That Sexy Stranger

by Nadia Lee

  “And yesterday,” Luke continues, “would’ve been their sixth anniversary.”

  Crap. Well. That changes things. Still, I hate conceding defeat. Accepting defeat is giving up. “I could’ve helped him make new memories.”

  “Or you could’ve done something memorable with a guy who isn’t pining over another woman.”

  Exhaling loudly, I look away. “What’s the point? That suite’s cursed anyway.” Everything about last night was cursed.

  I shove a headset over my ears and pull out the book I bought last week, but not before Luke’s throaty laughter ripples over me once more, sounding like velvet feels, sending shivers all over my skin.

  Five more hours. And then I’ll be free.

  Chapter Four

  After lunch, I sort of zone out for a bit. I am tired, since I spent most of last night tossing and turning.

  But I don’t nap for long; I won’t be able to sleep tonight if I do. The only thing keeping me awake is the book I’m reading. It’s the latest thriller by one of my favorite authors. Thrillers aren’t my go-to genre, although I read them occasionally. The book, Free Radicals, is surprisingly riveting—and hilarious—and I can’t figure out what outrageous method the protagonist is going to use next to get out of his predicament.

  Contrary to what I’ve been bracing myself for, Luke doesn’t try to talk. Instead, he’s been tapping away on his tablet, his big hand exceptionally dexterous. Hmm. Why is he ignoring me after going through the trouble of maneuvering events so I’m stuck sitting next to him? I feel like maybe there’s some kind of hidden plot or something. Or maybe he forgot what he meant to do after forcing me into 1A. But being ignored is better than being pestered. I think.

  Still, that doesn’t mean I’m not aware of him next to me. It’s probably the corral effect. On my left is the window, and he’s sprawled in his seat to my right, his legs stretched out to block access to the aisle as much as possible. It’s like being penned up, and of course I can’t sit anywhere else at this point. I’m basically trapped.

  Why else would I be aware of him?

  I take a sip of crisp white wine and steal a quick glance. He’s still looking at whatever’s on the screen. His dark brows are pulled together over slightly narrowed eyes, and he keeps running the side of his forefinger along the seam of his mouth. His lips are on the full side—not quite as full as my roommate Michelle’s, but enough to make me wonder how soft they would feel against mine. Or maybe the extra padding is just a ruse to make you think they’d be soft. They could very well be hard and unyielding. I can’t decide which I’d like better. Most guys I’ve kissed… Well, they weren’t bad, but they weren’t memorable, either. I can’t recall exactly how their lips felt. Would Luke’s mouth be just as forgettable?

  Hmm. I consider, tapping my own lower lip. No…I doubt that. A man who laughs the way he does probably doesn’t do anything blandly. And I have this sudden, ridiculous urge to satisfy my curiosity.

  Jesus. What the heck am I thinking? If I didn’t know better, I’d say I was daydreaming about his mouth, except, of course…that can’t be it.

  I must be a lot more tired than I thought. That has to be the reason I let my mind go there.

  Ruthlessly, I yank my focus back on the book. I want to find out if the hero is going to vanquish the forces of evil or not. In the book, they’re terrorists with nukes. I hope the hero catches them all and blows up their underground headquarters with their own bombs. The book’s not dark or serious. More like a campy James Bond—on steroids. I laugh when the hero jumps over a wall and wraps his hand around the helicopter’s landing skid, while holding on to his girl du jour.

  “What are you reading?” Luke asks suddenly.

  I pause, then give him a look. “A book.”

  “Romance?”

  Talk about stereotyping. “A thriller.” To prove my point, I show him the cover.

  His eyebrows arch in genuine surprise, and I smile smugly. Was he expecting The Italian Tycoon’s Thrilling Pregnant Virgin Mistress?

  Then, to let him know how much I don’t care for his interruption, I add, “It’s exactly one hundred and seventy-three point four times more interesting than any conversation you think we should have.” Then I promptly turn my attention back to the story, but not before I catch a small smirk from him.

  I ignore his reaction. I’m not letting anything about him bother me or get me to do something stupid…like talking to him or continuing to check out his mouth.

  Even if it’s surreptitiously. I’m pretty good at covert eye-fucking, a specific skill I mastered while “stalking” David.

  By the time the hero of Free Radicals makes it to a hotel with his girl, our plane lands in Dulles. The flight felt shorter than five hours—probably because it was so comfortable. As I gather my things, Luke hands me my lanyard. “Here you go.”

  I give him a wary look. “Why are you giving it to me?”

  “It’s yours, isn’t it?”

  “Thought you wanted to come by the office to hand it to me.”

  “Changed my mind.”

  I study him. He’s speaking too easily, and I can’t help but wonder what he’s really plotting. He doesn’t seem like the type to just…give up. “So you aren’t coming over?”

  “Didn’t say that.” He grins.

  “I’m not going to David’s office tomorrow.”

  “I know. That’s fine. I’ll drop by to see you instead. It’s that simple.” He waves as he deplanes first. “Until tomorrow, raven girl.”

  The affectionate tone as he says “raven girl” does odd things to my insides, making them jiggle like Jell-O. “That’s not my name.”

  “I know.”

  Chapter Five

  I tip the driver extra when he pulls in front of the three-level townhouse in Dulles, Virginia. I share the four-bedroom unit with Michelle and Jan, two of my besties from college. Jan owns the place, and it’s close to work, so it was no-brainer to move there after graduation. Besides, I can’t afford anything similar on my salary.

  The mid-February air stings my lungs. The weather’s unusually crisp for this time of year. I can’t wait for warmer days. I hate that it’s so dark and cold in the mornings.

  It’s drizzling, so I dash inside, dragging the suitcase behind me. Michelle and Jan are already home, stretched out around the coffee table in the living room with a large Costco pizza between them. They must’ve just gotten back from work, since both are in work clothes, sans shoes, which are scattered unceremoniously on the floor.

  “Why aren’t you over at Matt’s place?” I ask Jan in lieu of a greeting.

  “He’s working late.” She sighs.

  Her pout makes her appear younger than twenty-two. A pretty green-eyed redhead, she has this whole air of innocence about her. Sort of makes sense, since she was a virgin until five months ago. Matt Aston, our in-house legal counsel, popped her cherry, and I’m happy for her. I can’t think of anybody better for that particularly delicate task than him.

  “Come have some dinner”—she gestures at the pizza—“unless you’ve eaten?”

  “I haven’t. Thanks.” I plop down next to Jan, who scooches over, and pick up a large slice.

  “How did it go?” Michelle says, pushing her artfully curled brown hair out of her eyes. The slightly smoky makeup deepens their color to a burnt caramel. I swear her eyes make me crave sugar.

  “It was—”

  “Wait, wait,” Jan says, raising a hand. “Just a yes or no. No details. David’s my cousin, but he’s also sort of like a brother to me.”

  Well then. “No.”

  Michelle stares. “What do you mean, ‘no’?”

  “Didn’t Erin help you? She seems like such a helpful girl,” Jan says with a small frown. “Maybe I should’ve weaseled it out of him or something.”

  I sigh. My roomies knew my general plan. We went over it. More like I told them to hear myself talk and work out the kinks—no pun intended—and they listened. “No,
no. Erin was fine. I managed to get inside his suite…only to be pussy-blocked.”

  Michelle gasps. “By who? Did he pick up a hooker before you could make your move?”

  “It’s San Mateo, not Las Vegas,” Jan points out.

  “So? Californians need paid love, too.”

  I stuff my mouth with pizza and chew to stall. I can’t decide how I’m going to talk about Luke. “No hookers were involved in the pussy-blocking.”

  Michelle arches an eyebrow. “Then?”

  “I need a drink,” I say instead. “Of the alcoholic variety, before I can talk about ThAssIMWa.”

  “ThAssIMWa?”

  “That Ass In My Way.”

  Jan gets up and goes to the kitchen to grab a strawberry-flavored wine cooler. Maybe we should buy real wine, but I don’t want to bother until the cheap stuff starts to taste bad. Mom told me it’ll happen soon. Like when I’m ready to adult.

  We share the bottle and I give them the general outline of events. Jan and Michelle listen, riveted. They’re probably wondering how the hell I was vanquished so easily by Evil when I had a plan. A really good one, too.

  “Wow,” Michelle says when I’m done.

  “Right?”

  “I think this guy likes you,” Jan says.

  What the hell? I sputter. “He does not.”

  Michelle tosses her hair over a shoulder. “Jan’s right. You probably looked hot in your bustier and fishnet stockings.”

  “Who cares?” I grumble. “He wasn’t the right guy, and I didn’t get to pop any cherries.”

  Michelle blinks, and Jan stares at me like the universe just turned into orange cream cheese.

  “Are you a virgin?” Jan chokes out.

  “What?”

  “You said you didn’t get to pop any cherries, but… I’m pretty sure David’s had some experience.”

  “No, my toys. I wanted to make our first time memorable, so I splurged and bought a box of sex toys. All brand new.”

  “Thank God,” Michelle says.

  “Make sense. Slim pickings for that kind of stuff on the secondhand market,” Jan adds sincerely.

  I scrunch my face. “Ew.”

  “I know, right?” Jan makes a gagging motion with her finger. “So now what?”

  “Now? I need a new plan.”

  “Maybe this is for the best,” Michelle says. “Do you really want to be David’s rebound girl?”

  “There’s no such thing.” I’ve never experienced the need to rebound, except when my first relationship went sour. And that rebound lasted only about a week before I said, Fuck it, life’s too short. “A relationship is like a knot. When it’s time to end things, you just cut clean through, rather than trying to untangle the damn thing.”

  Michelle snorts. “That’s you. Most people aren’t as, uh, clinical.”

  “Yeah, but they should be.”

  She ignores me. “Guys don’t keep rebound girls. They fuck ’em and chuck ’em.”

  “They do?” Jan says, her eyes wide.

  “Rebound girls are like medicine. You use it because you have to get over the shitty hurt of the breakup, but once you recover…” Michelle shrugs. “I mean, do you care about Tamiflu once you get over your influenza?”

  I scoff. “You would if Tamiflu was nice as me. Besides, you have it all wrong. When David comes in contact with my magina”—I pronounce it as mah-jahy-nah—“he’s going to realize I’m the one for him.”

  Michelle tilts her head with a small frown. “‘Magina’?”

  “Magic vagina. There’s one for every man.”

  Jan spews a little of the wine cooler, staining her sunflower skirt. Michelle stares at me with her mouth open.

  “I think the term you’re looking for is soul mate,” she says finally.

  “Whatever. I just need to make him realize that, out of three and a half billion women in the world, I’m the one.”

  Chapter Six

  The next morning, I make my way to the eleventh floor of the Sweet Darlings Inc. headquarters in Sweetridge, Virginia. The townhouse is only fifteen or twenty minutes away even during the crappiest rush hour, which makes the commute a breeze. Most people in Northern Virginia have to crawl through a parking lot to get to work, and our metro system is often dead or dying. You can’t imagine how grateful I am, since the quick commute is what makes my a.m. run possible…even during the dark and freezing mornings of the winter months.

  The app dev division occupies the best and the most wondrous of all floors. I’m not saying that because I’m biased—I’m capable of being objective. But we have the best snacks and coffee. It’s just a fact. I don’t even need to stop by Starbucks on my way to the office. And unlike the other floors, our break room is stocked with my weakness—sour gummy worms. As long as I’m supplied with those and coffee, I can code all day and night long, with a couple power naps here and there.

  There are lots of tables, desks and beanbags, all of them colorful and fun. No partitions or walls. That’s not how we work, not like the cubicle inmates on other floors. And we’re pretty laid-back. Although our CEO, Alexandra Darling—who also happens to be Jan’s grandmother—usually dresses in business casual and every other department slavishly follows her lead, the app dev teams wear whatever’s most comfortable, and nobody cares. Most of us come in jeans and sweaters. Some do sweatpants, but never pajamas. The last time somebody tried, Tim Friedman, one of the team leads, told him Sweet Darlings wasn’t his mommy’s basement, and that was that.

  Unless I have to attend an interdepartmental meeting with David present—or if it’s Margarita Monday—during the cold months I usually show up in a super-comfy black half-zip long-sleeve top, cross-training pants, and racing shoes. There’s nobody I want to impress on my floor, except of course Tim, who controls my destiny at Sweet Darlings Inc.

  I put my purse into the bottom desk drawer and secure all three drawers with the master lock at the top. I won’t need to use anything from them during the day because everything I need is already neatly arranged on my desk. I’m a big believer in having all my tools at my fingertips. Hooked to an external keyboard, mouse and monitor, my laptop boots and a torrent of email pours into Outlook. Squeezing a blue stress ball between my hands, I skim the subject lines to see if there’s anything that looks urgent.

  Nope, nope, nope…

  I stop when I see a notice for two new positions in finance and marketing. There’s a referral bonus, but I don’t know anybody who would be good for any of the twenty-five current openings. Crossing my arms, I sit back in my comfy, ergonomically correct chair. Luke said he’d be coming by to see David. I assumed he was talking about a social visit, but for stuff like that, it makes more sense to come by after work or just meet at a bar somewhere.

  Is Luke trying to get a job at Sweet Darlings? Ugh. No. I do not need that man working side by side with David. Yeah, yeah, nothing happened, but the whole situation bothers me, as any unjust scenario would. It’s hard to explain—I’m a coder, not a poet—but it feels vaguely like he got something he shouldn’t have. It isn’t like he forced it or stole anything. But it’s—how can I put it…?—it’s sort of like he wasn’t supposed to get a tax refund, but due to some error, he got a hundred bucks that didn’t belong to him. And because he’s an asshole, he’s not going to send it back.

  Completely unfair, of course. And made even more infuriating by the fact that—if I really have to be objective—he is good-looking, with that mouth that keeps piquing my curiosity. And those hands… If David weren’t newly single, I might possibly consider Luke as a potential fuck buddy until he became available.

  Annoyed, I pull up Facebook—the people on my floor seriously don’t care as long as all the tasks are completed on time—and look him up. Luke Madison isn’t an uncommon name, but when I cross-reference it with David, I get a hit. There. The profile pic is casual—him on some aquamarine beach. Probably the Caribbean. He looks slightly devilish, grinning at the camera. A few white grains of s
and cling to his lower lip, and I have this ridiculous urge to reach into the screen and run my finger over them.

  Get a grip, girl. It’s a picture, composed of digital pixels!

  And he’s probably Voldemort Reincarnate with a super-strong permanent Confundo spell emanating from him. How else to explain my completely inappropriate attraction to him?

  Pulling myself together, I skim his profile data. Twenty-nine, the same age as David. Attended Harvard for one year. Freelancing nomad. Right. That’s a euphemism for “screwing around because I got no job” these days.

  Curious, though. He dressed well and flew first class. Maybe his mommy and daddy bought his ticket, but he hinted he had an assistant. Then again, he could’ve hired some third-world e-helper, paying them a buck a day. It’s amazing what some people will do to make themselves feel important…except Luke didn’t seem to be the type.

  I shake my head. Who cares? He’s probably a trust fund baby who dropped out of Harvard when he got his mitts on the dough. I have an intense dislike for lazy bums, regardless of their socioeconomic status. There, Luke’s attractiveness just dropped by five percent at least. I wait for it to drop some more, but it doesn’t go any lower.

  God. My standards are pathetic. This is what happens when a girl has to make do with hamburgers day in day out, so to speak. I need to find myself a man-steak.

  Shaking my head again, I shove the thoughts of Luke out of my mind and start coding away on my mechanical gaming keyboard. I have tons of work to do. The team’s scheduled to release a slew of bug fixes next Monday. Nothing major, but they do affect some of our power users. And those folks tend to complain the loudest.

  Not that I blame them. They pay good money to use the app to share pictures and videos with their loved ones. A lot of our users are parents with small children, and they tend to be price inelastic. Our app’s privacy settings are rigorous. Some of our users like to make their photos public, but most prefer to keep their kids out of public display.