She loved the way he looked at her just now, his eyes penetrating through all of her defenses. Before it had been like they were standing on opposite sides of the abyss but know, she felt him move closer to her, before he swept her up into his embrace.

When his lips touched hers, they were tentative but they didn't stay that way. His hands smoothed the fabric of her dress against her body at her waist, her back and finally in front where…

"Relax…they won't bite."

He blinked his eyes and looked at her and she almost chuckled at him as he finally did stroke where she wanted him to with his fingers, her breasts pushed against her shirt and when his eyebrows narrowed just slightly that's when she knew he had felt her nipples harden beneath the fabric.

Oh she wanted him now in so many different ways, but she looked towards the dungeon door, surely the evil man that they had locked up inside there would break it down any moment, leaving its splintered edges on the floor. But Julian still explored her mouth with his own, his stubble tickling her face and then…she felt his tongue slip in between her lips, exhilarating her. Her heart leapt because she had spent hours waiting for if not her prince, then this frog standing in front of her to kiss her just like that.

She felt it all the way to her toes, underneath the boots she had worn to scale the castle. The one where he had been held prisoner by the evil queen Carly who had tried to weave a spell on him so he'd do her bidding…she had to work quickly to break any remaining hold the queen had on him.

So she did the only thing she could think of, hidden in her memories involving the fairy tales she had been told…and that's why she had kissed him.

Oh wait, now she felt the cool air against her breasts because Julian had undone her dress and his hands now fondled her as he leaned to kiss her again, the warmth of his actions filling her in ways that robbed her of her thoughts…

Crash! Bang! Ow!

Ow…?

Neither of them had expected that but one of the queen's evil lords had apparently stubbed his toe while kicking the wooden door down. A litany of profanities which followed confirmed that theory.

She looked at Julian, her mouth still swollen from his ardent attentions.

"We probably shouldn't stay here," she surmised, "We need to find a quick way out."

Julian glanced towards the window.

"There…"

Then the door finally came crashing down and the room filled quickly with men, bearing large swords.

Alexis lifted up quickly, her breath coming quickly. God, what a nightmare when the men had come after the two of them…then again wait, before that part, it had gotten downright steamy between the two of them. Chalk another crazy dream to add to the stack of them she'd experienced ever since been holed up with the man who'd messed with her head and then her heart.

He never died in her dreams but he came close and she didn't know what to read into that. Was she afraid he'd die? Did she want him to die? Was this some kind of wish fulfillment deal going on in her dreams? Were these feelings she kept locked away until her defenses weakened during sleep?

No they were just dreams that was all.

She wondered how he slept at night since he'd been here. What kind of dreams filled his head. He did seem much better rested in the morning than she felt. But then not much of anything seemed to affect Julian…not even when she'd known him as Derek Wells.

Before hitting the sack, alone of course, she had this long conversation over beer on the porch swing about what had led her down the path where she had been so close to marrying a professional hit man for the mob. She'd even talked about how she'd killed the mobster who'd murdered her sister. He'd mostly listened, paid close attention and asked a question, made a comment here and here. Did any of it matter to him or was he storing it away with all the other info she'd spilled to him to use against an enemy? At this point she'd been too tired and a bit liquored up to care.

They had split up before midnight and headed to their respective rooms to sleep alone. But she had thought about him as she tried to drift off…what it'd be like if instead they had gone into the same bedroom for a change. One with only one bed, good sized of course which they would share.

Oh no you don't Alexis.

No, she and Julian, they could never do that here. After all, he had gone for women like Carly who were dramatic to the point of being over the top and manipulative. Olivia who was histrionic and flaky and still into Sonny who'd likely see the inside of a prison cell very soon.

Both mafia molls and members of Sonny's harem, of much higher standing than Alexis. Not that she minded in the least! Sonny was better as someone she didn't have to deal with directly in a personal way. A woman could run herself ragged enabling him and many had tried.

Olivia would be more the type who would bump into a shelf of crystal knocking them on the floor in shards of pieces. Carly would be more the type to fling crystal around in a tirade breaking it after walking into one of her hotel rooms using the master key to catch someone doing something or snooping.

But maybe Julian was like Sonny and just went for the same kind of woman. If Alexis knew one thing, she knew she could never be like Carly and Olivia and had no desire to do so. She was fine with who she was and the life she'd built for herself…her one weakness though was for bad boys and she'd spent a lot of years running away from that.

Okay maybe that wasn't the right choice of words because the only man she'd really fled from wasn't off the bad boy list. He was one of the nice ones. She'd pictured inside her head the life that they'd live together. Getting married, moving into a house with Kristina and maybe having children together.

But as much as she tried to fit herself into that life she knew deep down she could never ever live it. It'd suffocate her slowly day by day, hour by hour and at first she'd never even notice.

Until it was too late.

Shawn, he had seemed so safe because she knew she'd never love him and her decision to accept his proposal didn't change that and he'd sworn to her that he'd changed. He had his secrets clearly, those moments of silence between them but she never considered the fact that she might have gravitated towards another remorseless killer

She'd have to just face up to the reality that nice men weren't in her future. No, she'd been hardwired since the time she had taken her first breath, to embrace bad boys. Her father, bad boy, half-brothers, bad boys…first guy she had sex with…bad boy…turned into a ruthless mobster. More bad boys, more kids…mobsters, sleazy Ric and of course Jerry, the poster child for PC terrorism.

Now one of the bad boys was sharing a house with her, sleeping in another room and as far as her relationships, he'd been the original bad boy. Only a few hours some of it in a drunken haze and yet he'd shaped her life in ways she hadn't known until years later, beginning with the baby they'd created together.

Still, she had to figure out once again how to accept it and move forward. She didn't know if she'd be able to live with the realization that she'd always be attracted to and attract one bad boy after another. Maybe it was time to start to try to do that.

But with one of them on the roster, she still wanted more and she didn't know what to do about that.

Julian had tossed and turned not able to sleep well. His dreams had been of a brunette woman with impossibly sensual green eyes like the emeralds she had favored. The ones she wore over her creamy skin in one of his favorite dreams, mostly because that's all she had been wearing. She had been kissing his body, slowly by inch as he lay back his mind spinning. He'd clench the bed sheet when her lips found his favorite parts. She had just snuck into his bed like some form of seductress, really this couldn't be someone he'd said goodnight to only several hours earlier.

Then who was she?

He had traced the emerald necklace around her neck, looking into her face, just before he kissed her again, savoring the flavor of her mouth. Where the necklace rested on her breasts he had paid extra attention and her reaction in his dream had woken him back into the real world.

Where anything like what he had experienced with her didn't exist. In fact, she lay asleep in another room probably not dreaming like he had been. He lay back in his bed, the sheet tucked around him and tried to get back to sleep and not to dream.

But then a part of him so wanted to return to that world where the two of them broke their rules and had become lovers. So maybe as long as that existed in his sleep, then it didn't really count. He would never have to explain himself to her as to why like a guy, he looked at her wondering what could have been.

He knew that he had hurt her, not only through his actions but simply by existing. For insinuating himself into her life and her heart while hiding his true nature from her. But as much as he'd caused the rift by hiding his mobster background that's not what had dealt the biggest blow. She had been vulnerable when she met up with Shawn and that had partly been his fault. He'd been busy getting Coleman to do some work for him, surveillance on a situation looming like storm clouds in the distance. Coleman hadn't agreed to it at first until he laid out the terms.

The man had his soft spots.

Shawn had made his move and Julian guessed that an added bonus would be that his new wife couldn't incriminate him on the witness stand if subpoenaed at some grand jury hearing. When Julian had gotten wind of it, he did what he did best which was acted.

If Shawn wanted to play the wounded bridegroom and victim, he could go ahead. It wouldn't last much longer.

The woman who filled his dreams at night lately, most likely due to the close proximity they shared these days and nights. But as soon as they dealt with Shawn and the rest of his cohorts including his sister, the sooner they could return to their lives in PC and things would start it over and this time he'd get it right. Yes, that would definitely be what happened, he thought as he felt his eyelids close again.

He'd be bucking a serious tide because he knew when the feds got done with Sonny and his organization they more than likely would come after him. He could wind up sent to prison for the rest of his life too. Life was filled with risks and this time he could be out of luck if his past caught up with his present.

But as he drifted back to his dreamland, a part of him rebelled against that reality.