An Accidental Date with a Billionaire

She shook her head, stepping farther away from him.

The added distance resonated inside him, in places he’d never explored.

“It’s over,” she mumbled.

He caught her hand, refusing to let go this time. “Sam, I—”

“Don’t bother trying to explain or make any of this better. None of this is ever going to be better.”

“But maybe—” he started, not willing to let her go.

Not until he had a chance to think, damn it.

She grabbed her coat off the couch. “Just let it go, Taylor. You did something I could never forgive, and this is done.”

He stumbled toward her, tripping over his feet. “Wait—”

She shook her head. “It’s done. We’re done.”

Pain stabbed through his body.

“I don’t want you to go,” he said, chasing after her. “We can figure this out—”

He reached for her arm, but she yanked free. He scrambled after her, his gut twisting and his chest aching. Losing her was not an option.

He’d never known happiness, not until he held her in his arms, naked in his bed, and laughed at something so hard they both cried. Not until they danced in a living room with no music, just because.

Not until he had her.

His fingers slipped through her arm, grasping nothing but air. “Sam—”

“Stop!” she cried, stumbling back again, almost falling in her desperation to escape him. “It’s over, the date is over. I don’t want to be with you anymore. Just let me go!”

He stood still, choking on emotion and unspoken pleas for her to stay as she bolted to the elevator and pushed the button frantically. When this started, he promised not to press her for more than she was willing to give.

One promise he’d made to her had already been broken. He wasn’t about to break another.

The doors opened, and she fled into the safety of the metal box as if the devil himself chased after her. As soon as the doors shut and he was alone, he let out an angry yell, picked up the closest thing to him, and chucked it against the wall. It wasn’t until the vase shattered, until water and broken petals trailed down the drywall as his chest heaved with each staggered breath, that he realized the uncomfortable truth.

The devil she ran from was him.

Chapter Twenty

Three days. That’s how long it had been since she left Taylor’s apartment and sworn to herself never to go back. Six calls. That’s how many times her phone had rung, and she had refused to pick up because, if she did, she might forget what she shouldn’t. Four knocks. That’s how many times he’d come to her place, begging through her locked door to be let inside, to be given a chance to prove that she

hadn’t made a mistake in trusting him, that he wanted to be with her, no matter her past. Every time she ignored him was harder than the last.

Each unanswered call hurt more, too.

What made it even worse was that she’d love to open that door or pick up that phone, because she wasn’t really all that mad at him in the first place for what he did. She’d walked away to protect him…

Not to hurt him.

He’d been scared…but determined to take a risk on her. Putting everything he worked so hard for on the line for a girl he’d been having sex with was inconceivable, and she couldn’t let him do it. Things would have ended eventually anyway, and she loved him too much to let him ruin his life for her…especially since he didn’t, and wouldn’t, love her.

She’d hoped that over the course of the weekend she might get over him, but it hadn’t happened. She loved him and couldn’t be with him. You didn’t just get over that.

It took time.