Beck slips his key into the lock of the condo door and silently opens it. He pushes it open all the way and motions me in ahead of him. It’s almost one A.M. and both of us are exhausted from stress, lies, and a lack of sleep.

We’ve been at JT’s parents’ house in Sausalito, just two miles from their son. Neither Beck nor I wanted to go there, but we felt it was what innocent people should do. We both knew the police had us in their sights, and while they might also be following the theory that JT was killed by a Vegas bookie, they were not going to leave us alone.

The time we spent at Candace and Colin Townsend’s home was dreadful. We arrived to find Beck’s parents were already there, because of course they were going to call their closest friends first with the awful news. JT’s mom was wailing in the arms of her husband, who eventually gave her a Xanax to calm her down. It wasn’t until she polished off a vodka tonic that she finally slipped into sort of a silently numb state of shock where she sat on a velvet couch while Beck’s mom patted her hand in an awkward show of comfort.

Beck’s dad though?

You could tell he was devastated, more so than Colin Townsend appeared over the news of the death of his son. He faced the windows of the library, where we were all congregated, and stared out into the blackness. He barely acknowledged Beck when we arrived and was clearly distracted. I wondered if he was trying to manage some type of internal pain that he may have been suffering as a father.

We weren’t surprised when Beck’s mom called us not five minutes after the cops left to deliver the news. Beck, in turn, told his mom about the cops being there and that we were on our way.

Again, we really didn’t want to go, but it was what was expected of a grieving friend and partner of Jonathon Townsend. As Beck’s girlfriend, I was expected to go as well, although what I really wanted to do was open up a bottle of wine and drown my misery over what has gone down as the single worst day of my life.

Yes…even worse than the day I was gang-raped.

Killing another human being—even one who brutally violated me—was more traumatizing and damaging to my soul than I could have ever imagined. I was such a fool to initially even think it was an appropriate course those months ago, and now with the benefit of hindsight, I wish with all my might that I had never concocted the foolish plan to kill JT. I wish I would have gone straight to the police and let them handle it. I wish I’d turned to my dad to let him comfort me when I learned my attacker’s identity.

In this moment, I even wish I had never stepped foot in the ballroom of that Sugar Bowl Mixer where my intent was still to confront and kill JT, but instead I met Beck, his business partner, who enslaved my body, and later my heart.

Yes, I’d even give up Beck if I could go back in time and change things so I wouldn’t have this guilt pressing down on me.

And it’s not just guilt that I took another life. I think given time, I’m going to be able to accept that in that moment I had no choice. I was reacting on survival instinct and I think most people would have done what I’d done.

But I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to forgive myself for the course of events I started with my stupid plan for vengeance, which led to the police knocking on Beck’s door and looking at him as a potential suspect.

I will never forgive myself.

Beck did an admirable job at the Townsends’ of portraying the devastated friend but also the one with strong shoulders who bore everyone else’s grief. We “learned” some details of what happened to JT from his parents, who were contacted soon after his body was found.

Apparently, his private chef who cooks for him a few times a week walked into the bloodbath a mere twenty minutes or so after I stumbled out of JT’s house. When I think about how close I came to being caught, nausea rolls within me and I have to fight it back down. I have to fight with my own need for self-preservation not to offer up a prayer of thanks for letting me escape before his cook arrived.

JT’s dad recounted to us that the police told them that JT was stabbed in the neck with a sharp object, but that it hasn’t been recovered, and it appeared to have struck his carotid artery, causing him to bleed to death pretty quickly.

Yup. I can attest to that.

They also told his parents that they believed JT knew his attacker because there were no signs of forced entry.

Can also attest to that.

Finally, they confirmed that there was some type of struggle before JT died, but until forensics could finish their investigation, they couldn’t guess as to what occurred in the minutes before his death.

I could tell them the details but I won’t. I promised Beck I wouldn’t and I’d let him handle this.

We stayed for a long time, finally leaving the Townsends’ home around midnight. The long drive back into the city was silent, both Beck and I lost in our heavy thoughts.

I wanted to talk to him. I wanted to say something comforting to him.

I wanted to pour out my guilt and beg his forgiveness again for even getting him into this mess.

But he had put up a wall, and I could sense it as clearly as if he had told me point-blank that he needed some space. His body was stiff with tension, his jaw locked tight when I’d turn to look at him in the glow of the dashboard lights. He never said a word to me on the way back, seemingly fine to suffer in silence rather than with my support.

This confused me and hurt me, and yet…I really didn’t know how to even strike up the right type of conversation that would assure me that he still loved me and give him the emotional support he needed.

At this point, I’m so confused about where we stand that I feel like I’m on the verge of a complete breakdown.

Beck moves quietly down the hall toward our bedroom and I follow behind, flipping off lights as I go. He immediately goes into the bathroom, shutting the door softly behind him. I can hear him in there using the toilet and then flushing. The water turns on, and I can envision him washing his hands. A few more moments of silence, and then he opens the bathroom door, pulling his shirt over his head before he steps out. When the material clears his face, he finally looks at me standing by the bed and I have to hope he sees the look of need on my face.

I need him to say something.

Just one tiny word or even a smile that lets me know that while he’s burdened greatly by everything that’s happened, it hasn’t changed his feelings for me.

Instead, his eyes sort of pass over me and he turns to the closet to deposit his shirt in the clothes hamper.

“Beck,” I call out desperately, my voice heavy with need and fear.

He immediately whips around to face me, his gaze filled with worry. “What’s wrong?”

My eyes roam all over that face, and I try to take in every single feature that gives me a hint as to what he might be feeling in this moment. From the mussed-up hair indicating a long day without a comb to it, to the fatigue lines around his eyes, to the deep furrow in his brow as he looks at me. His eyes don’t shine but have turned a dull matte and his shoulders hang low.

He takes a tentative step toward me but doesn’t say anything.

The silence is almost damning, and my gaze sort of drifts to the window where most of the Financial District buildings are darkened except for strategically placed architectural lighting.

Perhaps we’re finished.

“Sela…what’s wrong?” Beck asks softly, and I look back at him. He’s standing in the same spot, staring at me expectantly.

“Do you still love me?” I blurt out, and those fucking weak-assed tears start to build up again. “After all this trouble I’ve caused?”

For a split second, he doesn’t react, but just stares at me impassively. Then it’s like a curtain is lifted over his face and understanding makes his eyes soften with empathy as he gets everything about me in one clear moment.

Two long steps and he’s in front of me.

His hands go to the sides of my head, hold me in place, and he leans his face down until our noses are almost touching. “Of course I love you.”

“I’m so sorry,” I whisper, the tears making a fool out of me as they spill out.

“Don’t,” Beck orders me, his eyes flicking back and forth between my own. His command is almost harsh, but his voice gently cradles my battered self-esteem. “Don’t you apologize for a thing to me. You did nothing wrong.”

I blink and more tears fall. “If only I’d—”

“Don’t,” he orders me again. “I’m not going to listen to it. If you’ve got some insecurities about what there is between us right now, then you ask them and let me reassure you, but don’t go about doing it by way of pointing a guilty finger at yourself. You hear me?”

I blink, clear the wetness from my eyes, and nod at him in understanding. It’s not that I wholeheartedly agree with what he’s saying to me, it’s just that I know a different way that he can reassure me that I still have his heart and he has mine.

Pushing to my tiptoes, I press my lips against his and speak against them urgently. “I need you.”

“You’ve got me,” he says, causing his lips to open, and when he tilts his head slightly to the right, I tilt mine in the opposite direction and slip my tongue into his mouth for a deep but brief kiss.

When I pull back, I look up at him and say, “I need you to fuck me.”

Beck’s eyes have been flatlined for the past several hours, burdened with death and consequences, but with those simple words fire sizzles and his jaw tightens. “You want me to fuck you? Right now?”

“And hard,” I murmur with a nod, pressing my body into his. I feel his dick starting to swell and give a little grind against him. “Really hard.”

He doesn’t answer me but responds by spinning me around, pushing me into the wall and then stepping up against my backside. I feel every single inch of him, even with the barrier of clothing still between us. For the first time in hours, I feel connected to him, despite the way in which he’s tried to protect me and the ways in which we banded together against the detectives’ questioning.

Only with the physicality of his touch and the fire I just saw in his eyes can I truly be assured that things might be okay between us.

Beck nuzzles his cheek up against the side of my head as his right hand slips down the front of my sweatpants and straight into my panties. He pushes his fingers straight into me, going deep. He makes me squirm and plead, “More, Beck. I want more than that.”

He gives a dark rumble of a laugh. “I’ll give it to you, love. Always trust that I’ll give it to you.”

Beck moves his fingers in and out of me, his lips on my neck and whispering filthy promises peppered with reassurances.

“You think my fingers are driving you crazy, Sela? Just wait until I fuck you with my cock. Then you’ll see how much I burn for you…always.”

Beck drives me wild until I’m begging for it, and then my pants are gone and apparently so are his, because he’s driving his cock into me from behind while I’m pressed up against the wall.

He holds still for a moment, gets his bearings, and then pulls my hips back slightly all while pressing a hand in between my shoulder blades to keep my torso against the wall. Placing his teeth at my shoulder, he gives me a tiny nip and whispers, “What you and I have, Sela…no one will ever comprehend it. No one will ever come in between it. But it’s real and it’s ours, and I’m never letting it go.”

I sigh out a long breath of relief over his words as well as pent-up sexual frustration. I circle my hips and get Beck focused back on the task at hand.

As requested, he fucks me hard, his pelvis slapping against mine. In between grunts of pleasure, he whispers in my ear, “Is this what you wanted, Sela? Is this how you wanted me to prove that you’re still mine?”

I nod, gasping and writhing with no control over my actions.

“Don’t ever doubt it,” he tells me after slamming deep and rotating his hips. “Don’t ever doubt that you are mine and this pussy is mine and that I’m never giving it up. I’m going to do whatever it takes to protect what’s mine.”

My orgasm explodes in response to his proclamations…his thrusts…fuck, I don’t know what it is, but when Beck declares that I’m his, my body acknowledges it by surrendering every piece of control and ownership of feeling to him.

That orgasm didn’t belong to me.

That belonged solely to Beck, and we both know it.