through his hair and moved past her. ‘Just call my sister when you’re ready to sort the arrangements.’ He didn’t look back as he headed for the lift, couldn’t bear to see the way her eyes glistened and body shook.
This is for the best. If she’s this upset already, just think what it would be like a few weeks down the line.
‘You’ll be pleased to learn that, following your little chat this afternoon, she’s ensuring we have no more need to see one another going forward.’
‘So that’s it, you’ve delivered your apology, attempted to seduce me when I’m in the know and, now that I’ve questioned your behaviour, you’re leaving?’ She stormed up behind him, the heat of her wrath penetrating his back, her words hitting so many nerves he could barely think straight.
‘It’s not like that.’
‘No?’
He paused at the lift and he sensed her stop too, but he didn’t dare look at her. He needed to be gone. Now. Before he backed up and kissed it all away, the pain, the disgust, and sank them both deeper into this mess.
‘I’m sure you’ll agree, it’s for the best.’ He ignored her question and pressed the button for the lift, grateful when the doors promptly opened. ‘Now you don’t have to see me, unless you choose to.’
He didn’t know why he’d added the latter.
Liar. You still hope she’ll look past your reputation to your bed. Well, fuck hope. You’re leaving this one well alone and moving on...
‘Goodnight, Ms Anders.’
He stepped into the waiting lift and pressed ‘Ground’, his eyes finding hers of their own volition. His insides clenched, her bright gaze holding his own, and then the doors came to his rescue, shutting out her penetrative stare and calming him the fuck down.
It’s okay, some space, some time away, and life can go back to how it was.
Pre-Zara.
Pre-all-this-weird-feeling-shit.
* * *
What the fuck just happened?
Dazed, Zara rubbed at the back of her neck, trying to coax away the unease that prickled there. How could the mood have changed so suddenly? So dramatically? One minute he wanted her and the next, he couldn’t move away fast enough. And all because she’d probed.
She turned away from the lift and forced her legs to return to her office, her limbs still shaky with the thrill of him. Not even the chill of his departure had stamped that out.
And what the hell was that about?
All that she knew of him, of what was wise and sensible to her sanity, and still she wanted him.
She scooped her bag up off the floor and tossed it onto her desk, dropping into her swivel chair and letting it spin with the force of her fall—Now what?
Something didn’t sit right.
As the chair came to a rest, she looked to the magazine still spread open, the words bouncing off the page even though she was too far away to read it. Not that it mattered—she knew it by heart.
The man on the page and the man she’d met yesterday, though they looked the same, they weren’t. He was a contradiction, a dangerous contradiction at that. And although her sanity told her to leave well alone, to keep him painted bad, she couldn’t.
Something had called to her, something she’d glimpsed when she’d thrown her insults at him. A pain, an anger even, that went far deeper than what she’d said had warranted, and for all her self-preservation, she didn’t want to believe the article. She didn’t want to believe the press. She wanted to believe in him. To gain an understanding of him.
Don’t be a fool. You’re playing with fire.
She laid her head over the back of her chair and stared up at the ceiling, her thoughts turning to the very real fire he’d stoked up low in her gut.
Yes, to pursue him would be foolish. No matter that her body ached for him. No matter that she knew somewhere beneath that cocky exterior was a pain she wanted to understand, to fix. He wasn’t for her.
She should be relieved that his sister had stepped in, that her eyes had been opened to this side of him, the side that very much mirrored Charles.