Page 3 of There Are No Words

Brady

a few days later

Ten minutes toclosing. Ten minutes and my self-imposed torture would end. The whole night I’d made sure to come out from my office periodically until I finally decided to work the bar just so I could keep one eye on the door—as I’d had for many nights now—foolishly waiting for Allegra to stroll in.

Allegra with her golden-brown hair.

Allegra with her beautiful brown eyes that I could get lost in.

Allegra with her supple lips that all I wanted to do were kiss, or better yet, feel close around my—

“Hey, boss, I’m going to take off,” David, my bartender, said, breaking into my fantasy. Damn David for needing to leave a few minutes early tonight.

As I commanded my body to relax from just the prospect of Allegra Morelli going down on me, I shooed David away. “Go. Have a good night.”

I could handle things here on my own. So long as I could keep my mind off all things Allegra long enough to get work done.

Easier said than done, though. That chick had been occupying my thoughts for far longer than since she’d come in here proposing we have sex. For one night only.

The fine print was a quiet bitch.

See, I had a thing for her—call it a crush if you wanted. Either way, I had it bad ever since moving into her apartment.

It was all Jack’s fault. Damn Jack, my younger brother, had to go and get hitched, moving his new bride, Quinn, into our previously shared apartment over this very pub, which we owned together. And essentially kicking me out. Not really, but come on, what dude wanted to live with his brother who’d just gotten married? Certainly not me. They needed room, and I needed to not know a whole hell of a lot about their relationship, which I had been on the fast track to learning, what with their bedroom sharing a wall with mine and all.

So, when someone had run their mouth in the pub one day that this Morelli chick had been looking for a roommate, I’d jumped on it. And that was the start of thething. Fine, my crush. Shit, I sounded like a teenage boy.

The point was, Iwantedmy roommate. And, sure, it’d started slow, but once it had become a thing, I couldn’t seem to stop it.

It was her.

Every little thing she did turned me on.

Sheturned me on.

And the way she talked about things that no one else in my life ever gave a shit about, like stars and crystals—she made it all sound so magical. There you go, I would have never thought anything was magical before, but here we were.

Nothing could’ve stopped the way things had intensified on my end after we’d had sex. That girl was a goddamn enchantress. I jacked off to the memory of her and that night too many times to count, but it was nothing compared to the real deal. It was only natural that I wanted a repeat performance.

But the reality was, Allegra wasn’t coming to my pub.

That door wasn’t going to be pulled open by her.

Not again.

For her, the other night was just sex. Which, apparently, she didn’t crave as frequently as I did. Or it was something she couldignore. I wasn’t sure which it was, but the point was, she’d done an admirable job of pretending nothing had happened.

Meanwhile, for me, it had been the best sex of my life. Because it had been with the most amazing woman I’d ever met.

Great, at this rate, I should apply for a job at a greeting card company. I was sounding disgustingly sappy even to my own ears.Most amazing woman I’d ever met.Allegra Morelli was my kryptonite.

Chapter Three

Allegra

present day

“Shit. Shit. Shit.”One look at my phone, which was going off like crazy, and I knew I didn’t have time to go back home and use this. . . this thing I’d just bought.

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