AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I’ll take you.”
“You don’t need to—”
“We need to talk. And we can’t go to my place.”
She shakes her head. “It’s all right, Mr. New—”
“Call me Rufus. For God’s sake, Clover—” And now we’re talking over each other, and the elevator is still descending. Fuck. I don’t have much time, because I can feel her putting this “Jane” persona away, and maybe forever.
Like it took too much of her to play my fiancée for an hour. Like this was just too hard.
She swallows hard and blinks up at me, a tear smearing the dark liner at the corner of her eye. “Please.”
“We need to talk,” I repeat firmly. I’ve crossed the car and now I’m crowding her—because I’m too tall, too big—and I’m close enough I can feel her whole body shudder with her exhale. “If you don’t want me to come to your place, we can rent a hotel room.”
She laughs. “What?”
Fuck, that came out wrong. “A car, then. I need to tell you… What happened upstairs… The grass wall—”
She cuts me off with a groan as the elevator dings. We’re on the ground floor. “I know, it was a reach, I’m sorry.”
The doors slide open, and she steps out.
I catch her hand in mind, interlacing our fingers, and indicate to the doorman that I need a car. We need a car.
We need to be alone, and I need my assistant to listen to me without feeling like I’m pressuring her to do something she’ll regret.A hotel room.Jesus Christ, Rufus, why not tell her how many times you’ve come with her name on your lips, too?
A black town car slides to a stop in front of us and I make sure Clover is seated and her door closed before I go around to the other side.
I give the driver Clover’s address.
She interrupts me and gives him my address.
“No,” I say sternly. “First address. Thank you. Don’t argue, Clover.”
She opens her mouth, then snaps it shut again.
The car slides away from the curb.
I take her hand, which immediately soothes the pounding in my chest, but replaces it with an equally complicated warmth.That’s not allowed.
And then she squeezes my fingers.
Fuck. Yes. That’s what I need.
I draw her against me, dropping my mouth to her ear so my words are private and for her only. “Thank you for today. It wasn’t necessary, but it was very appreciated. And I should apologize for some of it. All of it.”
She smiles, her mouth curving at the edge of my vision. “We’re a team, though, right? That’s what you say.”
“In more ways than one, apparently.” I bring my other hand up to her cheek, stroking her skin. “We have so much to talk about.”
She sucks in a breath. “Maybe we shouldn’t. Some things can’t be unsaid.”
That gives me pause. What would she regret tomorrow? “Maybe too many things have already gone unsaid, for too long.”
“What do you mean?” Her voice is low and soft, a whisper to match my own quiet murmur, but we aren’t alone in this car.
I can’t say what is in my heart with an audience. I glance at the driver, who is doing his best to ignore the radiating tension.
