Postcards From…Verses Brides Babies And Billionaires. Rebecca Winters

to ice on his back and chest.

      “It’s cold,” he said.

      “Yes.” She wrapped her arms around her torso. He still couldn’t see her face.

      “Better get inside.”

      They turned toward the door. She led the way, dragging the heavy fire door open. The heat and noise of the nightclub hit them like a wall as they stepped inside. Maddy stopped in her tracks, looking lost and overwhelmed.

      “Come on,” he said, taking her hand.

      He pushed through the crowd, towing her behind him. It wasn’t until he was holding her coat for her in the cloakroom that he saw the marks on her back.

      Red welts, abrasions from where he’d pushed her against the wall.

      He swore under his breath as Maddy buttoned her coat to the collar and began to wind her new scarf around her neck.

      He’d hurt her. He’d been so wild to get inside her, he hadn’t thought of anything else.

      They were silent as they stepped into the street. He watched his breath mist in the cool night air. He didn’t know where to start.

      “Are you okay?” he asked.

      She hunched into her coat.

      “Can we do this at home? Please?”

      He eyed her for a beat. She turned away and started walking. He caught up with her in two strides. The streets were empty and silent as they made their way through the maze of Le Marais to his loft.

      Their footsteps sounded loud on the wooden floor as they entered. He stopped in the living area. Maddy hovered nearby, not quite meeting his eye.

      “Did I hurt you?” he asked.

      “I’m fine.”

      “At least let me look at your back.”

      “I told you, I’m fine.”

      “Then let me see it.”

      She stared at him, on the verge of protest.

      “If I hurt you, I want to know about it,” he said roughly.

      “You didn’t hurt me, Max,” she said. But she shrugged out of her coat and offered him her back. “It’s nothing, see?”

      He stared at the raised, red marks on her pale skin. In good light, he could see they were more irritation than abrasion. He lifted his gaze to the long, slender column of her neck, bowed before him. There were so many things he wanted to say.

      “Maddy, what just happened—” He broke off as she pulled away from him.

      “I can’t do this right now, Max. I’m sorry.”

      Without looking at him, she strode for the bathroom. He stared at the door as she closed it between them. After a few long seconds, the shower came on.

      He closed his eyes.

      Great. She was washing him off her skin. Couldn’t wait to do so, in fact.

      In all the years that he’d fantasized about having sex with Maddy, not once had he imagined what would happen afterward.

      Not this, that was for sure.

      MADDY SAT on the closed toilet lid, her head in her hands. Steam from the shower filled the room. She’d turned the water on the moment she entered, hoping the sound would convince Max she was taking what had happened between them in her stride.

      She’d screwed up. Badly. She’d seen something she’d wanted, and she’d reached out for it like a greedy child. And now she had to face the consequences.

      “Idiot, idiot, idiot,” she said under her breath.

      She’d seen the questions in Max’s eyes. He wanted to know why she’d kissed him. Why she’d rubbed herself against him and pushed herself into his hands and led him outside.

       He kissed you back. He wasn’t exactly resisting.

      She groaned, pressing her fingertips against her closed eyelids until she saw stars.

      Of course Max had kissed her back. She’d practically ravished him, climbing all over him, grinding herself against him. He would have had to pry her off with a crowbar and a bucket of water she’d been so turned on and desperate for him.

      Her stomach was churning. She swallowed, the sound loud in the small space.

      She couldn’t take back any of it—the kiss, the trip outside to the courtyard, those hot, hard, fast minutes when nothing else had mattered. Worse, even at the height of her regret and shame and remorse, she wasn’t sure she would, even if she could. Those few breathless moments with Max would stay with her forever. She’d never been so wild for a man before.

      And yet Max was her friend. She loved him with all her heart for his generosity of spirit and his easy sense of humor and his strength and cleverness. She didn’t want to mess up what she had with him. She absolutely did not want to hurt him or make him angry or disappoint him. And in her experience, sex came hand in hand with all of the above.

      So why had she risked everything by crossing the line with him?

      The bathroom was so thick with steam her dress was damp and her hair heavy with moisture. She stood and used her hand to clean condensation from the mirror. The face staring back at her was tight with confusion and guilt.

      She pulled off her dress, letting it drop to the floor. She stepped under the shower and thrust her head beneath it, lifting her face into the flow. For long seconds she let the water sluice over her. Then she reached for the soap and began to wash her body. Her breasts tightened as she smoothed the bar of soap across them and she remembered Max’s touch on her skin. She washed the sticky warmth of their mutual desire from between her thighs and she remembered his fingers gliding inside her. She bit her lip, torn between desire and regret.

      She shut off the water and wrapped herself in her towel.

      The apartment was dark and silent when she exited the bathroom. Max had gone to bed.

      Her shoulders relaxed a notch. She made her way to her bed and found Max’s old T-shirt beneath her pillow. She tugged it on, then crawled beneath the covers and closed her eyes.

      Her body was as stiff as a board, and her back had begun to sting.

      The scent of Max rose from his T-shirt to envelop her, just as it had last night and the night before. She pressed her face into the pillow. Tomorrow she would buy a pair of pajamas and stop surrounding herself with Max.

      God, tomorrow.

      She tried to imagine what might happen, what Max might say in the cold light of day, what she could say to make everything right between them, but she knew there was no easy solution.

      They’d crossed the line. More correctly, she’d crossed the line and dragged Max with her. And tomorrow, she was going to have to pay the piper.

      She thought of all the lovers she’d lost over the years.

       I don’t want to lose you, too, Max.

      But it was possible she already had.

      MAX WOKE EARLY. For a second he stared blankly at the wall beside his bed. Then memory returned in a hot, sticky rush.

      Maddy against the wall, thrusting her hips toward his. Maddy’s breasts pouting in his hands. Maddy whispering her pleasure in his ear.

      Then the aftermath: her injured back; the walk home; the way she’d disappeared into the shower.

      He had a flash of the stunned, bewildered look she’d had on her face when they stepped back into the nightclub. At least he’d had ten years of knowing he desired her. What had happened last night seemed to have taken Maddy completely off guard.

      And yet…

      It