by M. S. Parker
“Don’t worry about it.” He dropped onto the couch and picked up the only bottle that still contained some liquid. “It’s not the first time I’ve been rejected by a woman for what I wanted.”
I’d been considering walking away and leaving him to whatever pity-party he’d been throwing for himself, but I didn’t hear just bitterness in his voice. There was sadness there too…and self-loathing.
No matter how much I told myself that it wasn’t my job to get personally involved, I couldn’t bring myself to walk away.
“What do you mean? Rejected for what you wanted?”
He drained the last of the whiskey and tossed the bottle to the other end of the couch. “Shouldn’t you be going? Running away from the deviant after your precious virtue.”
I flushed and told myself that he was drunk, rambling, probably didn’t know what he was saying. Hell, he probably wouldn’t even remember any of this tomorrow.
But this wasn’t about a kiss, and to do my job, I needed to know what was going on. That was why I’d come here, after all.
I walked over to the couch and sat on the arm. It was far enough away from him that we weren’t touching, but close enough that he’d feel more like he was talking to a friend than someone grilling him.
“What’s going on?” When he didn’t answer, I added, “I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me.”
“Why would you want to help me?” he asked, looking up at me. His eyes were dark and open. Sad. “You didn’t want me kissing you, and I thought it was a good kiss. Thought you wanted me to kiss you, but I was wrong. Not the first time I didn’t know what a woman wanted. I used to think I did.”
“You’re not making any sense,” I said. What he was saying should have put me off. All of it sounded like the kind of shit an egotistical little prick would say to get a woman in bed.
But something told me that wasn’t what he was doing right now.
“You might as well know. Nobody else does, but at least you’ll know, and you can get out while you can. Flee the sinking ship.” He made a disgusted sound and smacked the couch with the flat of his hand.
He really needed to quit drinking. This would do worse things for his reputation than trashing a hotel room or punching someone. Fans could handle their rock stars behaving like assholes, but this was the wrong side of vulnerable.
“I’m guessing you did your homework because Chester would have only hired the best, so you know about the break-up.” He glanced at me, and I nodded but didn’t say anything. He continued anyway, “She wasn’t living with me, Mitzi, I mean, but she stayed at my place when we were in New York. She had problems, and I knew it, but she didn’t want to talk about them, so I didn’t.”
He picked at a thread on the couch, and I wondered if he felt more like he was talking to himself rather than me.
“I came in one day and found her in bed with a couple roadies. She was strung out and didn’t even blink when she saw me. She just kept fucking them and told me that it was all my fault. That if I hadn’t made her do…” His voice trailed off, and he raised his head. “I’ve never forced a woman to do anything. You have to believe me.”
Even if my gut hadn’t been telling me that he wouldn’t do that, I could hear the desperation in his voice, and it wasn’t because he wanted me to believe him. He wanted to believe it himself.
“I believe you,” I said gently.
He’d been drunk when he kissed me, but he still let me go when I’d taken a step back. If he was the sort of guy who would force what he wanted on someone, that would’ve been a perfect opportunity to do it. But he hadn’t.
Maybe he wasn’t as bad as I’d originally thought.
“You’re pretty,” he mumbled as his head dropped forward, chin on his chest.
I sighed. “Okay, you’re going to get a crick in your neck if you sleep like that.”
I stood up and then reached down to get a firm hold under his arm. He was bigger than me, but I was stronger than I looked. It took some maneuvering, but I managed to get him to his feet. He kept muttering random things under his breath, but I didn’t bother trying to figure out what he was saying. I was pretty sure I’d figured out the incident that had triggered his change in behavior. Now, I just had to get him sobered up and then we could get started on rehabbing his career.
Nine
Reb
Something was off.
The pounding in my head was familiar and expected. So was the bed. Except I wasn’t supposed to be in this bed. Why was I here instead of at a hotel?
Oh. Right. Because I’d done some stupid shit and coming back here had been my only option. Well, the lesser of all the evils offered. No way in hell would I stay with my mom, or with my friends.
So, I’d come home. As my brain sluggishly woke, I realized that I still didn’t know why I was in my bed. I’d slept on the couch before because I hadn’t wanted to be in here.
Before I could try to sort things out any further, my body let me know that I’d been out for a long time. It was probably a miracle I hadn’t pissed the bed. Passing out drunk often didn’t guarantee the ability to wake up for the call of nature.
I groaned as I climbed out of bed, my joints stiff and aching. Everything of mine ached, actually. I limped into my bathroom, my hands keeping me from stumbling into something I couldn’t see in the dim light. I could have turned on the lights, but I had a feeling that might make me throw up, and cleaning up puke was not what I needed right now.
I breathed a sigh of relief as I emptied my bladder. Tempted as I was to go straight for my liquor cabinet, I was already in the bathroom, so a shower was probably a good idea. After everything that’d happened, I needed to at least put forth an effort, or all my years of hard work were going to burn right in front of me.
I drank a glass of water as I waited a few seconds for the water to heat up. Maybe after I’d had some of the expensive scotch I’d gotten from someone, I’d call Chester and find out if he’d gotten any feedback from the PR firm. Paige hadn’t liked me much, which made me wonder if she was going to request a change. I hoped she didn’t, and it wasn’t only because I thought she was hot.
She hadn’t been impressed by me. In fact, I’d gotten the impression that she really didn’t care what I thought about her beyond her ability to do her job. She’d held her own with me, both yesterday when we first met and then earlier today…
Shit.
She’d come back over.
I leaned out of the shower to check the clock on the bathroom wall. Six o’clock. Was that morning or evening? The last thing I remembered was talking to Paige. It had been afternoon. Maybe. But I didn’t feel like I’d slept for only a few hours.
My alcohol-soaked brain struggled to put the pieces together, but it took until I was toweling off before I was able to process that it had to be six in the morning. I’d slept for more than twelve hours. My stomach growled, as if it had needed the acknowledgment of time to be allowed to announce how long it had been since I’d eaten.
I wrapped my towel around my waist and started toward the kitchen. Breakfast first. Then I’d call Chester and have him send Paige a nice fruit basket or something in case I said something rude yesterday. I didn’t think so, but it never hurt to be cautious.
I was halfway down the hall when something new caught my attention. I smelled food. Specifically, bacon and coffee. Someone was here, but considering they were cooking, I felt safe in assuming they weren’t here to hurt me. My stomach rumbled again, and I walked faster. I’d never seen Chester cook, so I doubted I’d find him waiting for me, which meant it was most likely my mother. At the moment, I was prepared to happily trade a lecture for some breakfast.
The person standing at the stove, however, wasn’t my mother. I’d only met her twice, but I had no problem recognizing Paige, even from the back.
“Did you stay the whole night?”
She jumped, then turned, the startled expression on her face shifting to something else for a mome
nt before disappearing behind a mask of indifference. If I hadn’t known better, I would’ve said she was checking me out…because I was wearing only a towel. Shit.
“Sorry,” I apologized. “I forgot I wasn’t wearing–”
“You’ve been asleep for more than a day,” she interrupted, the look on her face telling me that she wasn’t going to acknowledge my lack of clothes. “It’s Thursday evening.”
I shook my head. “That’s not possible. I would’ve had to get up.”
She turned back to the stove. “You did,” she said. “Sort of.”
“What does that mean?”
She hesitated, and I had a feeling I wasn’t going to like what she had to say.
“What do you remember from yesterday?”
I ran a hand through my hair, sending droplets of water raining down on my shoulders. “Um, not a lot. My friends came over…no, wait, that was Tuesday. Yesterday. Right, Wednesday. I remember you being here. We talked. It’s all really fuzzy.”
“That’s all?”
Shit. “Did I do something? If I offended you, I’m sorry–”
“No,” she said sharply. “We talked. I put you into the closest bed I could find.”
“That’s a guest room,” I interrupted with a frown. “Did I move into my room at some point?”
“Yes. Sometime late last night, you…” Her voice trailed off and even with her back to me, I could see that the tips of her ears were red, but I didn’t think it was because of me and the towel this time. “I put the bed linens in the washer, along with your clothes. Once I cleaned you up and put you in your bed, I called a cleaning company. They’ll come do a deep clean on the mattress whenever you want.”
Heat rushed to my face. “I’m sorry about that. I should’ve known better than to finish vodka on an empty stomach. I can usually hold my liquor better.”
She turned around but refused to look at me as she held out a plate. “Yeah, well, no one can hold that much liquid that long.”
I took the plate, set it on the table, and then froze as I realized what she’d said could have meant something completely different than my original thought. I closed my eyes. “Please tell me that I didn’t piss the bed.” She didn’t say anything, and that just made it worse. “Please tell me that I didn’t piss the bed like some kid and you had to clean up after me.”
“Don’t worry.” Her voice was dry. “I’m billing you for everything.”
I hung my head and wished this was a dream. “And here I thought I’d already hit rock bottom.”
I felt a hand on my arm, and I jerked my head up, my eyes meeting hers. There was a hint of humor in those blue-green irises. “Don’t worry. Your confidentiality agreement with my company completely guarantees my silence.”
“Yeah, that doesn’t really make me feel any better.”
She took a step back, the humor falling away. “Let’s get some coffee and food in you, then we can talk.”
I didn’t like the sound of that. The talking. The other stuff actually sounded pretty good.
After I’d gone back to my room to put on pants – and a shirt – I returned to the kitchen and took a seat at the waiting plate. I took a few bites of bacon, and then asked, “Did I do anything else I need to apologize for?”
She didn’t answer, which made me think there was something she didn’t want to tell me, and considering what she’d already told me, I couldn’t imagine what would possibly be–
Her hair was like silk against the back of my hand, her skin almost as soft. My thumb found the hollow behind her ear as my fingers curled around her neck and pulled her toward me. This was a bad idea, but I had to know what she tasted like, what her lips felt like. My mouth came down on hers, and it was like nothing I’d felt before. Heat and electricity, all of it narrowed down to a single point of contact. And then she had her hands in my hair, her body pressing against mine. Fuck, those curves…
My hand tightened around my coffee mug. I wanted to believe that I was remembering a dream, but my body told me it’d really happened. It remembered better than my head what it had felt like to have her in my arms.
“Paige, I am so sorry. I was out of–”
“The drinking needs to stop,” she said briskly, acting as if she hadn’t heard what I’d been trying to say. “Not just cut back, but actually stop. No more alcohol until I say it’s okay.”
That got my attention. Not because of the drinking, but because she thought she could actually give me an order. Aside from my mother, no one told me what to do. It actually made me smile.
I stood up and picked up my now-empty plate. “What if I don’t want to stop?” I turned toward her, actually curious to hear her answer.
Her eyes narrowed as she closed the distance between us. Even though I was dressed, she kept her eyes on mine. She was as close as she’d been before, when I’d kissed her, but I had a feeling that if I tried that now, she’d probably slap me. Or bite me.
That last thought shouldn’t have sent blood rushing straight to my cock.
“I was hired to do a job, Mr. Union.” She put her hands on her hips. “This is how the job gets done. This is how I save your image.”
Her eyes were sparking, showing me that I hadn’t imagined her fire. I wanted to reach out and touch her, see how she’d respond. She was strong, stubborn, independent…all of the things that should have turned me off as a Dom. Even with vanilla sex, I needed the control, the challenge.
Paige was definitely a challenge.
“If you’re not willing to do what I ask, then maybe we need to find someone else to take my place.”
Hell no. This was just getting interesting.
“Maybe I just need the right incentive,” I suggested. I gave her a slow, thorough look, letting myself see all the things my subconscious had registered before.
Damn.
“What do you say, Paige? I do what you ask, and I get rewarded?”
Ten
Paige
“That’s not how this works, Mr. Union. I think it’d be best for everyone if I spoke to my boss and had someone new take over.”
That was what I should have said. I’d gone above and beyond the call of duty with him. I’d spent more than a day taking care of him, and that was so far out of my job description that I could make a case to Sybil to drop him completely as a client. I had a degree in public relations, not babysitting or housekeeping. No offense meant to anyone who worked in either of those fields. I respected the hard work it took to take care of kids and homes. But this wasn’t my home, and Reb was definitely not a kid.
I’d seen that for myself. Not that I’d doubted his masculinity before, but now I had visual proof burned into my mind.
He’d been half-conscious when I’d stripped off his clothes and cleaned him up. Not awake enough to have a coherent conversation, but enough that I wasn’t trying to move him around on my own. I told myself over and over that it was no different than helping my mom bathe my grandfather after his stroke, but…no, it wasn’t the same at all.
And I couldn’t get the memory of those amazingly defined muscles and that long, thick–
Dammit.
This wasn’t the time or the place for me to be ogling a guy, and it was never the time or place for me to ogle a client. I wasn’t immune to the fact that Reb was gorgeous, but that wasn’t the point. Nothing was going to happen between us. Nothing could happen between us.
And I preferred it that way.
Which meant I needed to take back control of the situation before it got any further away from me than it already was.
“If you have anything planned for Saturday, cancel it.” The expression on Reb’s face told me the direction of his thoughts, and I mentally cursed myself for not being more put off by it. My irritation at myself came out in my next statement. “You’re doing charity work.”
“I am?” He didn’t seem annoyed, but rather amused.
“You are.” I did my best to keep from returning his smile. The f
act that I was torn between wanting to kick him or kiss him didn’t make his grin any less infectious. I took a step back to put some distance between us, but it didn’t stop me from being able to feel the tension between us, the very thing I’d felt before we kissed. That couldn’t happen again.
No matter how much my mouth still burned from just the memory.
“That’s your brilliant PR plan? Have me do a little charity work, and all will be forgotten?” He shook his head. “I thought you were smarter than that.”
My temper flared, and I crowded into his space, glaring up at him. “Just because you’re paying–”
Before I finished the sentence, I saw the corner of his mouth twitch and realized he’d been intentionally goading me.
Asshole.
“Look,” I snapped. “This isn’t going to be some ‘one and done’ thing. The shit may not have hit the fan until recently, but you’ve been spiraling for months, and everyone knows it. It’s going to take more than one Saturday picking up litter if you want to move beyond ‘paid your debt to society’ and on to salvaging your image as a good guy.”
“You think I’m a good guy?”
I sighed. He wasn’t going to make this easy for me. “Fine. You do what I tell you to do, and do it well. In return, I’ll make sure you get something for your troubles.”
He grinned. “Then I put myself in your hands.”
I tried to think of the most bland, platonic way to take that statement. “I’ll send you a text with the time and place tomorrow.”
Then, before he could see me flustered, I excused myself and left. I needed to get home anyway. I needed to have a good meal, and a good night’s sleep, especially since I’d be working over the weekend. I told Reb the truth when I said the company would be billing for the time I’d spent, but a little voice at the back of my head wondered if I’d have stayed even if that hadn’t been possible.
By the time I arrived home, all of my frustration from the past week had coiled into a tight ball in the middle of my stomach. Going into public relations, I’d known that I’d be asked to work with people I disliked. While not all clients were people in trouble looking to smooth things over, there were enough that I knew, sooner or later, there’d be someone I found distasteful.