A Reclusive Heart (Hollywood Hearts #2)(65)

“I’m just helping you with your list, Jamie,” he said calmly as he swam after her.

“You could have asked!”

He shook his head as he continued towards her. “You would have said no,” he explained as he stopped in front of her and caged her in. “Now tell me what’s going on.”

“Nothing,” she muttered, looking anywhere but at his beautiful green eyes.

“If nothing is wrong then why are you pulling away from me, Jamie,” he asked softly as he gently cupped her chin between his thumb and finger and raised her face until she found herself eye to eye with him.

“I’m not-” she started to lie, but he cut her off.

“Don’t lie to me, Jamie,” he said, pushing a strand of wet hair out of her face.

“I know you’re pulling away from me. I just don’t know why.”

When all she could do was struggle not to cry he pulled her into his arms and held her. “Baby, what’s wrong? What did I do?”

She wrapped her arms around his neck and held him tightly. “Look, I know Holly said something to upset you-“

“I don’t like her,” she mumbled against his damp warm skin.

He chuckled softly as he pressed a kiss against her cheek. “She’s not my favorite person at the moment either, baby. Tell me what she said to you that had you so upset that you actually passed up chocolate.”

“She said that you were just using me,” she admitted softly.

Nick went completely still against her. “How exactly am I using you?” he demanded as he pulled away to look at her.

“To get my cooperation on this tour,” she said, hating the way all the tenderness in his expression disappeared.

“And you believed her?” he asked, not bothering to hide his disgust as he moved away from her.

“Why wouldn’t I?” she asked, choking on a sob.

“I don’t need to sleep with a woman to get her to do what I want, Jamie, especially a pushover like you,” he said, making her wince. “We both know that it wouldn’t take much to get you to do what I want so why the hell would I have to resort to sleeping with you to get your cooperation?”

She opened her mouth to argue, but realized that there was nothing to say.

He was absolutely right. Even when she was mad at him before he promised to help her with her list she would have probably backed off complaining to Rick with just the right amount of persuasion. It never took much to make her bend to someone’s will and everyone knew it.

“I’m pathetic,” she muttered, not realizing just how pathetic she really was until that moment. It was one thing to believe that everyone else realized they could walk all over her, but quite another to actually have it thrown in her face. She turned away from him and moved to climb out when he wrapped his arms back around her and pulled her back against his chest.

“You’re not pathetic, Jamie. You just have a problem with standing up for yourself,” he explained, pressing a kiss against her earlobe.

“How exactly is that not pathetic?” she asked, sniffling.

“You’re not pathetic, Jamie, and you sure as hell aren’t the same woman I found crawling on the floor of the men’s room,” he said, chuckling softly.

She cringed at the memory. “I thought it was the woman’s room,” she explained needlessly.

“So I gathered. The point is that you’ve come a long way in a very short time, Jamie,” he said, moving them closer to the corner.

“So you don’t think I’m a pushover anymore?” she asked too eager to hide it.

“Let’s just say that you’re doing a lot better about standing up for yourself and for those times that you’re not able to you have me,” he said, pressing a kiss to her neck.

“But I don’t,” she said, sounding sad even to her own ears.

“What the hell are you talking about?” he asked tightly as he turned her around and gently placed her in the corner where she could hold herself up by propping her elbows up on the side of the pool.

He placed his hands near hers and he closed the distance once again. “I need you to help me out, baby, and tell me what else she said that upset you,” he said when she didn’t answer him.

She sighed warily as she reached out with one hand and ran her fingers through his damp hair, loving the way it felt between her fingers. “I’m not sure how she knew-,”

“Knew what?” he asked, interrupting her.

As she toyed with a strand of his hair she answered, “That this was going to end when the tour was over.”

“And that’s why you thought I’d whore myself out to keep you under my thumb?” he asked casually, but there was not missing the hurt in his tone.

She released the strand of hair she’d been playing with to run her fingers over the slight stubble covering his jaw. “Is that what your mother did?” she asked, already having figured it out from the comment he made about losing his virginity.

For a moment he didn’t say anything as he looked away from her. She thought that maybe she’d gone too far and opened her mouth to apologize when he cut her off.

“My mother was sixteen when she had me. She was a typical teenage runaway who got mixed up in drugs and sex and had parents who didn’t look too favorably on her behavior. She decided that she didn’t need them and took off for California where she thought she was going to be a movie star,” he said, ramming his fingers through his hair as he looked back at her.