Hook Me Up (Business Of Love Book 3) Read online

  Didn’t it?

  He’s a guy. Of course he’s turned on. Pussy is pussy.

  Another finger slid inside me.

  All my muddled thoughts burst apart and I squirmed beneath him. Jackson tightened his grip on my wrists as if to demand I stay still. I tried, but it was damn near impossible. He knew all the right places to press into. His fingers curled up, and I whimpered, and when he pushed his thumb against my clit, I nearly burst apart.

  “Jackson,” I breathed.

  He descended upon me to leave a trail of kisses along my jaw and throat. He worked his way up to my ear where he pinched my lobe between his teeth. The stubble on his jaw tickled my cheek and the heat of his breath coupled with the way he was fucking me with his fingers had the pressure of a release building up inside me.

  Where is this going to lead? Are you going to wake up in the morning and it will be like this never even happened all over again?

  I tried to shut my brain off. I tried to focus on the pleasure not the logic. Jackson sealed his mouth over mine for needy kisses.

  What does he expect from me?

  My pants around my thighs felt suddenly constraining. Jackson’s grip on my wrists was tighter than ever, and even though it didn’t hurt, it left me feeling as trapped in my body as I felt in my mind.

  Does he want a relationship? Or does he want things to stay the same between us but we have casual sex whenever the mood strikes?

  I bit my bottom lip.

  I had to stop thinking like this. I was ruining the moment. I was so close to an orgasm—so damn close. Jackson broke our kiss and began working his way down my chest and over my breasts and down my belly.

  Was that what I wanted? Casual sex?

  Jackson tugged at my pants to pull them farther down.

  No. I don’t want that.

  My pants got caught up around my knees. My heart raced.

  I want all or nothing.

  “Jackson,” I said.

  He froze and looked up at me. His eyes were a startling green. He must have heard the urgency in my voice and realized something was wrong. His grip on my wrists immediately loosened. “Did I hurt you?”

  I shook my head. “No… no. You didn’t hurt me.”

  Jackson released my wrists. I was struck with how self-conscious I felt lying beneath him with my tits pulled out of my bra and my work pants stuck around my knees. My panties were pulled to the side and they were soaking wet and my juices were coating his fingers and—

  I gave my head a shake as my thoughts started spiraling.

  This was a bad idea.

  Chapter 20

  Jackson

  What had I done wrong? Had I said something? Had I hurt her? Had I moved too quickly?

  Hailey shimmied out from underneath me before she sat up and rested her back against the coffee table. She tucked her breasts back into her bra, worked her pants back up her thighs and over her ass, and wrapped her blouse around herself like it was a cardigan.

  She was hiding her body from me.

  “Hails,” I said softly. “Did I do something? I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  “No.” Hailey shook her head fiercely. “No. You didn’t do anything wrong. This is all me. My head. I don’t know what all of this means, Jack.”

  I frowned. She didn’t know what this meant? “I don’t understand,” I said.

  Hailey raked her fingers through her hair and refused to meet my eye. As the seconds passed, she pulled her knees inward and I couldn’t help but feel like she was trying to make herself as small as possible.

  “I don’t know,” she whispered. “What are we doing? What’s this going to lead to? What does this mean for us? How do we navigate what this is when all we’ve ever been is just friends?”

  Those were a lot of questions for her to throw at me all at once, and truth be told, I didn’t have any answers. I hadn’t thought it through that far. The only questions my brain had been asking me were related to how long I should wait before I kissed her again. Before I wrapped her up in my arms and laid her down on her back and worshiped her the way she deserved.

  I tried to process what she was saying to me.

  “Say something, Jack,” she pleaded.

  “I… I didn’t realize we needed a game plan before we could be intimate. I thought you wanted the same thing. I hadn’t thought about labels or what this might mean. I just went with it.”

  “We have to think this through.”

  “Why?” I asked. I wasn’t trying to be an ass. I genuinely wanted to understand where she was coming from. I’d had casual hookups before and none of them had been blown to smithereens. They’d all been pretty healthy and balanced and nobody got their feelings hurt. And I had a hard time believing there was anything that could ruin my friendship with Hailey.

  Hailey stared at me like I’d asked her the most ludicrous question in the world. “Why? Because I don’t want this to ruin our friendship. That’s why.”

  “Why would it?”

  “Sex complicates everything, Jackson,” she said with an exasperated sigh. She began doing up the buttons of her shirt one at a time, starting at the top. “We have to make sure we’re on the same page.”

  My cock was still rock hard and out of my boxers. Suddenly self-conscious and worried about making Hailey uncomfortable, I tucked myself away and tried to ignore the discomfort of my hard-on pressing up tight against my jeans. “I thought we were on the same page. I thought you wanted this.”

  “I do.”

  “But?” I asked, willing her to look up at me. She still wouldn’t. What did she want from me? And why wouldn’t she just come out and say it?

  Did she want a relationship? Did she want this to be more than just a friendship with casual sex thrown in? I understood that it was complicated to go from two friends who never crossed that line to all of a sudden being two people who willingly almost crossed it twice. There were going to be shifts and changes. But I didn’t think any of that were things that might cause her concern.

  I thought she trusted me enough to know I’d never hurt her.

  If this wasn’t sitting right with her, then I didn’t want it.

  At least, that was what I tried to tell myself.

  Hailey licked her lips and shook her head. With a frustrated huff, she got to her feet and did up the safety pin of her fly. I stood with her.

  “Talk to me,” I said. “Help me understand what you’re feeling.”

  “I don’t know what I’m feeling.”

  What was I supposed to do with that? What did she need from me here? Reassurance? Or did she want me to be the one to put a pin in this and tell her we were done and I wanted to go back to the way things were before we had sex that night back in Nashville?

  Could I even say that to her?

  I didn’t want to go back to that. I wanted to hear her moan my name again. I wanted to feel her. I wanted to taste her on my tongue while she plunged her fingers into my hair and held me between her thighs until she came.

  Hailey shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. Let’s just forget this happened tonight, okay? I was feeling vulnerable after work.”

  “I don’t want to forget,” I said. “Hails. Just tell me what you’re thinking.”

  “I’m not your type anyway!”

  I froze. She’d never raised her voice at me like that before.

  Frowning, I tried to make sense of the emotion pouring out of her. Her forehead was creased and her eyes were wide. Her cheeks were pink and her hands were balled into fists at her sides and I couldn’t tell if she was angry or sad or confused or a tumbling mix of all three.

  “How do you know what my type is?” I asked.

  She rolled her eyes and marched around the coffee table. “I know exactly what your type is, Jack. You like blonde girls with long legs and tiny waists. You like girls with big lips and fake tits that you can share a bed with but not your heart. You like easy girls.”

  Ouch. “That’s not true,” I sa
id.

  She made her way to the front door, where she grabbed her jacket off the hook and shrugged into it. “Yes it is. I know I’m not your type and I don’t want to be someone you fuck just because it’s easy and it’s safe and I’m there.”

  Double ouch.

  I reached for her but she pulled away. My hand fell to my side. “Is that what you think?”

  “I don’t know what to think!” Hailey pressed the heels of her hands to her temples and closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she focused on everything but me, like she wished I wasn’t there at all. “How am I supposed to know what this means? We have sex for the first time ever and then you move to New York like nothing happened and you basically stop talking to me, and then when I do reach out, you set me up with someone else from your business?” She paused to suck in a breath of air. “Who, I might add, was a complete miss for me. We had nothing in common. He wanted way more than I could offer him. You used me to appease a client. Not to find someone suited for me and my needs. You treated me like I was a client on one of your lists.”

  I blinked in surprise.

  Okay. Maybe I did do that. And maybe it was subconscious because secretly I didn’t want her to like Ambrose.

  Or was I just beginning to doubt my actions because I’d clearly hurt my best friend?

  “Hailey, I didn’t mean to—”

  “I need to clear my head. I’m going for a walk.” Hailey slipped her feet into a pair of sneakers tucked near the front door and wrenched the door open.

  “Hails, wait. Let’s figure this out. I never meant to make you feel this way.”

  “Jack,” she said firmly. “I need some time alone. I need to think. Don’t follow me.”

  She stepped out into the hall. The door fell closed with a soft click behind her and I was left standing there with my arms hanging slack at my sides and my mind spinning.

  How had it spiraled so out of control so quickly?

  One minute, we were kissing and all I could think about was how much I loved hearing her whisper my name when I made her feel good, and the next, she was fleeing like I was some sort of movie villain.

  No.

  I didn’t like that at all.

  I walked to the dining room and stopped in front of my liquor cart. I removed the crystal lid from the glass bottle of whiskey and poured myself a glass. I finished it off in three gulps and relished the burn down my throat and the warmth that spread through my belly.

  I poured another glass.

  Hailey should know I would never want to put her in a position to hurt her feelings.

  And I should have known this was too good to be true.

  Guilt swirled around in my gut.

  I should have thought of this from Hailey’s perspective. I should have recognized that for her, this might cut deeper. I never imagined she would be comparing herself to the other women I’d slept with in the past—or that she would resent me for it.

  And I never imagined she would need to leave to collect her thoughts and cool off. I always thought we’d be able to face whatever was thrown at us. I thought we were stronger together.

  But maybe I’d hurt her too badly for her to see it that way now.

  “Fucking idiot,” I growled before polishing off the rest of my second glass of whiskey.

  Chapter 21

  Hailey

  It started raining three minutes after I left the apartment building. Big, fat, cold drops fell from the sky and splattered on the hoods and windshields of cars parked along the side street I wandered down to get away from the thick throngs of pedestrians.

  I missed the sidewalks in Nashville. They weren’t nearly as crowded or covered in chewed-up and spat-out gum. I missed my usual coffee shops and my sister and Azira.

  I missed my comfort zone.

  My shoulder clipped that of a tall businessman in a head to toe black suit. I glanced over my shoulder and caught myself as I stumbled. “Sorry.”

  My apology was weak and timid and he stuck up his nose at me and kept walking, never breaking from his conversation on his cell phone.

  “Don’t let me slow you down,” I muttered as I massaged my aching shoulder.

  It didn’t hurt nearly as much as my heart did.

  My aimless wandering of the streets around Jackson’s apartment led me down a narrow lane with less foot traffic and old-school lamp posts. The evening was dull and gray and the lamps cast a warm ambient light on the concrete. I walked past coffee shops, hair salons, convenience stores, a pet-grooming business, and a rundown old ice-cream parlor that didn’t look like it was getting much business. If it hadn’t been so cold and damp out, I might have ducked in and thrown them five dollars for a milkshake or something.

  But it was cold.

  I kept walking. I must have been going for over twenty minutes before I realized the pace of my steps wasn’t doing anything to clear my head. I needed someone to talk to.

  So I called my sister.

  Hannah answered on the third ring. She had a chipper tone and I remembered it was Monday evening. She would have plans to sit down with a glass of wine and watch her favorite reality dating show. When I was her roommate, I’d sit and watch it with her. We used to love doing that. I especially liked it after a long day at work. It was the perfect way to unwind and clear my mind.

  Plus, those shows always made me feel like I had my shit together even though I knew I did not.

  “Hey, sis,” Hannah chimed. “You called just in time. I was about to hop in the shower. What’s up?”

  “Hey,” I said, trying to warm up my voice so she wouldn’t hear that something was wrong. My sister had an uncanny knack for knowing when something was wrong. I supposed most sisters did. The good ones anyway. But I would swear up and down and left and right that my sister was a bloodhound on the hunt when she sniffed out that something wasn’t right. It was time to put those skills to the test. “I missed you and was thinking about you today. I was thinking about how weird it was that I’m not there to cuddle up on the couch and watch your shitty shows with you.”

  Hannah laughed on the other end. “Oh please. You’re secretly glad you don’t have to endure two hours of petty TV drama.”

  “No. For once, I would actually give an arm and a leg to be there with you.”

  “You’re just saying that because you feel bad for bailing on me and moving to New York. Don’t worry, little sister. I can take care of myself. I’m not—” Hannah broke off. “Hang on. What on earth would make you want to watch garbage TV with me?”

  Shit. I’d overplayed my hand.

  So much for keeping my emotions in check and getting off the call in time so as not to disrupt the evening my sister was clearly looking forward to with great anticipation.

  “Nothing,” I said. “I just had a rough day at work.”

  “Wasn’t it your first shift?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did something happen? You don’t like your coworkers?”

  “No, it’s nothing. Don’t worry about it. We can talk about it later. You go have your shower and enjoy your evening.”

  “Where are you right now?” Hannah asked. I detected notes of suspicion in her tone. She was catching on and putting two and two together. She could probably hear the background noise of traffic or music playing on patios I passed by. Maybe she could even hear the rain.

  “I’m out for a walk.”

  “And where’s Jackson?”

  “Back at the apartment.”

  Hannah made one of her tell-tale, “I’m onto something” sounds in the back of her throat. It was one part groan and one part conspiratorial grunt. “Why do I have a feeling your bad day has more to do with Jackson than it does your new job?”

  There it was.

  Mic drop.

  She’d riddled me out in less than two minutes.

  I sighed into the line and took a left turn. I crossed the street on a jam-packed sidewalk and hopped up onto the curb on the far side. A few more shoulders
bumped against mine and I moved to the inside of the sidewalk to avoid the spray of water spitting off the tires of passing cars.

  “You might be right,” I said. “But I don’t want to cut into your evening. We can talk about it tomorrow.”

  “Nonsense. My shower can wait until after the episode. Start talking. I’m going to pour some wine.”

  It was easy for me to picture Hannah in my mind’s eye padding from her bathroom to her kitchen, where she’d pull a half-empty bottle of white wine from the fridge door and pour herself a glass that was too full to be considered classy. I listened for the sound of the fridge cracking open and heard it right when I thought I might.

  It was followed by the gurgle of wine being poured.

  “I’m waiting, Hailey,” my sister sang into the line.

  Where did I start? “Jackson and I almost hooked up again,” I said.

  “When?”

  “About half an hour ago.”

  “What? Damn, girl, you’re getting busy with that boy. Wait. Hang on. What do you mean almost hooked up? Why’d you stop?”

  “I panicked,” I admitted. “We were kissing and, you know, doing other stuff, and for a moment, it all felt so real and so right, and then it slammed into me that it probably meant something completely different to me than it did to him.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well,” I said, picking my words carefully, “it hurt me the last time we had sex and he was so easily able to hop on a plane the next morning and forget it ever happened. And this time would have been no different. I’m not his type, Hannah. You know the kind of girls he likes. Girls who look like Kim and you.”

  “Hailey. You stop that right now. You’re beautiful. And you’re dead wrong if you think Jackson doesn’t think so too.”

  Jackson thought I was beautiful in the best friend sort of way. The platonic sort of way. The “she’s a natural beauty but not a bombshell” kind of way.