Page 15 of My CEO Neighbor (Neighborhood Hotties #5)

"Monica," Ted started, his voice softer, but she was already backing toward her apartment door.

"It's fine," Monica said quickly, but her voice shook slightly. "Really. We both have lives to get back to. Important things to deal with."

She threw his own words back at him, and they landed like stones. Ted could see her rebuilding her walls in real time, protecting herself from further damage.

She was fishing in her bag for her keys, and Ted noticed her hands were trembling. The sight made him want to cross the distance between them, to pull her into his arms and take back every cutting word he'd just spoken.

But he stood frozen, watching her retreat, unable to bridge the gap he'd created.

"I should go," Monica continued, not looking at him, her voice taking on the same careful neutrality she'd probably used with difficult clients in her marketing days. "Let you handle your calls. I'm sure your investors are worried about their ROI."

The subtle emphasis on 'ROI' was her own small cut, suggesting that's all he really cared about—return on investment, profit margins, the quantifiable measures of success he'd spent three years chasing.

"Monica, wait—"

But she was already unlocking her door, already stepping inside. She paused for just a moment, looking back at him with an expression that was carefully blank, professionally polite.

"Thank you," she said formally, as if he'd held a door for her instead of sharing the most intimate experience of his life.

The words startled him. He should be thanking her—for the breathing lessons, for the conversation, for showing him what it felt like to be truly present with another person. For giving him the best sex of his life and making him feel worthy of tenderness.

"Wait," Ted said, but her door was already closing with a soft click that sounded final.

He stood in the hallway for a long moment, staring at Monica's closed door and trying to process what had just happened. An hour ago, he'd been buried inside her, listening to her scream his name, feeling more connected to another human being than he'd thought possible.

Now she was treating him like a regrettable business transaction, and he was doing the same to her.

His phone buzzed insistently, pulling him back to immediate concerns. Jennifer's latest text was marked urgent: Dexter rescheduled for tomorrow 9 a.m. Need to know if you're taking the meeting.

Ted stared at the message, thumb hovering over the keyboard. Tomorrow at nine. Another chance to pitch his company, to secure the funding that would launch CloudSync into the stratosphere. Everything he'd worked for, everything that mattered, reduced to a calendar invitation.

Everything that was supposed to matter.

He typed back: Confirm the meeting. I'll be there.

Then he unlocked his own apartment and stepped inside, closing the door behind him.

The silence was deafening. Ted's apartment had always been quiet. He preferred it that way, claimed it helped him think. But tonight, the emptiness felt oppressive, hollow. He could hear Monica moving around next door, the soft sound of her footsteps, water running in her kitchen.

She was so close, just on the other side of a thin wall, but she might as well have been on another planet for how he'd pushed her away.

He should dive back into preparation mode, should use the evening to refine his pitch and prepare for tomorrow's meeting.

Instead, he found himself standing at his kitchen window, looking out at the fire escape where Monica kept her plants.

Everything was exactly as it had been this morning, but somehow it all looked different now.

Ted's reflection stared back at him from the darkening glass. His hair was still mussed, shirt still wrinkled, and he carried the unmistakable look of a man who'd just had his world rocked. He looked like a man who'd spent the afternoon having incredible sex with a beautiful woman.

He looked like a man who'd just fucked up the best thing to happen to him in years.

In the elevator, it had felt like waking up after years of sleepwalking, like discovering he'd been holding his breath without realizing it.

Monica had been soft and strong and so fucking beautiful when she came apart in his arms, and the way she'd looked at him afterward—like he was worth loving, like he was enough exactly as he was—had made him want things he'd forgotten how to want.

And then he'd thrown it all away in thirty seconds of professional panic.

Ted's phone rang. Jennifer's number flashed on the screen, and he answered out of habit.

"Do you need anything tonight? Review materials, additional projections? I can come over."

"No." Ted's response was sharper than he'd intended. "I'm fine. I have everything I need."

The lie tasted bitter. He had everything except the one thing that had made him feel human again.

"Okay. Get some rest, then. Tomorrow's a big day."

Tomorrow was a big day. The day that would determine CloudSync's future, Ted's future, everything he'd sacrificed the past three years to achieve.

So why did it feel less important than figuring out how to fix whatever he'd just broken with Monica?

Ted stripped off his clothes and headed for the shower, hoping hot water might wash away the scent of Monica's skin and the memory of how she'd felt moving against him. But even under the scalding spray, he could still taste her, still feel the phantom weight of her body against his.

Still see the hurt in her eyes when he'd dismissed her like a temporary distraction.

Ted finished his shower and dressed in fresh clothes, then sat down at his laptop to review his presentation. The slides loaded automatically, familiar charts and graphs filling his screen with projections and market analysis and all the data that was supposed to prove CloudSync's worth.

But instead of seeing revenue potential, all Ted could think about was Monica's voice in the darkness, asking him what he'd measure success by if not his father's metrics.

All he could see was her face when she'd told him he was worthy just for existing, not for what he'd accomplished or how much money he made.

All he could remember was the way she'd kissed him—like he was enough, exactly as he was.

Ted worked until midnight, polishing slides and rehearsing presentations, but his heart wasn't in it. Every few minutes, he found himself listening for sounds from Monica's apartment, wondering what she was doing, whether she was thinking about him at all.

Whether she was regretting what they'd shared as much as he was regretting how he'd handled it.

Probably not. She was probably relieved to be free of the complicated corporate asshole who'd used her for stress relief and then retreated into professional mode the moment reality intruded. Who'd taken a beautiful moment and made it feel dirty with his cutting dismissal.

And maybe that was for the best. Maybe they really were too different, wanted too different things. Maybe what had happened in the elevator was just circumstance and proximity and the strange intimacy of shared crisis.

But even as Ted tried to convince himself of that, he knew it was bullshit.

What they'd shared had been real—the most real thing he'd experienced in years.

And he'd destroyed it because he was too much of a coward to handle something that couldn't be managed with spreadsheets and strategic planning.

Tomorrow, he'd get dressed in another expensive suit and pitch his company to investors who measured human worth in quarterly returns, and pretend that none of it mattered.

Pretend that he hadn't just discovered what it felt like to be truly known by another person.

Pretend that he hadn't just thrown it all away for a fucking spreadsheet.

The worst part was that he'd seen it happening, had watched himself build walls between them with each cutting word, and hadn't been able to stop.

Had known he was hurting her and done it anyway, because professional distance was easier than admitting he'd never felt anything like what she made him feel.

Because admitting that would mean risking everything, and Ted had spent three years learning that the only thing worse than being alone was losing what really mattered.

So he'd made sure it didn't matter, had reduced the most meaningful connection of his life to a temporary lapse in judgment.

And now he'd have to live with the knowledge that he'd had something real and beautiful in his hands, and he'd crushed it rather than risk being vulnerable enough to keep it.