You Only Love Twice (Masters and Mercenaries #8)(64)

He sat back, rubbing the space between his eyes.

“Can I get you anything?”

He turned and Phoebe stood in the doorway to the conference room. She’d taken her hair back down and looked more like the Phoebe he knew. Maybe it had been easier when she looked cool and professional. His dick reacted to softer Phoebe. His dick was a perpetual optimist. It was also a moron that didn’t know when to stop. “Nah, I’m fine.”

“I can’t believe he left you with those files.” She was shaking her head as she walked into the room. “My brother is a freak about files, and especially about his team. I would have been surprised if he let Taggart look at them, much less anyone else.”

It was nice to know he could still surprise her. Too bad she was surprised that someone would trust him. “He did let Tag look at them. He also didn’t get far. He and Tag ran out to grab a late lunch. If it helps, he told me he would kill me if I used anything against him.”

“You would never do that.” She gave him a tentative smile. “He trusts you. It’s a good thing. It means you don’t have to worry about him watching you again, though he’s really fast to ask you for a favor. You’ll have to watch out for that. He’ll have you picking up packages for him in the weirdest places, and sometimes the packages end up trying to kill you. I should know.”

He knew what she was trying to do. She was trying to find their easy camaraderie again, but he just couldn’t do it. Even being friends with her would be too hard. He just had to survive until she could go back to Virginia and the house she shared with her perfect husband. He nodded and stared back at his file. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“I’m sorry.” He heard her move toward him. “You know I was married. I haven’t done that with anyone but him. Have sex, I mean. It hit me afterward. It really wasn’t about you.”

He looked up at her, surprised. “No one else?”

“No. I was a virgin when I married Jamie. Well, not when I married him, but I did end up marrying him, so I sort of lost my virginity to my husband. I certainly hadn’t slept with anyone since I lost him.”

“I didn’t mean to hurt you.” It had been the last thing on his mind. Pleasing her, making her want him—those had been the things going through his mind. He’d failed.

“It wasn’t like that. You didn’t do anything wrong. That’s what I’m trying to explain to you. I had an emotional reaction.”

And he’d wanted to hold her. Even as he understood she was longing for another man, he’d wanted to comfort her. “It’s all right. We made a mistake. We won’t do it again.”

She flushed, her face going pink, but she nodded. “Yes. We won’t do it again. I just wanted you to know that I…I’m going to miss you when this is done.”

“Sure.” She would remember the dude she wished she hadn’t slept with and he would remember that he’d failed utterly. It was a great trade-off.

“Do you want to talk?”

“No.”

She frowned at him. “No?”

What did she want from him? “No. You said what you had to say, Phoebe. I get it. I won’t bug you again.”

“You don’t get anything. You don’t understand and that’s why I want to talk. You’re saying all the right things, but I can see you’re still blaming yourself. It’s not right. Let’s talk about it and maybe you’ll understand what’s going on.”

Tag was right. Chicks talked too much. Better to shove that shit deep and move on. He was going back to hookers. Hookers didn’t need to talk. They got the job done and went their own way. “We’re cool. I won’t hit on you again and then you don’t have to lock me out of the bathroom. It’s as simple as that.”

Her face flushed a nice shade of pink. “Is that all you’re upset about? That I locked you out of the bathroom?”

Maybe it would be better if he played this cool. He spent all his damn life being an earnest idiot. He wasn’t going to fall to her feet and beg her to let him in. It wouldn’t work. He’d played her fool more than enough. “My toothbrush was in there. Oral hygiene is very important to me.”

A long sigh came from her as she shook her head in obvious frustration. “Jesse, please talk to me. I know I hurt you and I want you to understand.”

He held a hand up. “It’s cool. Hey, it wasn’t that great for me anyway. We definitely don’t have to do it again. At least I don’t have any desire to do it again. I don’t think you do either.”

Now she went a pasty white and there was no way to miss the way tears clouded her eyes. “All right then. I’m going upstairs for a while. Let me know if you need something.”

Shit. He started to get up to go after her, but forced himself to sit back down. He wasn’t the bad guy here. He was trying to put some much-needed distance between them. Yeah, he’d been a douchebag, but that didn’t mean he should run after her and fall at her feet.

“That was rough.” Kai Ferguson leaned against the doorframe. He was dressed in khakis and a white button-down shirt with black loafers. It was what Jesse liked to think of as Kai’s shrink uniform. He wore the same clothes, though in different colors, almost every day. At night he wore leathers, but even then there was something soothing about the psychologist. Despite his neat clothing, his hair was long, brushing his shoulders, though he usually had it back in a queue. He reminded Jesse of a brainy surfer half the time.