by Tamara Lush
So he has read everything about what happened to me in New York. I don’t know how I feel about him keeping tabs on me. Satisfied? Annoyed? Thrilled? Probably all three. I steer the conversation back to business.
“But, what I don’t understand is, why don’t you get someone who’s really experienced, someone who’s a gamer?” I ask.
He turns to me and stares. I feel myself falling into his gaze and I tense.
“Why? Why are you offering me this job? Are you using me for the potential notoriety?”
“No.” His mouth purses, as if he’s annoyed that I asked the question. “I’m asking because I want you.”
I’m breathless at his words because I remember a moment when we were teenagers, and he said the same thing. We were on the beach at sunset, and I melted into his arms.
Why are you with me? I had been a tangle of teenage insecurity.
Because you’re smart and funny and gorgeous. Because I want you. I love you, he’d replied.
Back in the now, I look at his mouth, then his hands, and I’m unable to speak. I want to kiss him so badly.
“Cata. Hey. Are you okay?”
Startled, I nod. “I’m fine.”
The sushi comes and the waitress forgets my iced tea. I don’t care. I pick at the food, my mind reeling. Diego explains how Gamerhouse works. I notice that he no longer slumps over his plate and shovels food in his mouth like when he was a teenage boy. He’s even learned how to use chopsticks.
“Where did you learn to use those?”
He shrugs. “Sergei, the owner of Sahara, flew me out to Silicon Valley a couple of times. I picked it up out there.”
I nod slowly, and he changes the subject, launching into an explanation of how Gamerhouse works.
“Liam games midnight at night till eight in the morning. Then Sawyer takes over until four. I take the four-to-midnight shift, so I have mornings to deal with the business. I don’t have time to do the social media on top of everything else, and Sawyer and Liam are hopeless with that kind of work. They’re performers.”
I blink, taking it all in. “And what about the cameras? Will I be online, live? Or just in the background?”
Diego narrows his eyes and licks his lips as if he hasn’t thought this through. “We only have the live cameras downstairs. No cameras upstairs or in Sawyer or Liam’s areas. So yes, you probably will be on camera, at least some of the time. Do you have an issue with that?”
I shrug. I had spent my first year out of college working at New York’s biggest celebrity-news gossip site, then was publicly disgraced because a congressman had sent me dick pics after meeting him at a party. Combine that with being back in my hometown, where seemingly every man with eyes saw naked photos of me, well, I should be nervous. But Diego’s confidence in me is somehow contagious.
Being the social media manager for Gamerhouse is a great opportunity. On so many levels. It’s a chance to begin again, on a big stage. It’s also a chance to save my family from financial ruin.
“No. I’ve no problem being on camera.” I try to sound breezily confident. “If I take the job, will I do it from home?”
We stare at each other, the obvious sexual tension ratcheting up until I squirm in my seat.
I suspect those dark chocolate eyes of his have seduced lots of women over the last five years. He doesn’t need to tell me otherwise. His expression, slightly amused and arrogant and full of swagger, says it all.
“I have an office for you.”
I crack a smile, wondering how far the office is from his bedroom. I remind myself to be professional. Diego’s going to be my boss. I need to push aside that kiss from yesterday and all these messy feelings.
“What?” he asks.
“Nothing,” I whisper. I watch his eyes flit to my mouth and I feel a pang in my stomach, even though I’ve eaten.
He talks fast and with obvious excitement about how they’ve expanded into in-game product placement. How a Sultan from Saudi Arabia gives them a five grand donation every month because he thinks they’re funny. How a rich older woman in California sent Sawyer a bed because he was complaining about his aching back.
By the time Diego’s done, I’m laughing hard, captivated. He makes working at Gamerhouse sound fun, almost like being part of a family. And it is a brilliant concept. There’s a lot I could do with their social media to promote them. My mind spins with possibilities, then halts when I stare into Diego’s eyes.
I take in his beautiful, animated face. He’s still the same; when he gets excited about something, his face lights up with a little grin, and he talks fast. His accent comes out. It’s amazing how quickly my anger at him has thawed. Something in his smile, his gentleness, his easy laughter, is making the horrible memory of the photos fade.
I’m going to give this a chance.
I’m going to give him a chance.
Chapter Eleven
DIEGO
I can tell she’s intrigued by my proposal. When I walk her to her piece of shit SUV – hopefully I can convince her to buy something safer – she stops at the driver’s door and looks up at me, expectantly.
My head dips because she’s so short, and I smile because I’ve forgotten how short she is when she stands next to me. She looks girlish and grown up all at once, between the ponytail and the business dress. I think her breasts have gotten a little bigger and her hips a little wider. If you would’ve told me when I was eighteen that Cata could get any sexier, I wouldn’t have believed it. It’s hard to concentrate around her, honestly.
I drink in her curvy body, wishing our lunch wasn’t over. Somehow, her pink lipstick still lingers on her mouth after eating, and I can’t stop staring at her lips. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about yesterday in her kitchen.
We’re standing a little too close to each other, and she’s looking at me with those Technicolor blue eyes. She’s going to be working for me. I can’t kiss her now.
Or can I?
What is it about this woman that makes me feel like an indecisive, geeky kid again?
She’s about to say something when her hand goes to her bag. “Oh, wait. One second. My phone.” She slips a hand into her purse. Then scowls when she reads the text.
“Better get that.” My stomach clenches because I wonder if it's a guy. I don’t even know if she’s got a boyfriend. Why would I assume that someone as smart and gorgeous as Cata didn’t have one? Maybe she’s got someone waiting for her back in New York.
She shakes her head and replaces the scowl with a small, mysterious smile.
“Boyfriend?” I ask.
Her brow furrows. “Um, what?”
“Was that your boyfriend on the phone?”
She shakes her head. “Hunh? No. I don’t have a boyfriend. No, that was Scott. He wants me to come in early tonight. If I take this job with you, I’m going to tell him I can’t deliver pizzas anymore.”
I nod. Good. I don’t like the idea of her going to strange houses alone, anyway.
“And you?” she tosses back.
“I don’t have a boyfriend.”
She laughs and rolls her eyes.
“Or a girlfriend.”
She still does that thing with her mouth when she’s thinking, where her lips get sexy-pouty.
“Diego?”
“Yes?”
We haven’t stopped staring at each other, and between her eyes and the scorching, midday Florida sun, I’m sweating. It’s too hot for a suit, too intense for this much lust so early in the day.
“If I say yes to your offer, you’ll be my boss.” She slips her phone back into her purse.
“Well, I guess. Sure. But we don’t need to be that formal about it. Why?”
“Because…” she steps forward, so we’re only a few inches apart. “Because if you’re my boss, it would be really inappropriate to do this.”
“Do what?”
“This.”
She rests her palms on my chest, then leans up and brushes her lips over
mine. All I can feel is her warm palms on my chest, her skin burning through my cotton shirt.
And her lips, they’re soft enough to make me grunt for more. She kisses me again, with enough force that all the pent-up need ripples through my body. What I do next is second nature. I cup her face in my hands and kiss her hard. Like I want to possess her.
The little kitten noise that comes from the back of her throat inspires my tongue to collide with hers. And then I bite her bottom lip, a little. Just enough to make her gasp and press her body into mine. Her hands on my chest are replaced with her breasts, and her arms wrap around my neck.
I want her now, in the street, on her car hood. Whenever, however, wherever. Her mouth moves slowly against mine, and it’s as if I’m crackling with electricity with each nip, each movement of her lips. The growl that rumbles in my throat is from sheer instinct. Like a Cro-Magnon man or something.
Cata breaks away. Licks her lips. As I’m catching my breath, she says, “If you’re my boss, we can’t do that. So I wanted to kiss you before I formally say yes.”
I clear my throat. I’m off kilter, unsettled and discombobulated. And I want more.
She tilts her head toward my face and again flutters her lips over mine. Then she slides her mouth to my cheek and presses her face to my skin. My fingers tangle into her hair, and I close my eyes, overwhelmed with how perfect she feels in my arms.
Damn, she’s adorable.
“I also wanted to double check something."
"What?"
"When you kissed me the other day, you took me by surprise. I wanted to assess whether you kiss like you used to."
She steps back and still wearing that mysterious little smile, unlocks her car and slips inside. She rolls down her window and stares at me.
“Cata?” I ask. “Do I kiss like I used to?”
“No.” She shakes her head, and I look at her in horror.
“You kiss better.”
I laugh hard. “So do you, Kitty-with-the-blue-eyes.”
“Oh, and Diego?”
“Yeah?”
“Yes. I’ll accept your offer work for you. With you. So no more kisses.”
We grin at each other stupidly until she pipes up.
“See you tomorrow? Do you want me there at a specific time?”
“How about…” my voice trails, and I consider asking her over right that second. Screw the no-more-kisses rule. I need to show restraint, though. It’s enough to have her near me again, and once we get reacquainted, we can work on getting back together for real. It won’t be difficult after that kiss. Right?
“Let’s say nine to five, to start. Beginning tomorrow.”
Laughing, she fires up the car and drives off. I’m breathless. And happier than I’ve been in years.
Chapter Twelve
CATALINA
I shouldn’t have kissed him. Should’ve accepted his job offer and drove off.
But that kiss. Damn. I haven’t stopped thinking about it.
It’s a day after the kiss and the first day of my new job. I’m wondering if this is going to be weird as he takes me on a tour of his home, showing me every detail of the sprawling mansion.
It’s like a kindergarten for guy gamers, and every new room leaves me shaking my head and laughing. Which at least distracts me a little from Diego’s wicked and sexy mouth.
The sleek, blue pool overlooking the Gulf of Mexico, the study, which is converted into a room for a giant lizard named Crow in an enormous aquarium, the garage filled with ridiculous toys —an arsenal of Nerf weapons, pool noodles, Harry Potter wands—that they sometimes use as props while chatting online with fans.
The cameras. Diego must have noticed my slight hesitation when I passed by one mounted in the hall. He’s turned them off for the morning, in all but the room where Liam’s gaming, so we’re not being watched as we walk through. I’m relieved by this but know that someday soon, later today even, I’ll end up on the live broadcast. I wonder if his fans will be respectful or act like jerks.
Putting that dilemma out of my mind, I focus on the job as Diego explains more about the business. It’s going to be fun, I concede. Diego wants me to be as creative and crazy as I want. His only request is that I gain new fans, women gamers preferably, and grow the brand. I can do this. It’s a good job. It’ll boost my resume.
My only challenge is to not fixate on Diego.
I shouldn’t have kissed him.
“Oh, and if you want anything to eat, here’s our stash,” Diego says, opening the freezer. I’m startled, in part because I was watching his forearm muscles and not listening to his words. I burst out laughing, then make a mock horrified face at the stacks of frozen pizzas and burritos.
“My eating habits have gotten better over the years.” I giggle. I’m doing a lot of uncharacteristic giggling lately.
“Whatever. We take turns shopping every two weeks and stockpile. We like to video our shopping trips for our fans. Maybe you can come with us on the next trip.”
“Your fans watch you shop? Are you joking?”
He shakes his head. “Email us if you have any special requests for food. I don’t want anything too healthy in this house, though. No kale. No green juice.”
He’s teasing, but I roll my eyes. “I can’t live on this. I’ll gain fifty pounds.” I tap an industrial-sized box of blue raspberry Pop Tarts.
Diego laughs. “Feel free to cook for us, then.”
“Yeah, right. I’m not the chef. Or the maid.” I swat his arm and follow him to the stairs. I’m wearing a casual, flowy bohemian dress that comes to mid-thigh and silver gladiator sandals with straps that snake up my calves. The dress light blue and it also is slightly see-through. This isn’t unintentional.
“After you,” he says, grinning. I won’t lie about my need to flirt with him. It’s like the very air around us sparkles with our tension. Working a tiny sway in my hips, I walk extra slow up the steps, just to tease him.
At the top, I pause and look over my shoulder. “You didn’t want me to dress in business clothes, did you? I decided to go with something more casual. I figured that since I’d be on the Internet all day…”
He eyes me up and down, and his gaze lingers on my legs. “You’re fine,” he says in a strained voice.
A tingle runs through me when he puts his fingers on the back of my arm and gently guides me into a large room with gym equipment. There’s an entire free weight set, a treadmill, an elliptical and a couple of weight benches. This explains his amazing body. He then opens the door to an enormous walk-in closet and flicks on a light. There are cables and wires everywhere, and more computer equipment.
“What? Why?” I ask. This whole mansion isn’t like a house where real people live; it’s more like a dude Disneyland.
Diego sweeps a hand over a few shelves.
“Here’s the main server and router and fuses and other stuff, in case you ever need to reset anything,” he says. “We put everything in here because it’s the most internally secure room, in case of a hurricane.”
We’re standing shoulder to shoulder in the small space, and it’s suddenly very warm. The door swings closed. The crisp sparkling tension between us is suddenly gone, and now the air is heavy with pure need. I swallow hard and look at his mouth. I trace my bottom lip with my index finger as if I could feel a bruise from yesterday when he nipped my bottom lip.
I shouldn’t have kissed him.
He hasn’t said anything about that kiss, and I wonder if it meant anything to him. He’s probably so used to having women throw themselves at him that my kiss was insignificant. And yet, I can’t overlook the intensity I feel when we’re close together like we are in this closet. He shifts his body so we’re facing each other and my heart jackhammers in my chest. I won’t be able to say no to him, regardless of what he wants. Won’t be able to resist if he kisses me, takes off my clothes, tugs me down onto the plush carpet in the closet…
“This is really important, Cata. Neve
r give out our physical address to anyone. Don’t ask anyone over here and make sure any photos you put on social media don’t have our location in the metadata.”
I frown, startled by his serious tone. “Okay, that’s fine. But why?”
“Have you heard of swatting?” Diego’s voice is smooth and low, and I know he’s trying to tell me something important, but damned if I can’t focus on anything but his hands, which are resting casually on the shelf behind him. My brain’s soft and my body feels swoony when I’m around him. I feel like such a girl when he’s near. Not like the strong, independent woman I was in New York City a month ago.
I shake my head, mostly to clear my mind of the image of his hands on my breasts. My nipples in between his fingers. A grip on reality is what I need. I clear my throat and nod attentively, without looking into Diego’s big brown eyes.
“It’s when someone tricks the cops into busting into a house.”
Now all my attention is on his words. “I don’t get it. Why would someone do that?”
“Some gamers do it to other streaming gamers. They want to see the cops bust in wearing swat gear. Since the gamers are online when the cops break down the door and raid the place, it’s live for everyone to see.”
“Really? But what’s the satisfaction? I don’t get it.”
He shrugs. “Some people are sick. We’ve gotten some threats and some attempted attacks on our servers.”
“But the pizzas. That person knew your address.”
Diego nods. “It kind of freaked me out, truthfully. We do have a few, really devoted fans who know where we live. Last Christmas we invited some of them over, a few locals. The guy who ordered the pizzas was one of them. We also have a couple of local gamers who fill in for us on the weekends. They know where we are.”
“Even letting a few people know where you live still seems risky, though.” The whole idea that some unhinged person could summon the cops to the house made me nervous.