Plush Book 3: A Billionaire Romance (6 page)

Chapter Seven

It seemed that neither of us wanted to be the first to pull away, but the increasingly loud office noises were getting harder and harder to ignore from outside my office door.

“See, this is where a hotel room would be beneficial,” I said, my lips poised above Cooper’s ear as he rested against my breasts. “Why?” he asked.

“Well, how are we getting out of here?” I asked.

Cooper pushed his body weight off of me and I instantly missed his warm skin pressed against mine. He sat up and ran his hands through his short hair, and I couldn’t help but wonder what he was thinking. I propped myself up on my elbows and watched him for a moment.

“Cooper, who is Angela McKinnon?”

He whipped around and his eyes flashed as he stared at me.

A twist of panic wrapped around my stomach and I immediately regretting letting the stupid question pass through my lips. I didn’t even really know where it had come from. Somewhere between stopping the hacker, opening up to Cooper, and falling asleep in his arms, I had finally managed to push the nagging question to the back of my mind. But there it was…popping up again…at the worst possible time.

Cooper stood off the couch and hurried to put his pants back on. He slipped his jacket back on and took his time with the buttons. He avoided my eye contact, and for a moment, I thought he was going to leave without even saying goodbye to me.

“We have a lot of work to do. Don’t you think?” he said. He stood over me, fully dressed, and I felt completely naked even though I was technically still wearing my stockings, a bra, and panties—although they were probably torn apart by now.

I shifted on the couch and stood up, ignoring Cooper’s question and turning my back to him as I redressed myself. I pulled my skirt back on, buttoned my shirt, and only once my blazer and high heels were back on did I spin back around to face him.

“Yes, I guess we do.”

Rage had swept aside all lingering feelings of lust as I stared him down. I mentally cursed myself for even thinking that he might have changed. He was the same Cooper that he’d been the entire time. He knew exactly what to do…what kind of games to play…to get what he wanted.

That’s all this was, right? Just a game to him.

He thought that since he’d gotten me to open up and talk about my childhood and fall asleep on him, that somehow that equated to me being ripe for the picking again, and he could get back in my panties.

I cringed, realizing that it had worked. Again. I had to give him credit—he was the best gamer I’d ever encountered.

But it was done. I was done.

“I’ll check in with you later, then,” he said, his face masked and unchanging as he ripped open the office door and swept out.

As soon as the door was closed, I sank into the chair behind my desk and stared blankly over at the couch. My mind was racing with so many thoughts and emotions that I feared I was on the brink of a nervous breakdown.

Why was it that every time something like this happened, I was the one left feeling insecure and heartbroken and he could just vanish into thin air, like I didn’t mean anything to him?

Because you don’t, Allie. You’re just a piece of ass.

I buried my face in my hands and pressed my thumbs against my eyes, trying to hold off the flood of tears that was rapidly welling up inside of me.

I knew there was no way I was going to be able to get anything done, and I really couldn’t bear the thought of parading around the office in the same outfit as the day before, so I gathered my purse and fled, hoping that I could get out of the building without anyone noticing me.

As soon as I arrived home, I poured myself a huge goblet of wine and then poured myself into a bubble bath. Sam sat on the edge of the tub watching me, his tail swishing along the edge of the tub. I’m pretty sure his interest was because I’d neglected to fill up his food bowl when I returned home, but I told myself he was there to comfort me in my time of need.

My God, I’m pathetic.

I took another gulp of wine, letting it slide down into my belly, warming me from the inside.

“Can you believe I said that?” I asked Sam. He continued to stare.

The truth was—I still wasn’t sure where my blurted-out question had come from. It was phrased in the worst way and delivered at the absolute worst time. What had I been thinking?

I wriggled my toe against the faucet until a slow stream of hot water poured into the tub. I’d been soaking for twenty minutes or so and my bath was getting cold. My skin was turning pruny and wrinkly and I knew I should get out, but then I would be forced to come up with something to do for the rest of the day, and I wasn’t sure I could deal with entertaining myself right now.

Everyone else I knew would be working—like the good, responsible, mentally stable people I knew and loved.

I, on the other hand, suddenly had nothing to do except sit around, turning in a human raisin and bemoaning my bad taste in men and terrible habit of saying the first thing that popped into my head.

In all fairness, my question wasn’t one hundred percent off base. Cooper did owe me an explanation—and his resistance to give me one was only making me feel worse about the answer he was hiding. Whoever this actress was to him, it was clear that there was something going on between them. Something more than a casual acquaintance. First of all, casual acquaintances don’t spend the night at each other’s houses, they do
not
say things like “I love you”, and they do not hide them from other people. Especially not the woman they are involved with.

“Hah!” I had to laugh at myself. To think that Cooper even considered me when making decisions or choices in his everyday life was laughable, if not completely delusional. Cooper had proved time and time again that the only person he was capable of thinking about was himself. I really had no right to be mad at him. He’d never promised me anything. There had never been a discussion of exclusivity or relationship status. For all intents and purposes I was just a fling to him, a conquest, a notch on his bed post.

I drank more wine.

When the goblet was empty, I set the glass outside the tub and sunk lower into the bubbles. They were rapidly dissipating, but there were still enough to give a faint aroma of rose petal and sweet pea. It should have been soothing, but I couldn’t relax. My nerves were shot from the hacking fiasco last night and the crazy session in my office this morning. The last twenty-four hours had left me reeling, fighting for breath and clarity as my world continued to get weirder and weirder.

Eventually, I hauled myself out of the tub and wrapped up in a soft, fluffy bathrobe that I’d stolen from a hotel once upon a time. I knew it had been wrong, but it was the nicest thing I owned at the time, so I’d kept it.

I wandered into the kitchen and rummaged through my fridge but it was pretty bare. I had done all kinds of shopping over the weekend, but, unfortunately, none of it had been for groceries. I pulled out a container of hummus and a bag of carrot sticks, praying the hummus hadn’t gone bad. With my snack in hand, I sat down at the dining table and pulled open my laptop. I may have high-tailed it out of the office, but that didn’t necessarily mean I couldn’t get any work done. I needed to focus on this hack. The sooner I got Cooper the answers he was looking for, the sooner he would leave me alone.

And that was what I needed…for him to leave me the hell alone.

The man undid me in a way that I couldn’t even articulate. The way he looked at me, talked to me, talked about me. The way his hands felt on my skin, his body fit against mine, the smell of him. Ugh…it was all too much. He was driving me insane in the worst possible way.

I shook my head, hoping to clear him out, but it didn’t do much good. He was still there, hovering in the back of my mind as my computer fired up and I logged in to the company website. I checked my emails, but there was nothing super important. I’d been with Brighton Enterprises for a week and although I was cc’ed on most inter-office memos, they really had nothing to do with my position and I could safely ignore the majority of the chatter. I supposed Cooper wanted it that way, at least for now. Whatever he thought the competition had, he wanted it badly, and wanted to make sure I could focus on that task entirely.

The whole thing was so confusing. I still had no idea why he cared what the competition was using in their products. I’d given him the general ingredients, with my added suggestions of natural, plant-based substitutes, but still, he pressed on, demanding more information.

The next thing I pulled up was the data that I’d saved from the night before. I’d emailed all the tracking information and screen shots to myself for further review, and decided that now was as good of time as any. I munched on the stale carrots as I read through the files, digitally highlighting anything that seemed important.

As I scanned through the data, a ding sounded, indicating that an email had come in. I minimized the window and pulled up my inbox. There was some small speck of hope that it could be from Cooper, telling me he was ever so sorry about the way he’d left my office, and asking me to come back to work so we could talk.

The email was from Parker.

Curiosity quickly replaced my disappointment and I pulled it open to read his message:

Allison,

I’m really sorry to do this over email, but I don’t think things are going to work between us.

I hope this doesn’t make things too awkward at the office. I think you’re a great girl and am happy to have you on the Plush team.

Regards,

Parker

I almost laughed, but it died on my lips before it could escape. I rolled my eyes instead and deleted the email, not bothering with a response. I had no doubt that Cooper had nipped that situation in the bud as soon as he found out about it. It didn’t really matter. Parker was a nice guy, but not someone I wanted a second date with. However, knowing that Cooper had intervened in some way brought my anger rising back to the surface and suddenly I couldn’t get him out of my head again, which only made me angrier.

Chapter Eight

“Hey, Allie, long time! How are you?” Bryce asked when he picked up the phone.

“Well, I just spent two hours in the tub, day drinking and contemplating going postal, so… you tell me,” I replied.

After my bath and receiving the email from Parker, I’d called up the first person that came to mind—Bryce. I figured he’d know what to do since he’d been there at the beginning of Cooper and me…and whatever it was we were doing together. It wasn’t a relationship. But then, it wasn’t
not
one, either.

It was complicated.

“Sounds like you need to get out of the house. The question is, do you want to continue drinking, or do you need something to sober you up?” he asked.

I hesitated, balancing the phone against my shoulder as I craned around the corner to look at the glowing digital clock beside my bed. It was nearly one o’clock in the afternoon. I was still exhausted, but with everything going on in my head, I knew there was no way I was going to be able to sleep without medicinal intervention.

“Coffee would probably be the best solution right now.”

“Done. Let’s meet at Piper’s Cafe. They have good coffee and we can get you something for lunch, as well.”

I smiled, appreciative of Bryce’s concern. He rattled off the directions, and we hung up. I went to my bedroom and quickly changed into a pair of dark wash jeans and a black tank. I didn’t bother with makeup and threw my long hair into a ponytail. As I slicked back my hair, I recalled confessing to Cooper that I am a natural redhead. It had been ages since I’d let myself revert to my natural color, but in that moment, staring at my reflection in the mirror, I started to consider it.

I swept out of the apartment, giving Sam a pat on the head as I left, and within fifteen minutes had arrived at the cafe Bryce had indicated. It was a cute shop with indoor and outdoor seating. I spotted Bryce right away, and then noticed he’d brought Clay, his boyfriend, along with him. I’d met Clay once before, when Bryce had coaxed me out of my apartment after a different encounter with Cooper had left me down in the dumps.

Man, I have got to get off this fucking merry-go-round.

I was a little embarrassed as I walked over to them. I didn’t want Clay to think of me as some whiny chick who did nothing but complain about men. I didn’t know why it particularly mattered to me, but it did. Bryce saw me and started waving me over to the table they had selected. I plastered on a smile and resolved to not talk about Cooper at all.

My resolve lasted all of ten minutes—before I knew it, Cooper was, yet again, the focus of the conversation.

“So, wait, let me get this straight,” Bryce interjected at the peak of my story. “You’re working for him now? For
Plush
?”

I nodded and licked my lips nervously. “Well, technically, I’m in the IT department, but the current project he has me working on is in relation to Plush.”

Bryce and Clay nodded slowly in unison and I felt even more awkward.

“Is that bad? Do you think?”

I’d left out the part where Cooper had stalked me and hauled me out of a strip club I’d been working at to make rent. I had no idea what Bryce—and now, Clay, too—would think if they knew that part. It wasn’t exactly something I liked to bring up.

“Well, I don’t know, Allie. I’ve heard that working for Brighton Enterprises is a pretty sweet gig, but do you think it’s good to be in such close contact with him, after…everything?”

It felt warm and I wished they had chosen a table inside. I took a long sip of my iced coffee, partly to stall and partly because it seemed like I was overheating. “I don’t know. He was nice and the job pays more than I could have ever imagined…” My voice trailed off. I’d thought talking to Bryce would make me feel better, but now I just felt stupid. “I wanted it to be different. I was going to keep it professional. And it was…”

“Until it wasn’t?” Bryce asked, his eyebrow cocked.

“Yeah. I don’t know what my problem is. But now, I don’t know whether to stay and keep working for him or if I should leave.” I let out a sigh, exhausted by my own drama.