Nothing like the forced anxiousness of his old life, where he didn’t have a choice but to be thrown into the pit with the lions. No, this was something that could never compare to any power brokering—hell negotiating a deal with Bill Gates couldn’t be this nerve-racking. This wasn’t the nervous you feel when you have to deal with something someone else is doing, this was the nervous you feel when everything is riding on your performance and you feel as if your life is on the line. Because you want it to be. As many times as he’d had to face much worse than this, this felt as if it was monumentally more important. He had to be spot on, or she was going to slip even farther away. No letting himself dissolve into his ridiculous need to have her. He needed to be able to make her feel not only passionate about him, but loved. Totally, completely worshiped. If that didn’t work, nothing was going to. They walked into the dark house. He followed behind her as she kicked off her shoes and threw her purse to the coffee table.
