The Billionaire Next Door (Billionaire Bad Boys #2)(29)

“I could take a look at your photos again,” she said when he didn’t respond. “I mean, if you don’t mind working after hours.”

“You want to come up?” He smiled, tipping his head toward the door. His turf. His place. Maybe that’s what he needed to get on even ground. He waited for the flush to steal her cheeks. Instead, her eyes shuttered.

“Um, why don’t you come down here? Adonis.” The dog lifted his head from the couch where he was lazing. “He’s been clingy today.”

Tag could relate.

“Fair enough. Be right back.” He left the beer bottle on the counter, turned, and walked out the door. He’d either lost his touch or had seriously miscalculated the attraction between him and his neighbor.

Unless it was one-sided.

Which was alarming in every way possible.

*



Bree’s eyes were the size of dinner plates. “Then what happened?”

The bar was deader than the proverbial doornail as Rachel crossed her arms and leaned against the bar. She’d been cut fifteen minutes ago, but stayed to share what had happened last night. And Lord have mercy, did she need some advice.

“Then he came back downstairs and for the next two hours, we discussed how he could improve the bars at Crane Hotels across the US.” Rachel heard the abject disappointment in her own voice, and evidently so did Bree.

“He kissed you,” she said, clearly not understanding why more didn’t happen. “Didn’t he kiss you again? Like, when he left?”

“No, but I…” Rachel shrugged helplessly, which summarized how she was feeling about the entire situation with Tag. Like she was stuck in suspended animation. On Pause instead of Play. “I wanted him to, but I didn’t act like it,” she admitted.

Bree’s face scrunched in blatant misunderstanding, and was it any wonder? Her friend with her sparkly eye shadow, her provocative yet tasteful style in clothes, and her sassy confidence would never understand not taking what she wanted.

“I’m going to his apartment tomorrow,” Rachel said in a lame attempt to save face.

“A date?” Bree looked hopeful.

“We didn’t define it.” What he’d said was he liked her ideas and needed her input. He also offered to pay her, which she’d quickly declined. When he insisted on dinner as compensation for her time, she’d agreed on Chinese food. Takeout seemed to be a fair middle ground.

With tomorrow looming, Rachel was getting more and more scared. Well, not scared. But definitely intimidated. Of Tag, of sex. She wasn’t sure. No one was within earshot here at the bar, and Rachel needed advice. Lowering her voice and taking a quick survey to make doubly sure they weren’t being overheard, she told Bree her worries.

To her relief, her friend didn’t laugh. “Totally understandable. Shaun did a number on you.”

Rachel’s head jerked on her neck in surprise. Since she’d moved in with Bree after the demolition of the relationship, Bree had only met Shaun once, when Shaun brought over a box of books Rachel had mistakenly left behind.

“From everything you’ve told me,” Bree continued, “he was overly critical. Making you think your idea at work was subpar and then taking credit for it behind your back. What a dick.”

Rachel chewed on that ugly thought. Shaun was overly critical. During the last year or so they were together, she’d felt as if she couldn’t do anything right.

There at the end when things started unraveling, and he’d stopped saying “love you, Rach” before bed, Shaun had been downright bossy. Unsatisfied. With work, with their home life.

With sex.

She hadn’t told Bree about their sex life, only hinting how it had tapered off, but turning it over in her head now, she wondered if the secret to why they’d stopped sleeping together was not because of an outside force, but because Shaun was dissatisfied with her…performance.

Rachel cringed at how true that felt. No wonder the idea of Tag intimidated the hell out of her. She wasn’t sexy. Not overtly. Shaun had mentioned on more than one occasion that he wanted a writhing, confident woman in bed. How could she deliver when he’d been so hard to please?

Or hard for her to please.

“Oh, God.” Rachel sank onto a stool on their side of the bar, her knees turning to jelly as she arrived at a very unattractive conclusion. “I’m afraid of sex.”

“No. No, no, no.” Bree waved her palms in front of her and shook her head, sending her silky hair sliding against her cheeks. “No, you’re not. You’re nervous about getting back on the horse.” Her eyes went to the side in thought. “Tag Crane is a Clydesdale.”

“He’s too much,” Rachel murmured, nodding to herself. “That’s why I didn’t kiss him back. Why I keep pushing back. I can’t handle a Clydesdale right now. If ever.”

“He’s not too much. He’s just right. You deserve to overindulge after being under Shaun’s thumb. You can’t indulge much more than a Viking billionaire.”

Despite her worries, Rachel laughed. “Seriously, Bree.”

“Yeah, seriously.” Bree wasn’t laughing. “He can handle you if you walk away afterward, which is what you need. Nothing tying you down. Nothing putting you back in Shaun Territory.”