Page 21 of Midnight Player

She clamped her hand over her mouth. Pain lanced through her chest, and the tears she’d held back fell like rain.

She’d done the right thing, hadn’t she?

12

Jake strode away from her room, feeling as if his heart had been ripped from his chest while it was still beating.

Karma. That’s what this was, karma kicking his ass for his cavalier, playboy lifestyle. How many women had wanted more and he turned them down flat? Too many to count.

He barreled into his hotel room and hurled her book across the room like he was trying to throw a runner out at second. Only to stagger to his knees with a roar torn from his soul. The pain gutted him. How could she say no? He knew she felt as deeply as he did. Why would she kick him out of her life?

He needed to go back and convince her to change her mind. Hell, he wasn’t above kidnapping her, taking her to a cabin in the woods, and fucking the refusal out of her body. Because he’d never felt this way about any woman before.

Fuck! He didn’t even have her phone number. He should have snuck onto her phone and called his cell. That way he’d at least have her number.

Uncertainty dodged him. For the first time in his life, Jake didn’t have a playbook. He had no idea what it would take to win her. He felt like he’d been pummeled within an inch of his life.

Beyond dejected, he stripped and headed into the shower. Standing beneath the hot spray, it smacked him upside the head. Of course she turned him down. He’d only acted like he wanted to keep fucking her. While he did want that, wanted to feel her writhe and begging him to come, there was so much more he wanted from her.

And like an idiot, he’d done nothing to alleviate the fear he spied in her eyes. Nope, he’d done what he always did—he let her think it was only her body he wanted. But that wasn’t the case at all. He wanted her shy smiles and the way she fit him when they were snuggled together in bed. He wanted to plumb the depths of her mind and her sweet heart.

Rinsing off the soapsuds, he left the shower in a trail of water. He snagged a towel off the hook and hurriedly dried himself. He didn’t bother with boxers, shoving his legs into his jeans and grabbing the first clean shirt he could find. All he knew was that he needed to get to her, needed to make her see reason, and do whatever it took to make her his.

With his hair still damp, he snagged his room keycard and shoved his phone in his back pocket before racing out the door. Jake rode the elevator up to the tenth floor.

The moment the doors opened, he sprinted off the elevator and down the hall to her room. He pounded on the door.

“Willa. Open up.” His fist thudded against the door.

One of the maid carts was two doors down, and a uniformed woman emerged from the room. She was older, with streaks of gray in her dark hair. “Can I help you, sir?”

“I’m trying to get my girlfriend to open the door. We had a fight. It was dumb, but we’re going to miss our flight. And my keycard isn’t working. Could you let me in?”

“She left already, the woman staying in that room.”

“She had her suitcase with her?” Please say no.

“Yes, she had all her belongings with her and left twenty minutes ago.”

His heart dropped through the fucking floor. She’d left while he was bemoaning his fate. “Thank you.”

Maybe he could still catch her. He ran like his life depended on it back to the elevators. He rode it down to the lobby, praying he wasn’t too late. When he didn’t spy her anywhere in the lobby, he headed over to the registration desk and asked the redheaded clerk, “The woman in room 1014. Has she already checked out? I have something of hers and need to return it.”

“I’m sorry, sir, but it’s hotel policy that we cannot give the status of another guest. Is there something else?—”

Ignoring her, he turned away and strode to the front door. Mayhap she was outside and waiting for a cab. But when he stood in the circular drive, with people loading up vehicles or climbing into cabs. The young bellhop outside grinned and asked, “Good morning. Do you need a taxi, sir?”

“Did you see a woman with chestnut hair about this tall,” he held his hand up to his shoulder, “leave?”

“Yes. She just left in a cab.” He nodded his blond head, still looking at him expectantly.

The world swam before him. She was gone. He didn’t know what airline she was flying. He didn’t have her phone number. He only had her two names, the real one and the author one.

The second defeat hurt worse than the first.

Jake nodded solemnly. “Thank you.”

His footsteps weary and his heart heavy, he returned to his suite. He spied the book casually lying on the ground. In his fury, he’d been careless with the only thing he had left of her.

---