A Profiler's Case for Seduction(91)

She cast her gaze outside the window, where a light breeze stirred the trees, tugging some of the dying leaves to the ground. She’d always loved autumn, when the summer heat released its grip on the Big Apple. With her dance shoes in a canvas bag slung over her shoulder, she’d race from audition to audition with the welcome cool fall air on her face.

Now the dying leaves outside mirrored what she felt inside her soul and she had a feeling she would always hate this time of year...the time of her virtual demise.

As she heard the front door open and then close, her thoughts snapped back to Adam. A man who looked like him probably could have any woman he chose. Certainly he had a girlfriend somewhere in town.

Her heart stuttered a bit as she realized she hadn’t considered that he would probably want to have guests, perhaps even female overnight guests.

She tried to imagine lying in bed at night and knowing that he was upstairs entertaining a lady. A surprising surge of envy swept through her. She told herself it had nothing to do with Adam himself but was rooted in the fact that she knew she would never again feel the comfort of a man’s arms around her. She would never again enjoy the passion that a kiss could hold, experience the joy of making love.

She closed her eyes, and for just a moment she was the woman in Adam Benson’s arms, she was the woman tasting his mouth, feeling his body move in unison with hers.

As she heard the front door open and close once again, she snapped out of the fantasy, irritated with herself and irrationally irritated with him.

He hadn’t even finished moving his things in yet and already she had a feeling her life was about to change dramatically. She just wasn’t sure if it would change for the good or the bad.