Page 35 of Fierce-Hyde

Tori didn’t have to tell anyone where she was going but always did in case someone was looking for her or she got a call.

She ran up the two flights of stairs, then stopped at the door to Fierce Engineering.

“Hi, Tori. You can go back,” Maureen said. They knew her and never questioned anything. Maureen probably thought she was here to see Raina and she wasn’t going to correct her.

She could pop her head in to see Raina but didn’t want to delay what she needed to do.

When she got outside of Hyde’s office she noticed he was clean-shaven.

Holy cow.

How was it possible he could look any more gorgeous?

Talk about a dangerous superpower to have when she had no armor to shield herself.

He looked up quickly as if he just noticed someone might be watching him.

“Do you have a minute?” she asked.

He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. His expression didn’t change. He didn’t look mad though, so that was something.

“Sure,” he said. “Come in.”

“I want to apologize. I should have never sent that text and didn’t know what happened.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t think to reach out, but the truth is I wasn’t thinking of anything but my family.”

“I know that now. I was worried at first. Then annoyed. The embarrassment of being stood up got to me. I went home and ate ice cream out of the carton.” She waved her hand. She didn’t need to tell him all of this. “It’s not the point. I got into my head and let parts of what you told me feed this ugly emotion in me. That was completely wrong of me.”

“So you said that because you think those things or because I planted a seed that you didn’t know was there?”

She wasn’t sure why he asked that. “The second. I might have assumed those things based on your relationship with Ryder and your looks alone.” He smirked at her. She still didn’t know what was going through his mind. “But when you told me about your past everything flooded my brain and I was like, yep, there is another poor dating choice I’ve made.”

“You didn’t tell me you had a poor dating history,” he said.

“I figured we touched on enough other things. And I’m sorry. I had no right to say what I had. Especially after everything you told me about your past and changing. It was wrong of me. My hurt feelings and embarrassment are my own.”

“They are,” he said. “I have to ask myself if I want to go down the path again with someone who doesn’t believe me when I say I’m not that person. It was a lot of work on my end and the results were the same. Nothing I said or did mattered.”

She nodded her head. “You do,” she said. “And I won’t hold it against you if you decide that it’s too much.”

Especially since she was guilty of thinking it was odd he’d worked so hard with Shana.

“You’ll just move on like nothing ever happened?” he asked.

“We had one date and a lot of volatile interactions. Maybe it’s for the best. I don’t know. I don’t seem to know anything more than you bring the worst out of me.”

He looked sad when she said that and it wasn’t what she wanted. “I might feel the same way,” he said.

“Which leaves us wondering why we should bother. You should bring the best out of people, not the worst. I just couldn’t leave things the way they were, Hyde. It wouldn’t feel right. I hope we can just be friends.”

“Friends,” he said, laughing. Not a funny sound either. “Why not? Can’t have enough of them, huh?”

“No,” she said. “Have a good day.” She turned to leave and all but ran into Grant Fierce.

“Sorry about that,” Grant said. “Didn’t see you coming out of Hyde’s office. Did you get lost? Raina is a few down.”

“No,” she said. “I was in the right office.”

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