Page 84 of The Player Next Door

Logan had entirely forgotten he had told Amber to meet him at his building, so seeing her standing outside the doors, idly scrolling on her phone, stopped him short. When Peggy had left him in the lobby, he had spent a good five minutes wondering what thefuckhad just happened, before deciding to take her advice.

He was going to fight for Clare, and if that didn’t work, well, he was just going to fightwithClare. Because not only was Clare on a date, she was on a date on the roof. As in the place they’d spent the night talking, the place he had just now realized he’d come to think of astheirplace. Maybe he’d fight her date too, what the hell.

But first, he had to deal with Amber. “What’s wrong?” she asked, looking suspiciously at him.

“Nothing’s wrong, something just, um, came up.”

She crossed her arms. “Something, or someone?”

Logan decided blunt honesty was probably the best policy. “Someone.”

“That was fast, even for you,” she said drily.

“Look, it’s complicated. I’m sorry,” he said, and opened the door.

He had expected her to leave—Amber did not believe in wasting her time—but instead she followed him in. He was being an enormous dick, he was well aware of that. But his brain was only capable of processing one thing at the moment, and that was the thought of Clare on a date. If Amber was pissed at him, she was pissed at him. He’d deal with that later.

Logan pressed the button for the elevator and waited, Amber standing beside him with her arms still crossed. “Are you going to explain yourself?” she asked.

“Wasn’t planning on it, no.”

Amber snorted and tilted her head curiously as the elevator doors opened. “Wait, is she already in your apartment?”

Logan sighed. “No, but she is in the building,” he said, stepping into the elevator. “I’m sorry, but I really do have to go. Now.”

To his everlasting surprise, Amber stepped into the elevator with him. “I think I’ll come with,” she announced and let him hit the button for the top floor. “I want to meet the person who has you this worked up,” she explained.

He hadn’t really envisioned fighting for Clare’s heart with Amber as an audience, but then again, until about fifteen minutes ago he’d given up on fighting for Clare’s heart entirely. He was just going to have to roll with it.

The doors slid open, and he took off for the staircase that led to the lounge, dimly aware of Amber’s heels clicking behind him. Logan burst through the door to the rooftop, eyes already roving the chairs to find her.

And there was Clare at a table near the edge, staring at him as if she’d seen a ghost.

Chapter Forty-three

“Um, Clare?” her date asked. “Everything okay?”

Everythinghadbeen okay. They were having a lovely, albeit slightly stilted, first date on the rooftop, which she had hoped would also serve as an exorcism of sorts of her memories of Logan. It hadn’t been working very well, as she’d already managed to mentally compare Jason—no, wait,Joey—three separate times to Logan, although she’d chastised herself immediately after each time.

“Yeah, it’s just—uh, my friend is here.”

That was a straight-up lie, as Logan was not and had never been just her friend, and right now, he did not look particularly friendly. In fact, Logan was standing in the doorway to the stairs, looking positively thunderous.

“Really, Clare?” he called out in an unfamiliar voice. Even in the parking lot, he hadn’t seemed that pissed off. “Here?”

A woman that Clare vaguely recognized—and then immediately placed, much to her eternal embarrassment—followed Logan out the door. So he was back to his old habits, it would seem, and even though she was trying very pointedly to move on, that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt to see him doing the same.

“You mean my building’s rooftop lounge?” she said in an attempt at a cool, breezy tone. “Is there some rule saying I can’t?”

Logan strode angrily across the roof, reaching them in an alarmingly few number of strides. His legs really had no business being that long. He looked at Joey with a frown. “Him?” he said rudely, his thumb pointing at a now very perplexed-looking Joey. “Really?”

Clare stood up, for all the good that did her. “I could say the same for you,” she said acidly.

Logan’s date looked at her sharply. “Watch it,” she warned.

Clare didn’t really want to fight with the woman, who in addition to being a solid six inches taller than her had a look about her that saidDon’t fuck with me. Besides, it wasn’therfault Logan was being a massive jerk.

Joey looked around, surreptitiously pushing his chair back from the table to put a little more space between him and Logan’s towering stature.