But your son... He plays a mean game of Dying Light, and he challenged me. I can't back down."

"You're going to need to work on State of Decay next. Alex and his buddies are moving on in the apocalypse gaming world," Elle said, dropping her keys on the counter and giving her mom a peck on the cheek. Her mother wore green scrubs with Snoopys and Woodstocks on them. "How was he tonight?"

"Fine. Just fine. I plied him with pizza and schooled him with my survival skills."

"No easier way to the heart of a fourteen-year-old boy, is there?" While there was plenty of truth in her statement, for her son, video games weren't just the snack-food-and-candy path to winning his teenage heart-they were essential to his emotional survival. They were the difference between him talking and not talking.

Between speech and a complete breakdown.

Some parents might worry that their kids played too many video games, and while Elle set limits, she also knew what they meant for him. Because the time before? It was the end of the world. Black, empty, cold. A true pit of despair. In those dark days, she'd have given anything-a lung, a kidney, a limb-for him to talk to her. He'd shut down after his father died, completely withered, barely able to utter a word except for the essentials-yes, no, I don't know.

Understandable, given what he'd witnessed in their home on that night three years ago.

Somehow games, zombies, and post-apocalyptic stories became a portal for him. Elle never would have predicted it, but on the days after school when Alex would come by the center, he was drawn to the gaming room, and to the raucous energy of the boys shouting at the screen. After a year of being so traumatized by what he saw he'd gone nearly mute, video games reconnected the voice inside him to the rest of the world. They unlocked the part of him that he'd kept quiet, and how she loved to hear him shouting with his friends.

G.o.d bless the living dead.

And The Walking Dead, too. Alex's favorite show had become a key part of Elle's lexicon, since she had to stay up to speed with Sheriff Rick Grimes in order to converse with her son again. Zombies. Who would have thought zombies would rescue her son from the near-catatonic state that the death of his father had sent him into?

Her mother tucked the phone into her purse and gathered up her keys. "How was the benefit? Did you meet your goals?" Her mom held up her hand and twisted her index finger around her middle finger. "I had 'em crossed all night for you."

"We did. It was amazing," Elle said, and quickly gave a recap of the night. Well, the pre-pool-deck portion of the night.

Her mom beamed, then pumped a fist in the air and did a victory dance in the kitchen. "I knew it, I knew it, I knew it!"

The woman had amazing energy.

Elle's mom was pretty much the youngest grandma around. Like Elle, she'd started early when it came to baby making. Her mother was only eighteen when Elle was born. Barely fifty now, her mom poured her ample energy into her two grown daughters, her grandkids, her job as a nurse, and even her new boyfriend. She'd put herself through nursing school when Elle and her younger sister were toddlers, shuttling back and forth between day care and cla.s.s, struggling to make ends meet with two little kids all to herself. She'd wanted different things for her daughters, and she'd achieved that with Camille, who'd wisely waited 'til she was out of college and married before getting knocked up.

Not Elle.

The bun unknowingly went in the oven on the night of high school graduation, when the condom broke with Sam, the guy who became her on-again-off-again boyfriend, then eventually her husband, then her nearly ex-husband, since she'd been separated from him the last few years of his life while he was on-again-and-off-again in all sorts of ways. On drugs. Off drugs. In rehab. Out of rehab. Like a merry-go-round that gave her whiplash and nothing else but heartache.

"I am so proud of you, baby," her mom said, walking around the counter and clasping Elle in a big hug. "You worked so hard for this, and those kids need you. You have done so much for them."

Her throat hitched. "I'm lucky to work with them."

Her mom stiffened and wrenched back, narrowing her eyes. "Young lady, didn't you have your hair up when you left?" She arched an all-knowing eyebrow that somehow had the power to see right through her daughter.

But Elle wasn't eighteen. She was thirty-two, and she didn't have to hide her activities. Elle patted her mussed-up hair, then raised her chin up high. "I did have it up, but someone took it down."

Her mother held up a palm to high-five her then snapped it back. "Say you used protection. Did you use a condom, young lady?"

Elle rolled her eyes. "Yes, Mommy. I used a condom," she said in a sing-song voice. "And I'm on the pill. So don't worry your pretty little head about me."

"As if I could ever not worry about my baby girl," she scoffed. "Wait. Was it good? Will we see him around here?"

Elle shook her head.

"It wasn't good?"

Elle laughed. "Yes. It was amazing, as in out-of-this-world epic, incredible. But no, you won't see him around. He's not the type of guy I can have a relationship with."

"Why not? Is he an a.s.shole?"

"Definitely not."

Her mom parked her hands on her hips. "Then what is it?"

Elle shooed her to the door. "Get out of here. You're going to be late for your shift. You have fifteen minutes to get to the hospital." Her mom fixed her with a stare that said this conversation isn't over, missy, and Elle rolled her eyes. "I love you, but you need to skedaddle. Thank you again."

"Anytime," she said and walked out. But in two seconds, she popped the door back open and held up a finger. "And 'anytime' also applies if you want to booty call this epic, incredible, out-of-this-world guy again, and you need a warm body here. You know where to find me. Because I've got some flesh-eaters to destroy with my grandson."

"Your booty call offer is duly noted," Elle said, then shut and locked the door and walked down the hall to check on her son. Alex was sound asleep, curled up under the covers, air conditioning rattling loudly in his pigsty bedroom. His dark hair was a wild mess and would be sticking up in all directions in the morning. She bent down and dropped a quick kiss on his forehead.

"Night, sleepy boy," she said, then left his room and returned to the living room where she sank down on the couch.

And waited.

Waited to feel the regret.

Waited to feel the shame.

Waited to feel the sting of her bad choices.

She sat, watching the clock, then closed her eyes, trying to meditate, aiming to let her mind clear so she would feel all the things she was supposed to feel after sleeping with a man like Colin. All the things that gnawed at her and vexed her. That nagged and twisted away at her heart. The things that would cement her decision to make this the last time with him.

When she opened her eyes, she didn't feel any of those things. Not a one.

Instead, she simply felt...good.

What the h.e.l.l? She wasn't supposed to feel okay. Being with Colin broke promises. She needed to feel like s.h.i.t so she wouldn't go there again with that man.

Maybe a distraction would let the feeling sneak up on her. Leaning forward, she grabbed the game controller from the coffee table and turned on the TV. Lowering the volume so as not to wake her son, she proceeded to blast through a town of the infected, quickly clearing several blocks of zombies as night fell in video-game land. When a flesh-eater appeared out of nowhere, she panicked.

"You need to run away."

Pausing the game, Elle leaned her head back and looked up at her son. "I do?"

With his rumpled hair, basketball shorts, and gray T-shirt, he walked around the couch, and parked himself next to her. "Yeah, you don't have to fight the super zombies every time. If you successfully run away from them, you can level up your agility skills."

"My agility skills suck," Elle admitted, then added, "Why are you up?"

"Had to pee. Is that a crime?"

"Not that I'm aware of. I'll let you know if that changes though."

Alex laughed and grabbed the controller. "I'll show you how to run away from the zombies."

"Run! Run! C'mon you can do it," she said in a rah-rah voice to the big screen.

He swiveled his head to stare at her, then rolled his eyes. Typical fourteen-year-old. "No cheering, Mom. Anyway, here's how it's done," he said, turning the game back on and demonstrating his speed and skill in evading the enemy. "Now, we just need to get back to the safe house."

"So does this count if you're playing for me?"

He nodded. "Of course. I'm like your pinch hitter."

"When we enter the Xbox tournament, can you just fill in for me when I get in a pickle?"

"If there's a tournament and you're holding out on letting me play in it, you're in big trouble," he said, his voice deepening on the final words as he attacked bad guys on the screen.

"Hey! Your voice just went all crazy low there," she said, in her own imitation of a baritone. Alex had been hovering in voice-changing limbo for so long she was sure he was going to set some kind of record. While his friends paraded in and out of the home with Al Greene-esque vocal stylings as they sailed over that cusp of adolescence, Alex was still swinging in between the higher-pitched boy's voice and the deeper notes of an older teen.