Taking Him Down. Meg Maguire

again for coming out.” He laid a perfectly, horribly chaste kiss on her cheek.

      “Oh, sure.” She folded his jacket on the seat between them.

      “Take care.”

      “You, too.”

      And with a thank-you to the driver, she was on the sidewalk. Rich waved her toward the building and she heard the cab pull away once she made it safely into the foyer.

      Her legs were lead as she headed up the steps, and she was halfway to her apartment when she realized it.

      The most obvious answer was usually the correct one, and the most obvious answer was that it hadn’t been Mercer who’d texted, but some girlfriend Rich had neglected to mention. Or, equally gutting, a better offer for a night’s recreation.

      And just like that, her sails went limp. Just like that, she realized she’d been a fool to think she might be anything more to him than a convenient female body.

      She entered her apartment, and as she closed the door, she wasn’t just shutting it on the hallway or the October chill. She shut it on her gullible heart and her weak body, for having made her lose track of her head, if only for a night.