Sensing I wanted an actual answer, Caine shrugged. “I’m not sure.”

“No one, that’s who. Ashley is this Byronic limp noodle and Rhett is dark and challenging and all man. There’s no competition. Scarlett was a nincompoop.”

Caine’s lips twitched. “A nincompoop?”

“Yes! It would be like me choosing to have Dean in this bed instead of you.”

His amusement fled. “Who’s Dean?”

I choked on a laugh. “Dean. Your main receptionist. You know, the guy that sits at that big glass desk and directs people where to go.”

“Oh, that Dean.” Caine appeared adorably confused. “I thought he was gay.”

“My point exactly.”

“Ashley wasn’t gay,” Caine argued. “He was a gentleman.”

“Whatever he was, he was boring and spineless.” I flopped over onto my back. “Women are attracted to men who can take charge of a situation.”

“Not all women.”

I glanced up at him. “Speaking from experience there, are you?”

He sighed. “I’ve been known to intimidate some women.”

“You? Intimidating?” I teased. “No.”

Caine laughed and reached for me, sliding one arm across my belly so he could pull me into him. “And some women need to learn to be more intimidated by me.”

I giggled, wrapping my arms around him as he rolled so he was braced over me. “It’s not going to happen.”

He nodded, contemplating me. “I’m getting that.”

“I think you like it.”

Instead of answering in the affirmative, Caine brushed his thumbs across my cheekbones. “Favorite band?”

I smiled, glad he was so cool with sharing, even if it was just trivial stuff. “The Killers.”

“Nice choice.”

I warmed under his approval. “You?”

“Led Zeppelin.”

I trailed my fingertips over his muscular back in a lazy, familiar way that felt altogether much too good. “Favorite city outside of Boston?”

“Sydney. You?”

“Prague.”

Caine stilled under my touch. “A very nice choice.”

“I really want to visit Budapest, though. All the places I visited were with Benito, and none of them were the one place I wanted to see.”

“I’ve been to Budapest.” He bent his head to sweetly brush his lips against mine. “You’d love it.”

I loved this. I loved that he was no longer fighting to keep who he was from me. Right now we were two friends getting to know each other. While we were naked.

“Why do you like my apartment?” I suddenly blurted out.

Caine studied me a moment, seeming to drink in every aspect of my face. “Because it’s got charm. There’s no flash—it’s got a timeless, simple beauty about it. A lot like its owner.”

His compliment seeped into me, warming through to the very tips of my fingers. “I think that’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me,” I whispered.

Caine smiled. “You think that’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to you?”

“Yeah.”

“See. No flash. Just beauty.”

I narrowed my eyes in thought. “You secretly like my tank tops and short shorts, don’t you?”

He grinned in answer before swallowing my laughter in a deep, drugging kiss.

My greatest issue with our relationship was coming to terms with the fact that even if Caine allowed me those small moments of intimacy, he had no intention of changing his mind about what we were doing together. I’d developed a bad habit of building my hopes up only for Caine to remind me that this was still a friends-with-benefits situation.

Only a day after we’d spent the morning laughing and talking and playing, I was brought back down to earth with a bump. I’d felt close to him in those moments, but the next day everything was back to the way it had been before. I didn’t blame Caine. He didn’t know I kept changing the rules in my head. I was frustrated, however, by my lack of progress and I needed to regroup, to find another way to get through to him, and so far I’d come up with nothing.

We made no plans to meet that weekend and I considered dropping in on Effie for her unique perspective until a phone call with Rachel that Friday afternoon.

Caine was out to lunch and I was at my desk, nibbling at a salad. I hadn’t exactly had the best appetite these last few days.

“Lexie, come on,” Rachel huffed in her annoyance. I’d just told her about my failed attempt at getting closer to Caine. “Maybe it’s time to call it quits on this guy before you get hurt.”

I ignored that. “I’ve been trying to come up with a new tactic, but I realized something this morning. No more tactics. Maybe honesty would work best.”

“No way.” I could sense her rolling her eyes. “Unless you want things to definitely end between you … and I’m not exactly averse to that anymore.”

“You need to make up your mind. Do you find me screwing my boss sexy or stupid? Choose one.” She kept flitting between the two, which was not good when it came to needing advice.

“Right now it’s stupid. I think it’s ti—Maisy, Ted is not a toy!” She cursed, and I heard the phone drop. A minute later she was back with a breathless “Sorry about that.”

“Who is Ted and do I want to know what the devil child was doing to him?”