Protect Me Not ((Un)Professionally Yours 2)

“Please mate, me missus is going to kill me for forgettin’ our anniversary. Please. You’ve got to help me.”

“Try the Tesco Express down the road,” Ty suggested.

“Ty,” Vicki’s quiet voice said from behind him. “It’s okay. I have some unsold stock that’ll only wilt overnight. At least it’ll go to a good cause.”

“I don’t think so, Vicki.”

The guy redoubled his efforts when he spotted Vicki. “Please, lady. Have a heart. It’s our five-year anniversary. She’ll have me guts for garters if I don’t give her anything.”

“No.” Ty shook his head again, remaining resolute on the matter. He pointed to the left and shouted again. “Tesco!”

The guy shot him a malevolent glare and flipped him off before skulking away.

“Right back atcha, asshole,” Ty muttered and turned to look at a blatantly grinning Vicki.

“It would only have taken a few minutes to make him a cute little bouquet.”

“Shop’s closed. And I didn’t like the look of him.”

“Gut feeling?”

“My gut works just as well as yours,” he teased, happy that their conversation wasn’t as strained as it had been over the last few weeks.

It was great to have her smiling at him again. She hadn’t smiled at him since the night he had cooked for her. He only now realized how much he’d missed that little bit of sunshine in his life.

He fidgeted with the button on one of his cuffs, suddenly awkward, and then shoved his hands in his pockets—resisting the urge to touch her—while he stared into her sweet face.

“Nearly done?”

“Yes. I was coming to tell you that I’m ready to leave.”

He nodded and chewed the inside of his cheek before asking what he had vowed not to ask. “Honey, are you mad at me?”

His question surprised her. He could see it in the way her eyes widened, and her jaw slackened. She would be terrible at poker.

“No, I’m not.”

“Then why…” This time he did stop himself before he could complete the question, but she knew what he’d started to ask.

“I needed some time to think.”

“About?”

“About how our arrangement, such as it is, was making me feel.”

“It wasn’t working for you, was it?”

“I loved every second of it, Ty…but it’s not enough. And I wouldn’t dream of asking you to change the terms just because I couldn’t hack it. So, I suppose…” She sighed and shifted her shoulders. “I suppose I’m taking my out.”

Ty attempted to ignore the hollow pit of disappointment and misery that had opened up in his chest, but he wasn’t wholly successful. His hands fisted in his pockets, and he nodded curtly.

“You’re sure?”

“Not really.” She offered him a sad smile. “I feel like I’m missing out on a wonderful opportunity. I mean, you’ve certainly over-delivered on your promise of lots and lots of orgasms. It was fantastic. I felt like I could conquer whole planets but you wouldn’t allow me to make you feel the same way.”

“I’m sorry, honey. I get it, but I just…I can’t give you more. I wish I could be a different man for you. But this is me.”

“I wouldn’t want to change you, Ty. I like you exactly the way you are. But that’s the problem, you see? I like you, and you plainly stated that feelings were off limits. I can’t quite shut my emotions off, so…I’m getting out because that like is dangerously close to growing into something else.”

Something else? Like what?

Love?

He had given her no reason to feel this way. And he couldn’t help resenting the fact that her inconvenient emotions were getting in the way of something that had been pretty damned amazing between them.

Vicki watched his face close up, and his eyes shutter. She had known that if he had even an inkling of what she was feeling, he’d run scared…and here it was. Proof that the man was terrified of being liked.

Or loved.

Or maybe he was just terrified of being liked or loved by her. Not an inconceivable notion.

She sighed and gave him another sad smile.

That last night together, when he’d cooked for her…she had seen how it could be between them. And the idea of going back to the hot—but ultimately soulless—sex had depressed her.

It wasn’t enough. It had never been enough. And continuing would have left her in a truly dark emotional space.

She hadn’t been able to make the decision until this very moment, vacillating between continuing with it and ending it. But seeing him standing there—so handsome and so hopeful—reminded her of that man in her kitchen two weeks ago. The man he didn’t want her to know.

The awareness that he was keeping so much of himself hidden from her had made the decision easy in the end.

In four short weeks, they’d be heading to Cape Town. She probably wouldn’t see much of him there. He’d be in the background because Miles’s security detail would be in charge. She would only spend time with Ty if she went somewhere by herself. Which would be unlikely.