Free Since I Saw You by Beth Kery Page A

body. “I’m not the perfect one in this scenario.”
    Her nostrils flared slightly as their gazes clung. “It’s a relative term,” she replied softly. “I meant to perfect what you already are.”
    “You make me sound like I’m a doll you’re trying to make pretty for tea. It’ll never work.”
    Her chin tilted up in a subtle dare. “We’ll see.”
    •   •   •
    Her heart leapt an hour later when he caught her elbow on the way out of the store. She honestly couldn’t say if it did so in panic or in acute anticipation.
    “Where are you running off to so fast?” Kam asked when Lin glanced over her shoulder as she finished buttoning her coat.
    “I have a thing called a job.”
    He rolled his eyes. “Yes, I think we established that the other night.”
    He grabbed her elbow again, when she turned irritably and started out the door.
    “Why are you so prickly about my job?” she hissed over her shoulder. Immediately, she felt guilty.
She
was the one who was so prickly about her job today . . . about what Ian had told her about relocating to London . . . about Kam’s insinuations about her doing anything for her work . . . about
everything.
    “Because I don’t like being one of your job duties,” he replied in a hushed tone, glancing around the luxurious store. A man holding up two ties looked their way, obviously hearing their tense hisses. Kam nodded to the sunny street and sidewalk and followed Lin out the revolving door.
    “I told you. Monday night was
not
a job duty. Not the end of it, anyway,” she said succinctly when they faced off on the sidewalk. “Monday night
was
a mistake. And everything we do together from here on out?
Definitely
work, and tedious work at that,” she added with a hard glare. She started to walk away.
    He cursed in French under his breath. “I’m sorry,” he called out baldly.
    She halted abruptly and glanced back at him, her mouth falling open in surprise.
    “I’m sorry for suggesting that you were acting on Ian’s orders to have sex with me to soften me up,” he said in a muted tone, glancing from side to side to make sure no one was in hearing distance. “I wasn’t thinking straight at the time.”
    “I’ll say you weren’t. You were acting like a bully.”
    His eyes flared with anger, but then he briefly closed them and inhaled.
    “You’re right. I deserve that,” he said stiffly.
    Her gaze narrowed as she stepped toward him. “It would have been one thing if you were just being an oaf. But you were being intentionally rude. You were
trying
to be hurtful. Why?”
    He blinked, grinding his jaw, looking like he was “chewing metal” as Richard had put it. “When I saw you getting dressed that night when I came out of the bathroom, I realized you were done with me,” he suddenly bit out.
    Her expression went flat. A tingling sensation swept along her limbs. A car horn beeped loudly as traffic passed, but it barely penetrated Lin’s awareness.
    “It suddenly hit me how truly unlikely it would be that a woman like you would have initiated something with me,” Kam said.
    “So you accused me of going to bed with you on Ian’s orders?” she clarified quietly.
    He shrugged and glanced uncomfortably out at the street. “I knew I was wrong almost the second I walked out your door. But if I hadn’t fully guessed how wrong I was then, I would have this morning.”
    Lin took another step closer. For the first time since they’d slept together she looked straight into his eyes. He noticed and glanced down at her. She thought she really did see regret mixing with irritation in the light-infused, silvery depths. She got the distinct impression the frustration she witnessed was with himself. “What do you mean?” she asked. “What happened this morning?”
    “Ian seemed genuinely put off by your . . . presentation in his office earlier. There’s no way in hell he could have asked you to tango with me purposefully,” Kam scoffed.