A/N: Please read the Author's Note & Copyright page for important information.

*May 25, 2010*

Tuesday morning, I woke up in a panic.

Billy's voice wailed from my cell phone: the chorus of "Tremble," the worst collection of sound one could hear at 5:00 a.m. I waved about my phone blindly, squinting through one eye from my pillow. Was this my pillow?

I took a deep breath and smelled man. You know that scent of musk, sweat, and some foreign cologne that you couldn't name but could never get enough of. There was something else, too. I heard breathing. Deep, long, manly breathing. God, I had forgotten what that sounded like...

Grabbing my phone, I hit "Accept" by accident, before Billy would begin wailing the chorus again. "Hello?"

"Kat! Are you ready for your big day?"

"Hi, Mom." She was so loud, I pushed the volume down. The mattress shifted to my right. Yes, it was my mattress. Nicholas and I were in my apartment. We had been here since early Sunday morning.

"Is that sleep I hear in your voice?" Mom asked, surprised.

"No, Mom, I'm up. I'm up." I scooted to the edge of the bed and stood up, stretching. My arms met wiry tangled mess overhead, and I attempted to tame it as quickly as I could before Nicholas spotted me.

"Are you ready for the first day of the rest of your life? You do know that whatever you accomplish today will change everything."

"No pressure..." I turned around to face Nicholas and frowned. Busted. He lay on his side, propped up on his elbow, staring at me. I had on a thin white t-shirt, so he chose to focus on the most obvious place.

"Morning," he mumbled, grinning. His hair looked like a cat had run around in it all night. And his eyes. Oh, there was pure mischief in his eyes.

"You excel under pressure, remember?" My mom continued on the phone. "Now I know you have a long day ahead. So I'll let you go, now. But call me later with all the details!"

"Okay, Mom. Bye!" I hung up, tossing my phone onto the nightstand. As the screen dimmed, I saw it was exactly 5:12 in the morning. And when I looked down, I saw the last thing in the world that should have been there.

I cussed, bent down, and snatched the tablet Phoebe had given me off the floor. It must have slipped from my lap while I was sleeping.

"Oh God, please no!" I searched for cracks or scratches and luckily found none. I sighed in relief, though it was short-lived. I was officially and royally screwed.

"Hey, don't freak out. Come on." Nicholas said, pushing the covers off of him. I nodded and my breath hitched. He had on a thin t-shirt, too, along with a pair of boxer briefs that left nothing to the imagination.

Damn him! Damn him and his morning wood!

Getting up on his knees, he scooted to me, taking the tablet away from my hands. He pulled me in for a long hug. This was how he pulled me away from my assignment yesterday, an innocent hug. Pulling away yesterday was impossible, but I had to this morning.

"You can do this," he assured me, sitting back on his heels. He stroked my bottom, that yearning for him brewing in my depths.

"I would be more ready if we hadn't fallen asleep. And if we hadn't spent the entire day in bed." I frowned but wasn't as put off by him as I posed.

"So you read one of the four manuscripts, so what? It's an internship. They can't expect that much from you so early."

"They do," I said, picking up the tablet and navigating to the second manuscript called The Yellow River. It had over 400 pages. "Oh God. What was I thinking holding this off until last night?"

"You weren't thinking, remember?" Nicholas replied. With the early morning light filtering in through my curtains, his eyes swirled green and shimmering gold. Last night I had dreamed of falling into them and drinking him in. He tasted like fresh spring water in my dream...the dream I should not have had.

"Look, don't stress out about it. It's your first day. She'll understand."

"No, she won't. Theresa Evanson's got this three strike rule. I already have one strike against me. I can't get ano-"

Nicholas coughed, and his eyes bulged.

"What?" I asked him.

"You said Theresa Evanson, the editor." He sat down on the bed, rubbing his right cheek.

"Yup, that's her name." I cocked an eyebrow, pausing. "You know her?"

Nicholas nodded. "She and my dad..." He paused.

"What?"

"A few years ago, they got married."

Get out!

"Seriously?" What a small world. The way his lips twitched and his eyes darkened, it looked like it hadn't ended well. "But..."

"Umm," he sighed, taking my hands in his. "It was brief. Dad got it annulled. But I do recall the three strike rule. Hmm..." He frowned, a deep crease forming in his brow.

"I'm in trouble, aren't I?"

"Not necessarily..." He picked up the tablet again, closing the .pdf file and accessing the internet browser. "What are the authors' names?"

I told him. Then, he began typing on the tablet. "Nicholas, what are you doing?"

"I'll contact the authors for you and ask them to write a report on their pieces and email them to you by noon. How does that sound?"

Why didn't I think of that? "That's..."

"Brilliant, I know," he said grinning, mischief in his eyes once more. "You can thank me tonight."

I ruffled his hair, trying to laugh him off, but felt my heart tense.

"We went over this..." I started, giving his hair a tug before crossing my arms over my chest.

He sighed. "And I've been a perfect gentleman, haven't I?"

"Yes. You kept your hands on only the respectable places all weekend, and you understood why..."

"You want to wait until we know each other better."

I patted him on the head. "Case in point: Theresa and your dad."

Nicholas rolled his eyes, typing again. "I knew Theresa only a couple months." He shifted on the bed so that his face fell into the shadows in my room. "There's no real story there," he murmured. He began typing on the touch screen once more. "Anyway," he said with more vibrancy in his voice. "I have yet to see someone say no to her. These authors will drop everything the moment I tell them this is for her."

"True. I guess. True." I paused, watching him for a moment. "You don't have to do this, you know. It's my responsibility."

"I know." Nicholas turned to me, the sunlight suddenly hitting his eyes. They seemed transparent, like the spring water in my dream. "I want to."

After my parents divorced, I never liked the idea of long-term relationships. But if this was how it was, how real love could be, I would never let this man go.

"Why're you looking at me like that?" He asked, genuinely curious. I shook my head, kissing him on his cheek, hugging him again.

"Because... Just because."

Forty minutes later, I was ready to leave with two of the three reports ready... and my heart aching.

Nicholas stood fully clothed in my kitchen drinking some OJ. He felt it, too. The hairs on his forearm stood on end, and he rubbed the back of his neck red. Just like when we were in his dressing room before the workshop, the tingling prickling my skin. In a few minutes, the dread would hollow me out, leaving me burning hot and Nicholas shivering before me.

"When are you done? I'll pick you up," he said when we reached the front door of my building. He pulled me back into his body from. It eased the aching and tingles. If only I could take his arms with me.

"I'm off at five." I bowed my head with a quick breath. He was hard, still.

"And this is on Broadway and 7th?" He kissed the nape of my neck, heat spreading between my thighs.

"Right at the center," I said, turning to face him. He fingered some wayward strands near my temple, then he lifted my chin for a soft long kiss. If I could take his lips with me...

His eyes chilled as soon as I pulled away from our final kiss at the station. The heat in my chest shocked me and I couldn't feel my toes when I hurried down the steps. Sitting on the 3 train, I licked my lips repeatedly, needing to taste him. I squirmed in my seat remembering his lips and fingers, hoping the memory would fill the emptiness, but all it did was make it worse.

I tried to read the authors' reports but couldn't concentrate for the life of me. I was so lost in my memories, I almost missed my stop at 42nd St.

I would read the reports as soon as Zara assigned my desk. According to her email all those weeks ago, I would sit at the reception desk where she'd sat for my interview.

When I arrived at the security desk and the guard printed out my temporary ID, I had to slap myself back to the present, to reality.

This was my life. My dream was about to come true, but I was busy thinking about a guy?

"Pshaw," I said aloud, to which the security guard raised a salt-and-pepper eyebrow. I blushed and waved goodbye.

When I walked through the office door at The New Yorker, though, my memories of Nicholas became the only thing that maintained my sanity. Someone was at the reception desk already, the one that Zara had assigned to me for the next three months.

With a hot-pink encased iPhone in hand and a bright red lip curled in an all-knowing smirk, sat the last person I expected to be in my seat.

Briana Taylor.