I'm still not sure I didn't hallucinate the conversation while overdosing on his pheromones.

Gideon was a man who’d lived an entirely solitary life, and yet he’d accepted me into it so completely that he could envision a future I was afraid to imagine. I was so scared I’d only be setting myself up for a heartbreak I couldn’t survive.

There was always something hidden. Lying in wait to spring up and ruin everything.

He reached for my hand, lifted it to his lips, and kissed my fingertips. "I love you.

Gideon was a force of nature, his magnetic self-possession so powerful it put everyone around him in his shadow. I saw flashes of it every day and was awed by it, but not nearly as much as I was by the charming, wryly amusing lover I had entirely to myself in our private moments together.

Why can men be boys all of their lives, but we women must grow old while we are yet young?

Tell me you love me," I pleaded" "Gideon's eyes met mine. "You know I do" "Imagine if I i ever said the words to you. If you never heard them from me" "His chest expanded on a deep breath. "Crossfire