Kyrah Morris has built a life she’s proud of. As the College of Business Dean at the HBCU Crescent Falls University, she’s successful, independent, and surrounded by the friends who became family. She’s learned one important lesson: love hurts. So she keeps her intimate relationships in the friends-with-benefits category.

Then Shiro Bako walks onto the dance floor.

Shiro loves his family, his thriving auto repair shop, and a variety of beautiful, black thick women who knows how to have a good time until one dance with Kyrah leaves him waiting more.

Kyrah insists that they aren’t serious but Shiro has never been a man who backs down from what he wants. With patience, intention, and a whole lot of charm, he begins showing Kyrah that real love doesn’t have to look like the heartbreak she left behind.

Just when Kyrah’s carefully guarded heart begins to open, the past returns and old wounds threaten everything she and Shiro are building. Suddenly, trusting him means risking the one thing she’s fought hardest to protect: her heart.

When it comes to Kyrah, Shiro isn’t afraid of loving her and he sure as hell isn’t afraid of forever. He knows exactly what he wants—and he’s determined to show her that sometimes the love you’re most afraid to trust is the love you were always meant to find.

Their attraction is instant, their chemistry undeniable, and pretending they’re “just friends” becomes harder every day.