Page 177 of The Holiday Clause

His mouth quirked. “Just cleaning things up.”

“If by that you mean act like a territorial Neanderthal, you nailed it. Why not just pee a circle around me, Greyson?”

“That guy’s a creep. No way am I letting you near him again.”

“Lettingme?” She scoffed. “I’m going to stop you right there, Mister. You aren’tlettingme do anything. This ismybusiness.”

“He was scoping out your ass the entire time you were bent over!”

“Because he was trying to mirror the pose!”

“Bullshit. We both know this had nothing to do with yoga.”

“And we both know you weren’t actually working on anything constructive out there, making all that noise just for the sake of being disruptive.”

“The path needed clearing!”

“And what, you couldn’t find a wrecking ball to clear it?” She shoved him. “This isn’t high school, Greyson. This is my career.You can’t dismantle my life because you think I can’t take care of myself.”

He drew back. “Are you serious?”

She scoffed. “Very.”

“You want me to stand by while some creep tries to take advantage of you? No fucking way, Wren.”

“You must really think I’m helpless.”

“What are you talking about?”

She flung out her arms. “You’re still treating me like a child, Grey!”

“How? By protecting you?”

She scoffed. “You can’t keep using that as an excuse. It wasn’t always about protecting me. You were afraid of losing me. That’s why you never let any other guys within ten feet of me.”

He went perfectly still. “I was protecting you.”

“Well, I don’t need your protection. I only want your love.”

The room fell into suffocating silence.

“Say something!”

His glare sharpened. “I warned you. You know what kind of man I am. Maybe I was protecting you for myself all those years. At least I can admit that. What about you, Wren?”

“What about me?”

He laughed without humor. “The least you could do is admit—on some level—you liked it. You liked having my claim on you, knowing I’d go ape-shit if anyone so much as looked at you wrong. You can’t hate me for the same reasons you’re attracted to me.”

“That was high school. Things are different now.”

He scoffed. “No, they’re not. I’ll never stop protecting what’s rightfully mine.”

She looked up at the rafters of the studio. “Well, this place belongs to me. Until you can respect everything that means, I don’t think you should come here anymore.”

“You’re kicking me out?”

“You spent the last hour disrupting a one-on-one session with a high paying client?—”