He knew Rick wasn’t pissed because a woman had put him in the doghouse with Jamie, but that the woman had screwed with one of their clients. Their job was to ensure their clients were well represented, handled properly, looked after and were presented in the best possible light to readers. Having an author who looked close to crying every time someone asked for her autograph was the last thing any of them needed on this tour.
When he asked her what the hell she said to upset Jamie the woman tried to play innocent with him. She even had the audacity to suggest that they talk things over in her room. It wasn’t until he sent her packing that she lost that cool facade.
She’d glared at him before storming off, but still didn’t tell him what the hell she said to Jamie.
There was no doubt in his mind that whatever she said to Jamie was making Jamie think twice about being with him. An hour ago when he spotted her near the front desk he knew without a doubt that she was there to get her own room, but he wasn’t having that. He convinced her to come upstairs to work and then he’d been at a loss as to what to do. Thankfully he remembered the chocolate he snuck in his bag for her and used it to confirm his suspicions.
She was leaving him, which normally wouldn’t be a problem except that he didn’t want her to leave him. He wanted her to stay with him and he’d do whatever it took to make that happen.
“What the heck are you doing?” she demanded as he pulled her laptop away from her, yanked her to her feet and threw her over his shoulder.
“Are you going to tell me what’s wrong?” he demanded, standing perfectly still as he waited for her to make this easy for him and just tell him what the hell was wrong so that he could fix it. Of course she didn’t.
“Nothing’s wrong,” she said, wiggling in his arms.
“Then I guess I can’t put you down,” he said, heading for the door.
“Where are we going?”
“To check off another item on your list,” he said with a shrug that unfortunately shifted her forward and scared the hell out of her. He shifted her back to where she belonged as he made his way down the dimly lit hallway, relieved that she didn’t start screaming for help. Then again he probably should have known that she wouldn’t make a sound. She did hate being the center of attention after all.
He took the back elevator all the way down to the first floor and then followed the signs for the pool. When he came to the locked door and peeked through the glass door he noted that this was also dimly lit and apparently off limits until tomorrow morning. Not that it mattered to him since the manager had given him the master key for the pool area as a favor. He just hoped the manager remembered to make sure that all of his employees stayed clear of this area or he was going to have one embarrassed recluse on his hands.
“Why are we down here?” Jamie asked as he opened the door and made damn sure to lock it behind them.
“Are you going to tell me what’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong!”
Since she was being so damn difficult he decided to do this the hard way. He walked over to the pool. “Do you by chance have your cell phone on you at the moment?” he asked, walking towards the deep end.
“No, why?” she asked, sounding confused.
“No special reason,” he said even he shifted her off his shoulder and tossed her into the pool.
Chapter 25
“What is wrong with you?” Jamie sputtered once she came to the surface.
“You wouldn’t answer my question,” Nick said accusingly as he gestured towards her with his leather shoe before he tossed it over his shoulder.
“So that means that you have to throw me in the pool?” she asked in disbelief as she moved to swim to the other side and climb out.
“Damn straight,” Nick said, not bothering to try and stop her, she noted as she awkwardly climbed out of the pool and stormed towards the door. She just made it past the corner of the pool when Nick came after her, naked, hard and determined.
For a second she was so stunned by the sight that she couldn’t move and it cost her. Before she could make a run for it she found herself thrown back over his shoulder, but this time he was pulling her shoes and socks off.
“What are you doing?” she demanded as he put her down.
In answer he practically ripped her slacks off. When she let out a surprised squeal and went to stop him she stumbled back and fell in the water, sans pants.
This time when she resurfaced she didn’t hesitate in trying to make a run for it, but unfortunately for her, Nick was quicker.
Just as she was moving to climb out of the water he yanked her back in and had her blouse off within seconds. Her bra quickly followed after that. When he went for her panties she somehow managed to shift away and swim but not before she felt her panties rip and then she was left naked in the pool, a public pool where anyone could see, she realized with dismay.
“What is wrong with you?” she practically screeched as she swam to the deep end and moved into the corner to hide.
“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.<
br />
“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.
“She got mixed up with the wrong kind of people very early on. When she discovered that she was pregnant her and about five friends who were also hookers rented a three bedroom apartment. They set up two of the rooms to work out of and shared the third room. When I came along the initial plan had been to give me away, but it was Christmas and most of them were young kids and thought that my birth was a sign of good times to come so they named me Nicholas,” he said with a mocking smile.
Her heart broke for him as he continued. “They set my room up in the walk in closet off their room and whenever there was a John in the house they took turns locking themselves up with me until the John left. Needless to say with six hookers in one house I spent a lot of time in that closet. When I was about four they decided I was old enough to watch out for myself.”
“You don’t have to tell me about this if you don’t want to, Nick,” she whispered as she traced his strong jaw.
“It’s fine, baby,” he said, leaning in to press a kiss against her forehead.
When he leaned back he focused all of his attention on the water between their bodies. “I didn’t think much about the women living there walking around naked or blowing some guy on the couch while I watched my cartoons. It wasn’t until I started school and noticed that the other kids’ mothers didn’t behave like mine did.”
“As much as I hated living there,” he said tightly as his hands clenched into fists, “and how I fucking hated it, I couldn’t leave. I always thought, hoped really that my mother would wake up one day and decide to be a mother to me like the other children had, but she never changed and when I was old enough I walked away and started my own life and never looked back.”
“I’m sorry, Nick,” she said, not knowing what else to say.
“Don’t be,” he said, forcing a smile, “I’m over it.”
She didn’t think that he was. In fact she was pretty sure that the reason that he worked so hard was to put distance between himself and his past. She could relate to that. She didn’t want people knowing that she was a pushover or how pathetic she used to be. All she wanted was a chance to live her life without anyone trying to keep her down.
He looked so sad at that moment and she wanted to make it better for him, to let him know without words that he was loved. She leaned forward and brushed her lips against his. At first he didn’t move and she feared that perhaps Holly was right but then with a sigh he moved his lips against hers.
“I don’t want you to worry about anything, Jamie. I’m going to take care of you,” he promised as he gave her the sweetest kiss of her life.
As good as it sounded she knew that he wouldn’t be able to keep his word. As soon as the tour was over he was going to break her heart and she would be left with unimaginable pain, but she refused to focus on that. Right now she was in his arms and he was hers. She didn’t want to waste a second of their time together since she already knew that it wouldn’t last.
Soon the kiss turned hungry and they couldn’t stop running their hands over each other. There was really nothing better than being in Nick’s arms, she thought as she ran her hands over his wide shoulders and down his back, enjoying the feel of hard muscle tightening beneath her touch.
“Up you go, baby,” Nick said huskily against her mouth as he pressed one last kiss against her lips.
When he went to raise her out of the water she stopped him with a simple shake of her head. Frowning, he put her back in the water. He opened his mouth, probably to ask her what was wrong, when she gestured for him to get his butt out of the water. With an amused smile and a quick kiss he did just that. Once he was sitting on the edge she realized something very important.
She was kind of short.
Nick must have realized the problem because he lowered himself off the edge until his large erection was at eye level with her and although that was a pretty impressive sight she couldn’t seem to take her eyes off the muscles flexing in his arms and chest as he held himself up. When she caught his amused smile she forced herself to focus and leaned in and pressed a kiss to his hip.
She’d only done this a few times, but it was easily one of her favorite things to do for him. She knew that she probably wasn’t very good at this yet, but she was more than willing to keep trying. As she kissed and nibbled her way to the neatly trimmed patch of hair surrounding the root of the large erection that demanded her attention she couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like to take him to completion in her mouth. Whenever she thought he was close he always pulled away, but maybe now she’d get her chance, at least she hoped she would.
When she came to his erection she continued to take her time pressing teasing kisses against the hot skin until she couldn’t resist gliding her tongue over it. His low groan encouraged her to do it again. This time she took her time tracing her tongue over the thick vein that ran along the underside of his thick erection.
She flicked her tongue over the tip, licking away the excitement there before she took just the very tip into her mouth and suckled on it while she slowly traced the tiny slit with her tongue.
“Aw, fuck,” Nick groaned when she took him in her hand and slowly stroked him. The movement pushed more of his erection into her mouth, but not enough.
She looked up and met his hungry gaze as she moved forward and took more of him in her mouth. He sucked in a breath as he moved to pull away from her, but she refused to let him go, not when she had him where she wanted him.
“I need to be inside of you,” he ground out between clenched teeth as he tried
to pull away from her.
Never pausing in her slow strokes, she pulled her mouth away long enough to point out, “You are inside of me,” before taking him back into her mouth and doubled her efforts.
He was panting hard and she couldn’t help but love the sound of a strong man like Nick losing control because of her. It wasn’t long before he was slowly thrusting in and out of her mouth. When he became impossibly thicker in her mouth and let out a sexy growl she knew that she had him. It was confirmed seconds later when he shouted her name and he released that salty sweet treat that she was beginning to love.
As he pulled away she pressed one last kiss to the tip of the soft velvety head and couldn’t help but smile when he shivered. Her smile quickly disappeared when she found herself suddenly yanked out of the water and in his arms.
Without a word he moved back on the tiled floor until only his legs were in the water and laid back. Just as she was about to ask him what he was doing she found herself moved up his body and straddling his face. She wasn’t exactly sure what was going on until she felt the first swipe of his tongue and then she decided that she simply didn’t care as long as he did that again.