Page 75 of One Bad Idea

And yet, the image lingered. She was naked. He was naked. Cripes, even the imaginary bellhop was naked, because hey, as long as my imagination was running wild, I might as well go full-weirdo, right?

Stupidly, I still hadn't answered his question.What was wrong?I rubbed at my eyes. "Nothing."

"You're lying."

My grip tightened on the phone. This was just like him – Mister Blunt, even when calling from the beach – or wherever he was.

But it wasn'thimI was frustrated with. Mostly, I was frustrated with myself. Somehow, I'd let him get under my skin. And if that weren't bad enough, I was doing a sorry job of hiding it.

But then again, I'd never been great at hiding my feelings, even now, when I didn't know what exactly those feelings were.

But there was no way I'd admit any of this because, for one thing, he wouldn’t want to hear it. "Everything's fine," I lied. "Were you calling about the appointments?"

"What appointments?"

"The ones you canceled, on your calendar, I mean."

"Fuck the appointments."

No. Fuck Morgan. And fuck you.

Damn it.Why was I so bothered? It made no sense. I didn't even like him.

Really, I didn't.

When I made no reply, he said, "Tell me."

"Tell you what?"

"What's wrong."

I forced another smile. "Nothing."

"Alright," he said in a carefully controlled voice. "How about this? What's going on?"

"You mean here at the office?" I glanced around. "Nothing much. I rescheduled the appointments, and…" I hesitated. "Well, it's just me and Darla, so it's pretty…"

I bit my lip.Pretty what?

Weird?

Stressful?

Quiet?

Not hardly.Right on cue, a burst of laughter rang through the walls.

On the phone, Jaden asked, "Did you say Darla?"

"Yup. I sure did."

"And she's therenow?"

"Actually, she's been here all morning." I forced a smile so big, my face almost hurt. "Bright and early."

In a barely audible voice, he muttered, "Fuck."

I paused. "Excuse me?"