Page 109 of Fallen Hearts

“Mason, please.” He was giving me exactly what I wanted. But I begged anyway.

“And I’m going to picture this. You with your hand below the covers, inside that wet pussy of yours, thinking of me. I’m going to imagine your face, the way you call my name, as I pump myself, until I come as hard as I ever have in my life. All because of you.”

That was it. The proverbial straw. I went right over the edge, my eyes squeezing shut as I throbbed around my own fingers. When I finally opened them, Mason was grinning from ear to ear.

“That feel good?”

“Mmmm. Very good.”

“Maybe we should make this a regular thing,” he suggested. “I like making you come just with my voice.”

“I did use my fingers too,” I reminded him, knowing that alone would not have done the job.

“True. And speaking of fingers and getting off, unless I want to clean a mess over here?—”

“Go ahead.” I almost asked him to take the phone too but was too embarrassed. Mason would laugh when I told him about this, me being embarrassed to ask. “I’m wiped. Even more so now,” I added coyly.

“Good. Go to sleep and text me tomorrow anytime. I’m off.”

I wanted to ask what he did on his days off, but I also didn’t want to know. It made the fact that he wasn’t away on a trip but had an actual full-time life away from Cedar Falls, away from me, too real.

Better to pretend he was just on vacation somewhere and would be coming back soon.

Might as well pretend the Easter bunny and Santa Claus were real too, while I was at it, I scolded myself as I drifted off to sleep.

You’re getting deeper and deeper, Pia. Keep digging; it’ll be one hell of a hole to get out of.

I’d worry about that tomorrow.

39

MASON

The first week, I’d been too busy reacclimating to do any deep thinking. The second, two of my colleagues had been shot during what should have been a standard domestic call. Coupled with a protest that forced me into mandatory overtime, I hadn’t done much of anything but eat, sleep and work.

And get Pia off again during the wee hours of last Friday night. I hadn’t gotten home until after midnight, but she’d told me to call no matter the time. So I did. And both of us were happy about the fact, me less so two days later when I’d spoken to Parker.

“You’ve got competition,” he’d said when he called me about the hallway wainscoting project he insisted on doing, even without my help.

“Excuse me?”

“Competition. Pia and I went to O’Malley’s last night. The oldest Baker boy split with his longtime girlfriend. I guess he’s ready to start playing the field.”

I’d just walked into my apartment after a long-ass shift and wasn’t at all in the mood. But Parker had kept at it.

“He wasn’t subtle either. Bought her a drink after asking me if we were a thing.”

Fuck. He was a good-looking guy, a real-estate developer who’d been partially responsible for revitalizing Cedar Falls these past few years. The town considered him their golden boy because of it. Praise that was, I supposed, well-earned.

“What did you say?”

“What do you think I said? I’m pretty sure pretending she was my girlfriend so no one went near her would not have gone over well with Pia.”

Obviously. But the thought of Pia with him, or any man, had jumbled my thoughts. Both then, and now. And every time in between when I thought of it. Despite the fact that Parker said Pia hadn’t shown any more interest than just being friendly, could I expect her to never date anyone but me again? How long would she put up with that?

Not forever, that was for sure.

The third week, I actually asked for overtime to keep busy. To keep my mind off the woman who had hired an assistant and was now handling 90 percent of operations at Heritage Hill. Who was even more capable than I’d ever realized. As passionate as I expected, even after our first kiss.

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