My eyes flew over to the other side of the bed, which was very blessedly empty. Thank God for small favors, I thought, because if he’d been there, I didn’t know what I would have said. Yes, I’d wanted to tell him how I felt about him. No, I had not wanted to do so by freaking sleeping with him!
“Oh, God,” I whispered, following that thought to its logical conclusion. What must he think about me right now? I was his freaking assistant, and I’d just thrown myself at him the moment I’d had too much to drink!
I’d set up enough dates for Damon to know how careful he was about the girls he took out. I knew he was paranoid about his job and his reputation and his legacy, and terrified—or at least deeply concerned—that every girl who went out with him was a gold digger in disguise.
Personally, I thought he was right to be so concerned. Because most of the girls he dated were absolutely after his money rather than deeply in love with him. They wanted his fortune… or at least his reputation. If nothing else, they wanted to be able to say that they’d gotten into his bed and seen the inside of his house.
It was, after all, a bragging point to girls who moved in that particular circle.
I groaned aloud and put a hand to my head. Very gently. What if he thought I was the same as all those other girls? What if he thought that I’d just been playing his assistant to try to get into bed with him? What if he thought I only wanted him for his money? What if he thought I’d slept with him for all those reasons, and that it hadn’t meant anything at all?
The thought made me feel sick all over again, and I bent over the side of the bed, eyes flying around the room as I looked for a trash can to throw up in.
I didn’t throw up. But I did get up as quickly as I could—while moving as carefully as I could—and got dressed back into the outfit I’d been wearing last night.
I took one look at the tall heels I’d chosen, considering, then leaned down and picked them up instead of putting them on. I’d gone most of my life barefoot, and I didn’t think I could handle those shoes in my current condition. I would rather walk through the house and all the way back home in bare feet.
I cast one look in the mirror over the bed, moaned out loud at my appearance, and tiptoed out of the room, praying that I could get out of the house without seeing the man who was both my boss and the guy I’d slept with last night.
* * *
I was just sneaking as quickly as I could through the last hallway, planning to get out through the kitchen door—which I knew Damon didn’t use often—when I heard the sound of typing. Right ahead of me.
Too late, I skidded to a stop and turned, trying to figure out whether I’d come too far to get back out of the kitchen before he saw me. Unfortunately, I was in too deep, and I hadn’t even managed one step back toward the hall before I heard him.
“No need to be creeping around the place, Aubrey; this house is as much yours as it is mine at this point.”
I turned on my toes, trying to process what that could possibly mean, and stared at him.
Damon was sitting at the kitchen table, leaning over his laptop and typing away as if it was the most important thing in the world. And he was wearing the world’s most serious frown.
Terrific. That was exactly the face a girl wanted to see after she woke up in a guy’s bed. Alone.
Though it really did exemplify Damon. Date finished. Back to business. Important deals to be made. Must email.
“Um, okay,” I said. “I should really be going, though. About last night—”
“Don’t mention it,” he said, cutting me off without even looking up from his screen. “In fact, I say we never mention it again. It was just a mistake, Aubrey. It doesn’t have to mean anything. Certainly shouldn’t be something that worries you too much. It doesn’t have to change anything between us.”
He finally stopped typing and looked up at me, his face expressionless. “We’d both had a lot to drink, and we did something we shouldn’t have. But I don’t want it to become an issue. Let’s not let it make things weird between us, huh? We’ve known each other too long for that.”
I didn’t even try to answer him. I knew that if I tried, I would find that my voice had suddenly deserted me. Because what he was saying had punched me right in the stomach and driven all the air from my body.
Just a mistake? It didn’t have to change anything between us?
Excuse me?
No, it hadn’t gone the way I’d wanted it to, certainly, and I hadn’t even been able to get my speech out, which meant that he still didn’t know how I felt about him. But a mistake? Something that didn’t have to mean anything? Something that I shouldn’t freaking worry about?
I blew out the breath I’d taken before he started talking and tried to get myself under control. Tried to figure out what the right response was, and how I was supposed to say it when I still felt like I couldn’t even breathe properly.
“Right,” I said on a sigh, unable to do any more than that.
I turned on my heel, spotted the kitchen door, and strode out, my heart breaking a little more with every single step.
Chapter 6
Damon
I watched her leave, my heart breaking at the sight of her face. Aubrey was paler than I’d ever seen her, the freckles across the bridge of her nose standing out against the sickly pallor of her skin, and she definitely looked wobbly on her feet.
Was she that sick? Should I go after her? She looked so pale, so downtrodden—and I wondered suddenly if there was something seriously wrong. She’d had an awful lot to drink last night, and maybe that, combined with the shock of waking up in a place that wasn’t hers…
“No,” I told myself firmly, saying it out loud for added impact. I’d done enough damage to the girl.
I’d woken up very early, having forgotten what exactly had happened between us, and, finding a warm body in my bed, had settled into that hazy place between waking and sleeping, where warmth and companionship is all you can think of. I’d turned over against her and pulled her against my body, nestling my nose into her hair and breathing deeply.
Woman, my body had told me. Woman I had slept with. Woman who had come into my bed, who had known me so well that she’d known exactly what to say, what to do.
Woman I didn’t want to let go of.
I’d pulled her even closer, enjoying the feel of her naked body against mine, the softness of her skin. I’d settled even more deeply into that place of safety that she brought with her. The feeling that I belonged here, and that I didn’t have to try to impress her or be smarter than her. And then I’d inhaled again. And my body had given me one more clue.
Saltwater.
And at that—at the scent of hair that had been in the ocean so recently, and probably hadn’t been washed afterward—I had actually jumped out of bed, springing like a cat to get from lying down to standing.
Saltwater. Not just a woman, but Aubrey. My Aubrey. My assistant—the one I depended on to keep my life tidy, the one I knew I wouldn’t be able to live without. And at that moment, I remembered. Remembered the dinner and the champagne. Remembered the limo and telling her I’d take her home because I thought she’d had too much to drink to drive safely. I remembered her starting to say something, struggling with it like she wasn’t sure she could—or should—say it… and then the kiss.
Oh God, the kiss. The feeling of finally having something I’d been waiting for, though I’d never even considered the idea that I might want it. The way she’d responded to me as if she’d just been waiting for the opportunity, and the fireworks that had jumped from me to her, and back again, like we were some electric circuit that had just been turned on.
The way I’d felt as though we were somehow meant for it. Like we’d been heading toward it right from the start.
But I’d asked her if she was sure. I’d been positive that I’d had to.
She’d said yes. And I hadn’t stopped to ask again.
And then, I realized in that moment that I
’d slept with the girl. And not just once, but three times, because I’d been unable to get ahold of myself. She’d been like a live flame in my arms, all heat and spark, and I…
I hadn’t wanted to let her go.
Now, sitting at the breakfast table by myself, and knowing already that I shouldn’t have let her leave the way she did, I let my head sink down, and my forehead smack down on the surface. Once. Twice. Three times.
How could I have been so stupid? She’d had so much to drink that I hadn’t wanted her to drive, and yet I’d thought that I could bring her back to my house and sleep with her? I mean yes, she had kissed me in the limo, but I shouldn’t have let that count for anything!
I’d asked her. I’d made sure that she was sure. And generally, I would have said that was enough. But see what I said above about her having had so much to drink that I didn’t want her driving? If I didn’t want her driving, then how had I thought she was rational—and sober—enough to make a decision as big as the one I’d let her make?
Yes, I’d had as much to drink as her, but I also weighed a whole lot more than she did. I’d been only buzzed at the time. And I’d still let it happen.
It didn’t take a freaking rocket science to figure out that this had the potential to ruin everything. The way she’d walked out of my kitchen just now virtually guaranteed it. She was my best friend, my closest ally…
And I’d just endangered all of that, for a moment of feeling like I was sharing something important with someone.
Chapter 7
Aubrey
I practically crawled into the cab when it got there—ten minutes later than the app said it would—and slumped in the back seat, my head pounding with heartbreak and hangover, as well as the lack of food and having slept in a bed that wasn’t my own. Laying my protesting head against the window, I let the entire situation wash over me one more time.
The start of it all, when I finally said—or at least started to say—the things I’d been longing to say for years. The feeling of strength at knowing that it was finally the right time to stand up and tell him what I was feeling, rather than just fading into the background, yet another prop in Damon Parker’s life.
And yes, the elation of knowing that I might finally become something more in his life. The fleeting thought that this might be the very thing he’d been waiting for. The absolute fantasy that he might take this as the reason to move forward.
All of which had let right to the more-than-somewhat-alcohol-induced decision to kiss him instead. Because you know, who needs words when you can just demonstrate exactly what you mean?
And then the image of him pulling me into his lap and making the kiss a whole lot deeper than I’d expected. The moment when he pulled back, his eyes telling me that he was trying to be responsible in a moment when the lust between us was so strong that you could have cut it with a knife. Are you sure? he’d asked me. Are you sure you want to do this?
And I’d said yes. And I hadn’t even really thought about it, because the moment he’d started kissing me, the very concept of thinking had flown right out of my head. All that intellect I was so proud of?
Yeah, gone the way of the dodo bird.
He’d taken my answer and run with it, telling his driver to take us to his house rather than dropping me off at my apartment. And then he’d actually carried me through the doorway of his house, and right to his bedroom, like some bride on her wedding night.
And then there was everything that came after that. Including waking up alone and cold, and trying to sneak out only to find him in the kitchen, practically radiating displeasure at what had happened. Because he’d looked downright… well, annoyed was the only word I could think of to describe it. Like he’d done something so stupid he could hardly believe it.
Which, I guessed, would explain the words he’d thrown at me about this not meaning anything.
Evidently, he thought things could just go back to normal if we ignored what had happened. Go back to the way they’d been.
I let out a soft sob at that, realizing only after I’d done it that I had actually made that heartbroken sound out loud. My eyes flew to the driver’s mirror and I saw him staring back at me, his own eyes wide and awkward.
Yikes. That was exactly what I needed. For some complete stranger to pick me up at one of the biggest houses on the island and then catch me crying in the back of his car. All I needed was him to see me crying over the fact that I’d slept with my boss and then had my heart stomped on.
Oh God, if he told anyone, it would be the end of my career.
“Are you okay?” the guy asked, his forehead creased in deep concern. “Do you need something? Water? A doctor?”
I almost died of embarrassment right there on the spot, but I managed to wave a hand at him, dismissing my general pathetic-ness.
“I’m fine,” I lied. “Just a bad hangover, honestly.”
A bad hangover. Right. If that was what you called having almost exposed your deepest feelings to the man you’d been in love with for four years, having him jump at the opportunity to sleep with you, and then dump you first thing the next morning.
* * *
The cab ride was blessedly short, though peppered with more worried looks and inquiries from the driver, each of them somehow making me feel even worse than I had before. I’d finally told him that I just wanted to be quiet, if it was all the same to him, and after that he’d at least tried to disguise the glances.
Honestly, I was betting that he was a really good guy. Probably the sort who brought soup home for his wife when she was sick. But I was not in the mood.
I’d never been so glad to get home in my entire life.
I stumbled up the stairs to my walk-up apartment, which sat on the beach right over a coffee shop and therefore always smelled like a combination of coffee and saltwater, and though I had more trouble getting through the door than usual, after a few fumbling attempts at the lock, I finally got it open and fell through the door. Then I took a deep, heaving breath of home—the kind you take after you’ve been crying for hours and need to restock your lungs’ supply of oxygen—and fell right onto the couch on my face.
I’ll admit it. I screamed into the couch cushion for a few seconds. I freaking deserved it.
What a mess I’d made of things! I’d had such a great plan. Been so sure of my direction. Been absolutely positive that I’d owed it to both myself and Damon to tell him the truth.
Because I knew what his life was like. I’d seen how few friends he actually had, and how few of his dates ever developed into anything more than a one-time thing. I didn’t think any of the girls had lasted more than two weeks. And once they were gone, he certainly didn’t make an attempt to reach out to them again. He dropped them like they were hot potatoes.
So was it any wonder that I’d assumed he was lonely? That he wanted someone steady in his life? That he wanted some sort of companion other than me as his assistant?
Or rather… I’d assumed that he wanted a companion. I’d hoped that I could fill that slot. Step up from being his full-time assistant to being his full-time… what? Girlfriend? More, if things went right?
How stupid. How freaking stupid. I should have known better. Because I’d known Damon a long time—five years, to be exact—and I was going to guess that I knew him better than almost anyone else in the world. I certainly spent more time with him than anyone else—and that included, from what I’d heard, his parents, when they’d been around.
Which meant that I knew how he operated, and if there was one thing I could say with absolute certainty about Damon Parker, thirty-six-year-old billionaire owner of PBC, and most influential man in Hawaii (depending on who you asked), it was that he always knew exactly what he wanted, and went for it without second-guessing his instincts.
If he’d wanted me, he would have figured it out a whole lot sooner than I had and done something about it. He wouldn’t have been sitting around waiting for me to make the first move.
“Couldn’t have figured that out, I don’t know, last week or something, could you?” I asked myself, talking right into the cushion. Not that anyone was there to have heard me, anyhow.
Still. The conclusion here was the same, regardless of whether anyone heard me or not. I’d done something that was absolutely, positively, without any doubt in the world, going to ruin my working relationship with Damon. Which meant that I had to stop pouting about that and start figuring out what in the world I was going to do next.
Namely, I needed to figure out where I was going to work to keep paying my bills. Because this apartment might be on a beach on the wrong side of the city, but it was still on the beach. And that didn’t come cheap.
I sat up, sighed, and pulled my laptop off the table and onto my lap. If I was going to have to start looking for a new job, there was no time like the present.
The moment I opened my computer, my inbox started collecting all the new emails that had come in since the last time I checked.
“Regarding PBC, regarding PBC, regarding PBC,” I murmured, scanning through them quickly. Well, it was a Saturday. And I was definitely not doing any work for Damon today.
Maybe not ever again, honestly. Depending on how things progressed from here.
Then my attention snagged on a subject line that didn’t have anything to do with work. Instead, it noted my resume and an opportunity. Frowning, I clicked on that one—halfway expecting it to be spam trying to sell me a timeshare in Siberia—and read through it quickly.
They weren’t trying to sell me a timeshare. It was about a different country, all right, but that country wasn’t Russia.
“A terrific opportunity,” I murmured, my gaze running over the text. “Oceania Broadcasting Network is looking for new assistants—people with your exact specifications—and we would love to set up a meeting between you and the CEO. Please let us know if you’re interested, and what your salary requirements are.”
The Billionaire's Lockdown Baby Page 3
