Page 28 of A Very Titan Christmas (Titan #14)
Bryce hustled up the back hallway that led to the main part of the toy store. He needed to talk to Rachel but had little he could share. He saw her fly by the nutcrackers flanking the door.
“Sugar Plum’s on the move,” Winters said into their earpieces.
Bryce snagged his parka and pursued her. “I’ve got her.”
He pushed the front door open. Little biting flakes of ice pelted down. “Rach, hang on a second.” His boots crunched over the icy sidewalk. He caught up with her, grabbing her arm. “Rachel, slow down.”
“I’m going to talk to my dad. He’ll give me answers.”
“I don’t think he will.”
“Then we’ll find out.”
“Think he’s busy. He’s in meetings today, prepping for the summit.”
She let out a sigh that turned into a little cloud of breath. “I hate not knowing things.”
“I get it.”
Rachel looked at him accusingly, as if he had things he should have told her but hadn’t. His heart stopped for the duration of that look. He hadn’t said anything but had sure as all hell shown her what was in his head. That had to count for something important.
She huffed and spun away from him.
“What are you going to do? Walk back to the resort?” He’d driven them to the toy store and wasn’t sure of her grand plan to get back without him. “Even if you wanted to walk, I’m not sure most of the roads are passable on foot.”
She spun back around. “Fine. You drive. But I need to talk to my dad. He’ll give me answers.”
They crossed Main Street, and he had her in his vehicle before he broached the topic of their situation. “You’re upset, and you really don’t need to be.”
“Okay, that makes me feel better.”
He tightened his grip on the steering wheel and tried to let go of his annoyance. “What about this is bothering you?”
“I’m being left out.”
Bryce turned off Main Street. “Of the security issues? Yeah, sure. We wouldn’t run every security threat by the principal’s family.”
“You’re telling me that Eloise doesn’t know what’s going on.”
“I’m telling you that I have no idea what your mom knows. Half the time, I bet your dad doesn’t know. There are people who are paid to handle general concerns. He doesn’t have time for all that.”
“Nobody in the Titan Group is making those worried faces because of a general concern.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’m unaware of a specific threat…”
“But?”
Bryce ran through what he could tell her in his head. It wasn’t a secret that there had been a leak. That was the fucking problem with a leak. “There was a leak.”
“I know what that means, but not why you look on edge.”
“I’m not—”
She glared at him.
“The likelihood of a threat increases significantly if people know what’s happening.” He offered a shrug, hoping to downplay his words. “We’re more visible than we want to be and have been since last night. That’s enough time for someone with infinite resources to cause a problem for the summit.”
She bit her lip. “I still want to talk to my dad.”
“Then, good. You should. But I don’t think his schedule will allow it right now.”
“What about you and me?”
That caught him off guard. “What about us?”
“Did you only stay with me during the snowstorm because there could be threats?”
Anger punched him in his chest. He stared at her, back at the road, and then back at her. “Are you fuckin’ kidding me?”
“Titan Group was doing me a favor. I have to remember that. You said the fake relationship was written into my security plan. So…”
His molars clamped together. “You think my boss would tell me to have sex with someone for a job? And that I would do that with you? For work?”
“When you put it like that…”
“Yeah, when I put it like that. That’s what you just said.”
He slowed at a stop sign. “Rachel, look at me. Since the moment you got me in ice skates, I haven’t done or said a damn thing I didn’t want to.
” He cupped her chin and slid his thumb over her cheek.
Simply touching her was enough to distract him from work.
A thousand ideas of other ways he could touch her instantly popped to mind.
The intensity of his need unnerved him. It should have given him pause, but all it did was urge him on.
He pulled her face toward his, and her lips on his was an instant balm to the heartburn this argument had stirred up.
“You and I are going back to your cabin.”
Someone in the car behind them honked their horn.
They laughed. She tucked her chin, and he waved apologies to the driver behind them.
“Are you using sex to distract me?” she asked with a half laugh.
He turned into the resort. He was using sex to fulfill them. To ease the tension and make her pliable, soft, warm, and under him. “Can’t think of a better way to pass the time.” He pulled into the tiny driveway in front of her cabin. “But really, I’m just greedy for you.”