THE next morning Lena cleared her emails. It was all organised. She’d had confirmation messages from Andrew, the social worker for the charity. Nothing from Seth himself. Of course not—he’d got what he wanted already. Grimacing, she picked up the box of sponsorship goodies that had arrived for the totally spoilt team. She’d leave them in their lockers; the boys should be on the pitch already, ten minutes into training.
‘Coming through!’ she called just in case, but the change room was silent and empty. She started unloading the box, chuckling when she saw that it was the two best-looking stars of the team who had the specially wrapped, larger freebie packs.
Footsteps sounded behind her and she turned, expecting it to be one of the guys. It was a guy, all right. She stared at the bare chest, instantly recognising and responding to the dusting of dark hair and defined pecs and abs. It hadn’t been baby oil that had made this chest gleam the last time she’d seen it; it had been sweat and wet—from her lips and tongue.
It took all her willpower not to lick her lips now, and far too many seconds before she could drag her gaze upwards. The silence, for all that time, said it all.
‘What are you doing here?’ she finally asked, trying not to let her streaming excitement sound, but he had to be able to hear her heart battering her rib cage.
‘What does it look like?’ Eyes dancing, he took for ever to slip his tee shirt over his head. ‘I’m doing a training session with the team. I need to know what to prepare the boys for next week.’
‘What?’ Horrified, she glared at him. ‘That’s not a good idea.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because…’ She paused. Because he’d probably get killed—but how did she say that without sounding too concerned? ‘Can you afford the dental work?’ she eventually spat.
‘So little faith?’ Good humour beamed from his face. She knew he was enjoying her OTT reaction.
‘You’re not a professional rugby player. Those guys are demons.’ Oh, hell, she sounded pathetic.
‘Why, Lena—’ he put his hand to his chest ‘—you care about what happens to me?’
‘I wouldn’t like to see anyone permanently paralysed,’ she corrected him bluntly.
‘Your concern for my welfare is very sweet, but I’ve no intention of being pulverised.’
On that pitch he wasn’t going to have the choice. The Knights were the best team in the country. Fighting machines who showed no mercy. Ever.
Without realising, she followed him out of the change room into the tunnel and towards the pitch. ‘Why are you doing this?’
‘Well, there are a couple of reasons. I do need to prep for my boys.’ He stopped right at the end of the tunnel and faced her. ‘But I’ve also got energy to burn. More than a little frustration. Ice-cold showers aren’t enough.’
His words torched Lena’s cheeks. She clamped her jaw, trying to ignore the flames licking deep inside her, too. Had he guessed she’d been having like three ice showers a day?
‘Besides,’ he continued easily, ‘I’ve always wanted to play on this pitch.’
‘This is some childhood fantasy?’ What was it with these guys?
‘Why not?’ His smile was unrepentant and infuriatingly irresistible. ‘I never played rugby as a boy, had a couple of part-time jobs and couldn’t make the training sessions at school. So here I am, fulfilling that youthful ambition.’
‘So your unholy desire to make truckloads of money began right when you were a kid?’
Her sarky comeback killed the smile in his eyes, leaving them colder than she’d ever seen them. ‘Like most people, I like to eat. And in order to do that on a reasonably regular basis, I had to work.’
Lena swallowed, lost for words and suddenly sorry.
‘We didn’t all have the perfect upbringing with the piano and tennis lessons and home-baked biscuits in our lunch boxes,’ he tossed, stepping out onto the grass.
‘Seth—’ Lena called after him, now angry, too, because he was as wrong as she’d been.
He turned and glared, defiance flaming in his eyes. ‘Here’s the thing, Lena. You don’t know me very well. And you certainly don’t know how determined I can be.’
His chin lifted as he jogged to join in the warm-up drills. Open-mouthed, Lena watched. Determined? About what she thought he meant? He turned his head, flashing another look at her.
Oh, yes, he did mean that—because that defiance was desire drenched. Stupidly, all she could wonder then was whether he had a mouth guard. Irresistibly she was drawn to the rail. Dion was lounging against it, yapping into his mobile phone. She didn’t want to watch the carnage, but her body wasn’t listening to her brain. When it came to Seth, her body refused to hear sense.
‘Hey!’ A few of the guys grinned and high-fived Seth.
A few others shivered, and drew away from him as if they were afraid.
‘Don’t be too hard on us, bro. We don’t wanna see any of your KO moves out here.’
Seth just grinned. Lena frowned. What were they talking about?
The start-up drills were easy—running, ball skills, none of the blood-splattering tackles to begin with, but it would only be a matter of time. She watched him—black shorts, grey tee shirt. Lean, fit, hard. Edible. But not a rugby professional.
She gripped the rail tightly, trying to get a grip on the adrenaline coursing through her, trying to lose the fear factor.
‘You didn’t want to get out there, too?’ she asked Dion when he put the phone into his pocket. If it was slam-the-amateur hour, then shouldn’t he be getting bloodied, as well?
‘Hell, no, I’d only play against Seth in a non-contact sport like chess or something. Even then, he’d clean me up.’
Really? If she weren’t feeling so anxious she’d roll her eyes. But they were glued to Seth’s sleek physique. He was fast and fully holding his own; she’d easily lose him in the mix. ‘Is Gabe in?’ she asked breathlessly. She’d feel better knowing the team doctor was on-site.
Dion chuckled. ‘Seth’s not going to need him, if that’s what you’re thinking. I think the boys are more afraid of him than he is of them.’
Amazingly that outlandish comment seemed to be accurate. The team were throwing cautious looks his way, but that was probably because they were afraid of hurting him or something. Except it didn’t look like that would happen. How did a guy who bought and sold buildings end up with such sharp muscles? How come his abs were more defined than most of the other guys’? How come he wasn’t breathless and panting after all those sprints? Some of the locks looked as if they were hitting their cardio limit already but Seth was still smiling. And the warm-up was working for her as much as for those locks, because all she could think about was his body pouring all that power into hers.
‘Why would they be afraid of him?’ Lena asked, half panting herself.
‘Because he has a killer left hook. In his time he KO’d more opponents than anyone else in his division.’
KO’d as in knocked out? ‘You mean he’s a boxer?’
‘Yeah.’ Dion answered as if he was amazed she didn’t know that. ‘He was a national amateur champ.’
No way. Seth wasn’t a boxer. Where were the battle scars? Where was the bump in the nose from the repeated breaks? His face was far too perfect. She stared at him as she processed. Boxing? It was even more violent than rugby.
So he really was a fighter. No wonder he had such a fit body. As a rule she loathed the sport—loathed the violence. Only, now she felt a rush of liquid heat at the thought of him engaged in something so overtly masculine—that raw determination to channel untamed aggression. She shivered. Wasn’t the aim to physically hurt another and assert dominance primitive and barbaric?
Yet when Seth had dominated her, when he’d used his body to torment hers, it had been with tenderness. Ferocious passion, yes—but also infinite tenderness.
The dichotomy intrigued and inflamed her. There was greater complexity to the man than she’d realised and she was so curious. Why had he got into boxing? Why was he working with these at-risk youth? He hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d said he wasn’t after promo ops. She’d checked his website yesterday and there was nothing personal about him on there. The first hits on a quick Google search had been pictures of him on the town with beautiful women and had been so depressing she’d shut down the search instantly.
She shoved the questions away now, too. Curiosity got cats into serious trouble, after all. She turned and went to hide in her office. Organising her in-tray, she counted the seconds down until she figured it was safe to go back down to the change room and sort the rest of the stuff she’d abandoned. The boys should have finished and cleared out—they had a session with the dietician on a Thursday.
‘Coming through!’ she called regardless, her voice echoing in the empty room.
‘I hoped I’d see you again.’ He stepped round the corner.
Okay, so the room wasn’t quite empty. And he hadn’t changed, still hot and sweaty, his body looking all the more powerful.
‘I jogged round the pitch a few more times after training had ended,’ he answered her unspoken question. ‘I’m still suffering from more energy than I know what to do with.’
She glanced up to his face, just for a second. But that second morphed into an endless moment because the expression in his eyes entranced her. It was that total focus, the look that made her feel as if there were nothing and no one else in the world but her. She tried to break free but it was impossible. Lust, she reminded herself, just lust. A hormonal mix headier than most—okay, deadly. But lust meant nothing. This could be nothing.
His tee shirt clung to his breadth, his skin gleamed, his chest rose and fell faster than usual. He was steaming hot. And she was dying of attraction. She had to kill it.
‘You need a shower,’ she said roughly. But she needed one more.
All Seth could think about was hauling her into the shower with him. Yeah, the whole point of the exercise this morning was purely to see her again—not play rugby. He wasn’t really a team-sports guy. He preferred one-to-one challenges. Like this. He’d spent hours wondering what she’d be wearing when he saw her next and it was every bit as gorgeous as he’d fantasised. He’d seen the millions of dresses in her wardrobe when she’d opened it yesterday morning. He loved the way they emphasised her shape, loved the fantasy of lifting her skirt and having easy access. Today she wore emerald green. It would look even better wet.
Deliberately he stepped closer, his intent sharpening when she didn’t step back. He watched for a blush or something—anything—to clue him in to her thoughts. He hoped they were as rabid as his were. But she was one hell of a blank slate and the poker fantasy came back at the worst possible moment.
‘Can you really leave it at just one night?’ The question slid out of him—and wasn’t at all an example of the cool way he’d planned to play it.
Her brows lifted. ‘One night was all I needed.’
Never. ‘What about what I needed?’
‘Oh, Seth,’ she answered slowly. ‘You’ve got a zillion other options to get your needs met.’
True, but that wasn’t the point. ‘Maybe I don’t want other options. I want you to meet my needs.’ He frowned, struck by a nightmare thought. ‘Have you got other options?’
‘No,’ she snapped right back. ‘But maybe I don’t have the same level of need as you.’
He laughed—hard—before thinking better of it. ‘No, we both know your needs are way greater than mine.’
Her jaw became more defined, her chin pointier. ‘You’ve got the wrong impression.’
‘I don’t think so.’
She might be gritting her teeth and his balls ought to be frozen by the dry ice steaming from her eyes, but he was committed now. He saw her bite harder on her lip.
‘Relax, Lena.’ He took her hand and smoothed his fingers across her cold knuckles. ‘Tense doesn’t suit you.’ He knew what did.
‘I’m not tense.’
Her pulse slammed into his fingertips, fast and furious. Her wanting—her not wanting to want. He didn’t really want to want her quite like this, either, but he wasn’t as into denial as she was. Surely she knew if they gave into it, it would go away. It always did. He glanced down and saw she’d curled one foot around her other leg, so she was standing in a weird flamingo kind of way. Totally closed off, with her toes curled in the ends of her sandals. Toe curling was a good sign, wasn’t it? Toe curling meant she was holding something back. Satisfaction made him smirk but she saw and jerked her wrist free.
‘You know, you’re supposed to be highly intelligent, but the most boneheaded rugby boy has got it before you. I’m saying no.’
‘I am highly intelligent,’ he answered patiently. ‘So I can see straight through what you’re trying to do.’
‘Oh, what do you think that is?’
‘You’re playing me, keeping me dangling on your string.’
‘You think I want you on my string?’ she muttered. ‘Your arrogance is something else.’
‘Yeah, but I’m right. Women like to manipulate. You play hardest to get when you want it most, as if somehow it’s wrong to want it so badly and putting up a fight makes it more acceptable.’ He moved closer, needing to be near. ‘But there’s something about a woman who’s honest about wanting it, and who wants it as much as I do. Be honest with me again, Lena.’
‘You’re wrong,’ she said firmly, her ice-chipped eyes unwavering. ‘Not all women play those kinds of games. I don’t. I mean what I say.’
‘But a massive part of you doesn’t want to say it.’ Her toe curling was giving it away. He hoped.
‘You think?’ She glared at him, her ice dissolving in anger. ‘You’re actually a no-means-yes, take-it-willing-or-not brute?’
‘You can try to be as insulting as you like but it isn’t going to work.’ He grinned. ‘You can’t manipulate me into getting angry and walking away.’ He’d literally fought to learn to control his emotions—it took a hell of a lot for him to give way to anger now. And he was miles off angry at the moment, more like amused. Her lashes lowered and he waited expectantly, eager to see her next move.
‘It’s all about the game for you, isn’t it?’ She peeped a look back up.
He smiled because she couldn’t resist that little look. And, yeah, she had his number, but he’d get hers, too. He’d tease it out. ‘I don’t think you can deny this, Lena. You were so hot the other day you exploded at first touch. How long had you been on the boil?’ He angled his head, leaning closer, deliberately trying to bait her because it was working. ‘I don’t actually think it’s me. Clearly working around all this testosterone gets you het up and after a while your safety valve blows. Best it blows with someone like me rather than one of those boys, though, right? You wouldn’t want to get messy in the workplace, would you?’
She went pale. Seth’s radar zeroed in. Oh, that was interesting—was that why she was so stand-offish with the team? She’d once had a messy office affair? His curiosity raged. Yeah, there was the thing. This wasn’t just about getting her back into bed; he wanted to know all about her. Most of all he wanted to know what else would make her laugh.
Lena drew breath and forced history back to the past. Seth thought she’d been horny from hanging with the rugby guys? He was crazy. Those boys were beautiful, but they didn’t light her fire. It was all him. Something in him called to her, something she feared was more than skin deep. But she was happy to let him keep his wholly wrong idea. The sass only Seth sparked bubbled up and she leaned forward, reckless. ‘It’s a once-a-year thing,’ she whispered. ‘Can you hang on that long?’
‘Once a year?’ He laughed, predatory sharpness defining his features once more. ‘You haven’t a hope in lasting that this time. You’re still thermonuclear.’
She pulled back, putting both feet down to stand her ground. ‘And you’re delusional.’
‘No.’ He shook his head slowly. His lashes lifted and the azure-blue eyes gleamed at her thoughtfully. ‘What I am is honoured.’
‘I’m sorry?’ He’d lost her totally now.
‘An annual event at most,’ he said, utterly serious. ‘Given you were worried you’d forgotten how, I’m honoured that you picked me the other night. And as it was such a rare experience for you, I take it to be a real privilege. And a compliment.’
She ground her teeth. ‘The other day you were making out like I was in here getting the entire team off.’
He nodded. ‘Amazing how wrong that first impression was, huh?’ He sidled closer with a snaky smile. ‘What was your first impression of me?’
‘That you’re an arrogant jerk.’
‘See?’ He beamed widely. ‘So wrong.’
She stared at him for a second and then couldn’t help but laugh. Her chuckle deepened as the tension eased. It felt good. ‘You’re…you’re…’
‘Ready when you are,’ he quipped. ‘Come on, let’s get out of here.’
She kept shaking her head but couldn’t pull back her smile. ‘Incorrigible. Unrepentant. Impossible. Please give up.’ She really meant that.
‘I can’t believe you’re asking me to.’ He dropped his joking manner and moved back in on her, closer than before.
Her skin tingled, threatening to burst all over with goose bumps. Oh, he was good. Temptation shook her foundations.
‘Yes,’ he whispered, stepping closer and holding her gaze captive.
Was he saying yes for the both of them?
She swallowed, but she couldn’t stop her honesty. ‘Okay, I won’t deny I’m attracted to you. But it’s more intelligent to walk away.’ And she was so determined to do the intelligent thing, the right thing for her this time.
‘How can that possibly be more intelligent? You know it’ll be good.’
‘I told you.’ Her chest ached while her belly burned. ‘Too much of a good thing leaves you feeling bad.’
‘So we won’t have too much, then.’ He shrugged. ‘Just a little more.’
It wouldn’t work that way for her. She’d fall quickly, deeply, uselessly. It would take nothing to fall hard for Seth.
‘Look at me,’ he said quietly, but with an undertone that made her nerves screech. ‘Just for a second.’
Seth really needed to see into her eyes to try to fathom what she was thinking. Except when he did he still had no bloody idea.
‘I don’t want to have a fling with you,’ she said softly.
He paused, knew he had to be honest with her. ‘Lena, I’m a lifetime off marriage.’
Her eyes flashed. ‘I’m not exactly painting the nursery, either.’
‘Okay, but let me tell you why I’m not.’
‘You want to share your sob story to win me over? Play on my emotional feminine side? Butter me up so I say yes?’
Her sudden cynicism silenced him for a second—someone had to have played a real sob story on her in the past. ‘No, I just want you to understand where I’m coming from.’ Mainly because he wanted to know what her story was and he figured if he shared, she’d share. It usually worked that way. Once he understood the reason for the reluctance, he could see her through it. Carefree didn’t mean careless, after all. He only wanted nice, light, naughty fun for both of them. And while she might sound as if she wasn’t interested, she was all eyes and ears.
He put it lightly. ‘Look, my parents divorced in one terrible mess. Put me off for life.’
‘How convenient for you to have an emotional reason for not committing,’ she said sarcastically.
He bit back a laughing grunt. She had no idea of the reality. That divorce had been too long in coming—months of bitterness and betrayal. Months of his mother trying to make it work. Months of him trying to be the model son.
‘Fortunately I was spared a nasty custody battle,’ he said drily. Yeah, there’d been a total lack of custody battle. The father he’d once been dumb enough to idolise had walked out and never looked back. Too busy with his new family to be interested. His mother had been devastated and Seth hadn’t been enough to help her. And that made it suck all the more. All that hideous turbulence combined with teen displacement had seen his anger threaten to screw his life completely. Control had come in isolation, with him literally fighting it out. And he’d learned what he needed to succeed—just his emotionally unencumbered self.
He forced himself to breathe, to keep the flippant tone, to fast-forward. ‘But of course I do have an evil ex.’
‘Of course you have an evil ex. Do tell,’ she anti-invited, saccharine sweet. There was no softening her.
‘First year uni. Medicine. I scored the girlfriend that all the guys wanted. The hostel hottie.’
Her eyes narrowed; he half hoped the green was glowing deeper from jealousy.
‘But then I started the pizza thing. I’d designed the tee shirts for the delivery guys to wear and they turned out to be as popular as the pizzas. I knew I had a chance at something, so I dropped out to pursue it full-time. According to her I was going to be a loser like my dad—who incidentally was a total loser.’ For a second his mood darkened.
‘And her attitude only motivated you all the more?’
He managed a smile. ‘Of course.’ She’d laughed, then grown scornful. There’d been no attempt to understand, no belief in him. No, he very quickly learned that belief had to come from yourself, success from yourself, happiness from yourself. Dependence on others didn’t get you anywhere. Dependence on others got you hurt—check out Exhibit A, his mother. She’d relied on having a husband and kids to be happy. But her husband had left and she only had the one kid. He hadn’t been enough. Still couldn’t do enough. He hadn’t been enough for the girlfriend, either—not once he’d lost the status of being the top student in his med class.
‘No doubt she lived to regret her decision?’ Lena batted her lashes, still sarcasm personified.
Yeah, she wasn’t taking his confidences terribly seriously. But what had happened had really sucked and stupidly still bothered him—well, to a degree. ‘She started dating my arch rival in med. Until I dropped out, he and I had been competing for class honours. He won both the first-year prize and her. But when the marriage faltered she looked me up.’
By then he was a multimillionaire and had more status and success than any general practitioner. It was only the status and success that had attracted her.
‘Did you have an affair?’ Lena was looking at the floor now.
Seth had been angry at the invitation. His ex had no problem with infidelity, but he did. ‘No, and even when she was divorced I still said no. I don’t repeat my mistakes.’ He’d known what it was she’d wanted—the money and status, not actually him.
‘And since then you’ve done the dumping, right?’
He’d ended every fling—all except for Lena Kelly.
‘Is that why you’re here now?’ she asked sharply. ‘Because I said no?’
‘No.’ He should have seen she’d leap to that conclusion. ‘I’m here because I’m honest enough to admit I want to be with you again.’
‘It’s just sex.’
‘Not just sex, fantastic sex.’ And he had the sinking feeling that wasn’t all it was. The desire to be near her, to know her, was more than sexual. He studied her blank expression. ‘So has my sob story scored your sympathy?’
‘This all happened, what, a decade or so ago and you’re still not over it?’
Ouch. He chuckled. ‘You know how it is, the first cut’s deep.’ And you were landed with the parent dramas for life. He might be able to forget his father now, but his mother still frustrated the hell out of him. He still couldn’t help her the way he wanted to be able to.
Lena was really trying to diminish the effect of his opening up to her. It wasn’t that much of a sob story, right? Loads of people had parental issues and ex issues. She had them herself. ‘You really want my sympathy?’
‘Right now I’ll take whatever I can get. Are you going to try to save my scarred heart?’
‘I have enough awareness of my limitations to know that’s not possible,’ she said with heartfelt honesty. ‘Besides, I’m not convinced you actually have a heart. I think what you have is an overblown need to win. You don’t like me calling time ahead of you.’
‘Well, you have to agree you did it prematurely.’ He grinned. ‘Why did you? What’s made you such a scaredy cat?’
‘I’m not scared, I’m being sensible.’
‘Sensible doesn’t suit you.’ His voice dropped. ‘Your beauty glows when you laugh and when you’re reckless.’
‘The lines won’t work.’ Except they were and now she was desperately trying not to dwell on the tantalising information she’d just learned, but in truth examining every salient fact. So his parents had split, so he had a witch ex-girlfriend. And dropping out of med school to make pizza and print tee shirts with pithy slogans did seem a random path—one that only Seth could make succeed.
She wasn’t supposed to have learned anything more about him. She wasn’t supposed to have become any more curious. He was supposed to have walked out of her life yesterday—for good. Only, now she was beyond intrigued. And the more she knew, the more she wanted. That delicious melting feeling immobilised her. He was watching, smiling, and she knew he knew.
‘You really don’t want me to kiss you again?’
He was so close her skin was doing the alternate sizzle-then-tingle thing.
‘You don’t want me to slide my hand like this?’ To her waist, to draw her close.
She dug in her toes, trying to hang on to the last scrap of sanity she had left. And then, thank goodness, she remembered.
‘You need to step back,’ she whispered jerkily. ‘There’s a camera in here.’
Seth froze, then glanced up at the ceiling and round the walls. ‘In the change room?’
‘The half-time cam for the at-home audience. The guys know where it’s placed so they don’t change in front of it. But we’re centre-screen right now.’
He spotted it, on the wall beside them. ‘Is it filming?’ He was horrified they had a camera in here.
‘Not something I’m risking.’ She had her distance back now, and she was growing it—literally.
‘Not willing to risk much, are you?’ Seth called after her as she scampered off. Fists clenched, he thought about hitting the wall, but it was concrete and he wasn’t that stupid. Damn the camera.
Privacy was important to him. But breaking through her barriers had been more important. So he’d spilled some details he rarely shared—in the hope she’d confide something in return. Only, she hadn’t. Lena Kelly wasn’t like other women. She was saying no, but she still wanted him. That had never happened before. And he sure as hell didn’t want to be haunted by her, which right now he was.
He wondered what the mess was she’d landed herself in. It had to have been a big one. He knew the wounded look and he’d seen those shadows pass in her eyes a few times. As a rule he avoided bruised women—they had vampiric emotional needs and he didn’t do angst or drama. Didn’t have the resources within him. Not for anyone. Better to play light and leave the needy alone. But he wanted Lena. He wanted the sparkle he’d seen more often in those same beautiful eyes. He wanted the laughter in his arms again. There had to be a way of making it impossible for her to say no for much longer, but, short of parading round half-naked like some rent boy, he really didn’t know how he was going to manage it.
It would be simpler if he found someone else, but he had the feeling no other woman would be remotely interesting until he understood all there was to Lena. And had her every which way and back again. He was so on her leash and she was jerking him hard. She was proving better than he at this despite not being anywhere near as much of a player.
Breathing hard, he flicked the shower to freezing and gritted his teeth. His muscles twitched, eager to release pent-up energy as if the two hours’ hard-out training had never happened. Dressed, no less frustrated, he thudded up the stairs to Dion’s office. Dion glanced up from his computer and a way-too-amused look crossed his face.
‘She smacked you down,’ Dion said.
Seth shrugged.
‘Don’t take it personally,’ Dion soothed evilly. ‘It’s happened to all of us.’
‘You asked her out?’ That really didn’t help his mood.
Dion just grinned and swivelled his chair to stare out of the window.
‘You’re her boss.’ Annoyance tainted his supposedly lazy drawl.
‘Not technically,’ Dion mused. ‘I’m here courtesy of the council, she’s employed by the team management.’
‘Dion.’ Seth glowered. ‘That doesn’t make it any better.’
‘Don’t get steamed.’ Dion raised his hands into the surrender position and laughed, spinning back to face him. ‘I didn’t, okay? I’m not into sexual harassment or power plays.’
‘Yet you have those cheerleader girls in the tiniest outfits,’ Seth muttered, not ready to laugh yet.
‘And the rugby guys are all but naked in the calendar.’ Dion shook his head. ‘Lena is all yours, but if she doesn’t want you, she doesn’t want you, and I’ve never seen her change her mind. You might just have to deal with failure for once.’
Seth didn’t know the meaning of the word. And he had no intention of finding it out now.