She wrenched open the door of the office and flounced out.

He stared at the door as it shut in his face, running through every goddamn thing he’d said and done to her. He couldn’t find any fault lines, any red flags, any horrible insults. What the hell had he said?

He felt like he’d been stripped naked and sucker-punched.

This was not over. He slapped the door open. The elevator down the hall was closing. He sprinted for it, but the doors pinged shut before he could wedge his fingers in. The other one was noodling up around the fiftieth floor. He dove for the stairwell.

Enough being baffled. Enough guessing games, enough bombs going off in his face. He was sick of it. She wasn’t getting away from him until he knew exactly what he’d done to piss her off.

Fuck this stress-inducing bullshit.

Chapter

5

Nell stumbled out onto the street. Her knees wobbled with anger and everything that had preceded it.

She set out, wiping tears away with the back of her hands, leaving horrendous streaks. She must look like a Halloween horror.

Mutually beneficial arrangement, her ass. Hammer out the details? He might as well ask for a fee schedule. Like a sushi menu. A combination platter. Four pieces of sashimi, maki roll, and miso soup. How much for a mind-bending kiss, heart-pounding dry humping, amazing protracted cunnilingus, and a long, hard screw on the conference room table? Should she give a discount for all the orgasms?

Crass, arrogant asshole. Reducing it to that, after he’d laid her so bare. Her heart, her fears and hopes, her deepest self, all stripped down and raw. Live wires carrying a lethal charge. As he had discovered, to his cost. She’d overreacted, maybe, but it had been all she could do not to scream like a banshee and swing her purse at his head.

Or maybe that had been just one last lingering remnant of common sense. All she had to do was look at the guy to see that she would not fare well in any sort of physical confrontation with him.

Her legs shook as she stumbled down the sidewalk. Her crotch was wet, hot and flushed and glowing with pleasure. As if all the lights had been turned on, and left on. Every step, every clench of her thigh muscles felt…well, good.

Damn him. That had been so cold, so crude, so unnecessary. He should deal with professionals, not dumb-ass romantics like her, primed and programmed to fall like a ton of rock. Embarrassing themselves and everyone else in their immediate vicinity.

She bumped into people on the sidewalk and bounced off them muttering soggy, abbreviated apologies. The colored lights were a dizzying tear-blurred swirl. She stopped at a street corner and wiped the tears and mascara away with her sleeve. God knew, this dress would have to be cleaned anyway. She might never wear the thing again at all.

She peered up at the street sign. Broadway. Good. Busy at all hours. Even though a faraway, disconnected part of her mind reminded her of her promise to Nancy and Vivi. The Fiend. It wasn’t safe.

But her wallet was so close to empty, she could not even afford a car service home, and her bank account was no better. She’d spent all of yesterday’s tip money on that stupid haircut this morning, and today’s tip money at the bank, on her break, paying down her hefty credit card minimum. And then the car service to Burke’s building.

But fear not, right? Salvation was at hand. High-level call girls pulled in a thousand an hour or more, depending on the services they were asked to provide, the level of kink. Not that she could really boast of her sexual technique, as little effective practice as she had, but hey, she could wing it, she could fake it. She had it in her blood, after all.

All she had to do was whip up a stiff fee schedule for that ice-hearted bastard, and there was the cash she needed, for the cab fares, haircuts, dresses, rent. Hell, her tuition, too. If she wanted to spend that much time on her back. Or her knees.

All she had to do was kill something inside herself. Something shining and precious and delicate. Something she’d never even known she had until that moment of astonishing connection with him. Hope.

She was appalled at her own vapid stupidity. She’d actually been hoping for love. Real love. From him. And she hadn’t let herself admit it.

She’d been walking for a long time. Her feet were aching. The busy, self-important city swirled around her. Wind swept down the street, cool against her tear-streaked face. She recognized a familiar sign. A big-chain bookstore where she loved to hang out when she had time. Standing for hours in the aisles, gobbling books she could not afford to buy. If any place on earth could offer comfort, it was that one.

Maybe she’d go in and buy something extravagant. Like the complete works of E. E. Cummings. She’d put it on her card.

And she’d stay in the place until they threw her out bodily.

Duncan dropped a few meters farther behind, keeping the pale flash of her dress in his field of vision. He’d charged out of there all fired up, with every intention of confronting her face on, right in the street, and demanding to know, exactly, in every particular, what her fucking problem was. Then he’d gotten close enough to see that she was crying.

And aw, shit. He’d lost his nerve. He might have known he was going to pay in blood for anything that good.

So he went into surveillance mode. Blank, emotions flatlined, attention focused on the target. Projecting a don’t-see-me vibe, for camo. He was nobody important, just a faceless suit in a sea of suits. Though at this hour, there was no sea of suits on the streets. The suits were vegging in front of their TVs, or packed into bars managing their stress by consuming excessive amounts of alcohol. Not a problem, though. Nell wasn’t noticing him. She was stumbling along the sidewalk, her hand over her mouth, clutching her purse. Attracting attention. A beautiful woman sobbing right out on the street. Christ.

That made his emotional flatline twitch, first with guilt and then with anger. What the fuck? Why? He hadn’t intended any of this. The last thing he wanted to do was to hurt her feelings. All he’d done to the chick was give her multiple orgasms. So fucking shoot him, already. Of course, seducing her hadn’t helped with her current off-the-charts stress level.

But he hadn’t been able to stop himself. It just…happened.

Yeah, and now he was compounding his problems by stalking her. Nice. That was superintelligent. Yeah, that was razor sharp.

But his feet didn’t hear the sarcasm, didn’t get the message. His feet just kept carrying him along, keeping her a safe thirty meters or so ahead of him. Watching that mane of springy black ringlets sway and swirl with every gust of wind.

Then he felt it. Like the whispery brush of a cobweb breaking across his mind. Instinct that said, Something’s wrong with this picture.

He looked closer. Since he’d snapped into surveillance mode, part of his mind had been tracking not just her, but everything around her. That gray sweatshirt had been around for a while. Too long. Behind, but not far. Gray sweatshirt, jeans. Long blond hair. Dirty white athletic shoes. Nell paused to wait for a light. The guy slowed and gazed into a cosmetics products shop window. Yeah, right. Like that skank could be interested in aromatherapy bath salts or orange blossom body butter.

Duncan got on line at a streetside bank machine, and watched out of the corner of his eye as the guy sauntered across the street, and continued on his way, in the same direction as Nell, parallel to her.