“I still can’t believe he actually said that,” Laurie says without taking her eyes off Adam Levine being super sexy on The Voice.

“Me neither.” I frown into my box of Chinese takeout. “I mean who even says stuff like that?”

“What exactly do you have a problem with?” Brett asks. He’s sitting beside Laurie on the couch, feeding her from his own takeout. “Is it the wording, or the intention conveyed?”

I scowl at him. “I have a problem with everything—getting me to go his lounge under false pretenses then pretending he didn’t know who I was. Just who does he think he is anyway?”

“Hush,” Laurie complains as some teenage girl with knee-high suede boots starts to sing a country number.

“I think you should fuck him,” Brett whispers. “You obviously want to, and you already did before, so…” He shrugs.

“I agree,” Laurie adds, looking away from the screen long enough to give me an encouraging smile.

“Definitely not,” I reply, getting up. “I’m going to bed. Apparently, you two have no idea what a one-night stand means.”

“There’s no law that says you can’t have a repeat,” Laurie calls after me. I ignore her and dump my takeout box in the trash then go to my room to get ready for bed. When I finally lie down and close my eyes, all I can think of is Landon, and those words repeating in my ear like an erotic refrain.

I want to fuck you again.

In a shameless part of me, I admit that I want the same thing. I’ve wanted it since I set my eyes on him at the Insomnia Lounge. Thankfully, there’s another part of me that’s sensible enough to be infuriated at him.

I always get what I want.

“Well, good luck with that,” I mutter to myself, tossing on the bed. I’m most definitely not going to sleep with him again. I’m not interested in a guy who thinks he can own the world just by wanting it. It doesn’t even matter how sexy he is. I won’t be adding myself to the list of women he can get into bed just by saying something as raw as ‘I want to fuck you again.’

Out of curiosity, I open the browser on my phone and run a search on him with ‘girlfriends’ as one of the keywords. The articles that come up in the results are mostly from the New York gossip sites, with pictures of him with various women, including a few famous ones. The articles allude to romantic connections between him and some of his dates, but most of the allusions seem to have been based only on rumors. I wonder if he approached all the other women as directly as he approached me.

I want to fuck you again.

Jesus!

I put the phone away and close my eyes. There’s no point in reading about his past relationships when I should be banishing him from my mind, memories of great sex and all.

The first step is to stop thinking about him, and I will, starting tonight.

I try my best, but by the time I finally fall asleep sometime later, I’ve already failed miserably.

I do better the next day, burying myself in work and writing up a storm. At lunchtime, I walk down to a nearby deli with Chelsea and Sonali Nagra, a cute new Indian intern who speaks with a British accent despite growing up on Park Avenue and who insists that her home is in Mumbai even though she’s been there only once in her life. Her dream is to work at Gilt Style, the most popular of the Gilt magazines, and after that, to launch her own couture line. Over lunch, we gossip about people from the office and laugh about the more ridiculous articles Chelsea has had to write lately.

“I finally saw Jack Weyland yesterday,” Sonali exclaims at some point, running perfectly manicured fingers through her coal black hair. “He looks even better in person. I swear when I got scorned at Gilt Style, I accepted the position at Traveler just so I could work with him.”

Chelsea looks from Sonali to me, and I shrug, making it clear that I don’t care if we talk about Jack.

“You shouldn’t have taken the position then,” Chelsea says sympathetically. “He never dips his dick in the office ink.”

“Plus he’s engaged now,” I add, chuckling silently at Sonali’s obvious disappointment.

“I’m more worried about his attitude about office relationships than his engagement,” she replies, her eyes serious. “Claudia Sever has broken three engagements in the past two years, and everyone knows the person she really wants is Reese Fletcher, the billionaire. They’ve been on and off for ages.”

I wonder if she could be right. When it comes to gossip and fashion, Sonali always knows what she’s talking about. However, instead of the sick relief I would have felt in the past at the knowledge that Jack might soon be available again, I just feel uninterested.

“Speaking of hot men, I saw Landon Court in the building yesterday,” Chelsea grins. “Now that’s a big girl’s Jack Weyland. I wonder what he was doing there.”

I feign ignorance by keeping silent as they both speculate about the person whose name I’ve already decided to banish from my thoughts.

“I wouldn’t mind the brother,” Sonali says with a sigh. “He’s doing a play on Broadway right now, though it’s still in the preview stage. Some of my friends went, hoping to catch a glimpse of him.” She lowers her voice. “There’s something about guys with tragic stories. My mom says both brothers were in the car with their mother when she had the accident. Landon pulled Aidan out and then had to watch as the car burned with his mother inside.”

“That’s so awful,” I exclaim, unable to imagine how painful it must have been, how painful it must still be for him.

Sonali shakes her head. “Yes, but they were both uninjured. Poor things.”

“Yes, poor things,” Chelsea says. “But enough with the sad stories. I still want to know what Landon Court was doing in our building.”

“Maybe he’s planning to take over Gilt,” I quip. “Takeovers are the new conquests.”

“Well, I wouldn’t mind working for him.” She grins. “Or under him, depending on what he prefers.”

It’s an innocent statement, but my reaction to it, a mixture of possessiveness and fierce jealousy, startles me. I shouldn’t care if my beautiful colleague finds Landon attractive. He’s nothing to me.

“I doubt he’s available,” I point out, unable to let it go.

“Yeah.” Chelsea sighs. “But a girl can dream.”

WE walk back, with Sonali doing a running commentary on every hot guy we pass on the street. By the time I get to my office, I’m still laughing a little, but my thoughts soon go back to Landon and the things Sonali said about his mother’s death.

I do a quick search on my computer, looking for old archived news reports from twenty years ago. It’s not hard to find a report on the accident.

Even before I start to read the article, my heart breaks at the picture of two boys—both wrapped in blankets, the little one looking confused while the older one, Landon, has the most heartbreakingly sad expression. Next to that is a picture of a beautiful couple, his parents.

I start to read the article. The car skidded off the road and somersaulted a couple of times. According to an eyewitness–a teenager who stopped his car a few minutes after the accident occurred and called an ambulance–Landon emerged from the car carrying his little brother, but the car started to burn immediately after, and by the time the ambulance reached them, it had been too late for Alicia Creighton Court.

Oh Landon. To witness all that! He must have been devastated.

My desk phone starts to ring. Reluctantly, I abandon my perusal of the article and answer the call.

“Hello.”

“I’m just confirming that you’re back from lunch.” Carol Mendez’s voice is, as usual, brusque and efficient.

“Why?”

“Jessica wants to see you.”

I frown, a sense of déjà vu creeping into my spine. “Now?”

“Well, not tomorrow.” I hear her say something, not to me. Then her voice comes back on the line. “Sit tight. She’s on her way.”

I hear a click as the line goes dead. Jessica Layner is coming to see me? If that isn’t strange, I don’t know what is. I close the browser and arrange a stack of sheets on my desk, wondering what she wants. I just know, somehow, that this has something to do with Landon.

Jessica pauses at the door to my office, her eyes taking in the space as if she can’t quite believe how small it is. She looks stylish in a cream sheath dress and scarlet heels. There’s a rumor that the powerful women in the Gilt organization are perpetually in competition, which is why they always look on point and demand perfection in every single aspect of their magazines.

She takes a step inside the room and closes the door behind her. I get up from my seat, and she waves a hand. “Oh sit,” she says lightly. “I’m not the president.”

I sit my ass back on the chair, confused. She walks to the window and stares out. “You haven’t got much of a view have you?”

“It’s adequate.”

She shrugs, then turns around to looks at me. “There’s a hotel in San Francisco, the Gold Dust Hotel. It’s one of those old, classy places.” She looks at me to see if I’m following. “Landon Court purchased it some time ago from the original owners, and it’s been undergoing renovations ever since.”

I wait for her to continue, not sure where I come in but already knowing deep down that Landon has initiated something I won’t like.

“I’ve already heard that it’s going to be a top destination in San Francisco, and he has the most renowned interior designers as part of the project team,” she says. “About a month ago I approached him about doing an article in Gilt, a glimpse into the new hotel for our readers. He wasn’t interested.” She pauses. “Then last week, his assistant calls to arrange a promotional article for a lounge he owns. And yesterday, he was here, asking to see you and offering me the article about the Gold Dust.”

I frown. “I’m not… I don’t think it has anything to do with me.”

She raises her perfect brows. “You don’t?”

I shake my head. “Maybe he decided he needed the publicity for his hotel after all.”

Her eyes assess me for a moment. “When you applied to Gilt, you wanted a position at Gilt Review—why?”

I studied English Literature, and I’ve always wanted to have a career that had something to do with books and literature. “I thought it would be the right fit for me.”

She waves a hand in a dismissive gesture. “There’s no such thing as a right fit. You have to take ownership of wherever you find yourself, make it fit you.” She stops and gives me a look. “You’ve applied yourself very well here. You won’t have a problem going to San Francisco to write about the transformation of the Gold Dust, will you?”

I choke on air. “You want me to go to San Francisco to write about Landon Court’s hotel?”

“Don’t you want to?”

I swallow. “I’m not sure… I’ve never handled anything like that.”

She gives me a questioning look. “I would have thought you’d be sick of all those promotional articles by now. You’re not a hack. This is a real assignment. It’s going to be a main feature.” She walks over to my desk. “I’m not in the habit of visiting associates in their offices, but I want to know if there’s a conflict, any reason you can’t do it.”

I hesitate. Do I really want to tell my boss I don’t want to take an assignment because I think the owner of the property I’m going to be writing about, a billionaire with properties around the world, wants to get into my pants? And Landon, God! I wonder if writing the feature would mean seeing him again. I can’t lie to myself—I want to see him, especially after the article I just read about him. “I would love to do the feature,” I hear myself saying. “I’m glad you considered me.”

Jessica nods. “The travel arrangements are being made on his end. You’ll be meeting with Tony Gillies at the Swanson Court Tower to discuss logistics. Is that okay?”

“It’s fine.”

‘That’s all then.” She taps a perfectly manicured nail on my desk. “All the best.”

An hour later, I’m climbing out of a taxi in front of the impressive mixed-use office and residential high-rise that is the SCT building. As I walk toward the revolving doors, I catch a glimpse of myself in the reflective glass walls. I’m wearing a gray pencil skirt, a light green silk blouse, and black pumps with my hair held back on one side with a rhinestone barrette. I pause for a moment to check that the little makeup I applied before leaving the office looks okay, and then I mutter an unladylike curse and keep walking, unwilling to accept that Landon is the real reason I’m so concerned about my appearance.

Screw him, I think resentfully as I give my name to the security at the front desk. They’re apparently expecting me, and they hand me a visitor’s pass to enable me to cross the turnstiles between the doors and the elevator bank.

“Sixty-second floor,” one of the guards informs me.

“Thank you,” I reply, still thinking of Landon. I have no doubt he has engineered this whole thing because he thinks he can use it to get me into his bed, but I’m determined to disappoint him.

On the sixty-second floor, the elevator doors slide open, revealing a spacious reception room with a large marble desk and a TV screen overlooking a plush seating area. I step out of the elevator a second before an almost invisible glass partition between the elevator bank and the reception area slides open, allowing me to walk toward the reception desk. There, an immaculately dressed girl with cropped black hair and glasses is waiting for me with a friendly smile.

“Good afternoon, Miss Foster,” she says cheerily.

“Good afternoon,” I reply, waiting as she scans my visitor card. While I wait, another set of glass doors slide open and a sharp-looking guy steps into the reception area. He’s about my height, and like the receptionist, he’s perfectly dressed in a trendy suit, his short curly hair neatly framing his face.

“Hello,” he starts, extending his hand. “You must be Miss Foster from Gilt. I’m Tony Gillies, Mr. Court’s assistant. We’ll be discussing the logistics for your trip in his office. Please follow me.”

In his office? “Landon—Mr. Court is going to be there?” I ask, suddenly tense.

“Yes.” Tony nods and then starts to walk, giving me no choice but to follow him through the sliding glass doors into a long wide corridor with glass partitioned offices on one side and conference rooms on the other. At the end of the corridor, there’s another set of glass doors that lead into a large office with two desks and a sitting area. One of the desks is occupied by a woman speaking into a set of headphones in a language that sounds like Italian, though I can’t say for sure because I’m totally hopeless at any language that’s not English. She doesn’t look up when we enter.

“Please take a seat,” Tony says, the picture of formal efficiency. He glances at his watch. “Mr. Court is in a meeting at the moment, but it will be over in a few minutes. Would you like anything to drink?”

I shake my head. “No.”

He nods then retreats behind the second desk in the room. As I wait, I use the time to look around. On one side of the room, there’s a wall of some sort of frosted glass with a door in the middle. I’m guessing it’s the door to Landon’s office when it opens and three men pour out of the room beyond, talking quietly among themselves. Through the open doorway, I catch a glimpse of Landon seated at the head of a conference table. He’s looking at some papers on the table, a frown of concentration on his perfect face. I can’t tear my eyes away from him. I would keep on staring, but the doors close, blocking him from my view.

“We can go in now.” Tony is already standing by my side. I also stand, nervously smoothing my skirt. Why am I so anxious? I have nothing to be worried about—nothing apart from being in the same room as Landon again.

I follow Tony to the door, waiting as he holds it open for me to walk inside. Immediately, my eyes settle on Landon. He’s now standing beside the conference table, tapping an impatient finger on the glass surface. He’s removed his jacket, which is now hanging off the back of the chair he just vacated. In just his light blue shirt and slim black pants, the strength and fitness of his perfect body is obvious—much too obvious.

I step into the office, and he looks up. His hair is slicked back, making him look even more intense. As his blue eyes land on me, he breaks into a smile. My heart misses a beat at the transformation of his face, and my steps falter.

“Come in Rachel.”

I steady myself and keep on walking. The office is easily larger by far than any I’ve ever been in. Aside from the conference area, there’s a sitting area with plush leather chairs and a glass coffee table. A large desk sits on a slightly raised area, almost like a dais, with the skyline of Manhattan as a backdrop. There’s a wall covered with screens, which, at the moment, are all tuned to different news channels and financial reports from around the globe.

He has already pulled out a chair, and he stands behind it as he waits for me to sit. I walk toward him on shaky legs, cursing myself for the uncontrollable effect he has on me. One look and I forget all my resolutions.

Tony busies himself with setting up the projector, oblivious to the tension between Landon and me. I take the offered seat, trembling slightly when Landon’s fingers deliberately brush my shoulders before he returns to his own seat. After a few seconds, Tony joins us at the table and starts up the slideshow of pictures of the new hotel, showing the stage of refurbishment already accomplished. The décor is a little more light and modern than the New York hotel, with more glass and brighter colors, but whoever the interior designer is, they sure know what they are doing.

Landon doesn’t say a word as Tony goes over the description of the amenities being provided, the design firms involved, and what Swanson Court International hopes to achieve with the new hotel. Then he goes into the history of the property. Formerly known as The San Francisco Gold Dust hotel, it was built in the twenties and has been in the Sinclair family for generations. Landon recently acquired the property from Evans Sinclair and will reopen it as The Gold Dust, a Swanson Court Hotel.

I take notes, asking questions and documenting the clarifications as well as highlighting areas for further research. Tony has done a great job on the presentation, showcasing the extensive and indigenous art collection that’s part of the property, the high-class spa, the famous chefs, and the celebrity fitness trainer who will be joining the hotel. I have no doubt that for the people who can afford it, it’s going to be worth every penny.

Finally, we get to the end of the slideshow, and I look away from the screen to find Landon’s eyes on my face.

“Is that all?” he asks. He’s talking to Tony.

“Yes.”

“Thank you. You can leave us now,” he says. “Miss Foster will communicate any requests for additional information or clarification.”

Tony nods and exits the office, leaving me alone with Landon. I avoid looking at him, feeling the tension in the air thicken with each passing second.

I start to get up. “I should be going.”

His hand on my arm stops me. “No, don’t.” He moves his chair from the head of the table to directly beside mine, arranging it so he’s facing me. “We should talk.”

“I know what you’re doing,” I say heatedly. “You engineered this assignment so you can get me to spend time with you.” I glare at him. “Well, guess what, this time you’re not going to get what you want. You’re wasting your time. I’m not going to let you get away with manipulating my job just so you can fuck me.”

His eyes flare at my heated words, but instead of responding, he presses a button on the desk, turning the frosted glass of the office walls even more opaque. “Let’s see,” he starts, “I generously agreed to a request your boss made a long time ago. How is that manipulating your job?”

“And the article about the Insomnia Lounge?” I challenge.

“I brought you there to give you a chance to tell me the truth, which you didn’t