Page 16 of A Reclusive Heart

She opened her mouth to tell him no, but then reconsidered it. “Yes, yes, I have to work,” Jamie lied.

“Fine,” Nick said, saving his work before passing over the laptop. “There’s a folder on the desktop with your name on it. I’d appreciate it if you kept everything you worked on in there.”

That would definitely make this easier, Jamie thought as she shifted in her seat so that he couldn’t see the screen. She opened a new Word document and quickly titled it, “Try New Things.”

Nick barely stoppedhimself from rolling his eyes when the little recluse shifted in her seat so that he couldn’t see what she was working on. As long as she worked, he really didn’t care what she was doing, and judging by her focused expression and fingers tapping away at a rather impressive pace, she was no doubt working on her next book.

A new book would be the perfect finishing touch to this tour. Granted, it would probably start a whole new tour, preferably a European tour, but he would deal with that later. He thought about asking her what her new book was about but decided that he’d ask in a couple of weeks. Right now, he needed to focus on getting her through this book tour in one piece.

In a few weeks, when everything settled down and his little recluse was firmly under his thumb, he’d start working on her new book with her. He knew getting her to do things his way was going to take some time, not much considering how easily she’d folded under a simple glare, but it was still something that needed to be done and quickly.

There was too much to do and not enough time to do it in to let the little recluse get in the way. He needed to be able to make last-minute decisions without having to worry about holding her hand. It would just make things easier if she left everything to him. All she needed to do was write, edit if it made her feelimportant, and show up and smile when and where he told her to, which he thought with a satisfied sigh, wasn’t going to be an issue anymore.

Four hours later, he knew that he had her exactly where he wanted her. From here on out, there weren’t going to be any problems. She accepted his word as law, which she should. In fact, if all women listened to him as well as his little recluse did, his world would be perfect.

He watched as she looked around the hotel foyer nervously. When her eyes landed on the Gold Ballroom’s bulletin board announcing the romance writer’s convention the following day with a special appearance by J.L. Lewis, he had to bite back a smile. The blush and look of surprise on her face was actually kind of cute, but it also let him know one very important thing.

Jamie was easily intimidated.

This was going to be so fucking easy. All he had to do was give her a little nudge every now and then, sprout bullshit in her ear and he’d have her doing everything he wanted.

CHAPTER 9

“Where the hell are you?”Nick bit out harshly.

“Out,” Jamie said, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth as she looked around.

“Where?”

Good question.

She looked down at the complimentary map she’d picked up in the hotel lobby before she’d started this adventure and frowned. Why did they have to make everything so tiny? Because the map was the size of a brochure, she thought with a sigh.

“Well?”

“I’m out.”

“You’re out?”he asked tightly.

“You said that you wouldn’t need me until tomorrow morning, so I decided to go for a walk and grab a bite to eat,” Jamie said, turning the map slightly to the side and frowned. Was that brown spot the symbol for a restroom or an ATM? Not that it mattered since all she wanted was go to the Museum of Science.

Visiting a museum probably didn’t seem like a big deal and it wasn’t, but she’d decided to break into the whole “Try new things” plan slowly. Besides, she was only killing time untiltonight. She was going to her first nightclub and she was really nervous about it.

She’d never been to a nightclub before. The closest she ever came to going to a nightclub was the sixth-grade dance that Tommy Perkins invited her to on a dare. She’d learned that fact after he’d grudgingly danced with her while his friends pointed and laughed.

It had been a memorable night.

She’d always wanted to go to a nightclub, but she always talked herself out of going. Now that she was on this trip, she was going to force herself to try a lot of new things. By the time this trip was over, she hoped that the old Jamie was gone and the new Jamie was everything that she’d hoped to be.

A loud sigh broke into her thoughts.“Fine. Just head back to the hotel now so that we can go over everything. I hope you ate already because it’s going to be a long night.”

Her shoulders slumped in defeat as she opened her mouth to tell him that she’d be there soon, but something stopped her. She didn’t know what it was. This was supposed to be a working trip, but he told her that she wasn’t needed until tomorrow morning, so she’d made plans. He really couldn’t expect her to drop everything at a moment’s notice to accommodate him, could he?

If she went back now, then he’d know that he could push her around and she was done with that. That old Jamie was gone. The new Jamie wouldn’t be jumping for anyone. She’d wasted too many years of her life hiding in the background and letting life pass her by.

She was done.

When she was supposed to work, she’d work her butt off. She’d write, edit, and do everything that was expected of her that just thinking about gave her heart failure, but when it was her time, she was going to enjoy her life for once and no one was going to stop her, least of all the overbearing jerk.

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