Page 21 of Hidden With You

ChapterEight

While Jasper and Ryan talk outside, I replay the conversation in my head. There was something behind Jasper’s words, but I can’t quite figure out what it was. He was pushing. Prodding.

Something is going on in his head, and all that I can think is that he’s circling back to our time in the atrium.

I sigh. I want to tell myself that night was a mistake. That getting up close and personal with the guy—only to find out that he’s my personal bodyguard—is not going to go well.

Still, I can’t regret it any more than I can deny that I still want him. And it pisses me off that he’s so close, and at the same time so out of reach.

When he walks back in, my head snaps up, and before I can censor myself, I say, “You shouldn’t have left.”

“Ryan and I had things to talk about. You may be paying the bills, but sometimes we need to talk without the client around.”

“That’s not what I was talking about.”

He studies me, and I feel my body tingle as his gaze roams over me. I’m watching his face, and I see heat rise in his eyes when he realizes what I mean. “You’re talking about the party.”

I lift my chin. “You should have finished what you started.”

He doesn’t say a thing, but I’m certain that when he speaks, he’s going to shut this down. He’ll tell me that I need to drop it. That anything physical between us would be unprofessional. And if I can’t dial myself in, he’ll have Ryan assign somebody else to watch over me.

Honestly, that’s what he should do. That would be the professional thing to do. Ryan doesn’t know what happened, after all. Or, at least I assume he doesn’t. So Jasper will tell him, Jasper will be off the case, and that will be that.

He should do that. More importantly, I should want him to. I should want him gone, because the man twists me up inside more than he should. I know it’s because of unfinished business. That promised but undelivered orgasm in the atrium.

It’s not like I’m interested in anything developing between us, and I don’t play out fantasies about guys in my head. I’m not that girl. And yet last night, I was. I did. I got home and spun fantasies in the dark with my hands and the memory of his face. His lips. His body.

“Well?” I snap when I realize where my mind has gone in the lingering silence.

He grins. “I’m not the one who started it. And, yeah, it is better that I walked.”

“Better?” I move past him and into the kitchen area, needing to do something other than just stand there looking at him, wishing that he would touch me. I put a pod into the Keurig and start a cup of coffee brewing.

“I mean that I’m here now. And I need to stay objective. If we’d gone any further, objectivity would be out the window.”

He’s moved into the kitchen, too. I’m still facing my coffee, but I see him in my peripheral vision leaning against the half wall that separates the dining area from the galley-style kitchen. I want to turn around and look at his face, but I don’t. Instead, I watch the stream of coffee dripping down into my cup. And I think about his words. Objectivity.

Objectivity? How does objectivity play into a bodyguard job?

For a moment, I don’t understand, then I get it. And the realization feels as if he’d tossed my hot coffee right in my face. I whirl around to face him. “You prick.”

His eyes go wide. “What the hell?”

I cross to him in two long strides. “You goddamn son-of-a-bitch.”

“What—”

“You think I had something to do with this. You think that I’m a suspect. That’s what you can’t be objective about. If you’d fucked me, then you’d be all lost in your hormones and couldn’t look at me objectively. Well, damn it, Jasper, look. Look at me. Because I didn’t do anything except end up with some son-of-a-bitch sending me a threatening note, and how dare you think otherwise.”

I’m pacing now, fury coming off me in waves. He really thinks that I set this up? What kind of a bastard thinks like that?

“Damn it, calm down.” He grabs me by the shoulders and holds me in place, trying to force me to face him. I dip my head, so that the only thing I’m facing is the tips of his shoes.

“Look at me.”

I don’t.

“Damn it, look at me.”