by Kira Blakely
He shifted on his feet, trying not to look out of place even though he felt that way. Nobody took much notice of him, and he was glad for that even as he was irritated by it.
He was richer than many gathered there thanks to an app he had worked on with Ashton and the video game platform he had created recently, a platform he had sold for so much money that the number still staggered his brain every time he thought about it.
He regretted selling the platform, in truth, but he had been unable to resist the idea of all that money – or the idea that the buyer had been able to take it into a global market in a way he, himself, could never have done. The truth was he would have made a great deal less if he had not sold it, but now that it was gone and the frenetic joy of creating something was too, he was bored and restless, and not even the large amount of money he had could make him feel any more content.
Or at ease with the people in that room.
Jackson had grown up in a rough neighborhood. He had been the kid who wore used clothes and ate free lunch. It had never occurred to him that one day he would be standing in a luxury high-rise, watching people with more money than they knew what to do with scarfing down expensive wine and snacks and congratulating other rich people for being smart enough to get rich.
“Hey, bro.” Ashton appeared at his side, and Jackson grinned at him. He and Ashton went way back. They had gotten arrested together, been each other’s wingmen in every bar in the city, and they had made millions together. Through it all they had managed to stay friends – and not just friends, but friends who respected each other.
“Hey, yourself. It’s quite the shindig, isn’t it?”
Ashton grimaced. “It’s Dawson, so first class all the way. I keep wondering when they are going to figure out I don’t really belong here and chuck me out of the nearest window or something.”
“Probably right after they hurl me through it. But be grateful for that. You will have less flying glass to worry about.”
Ashton laughed and dug an elbow into the taut span of Jackson’s waist. “Yeah. I hate to sound ungrateful. I was just hoping that, for once, Dawson would just do a barbecue or something, you know?”
Jackson did know. Dawson had never had to leave the nitty gritty behind, because he had never really had it in him. Oh, he was tough and he was a fighter, too, but Dawson had always had one eye out on the horizon, looking for any break that would get him off the streets that they had all grown up on like he knew somehow that they were never meant for him.
“Before you and Laura head out of town you should stop by my place. We’ll throw some pig on the smoker and crack open some beers.”
Ashton nodded, “Cool. I will. How’s the new house?”
“Great.” It was great. It was also way too big and way too empty. “I even managed to not throw that crazy decorator Dawson had sent over out on his ass.”
Ashton’s eyebrows nearly hit his hairline. “Say what?”
Jackson rolled his eyes. “I needed furniture. I had no idea that would entail having to look at swatches and paint samples.”
Ashton burst into laughter. “You hired a decorator?’
Jackson gave him a withering glare. “No, I told Dawson I needed furniture, and he sent that guy over. I said thank you and refused to sign on the dotted line to have the guy do whatever it was he was talking about. I went to the store and bought some furniture myself, thank you very much.”
Ashton sucked in air, and said, “Wow.”
“That’s what I said, too.”
Ashton said, “Well at least you can afford a house, right? I remember when we could barely afford rent at that crappy little pay by the week place we lived in.”
“Those were good times.” They had been. They had both been so young and stupid – barely eighteen – and working for a pittance at a lawn care company. The days had been hot and long, and they’d often had to sweat out the beer and liquor they had drank the night before, or work through a blistering hangover that would not let them go from its vicious grip.
“The best, man.” Ashton spotted Laura and added, “But I think these are good times, too.”
“Yeah, they are.”
Ashton wandered off to speak to Laura. People drifted around but Jackson didn’t want to talk to any of them. He had just spotted Laura’s friend, Hope, and he stood watching her for a moment.
Hope was gorgeous. She was also cold enough to freeze a man’s balls off from a hundred paces away. He sipped the dry champagne, wishing it were whiskey, then set the glass aside.
He’d met Hope a few times, and he had always felt a serious interest in her. She never seemed to notice he was flirting though, or if she did she was not at all interested in him.
She was by herself now, standing near a small potted plant on a tall and graceful table. Well then. They were both alone, so why not go start up a conversation with her?
He strolled over and said, “Hey there, Hope.”
2
GOD, NO. NOT HIM. Hope’s lip curled as she watched Ashton’s best friend, Jackson, saunter across the floor. The man was so arrogant, and so…
So hot.
Irritated by that thought, Hope deliberately turned her back and stared at the far wall, sipping her glass of wine.
“Hey there, Hope.”
She looked at him, hoping that her withering stare would knock him back about ten feet. He just curled up those full lips of his into a smile that revealed his perfect, white teeth. His thick, chestnut-brown hair had been neatly combed when he had arrived half an hour before, but it was already becoming mussed thanks to his habit of running his fingers through it when he was deep in thought.
That she knew that irritated her even more.
“Hello.” She kept her tone icy. It didn’t matter. That chill bounced right off of him.
“Nice party, huh?”
“Hm.” She sipped her wine again, hoping he would lose interest and wander off. Jackson just planted his feet and spread his long and trim legs in a stance that said he was not going anywhere.
Hope sighed inwardly. The party was nice. It was being thrown by Dawson, who was the guy that Lexie was dating. Lexie was Laura’s best friend’s – and one of Hope’s good friends as well. Ashton, Laura’s boyfriend, was one of Jackson’s best friends. At one time, Ashton and Jackson had created a megabuck dating app that had made them both multimillionaires. Then, Ashton and Laura had created an app that had made Ashton even richer and Laura a newly minted millionaire.
That party was a celebration of Ashton and Laura’s success. They had just sold the app and were planning on doing some travelling – going on a sort of semi-permanent vacation that would take them to the different corners of the globe.
Jackson grinned at her, and she gave him a filthy glare. He let his eyes sweep over her in a slow way that made her nipples stiffen and her temper – and temperature – rise. “How’s the research going?”
“It’s going.” She sighed. “It’s always the same struggle. I have to get as many grants as I can, and the boards are always screaming for results.”
Jackson asked, “Are you not having any luck?”
“Some, but it’s always slow, because clinical trials have such a long list of hoops to go through before we can ever get to the proper government channels to ask for human trials. The grant boards know that, but they act like they don’t all too often. It’s frustrating.”
His hand grazed her shoulder. Little tingles erupted along her skin. “I can only imagine.”
Dang it! Now, she’d just given him a chance to swoop in and play the nice guy, the one who listened and was understanding.
She might have bought it, too, if she was not all too aware of what a player he was. Jackson was such a player, he had co-created an app to help him get laid.
Well, so had Ashton, and he had turned out to be a really nice guy – one who truly loved Laura and wanted a long and happy life with her.
Not that she had any reason to think Jackso
n was like Ashton.
Jackson said, “How long do you have before the grant money runs out?”
She snorted. “Oh, it did already. That is part of the reason why my work is crawling along. I really can’t do anything without money. Even with a lot of interns and passionate researchers willing to wait out the grants and forego salary for now, there’s still not enough money.”
Jackson frowned. “Tell me again why the grant board is stalling.”
Hope looked around the room. Everyone was gathered into little clusters, talking away. She and Jackson stood alone near a small corner of the extravagant room. She knew why she was not enjoying the party very much, despite being friends with Laura – everyone there was an entrepreneur or married to one. The aura of money and wealth was everywhere and, as usual, her defenses were up.
That was it, in a nutshell. The feeling of being out of place and being somewhere that she didn’t really belong was making her even snippier than usual. Jackson was a player, sure, but he was probably just being nice by talking to her. After all, nobody else was, and she felt guilt for trying to ice him out. So she said, “I can’t get them the results they want.”
“Because it takes a lot to get to clinicals. Got it. But what about the results that come in daily? Do you report them?”
Her forehead creased. “No. I mean, results can be false positives or negatives. There can be a lot of data pouring in at one time, and it needs to be sifted through, which draws out the process further. If I had a program that would go through all of that in a reasonable time and in a faster way than the programs we use–”
He interrupted her. “How old’s the program?”
Hope groaned. “Old. And, before you ask, I can tell you all about every piece of equipment I use, but I suck at computer tech so I have no idea.”
His hand stroked his chin. His body shifted. The slacks he wore clung nicely to his long and lean legs, and for a moment she spotted a thick and chubby bulge in the front of those slacks, but then he shifted again and it vanished from sight.
The memory of it – hard and thick flesh pressed tight against the fabric of the slacks – stayed burned into her mind though, and a sudden and entirely unwanted desire ran through her body.
“Interesting,” Jackson said.
He stepped closer. His cologne came to her nostrils: slightly spicy and musky, very masculine – just like him. For a moment, she felt like he was talking about her when he said that word, and not some program. She hastily stepped back just a bit. “I guess, if you find that kind of thing interesting.”
“Tech’s my thing.”
“I thought you built apps for the masses.” Damn it. The sarcasm was real and thick, and she immediately regretted both the words and the tone that she had delivered them in. “I am so sorry. That was uncalled for.”
“No worries. It is true. I do make apps. Successful ones. Four so far. But the apps are just to keep cash coming in. The gaming platform was my real dream.”
She had no idea what a gaming platform was, but it sounded like he was excited about it. Maybe it was like an oil drilling platform or something. “And you created it.”
He nodded. “Yes.”
She floundered and said, “Well, congratulations.”
“Thanks.” He titled his head back, “So how about you? What is your dream?”
“To save lives. I thought you got that earlier in the conversation.”
“Wow, and ouch.” He shifted. Her eyes dropped. Her face heated. The bulge was back. She yanked her eyes up, hoping he had not seen her checking out his package.
That desire running through her, and the fact that Jackson seemed to be toting what was likely a really big dick in those pants threw her into a momentary confusion. She recovered enough to ask, “I am sorry, did you say you created a gaming platform? What is that, exactly?’
His eyebrow tilted, and he said, “It’s a system on which to play games.”
More confused than ever and remembering only that he had created a dating app, the first thing that came to mind was that he had made some kind of game for people trying to get laid. That could not be correct, so she asked, “Oh? What kind of games?”
“Mostly interactive.” He grinned and added, “It’s supposedly going to revolutionize the video gaming world.
She got it then. “You make video games?”
He shot her an amused look. “You don’t like video games?”
She didn’t know if she did or not. They had been forbidden as a waste of time when she had been growing up, and she had never played them as she had gotten older. “Um, I never played them. Sorry.”
“You should, sometime. I could teach you how.”
There was dare in his eyes, and then his eyes raked along her body yet again in a way that made her core clench and her toes tingle.
“I prefer more adult pursuits,” she shot back, but just then her mind insisted on fetching up an image of the two of them engaged in a very adult clinch. Her breath hitched in, and she licked her lips which had now gone dry. “Um…I meant…”
He didn’t, thank God, decide to put that up for further discussion. Instead, he said, “A lot of grownups play video games. Besides, it’s an industry that will stand the test of time and let’s not forget, extremely lucrative.”
Hope surveyed his handsome face. “Is money the end goal for you with everything you create? I mean, do you never make something just for the sheer joy of it? And why not create something that could be helpful to people instead of just a waste of time?”
He said, “The people who play video games do not see them as a waste of time, but I could see how and why you would. Yes, by the way, I like making money from what I do, but if I did not love what I did I would not do it. The gaming industry is forever evolving and challenging to stay relevant. And it’s a challenge I gladly accept.”
Shame burned high as she realized she had likely given him the impression his career wasn’t meaningful. She knew what that felt like all too well. “I didn’t mean to make it sound like I think that what you create is pointless.”
“No, just a waste of time.”
She gritted her teeth. He was so infuriating! She was trying hard to make it up to him for being so rude earlier, whether she had meant to be or not. “I didn’t mean it that way either. I just wanted to know if you ever considered building something that would be actually helpful.”
“And video games aren’t?”
Oh, great. Now they were arguing. She did not want to argue with him.
She wanted to make love with him.
That thought careened across her brain, and her nipples stiffened noticeably. She crossed her arms over her chest, hoping to hide those tight little points. She saw from his face that he thought the gesture was a sort of closing off the conversation.
She said, “I am sure people who use them find them very helpful for…for whatever reason. I was just wondering, with all your tech skills have you ever considered trying to create, say, a program that could be used in medical applications – you know, in life saving and changing ways.”
“Not everyone is you, Hope.”
Her defenses had caused her to argue with him, but those few words of his shattered her armor. She looked away. “You’re right. I…I am so sorry if it sounded like I was knocking what you do. I wasn’t. It’s just…oh, hell. I always get a bit bitchy when I feel like I’m in a place I don’t belong.”
“Me, too.”
She blinked as her head came back up to see him giving her an understanding look. She asked, “You get bitchy?”
His laughter was warm and dark, and it made low ripples of desire run across her lower body. He said, “No. I just don’t know how to put my shield down when I am in a room with the one person who gets why I don’t want to be in that room. Or party, in this case.”
She stared at him. He was not comfortable there, either? “Oh. I see.”
“I think we both sort of offended each other by accident. How ab
out we start over?”
She laughed. “I would like that a lot. So, this is not your typical thing, huh?”
“No, not at all. I’d rather be anywhere but here, actually.”
She looked around. “Me, too.”
Now that that they had made it past that first, horrible part of the conversation and they had both admitted that they were uncomfortable, they could relax a bit, and they did.
Jackson asked, “Did you come by yourself?”
“Yeah, I told Laura I could not stay long so I could duck out as fast as possible, but I have not even gotten close to her yet so she could see that I made it. So I am sort of stuck for the duration.”
“Ah, well I have already seen Ashton, so I could leave.”
Was he hitting on her? Was he asking her to leave with him?
A waiter appeared, having finally noticed the two of them alone there, and his appearance broke into her thoughts. The waiter extended a tray holding delicate little shrimp puffs and other delicacies as well as a stack of cocktail napkins. They both took a few of the offerings, but as soon as the uniformed waiter walked off, Jackson said, “I’d love a pizza.”
“Me, too.” She bit into the light and airy shrimp puff, chewed and swallowed, then said, “With extra cheese.”
“Pepperoni,” Jackson added.
“Olives.”
Jackson paused with a small bit of pastry-wrapped bacon and cheese hovering close to his lips. “Black or green?’
“Both.”
He said, “You are a girl after my own heart.” He popped the morsel into his mouth, chewing in a slow and sensual way that made the little shiver steeling across her body get longer and wider.
“So, how is the video game business?” Hope asked finally, not because she cared, but because she had to say something to take her mind off the wicked thoughts wandering her brain every time he licked that tongue across his full lips.
He said, “It’s good. For the record, it’s not just about the money, even if the money is nice. I never planned on making any money, to be honest.”