Page 102 of The Business of Love Box Set 1: Books 1 - 4

JACKSON

W hat 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 said.

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.