Light slanted across his face as the sun rose higher in the sky. He had a decision to make. Did he stop running and see what the man who had once been his hero wanted? Or did he wait until it was too late?
Rather than contemplate a question he wasn’t prepared to answer, he headed for the shower. It was too late to go back to bed and really, it was the last place he should be. Why he’d thought he could take Bailey to bed in a no-strings arrangement as she’d offered was the joke of the century.
He turned the shower on and stepped under a steaming hot spray. No strings. He might as well have handed Bailey the rope and asked her to tie him up in knots. Because if his Zen master had cornered him now and ordered self-awareness, he would have had to admit the only word for last night was…emotional. He struggled to get his mouth around the word because it was so foreign to his vocabulary. Emotion didn’t figure into his work or relationships. It was an unwise word that made people do stupid things. But he could not deny the truth. He had never felt so connected to another person in his life. And not just because Bailey had been a virgin. It’d been as if he was in her head and she’d been in his.
God. He tipped his head back and sluiced the water out of his face. He’d told himself not to do it. Had warned himself it was a mistake. Why did he continue to let himself want what he couldn’t have? How could he be tangling himself up in a woman who was not only the obsession of Alexander Gagnon, she was rapidly becoming his?
He tipped shampoo over his head and attempted to scrub some sense back into his brain. He needed to focus on this presentation and win. Take Bailey at her word. It had been one night of ridiculously good sex agreed upon by two consenting adults.
The fact that Bailey had stolen a piece of his heart last night, had been stealing pieces of it for the past week, was inconsequential. He would never be the kind of man who connected on a permanent basis. He didn’t have it in him.
It was time he started acting like it.
* * *
Bailey leaned back against the bathroom door, nail in her mouth in an absentminded chew as she contemplated an in-the-shower Jared from the perspective of a woman he’d just taken to heaven and back. She was sure no other man would equal his outrageously good body and technique, and had a newfound appreciation for the tennis bracelet club in the Valley.
She replaced the thoroughly chewed nail with another. Last night had been exactly what she’d needed to take her mind off Alexander Gagnon. Except she wasn’t sure it’d just been sex. She could have stayed in Jared’s arms forever. And that was the problem. Not that he’d sneaked out of her bed.
She swallowed hard. Last night had been unforgettable. The heartbreakingly beautiful way Jared taken her virginity, so in tune with her every emotion…how treasured he’d made her feel…how desired.
Oh, Lord. She snaked a hand through her tangled hair. She’d told herself she wasn’t getting emotional about this. Enough.
She cleared her throat. “Could you tell me where that research is? I want to read it before our meeting.”
The click of the shower shutting off should have been her first clue he was getting out. Why she stood there frozen as he shoved the curtain aside and reached for a towel, water dripping off his utterly delicious masculinity, she wasn’t sure.
“Sorry, I—” She took a step backward. “I’ll wait for you in the bedroom.”
“For God’s sake, Bailey.” He ran the towel over his hair. “You had your legs wrapped around me last night. It’s a little late to be embarrassed.”
Yes, well, that was last night and this was now. She bit her lip. “Was that your phone I heard earlier?”
He nodded, relieving her immensely by wrapping the towel around his hips. The hard set of his angular face didn’t do a great job of reinforcing that comfort, however. His blue gaze was laser-focused and impersonal as he waved his hand toward the bedroom. “It’s on the table by the window. Help yourself.”
She shifted her weight to the other foot, studied him. Regret. Definitely regret. Fine.
“I ordered us coffee and croissants. I’ll go read it.”
“Thanks.”
She waited, a fraction of a second, just to see if he’d have anything to say about last night. Anything that might make today a little less awkward.
The silence was deafening.
She dug her toe into the tile and looked up at him. “It’s clear you regret what happened last night.”
He gave her an even look. “I don’t regret it.”
“Then why do you look li—”
“Bailey.” His gaze narrowed. “It was great. It was hot. You were hot. Absolutely worth it. What else can I say?”
She squinted at him. Had he actually just said that?
A sharp pain gouged her insides. “Right,” she said, clenching her stomach and pushing past it. “Good to know. And in case you’re running a little scared which is wholly possible, you’re absolutely right. I meant what I said. It was one night. We’re good.”
She turned on her heel and left before she became certified dangerous.
* * *
They spent the morning hearing presentations from the marketing and sales groups at Maison headquarters in the Montparnasse district of Paris. Jared thought it interesting that Bailey sat on the other side of the room from him beside an attractive, very young French marketing executive who flirted with her at every possible opportunity. He told himself it was a smart, strategic move on her part, positioning herself as part of the Maison team.
That was before, however, she walked away from him midsentence during a break. Before she blew off his request to get her a coffee.
“Bailey.” He kept his voice low as he cornered her on the way back from the machine, coffee in hand. “You know this can’t happen between us. It’s a bad idea.”
She looked up at him, the only sign there was anything going on behind that ice-cold expression of hers the quivering of her bottom lip. “I told you this morning, I get it. Hang on to that impressive set of rules, Jared. It’s all good.”
He stood there, speechless, as she ducked around him and set the coffee down. Really? She was going to be like that about it?
The deep freeze continued throughout the afternoon as they toured three of Maison’s stores in Paris. Through the cocktails that preceded the French company’s annual summer party they’d been invited to attend along with the Gehrig team. He held it together through it all, until they were speaking to the CEO of a Parisian cosmetics company Maison had a partnership with, Jared laying on the charm because the CEO was a great contact to have. Then Bailey rolled her eyes at him. Rolled her eyes at him and muttered something about needing to use the ladies’ room.
He stared after her, a dangerous heat filling his head. What was wrong with her? They had the biggest deal of his life to win tomorrow, he had backed her without fail this entire time, and she was acting like a girl over one night together?
He made it through the rest of his conversation with the CEO, scouted out the washrooms and found them in a hallway off the restaurant. They were one-person affairs, and there were multiples of them. He eyed the one marked women with the door closed, stuck his hand against the wall and waited.
When the door swung open and Bailey stepped out, he pounced.
“Give me a minute, will you?” He bit the words out as he shoved her back into the washroom and shut the door.
“Jared—” She looked up at him with wide eyes. “This is not the place.”
“You’re making it the place.” He jammed his hands in his pockets and stared at her. “You told me last night there were no strings. So for God’s sake what is wrong with you?”
“Nothing.” She bit her lip and made a study of the intricate pattern of the floor tiles.
His curse split the air. He slid his fingers under her chin and brought her gaze up to his. The brightness in her eyes made his stomach clench. “Don’t you do this to me, Bailey. You promised me you’d be okay with this.”
“I am.” She pulled out of his grasp and backed up against the vanity. “I guess I’m just not made of stone like you are. Funny,” she derided, forcing out a harsh bark of laughter, “women like to use that to refer to a certain body part of yours, but I think it better describes your heart. You can just turn it off and on at will, can’t you?”
He looked at her nonplussed. “Apparently not with you, because here I am when I should be schmoozing executives.”
“Oh,” she choked out. “I think you were doing an excellent job of that.”
“Jealous, Bailey?”
She stared him down for a moment, then leaned back against the vanity and ran her hands through her hair. “I just—I don’t…I’m just finding it hard to put last night aside. To pretend it wasn’t special when to me, it was.”
He felt his carefully engineered defenses dissolve into dust. Bailey was like a flaw in his perfectly designed ability not to care. A weakness that would surely dismantle him completely if he let it.
“It was…special to me too,” he admitted, choosing his words carefully. ‘I just don’t want us to get too carried away here.”
“Why?” She poked him in the chest, and God, didn’t she know by now how much that antagonized him? “What do you think might happen if you let yourself feel? The earth might open up and swallow you whole?”