Part 2 (2/2)

I pull back, my lips still swollen from his bruising kisses. He chases my lips for a minute, not realizing that we're done, but we are. I need to be the one to stop this time.

It's like dragging myself blindfolded through mud. Putting distance between us is strangely disorienting when sparks are still firing in all directions and every cell in my body is saying, ditch work and drag him into your room before he realizes what he's doing.

”I didn't mean to-” he starts at the same time as I make a dismissive sound and cover my face with my hands.

”Don't worry about it, faces b.u.mp all the time,” I mumble through my fingers. ”You should go.”

He makes a noise I can't quite decipher, and after a beat I feel the absence of his body heat as he moves away from me, then the door k.n.o.b turns, the hinges squeak, and he's gone.

I said it. And yet I'm standing here, wis.h.i.+ng like h.e.l.l I hadn't just pushed him away, because kissing Cole Parker was like winning the make-out lottery.

Too bad I'm never going to do it again.

-four-.

Cole.

Outside Hailey's apartment, I stand on the landing for thirty seconds. Twenty to get my s.h.i.+t together and will my erection away, and the last ten talking myself out of heading back inside.

Kissing her was a stupid move. I didn't mean to do it.

I've thought about it for months and done everything I can think of to c.o.c.k-block myself. Dated other women to drive the thought of her mouth from my head. Stepped back into the shadows at the handful of events we'd happened to both attend. Watched her with other men-men nothing like me-and told myself to get a f.u.c.king clue.

Downstairs, Wilson is patiently waiting for me. He looks up from his phone and smirks. ”Did you forget we agreed on video surveillance for the apartment?”

f.u.c.k me. Not patient at all, the f.u.c.king perv. ”Destroy that.” I close my eyes. ”No. Download it onto a USB stick for me. Then destroy it.”

”Seriously, you want to w.a.n.k off to it? You're an idiot.”

”f.u.c.k you.” I take a deep breath. I don't know why I want it. I don't need video of what is probably just her heels on my a.s.s to get off. I've got the memory of her tongue licking along my lips and her teeth against the skin on my neck. I'm good. But I still want the video.

”And stop the video surveillance.”

”You trust her?”

”More than I trust you, a.s.shole.” It was a lie. I'd trust Wilson with my life, as much as I would Jason or Tag. But it sc.r.a.pes at me that I forgot for a second that his eagle eyes were always watching-that just a few hours earlier, I'd asked him to put that surveillance into place.

And all it took was Hailey yelling at me across her kitchen for my blood flow to head south and make some dumb-a.s.s decisions.

I'm not going back to her place. I do have will power, and I'm able to bury what I want when it's for a greater good. What's good for Hailey is me, far, far away from her.

But just in case. ”And sweet talk yourself back in there and remove the cameras.”

”And what should l tell her...?”

”Tell her nothing. Tell her you want a f.u.c.king knitting lesson. Tell her you need to babysit her until after we figure out a plan of attack for the media. I'm heading back to the office to meet with Jason.”

Wilson shrugs, his slightly-too-long hair flopping in his eyes. He does apathetic disturbingly well, part of his everyman presentation. I've seen him be everything from a gamer geek to a blue collar construction worker. I've also see him in the underground fighting rings. Nothing everyman about how he pummels bulkier men into the mat.

Floppy hair my a.s.s.

”Thanks,” I mutter, shaking his hand.

Twenty minutes later, I pull into the underground parking garage beneath our offices. We have the second and third floors of an office building between Dupont Circle and Adams Morgan. s.h.i.+ny enough to impress our clients, but not quite inst.i.tutional K Street. Also, close to my condo, which is really all I care about. I stop at the coffee shop on the ground floor and get lunch, telling myself I'm not postponing the inevitable lecture on professionalism and priorities from my business partner.

I'm lying, because Jason is waiting to pounce as soon as I step into our reception area on the second floor. I should have just gone straight up to my office on the third.

”What the h.e.l.l were you thinking?” he spits at me, and I ignore him.

Instead I nod at Ellie, our receptionist. She gives me a wincing smile that says he's been p.i.s.sed for longer than the half hour it took me to get here from Hailey's place. I let out a long, slow breath, and wag my coffee at the stairs. ”Let's go do this in private.”

He waits until we get upstairs, then lets loose. ”Tag? You gave Morgan Reid to Tag?”

Oh. ”That's what you're p.i.s.sed about?”

”Tag's a f.u.c.king bull in a china shop. s.h.i.+t. I spent most of the morning apologizing for him.”

”Did he make Amelia and Taylor happy?”

”Only because one or both of them want to f.u.c.k him.”

I sigh. ”And we know that's not going to happen, right? So who cares how p.i.s.sed Morgan gets?”

”He's the one paying our bill.”

This is delicate ground. Jason's half-brother Mack is a silent investor in our firm, and Jason has a legit oar in wanting to always stay in the black. On the other hand, I don't give a f.u.c.k about money, not the same way he does. Plus we're plenty profitable. ”Then you should have gone yourself.”

”I did. But he's your client.”

”I don't want him as my client.” The half-year-old tension simmers between us. Truthfully, neither of us is right or wrong. It's f.u.c.king shades of gray and Jason wasn't pus.h.i.+ng me for selfish reasons. Between the two of us, he's more the good guy. h.e.l.l, he's still working for Uncle Sam, even if it's in a dark and unseen way.

But it wasn't f.u.c.king right, what we did. Not then. And that truth has eaten at me for six long months.

I don't care where the order came from.

Jason grits his teeth and glares at me. ”Is that why you're f.u.c.king his daughter?”

I don't even feel my coffee slip out of my hand. He says the words and I'm in motion, one fist grabbing the front of his s.h.i.+rt, the other cracking against his jaw.

He's like a brother to me, so I stagger back after that one shot. One too many, but I couldn't help myself.

”You done?” he asks slowly, glaring at me from under pulled together eyebrows. His voice is quiet as he rubs his jaw. n.o.body does Disappointed Dad quite like Jason.

”It was one kiss and Wilson has a big f.u.c.king mouth.” There's no point in staying p.i.s.sed about it. Part of me knew I'd be coming back to this conversation. But I'm p.r.i.c.kly-too p.r.i.c.kly, which would be Jason's point if I let him make it.

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