The morning rays had flickered into his eyes as Comoran Strike cursed himself that he had forgotten to close the curtains. His body naturally turned wanting to turn away from the imposing light when he felt something foreign draped across him.

At his slight movement, Strike felt a shuffle from the other side of the mattress and the weight was removed. At this, his eyes flickered open in confusion. Who was in his bed?

Strike was no stranger to having too much to drink the night before and then having company in his sheets which he later regretted. However, he thought those days were behind him since his new resolve, and he was confused about how his subconscious had let him become so inebriated to allow such events to still unfold.

His body, now processing that he was fully awake, reminded Strike that he needed a pee and a fag. However, he would first have to locate his prosthetic. Strike cursed all his biological urges as they must have taken over the past night to have landed him in this situation.

The memory of the night was still hazy in his mind, and there were elements of luxury and a semblance of a bar, but he could not make sense of it. There were visions of drinks like champagne and fancy cocktails mixed in with beer bottles and elegant wine glasses. All these images did not bring him closer to figuring out whose silhouette was under the covers beside him.

Strike knew he could just look, but his sleeping companion would eventually wake and inevitably want some acknowledgements of events he had no recollection of. It was a morning-after dance that Strike was familiar with, and he was unsure why he was prolonging it this morning.

Had he met a woman in a bar who deemed his looks tolerable for the evening and he took them to bed? Had someone recognized him as the illegitimate son of a rock star or from the paper and assumed that being with him would result in some residual fame? Had he been weak and called upon his long affair of on again and off again with the delectable and complicated Charlotte Campbell now Ross? What complication had he set up for himself for the present morning?

Strike's eye wavered to the sleeping figure who was curled away from him with her alabaster naked back exposed, and with strands of golden locks cascading which caught his gaze. Strawberry-blonde locks, he corrected himself.

Robin.

Strike felt himself inhale sharply as panic set into his body. Could the mystery woman tenderly snoozing next to him be his fellow private detective, business partner, and self-declared best friend?

His mind immediately went to a moment of the previous day, when he adjusted his suit and tie in the mirror before departing his flat to meet the elegant Robin Venetia Ellacott for fragrance shopping. Strike had devised the plan to show his appreciation to his exquisite partner by treating her to a wonderous evening at the Rivoli Bar amongst the walls of dark wood and frosted panels. They, as a team had wrapped up their cases, and the night was hers, hers alone.

Because of Robin Ellacott, his business had grown to gain public recognition and provided ample future cases for their choosing. Her methods complemented, in fact, outdid his years with the Royal Military Police Special Investigation Branch, and with her gift for disguise and natural knack for gaining suspect's trust, she had gotten further in several investigations where Strike alone would have failed.

But how was this gorgeous, talented woman in amongst his modest sheets? Over the last five years, he had contrived a platonic relationship by erecting barriers and by convincing himself that there could never be more because it would risk their agency and their friendship. And in one single night, and probably too many drinks he had undone all of it?

Strike was not oblivious, nor did he not appreciate a voluptuous female form, of which his curvy partner had plentiful. He often had to avert his eyes whenever she bent over in any direction in front of him. He was also not clueless to other men ogling her wherever they went, but how had he bypassed all his inner boundaries and succumbed to the physical pleasure that is her?

As he racked his hungover and sleepy brain, he tried to remember concrete memories of his outing with Robin, celebrating her thirtieth birthday.

In the intimate ambience of the Rivoli bar, she sat across from him on the leopard print seating in that figure-hugging blue dress that cut just a little lower and that opal necklace with the reflective sparkling diamonds, Robin was a goddess sitting among mere men with genuine smiles and melodic responsive peals of laughter to his comments and stories.

Strike and Robin had spent hours conversing from the familiar to the personal. The subtle blush that crept to her cheeks when he praised her or doled her compliments on her attire, tactics, and insights. As the night went on, her radiant blue eyes were transfixed on his with an indecipherable look. This intrigued him because of its novelty.

To avoid getting lost in her pools of subtle stares, he frequently glanced at the bronze panel above her head, not that it killed his desire, it was a not-so-tame portrayal of Leda being impregnated by swan-shaped Zeus.

The alcohol had loosened his tongue as he recalled an inappropriate story with Charlotte's family in Arran and sheep. Robin went along with the conversation and seemed genuinely reacting to his candour.

Although they seemed like candid snippets of conversation from Robin, they had re-entered his mind as they had talked about life statuses and stages where he recalled Robin announcing that she was ready to move out, but she will miss Wolfgang, a dog which turned the conversation to dating Germans, or to her dating in general. Exasperatedly, she had admitted there was pressure from her friends and family to try especially with some bloke named 'Axeman', to which she dropped in a piece of key information he hadn't heard before: she tried to end her marriage on her honeymoon, but she chickened out. What had that meant? Strike's detective intuitions were screaming at him, now, in the morning as he processed this, but in the moment why hadn't he pressed? He could not recall.

As the night wore on, she had never looked good to him more: flushed with drink and laughter. The more cocktails of bourbon Strike drank, the more his eyes lingered on her. At one point Robin had bent forward to pick up her perfume in a gift bag off the floor, and his gaze just rested on the cavern of cleavage behind the hanging opal. Appreciatively, Robin smiled at Strike as she applied some of her fragrance then tempted him further by asking him to lean in and express his thoughts.

Oh, and he had some thoughts, thoughts that were indecent and that absorbed him as the rosy, musky smell ignited his fantasies of the breathtaking woman before him. He vaguely recalled his mouth saying that he would get her a cab. His mouth couldn't resist adding his praises and complimenting her quick thinking from their very first case. His manners helped her slip on her coat, which wafted a new wave of fragrance his way.

Strike remembered being more than delighted to close the gap between them when one of her heels caught the rug. His mind fluttered to him holding her at the waist as they left the Ritz. Mutually leaning on each other for dependence against the steep stone steps, him for his leg and her for loss of ability to walk in heels. Her head was against his chest, and his heart started to beat faster. While wondering if she could feel it, Robin looked up at him and met his gaze. Strike involuntarily, called "Taxi."

She said his name, "Strike…"

Their lips crashed together with want and need. Her soft ones were met with his rougher pair. But before he could comprehend what they were engaging in, her tongue asked for permission from his lower lips to deepen the kiss.

The taxi pulled up with a monosyllable honk, and Robin pulled his six-foot frame in with her into the backseat. in between her delicious and soft but desiring kisses, she breathed "Denmark Street," to the driver.

As the taxi wound through traffic, Robin and Strike's eager hands explored each other. When the car finally pulled up in front of their offices, Strike pulled away only to extract banknotes from his pocket to pay the driver. Robin was already hungrily pecking him by the time the vehicle pulled away.

They struggled to keep upright as they entered the stairway, Robin's hands travelled under his coat, which was awkward as she was still holding her gift bag. Strike still pulled her even closer to himself as they climbed the staircase. How did they get up to his flat in their states?

All Strike could recall was that lustful look in her eye and the need in her touch. How had he even concentrated enough to unlock his door and get them to the bed? Those soft, supple lips that were reciprocating his wanting with increasing need. Those determined, delicate hands of hers worked their way under his shirt, meanwhile, his clumsy ones were handling her as if she was fragile china.

Strike let out a sigh as the rest of the night passed through his mind.

"Cormoran?" said a quiet voice from his left. "Are you all right?"

His eyes met at Robin's sheepishly grinning face looking at him from beneath the sheets, searching for his reaction as traces of blushes were making their way to her cheeks. Her hand, as if had a mind of its own, started to bury itself amongst his chest hair.

Strike felt himself return a smirk as he lifted his hand to push a lock of hair out of her features.

"Never better," Strike said as he planted a soft chaste kiss on her still-smiling lips. "Happy Birthday, Robin."