Behind Closed Doors (Behind Closed Doors #1)(18)

What’s important at this very moment is for me to get out of here before I make a bigger fool of myself. I cut my gaze and start buttoning my blouse. He doesn’t move, crowding the personal space I’ve valued these past six months. Why was I so fast to give it away with this man? I try to step away from him.

He shackles my arm and my gaze darts to his, meeting the soft, almost gentle regret in his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he surprises me by saying.

“For what?” I ask, wishing I didn’t want him to say something wonderful and perfect, something that wouldn’t matter if I really were lost in a one-night escape, something I’ve tried to convince myself of.

“For my manager. For making you doubt what just almost happened when I don’t want you to doubt it.”

“Jason!”

His eyes shut and he sighs before looking at me again. “All jokes and flirtation aside,” he says, leaning down and snatching his shirt from the ground, “I’ll make this up to you.”

He turns away and heads for the door, his long, loose hair making it obvious that I just had my fingers all in it. Why does he care about making this up to me? Oh, right. I’m the only female available at the moment. No, I think as mortification sets in. I’m the female with the storage unit he wants to get into—and he just tried by getting into me.

Voices sound in the hallway, growing closer. I grab my purse, shove the strap over my head cross-body style, and spying a mirror hanging in a corner above a dark brown leather chair, I hurry forward and inspect my appearance. Great. My hair is just as wild as Jason’s and my lips are swollen and free of lipstick, which is probably all over him. I am definitely wearing the “current f*ck” badge, and not with honor.

“You have the key to the storage unit?”

I turn at the question delivered by a man in a gray pinstriped suit, with wavy blond hair, who I judge to be about Jason’s age. He is good-looking and oozes confidence that borders on arrogance. The kind of man I normally go for and who demolishes me with the ease with which I gobble down a bar of chocolate. Maybe that’s why I am instantly uneasy. Or maybe it’s my stupidity at being caught alone with two strangers. All I know is that I need to get out of here. I should never have come to this room, or this place, or gone to that stupid storage auction, for that matter. I’d lost sight of the course I was on. I had a plan. It was working, and impatience got the best of me.

“Fuck, Daniel,” Jason grinds out. “How about having some damn manners?”

Daniel arches a brow and smirks. “And the word f*ck is all about manners.”

Jason grimaces. “That ‘f*ck’ was for you, not her.”

Daniel’s lips quirk. “Right. One ‘f*ck’ for me now. The one before I opened the door was for her.”

My lips clamp together and my cheeks burn. Jason might be known by many as Red Bull, but I’m certain this man is known by equal numbers as Asshole.

“I’m leaving,” I all but hiss, trying to step around Daniel, but I don’t get far.

Mr. Asshole himself, in all his blond, pressed-suit jerkiness, steps in front of me. “Not so fast,” he declares. “Jason has a tournament and television show taping to get to, but you and I aren’t done yet. I want into that storage unit.”

“Then you should have bid and won it.”

“I would have if—”

“Back off,” Jason snaps, draping his arm around my shoulders, pulling me close, his hip to mine, his long, hard body aligned with mine. Like he wants to protect me, as if I’m his new groupie. “She’s not a part of this. In fact, she’s graciously hearing my story when she doesn’t have to.”

Asshole smirks again. I really want to smack that smirk off his face and I’ve never wanted to hit a man the way I do now. Okay, I have, but it took years to get me there, not minutes. “Right,” Daniel drawls. “And you were just saying ‘thank you’ before I intruded.”

“Enough,” Jason snaps.

“Enough is right,” I agree. “Or maybe you’re just overflowing with so much *ness that enough isn’t in your vocabulary.” I jerk against Jason and take him by surprise, temporarily freeing myself.

He responds instantly, shackling my arm and placing his body between mine and Asshole’s, giving said * his back. “I’m sorry. Fuck.” He scrubs his jaw. “Really f*cking sorry. He’s an *—”

“You think?”

“Yeah, but you know what they say: better that the * is in your corner, not the other guy’s.”

“Keep him in yours.”

“He’s freaked out about all this shit I’m dealing with, just like I am, and it’s his instinct to protect me.”

“I’m pretty freaked out right about now, too. I shouldn’t have come here.”

His eyes—those green, beautiful eyes—soften and I hate that I notice. “I don’t want you to be freaked out.”

I also hate how sincere he sounds and how much I want to believe him. “Because you want into the unit.”

“Of course I do, but that’s not why I’m sorry. Letting him in the door was the mistake, but I had no choice. He’s a damn loudmouth who won’t go away.”

My lips thin. “Because he wants into the unit.”