by Hazel Keys
Her mind was pretty much on cloud nine the entire time, her mind only occasionally getting weighed down with doubtful thoughts. The rest of the time she was having to keep herself from giggling with nervous excitement each time she thought about the possible ways that Valentine’s Day could end for her. The thought of being able to go home with Tristan in the aftermath of their date was a topic that she especially loved to let her mind fantasize over, and there had been more than one instant where she had been forced to rush to the bathroom in the middle of the day in order to remedy the surges of lustful desire that seemed to be afflicting her more and more.
Her favorite daydream so far had involved Tristan inviting her over to his house, where the two of them would swim in the pool in his backyard in order to cool off after drinks. She would be dressed only in her swimming suit, and the swim trunks that he put on left very little to her imagination, a sizeable bulge pressing against the fabric in the front. They would splash around in the pool for a while, the two getting embroiled in a somewhat heated splash fight that would only end when Tristan suddenly pulled her to him for an unexpected kiss. She didn’t even try to fight it in her daydream, and soon her legs were wrapped around Tristan’s waist as he slammed himself into her over and over again, their mixed moans loud on the air.
Bella gasped when she realized that she had allowed herself to get engrossed in her daydreams once more, shaking her head rapidly to try and clear her mind of such thoughts. She could feel the puddle of arousal that now sat in the crotch of her panties, her inner thighs caked with her juices from when she had been rubbing her legs together during her fantasy. She sighed lightly as she stood up and made her way to the bathroom, replacing her panties with the spare pair she usually kept in her purse during her period on the off chance that she accidentally bled into whatever pair she was wearing. She shook her head slightly at how wet her panties were, doing her best to dry the crotch with some paper towels before slipping them into her purse.
When she returned to her desk she had forced herself to immediately launch into her work. Rachel stopped by about an hour later, the two of them spending a good couple of hours sitting together at Bella’s computer as they went over the coding for the catalog. Bella made sure to tell Rachel about the error that she had run across the other day, which Rachel sounded quite grateful about her having fixed it when Bella told her.
“Thanks for fixing that, Bella. I am not sure what went wrong with the coding.Maybe I accidentally pressed a wrong key when I was editing it last time,” Rachel said as she took a sip of coffee from the mug that she had brought with her from her office, eyeing the lines of code that were currently pulled up on Bella’s screen.
“No problem, Rachel. I know how easy it can be for stuff like this to slip through the cracks. Never hurts to have a second pair of eyes check it over,” Bella said cheerfully, her fingers tapping a few keys as she added a new line to the code. “I’m just sorry that I have to pull you away from your own work so that you can help me with this project.”
“It’s no worries. I knew that I was going to have to be involved with anything that had to do with the catalog from the very first day that I submitted the idea to Ryan and Bradley. I am just grateful that you agreed to take over most of the work for adding the new functions with Tristan. I wouldn’t have been able to pull it off if I had to try balancing everything going on right now with what is surely going to be a multiple-week project,” Rachel said matter-of-factly, her eyes slowly moving to glance over in the direction of Tristan’s office. “Speaking of, where is Tristan right now?”
“I am not entirely sure. I think he might be attending a meeting with Bradley. Last time I talked to him, he said that he was still going over all the details with Bradley about what exactly we were planning to do to the catalog,” Bella said, her shoulders rolling in a mild shrug as she spoke. “I am sure that he will be back soon, though. Why, do you need to ask him a question?”
“I was going to ask if he ever figured out what was going on with his computer. He said that it was running slow the other day when he came up to talk to Bradley, and while he said he was going to see if you would take a look at it I wasn’t sure if you had actually done so yet. I guess I can just ask you whether or not you got around to that since I might need you to take a look at my computer as well,” she finished plainly, her finger moving to point at the computer screen. “You need to add the number three here to complete this sequence,” she added, tapping the screen of Bella’s computer gently with her pointer finger.
“Yeah, I took a look at his computer. It turned out that an email attachment that he had sent to him had a small piece of malware that hitched a ride on it. It was subtly forcing certain programs to open, which was making the CPU work harder, which was what was ultimately causing his computer to run so slowly. I ran a malware program on his computer to clean it up, and since he hasn’t come to ask me for more help since then I imagine that I solved his problem,” Bella said with a smile, quite happy about the fact that she could be of help to him. “Do you want me to take a look at your computer too?”
“If it wouldn’t be too much of a bother,” Rachel replied, scratching her cheek gently with the nail of her pointer finger. “I wouldn’t want some piece of malware keeping me from being able to do my work.”
“Alright, I can go ahead and run up there now. I can leave you to look over this while I am gone, right?” Bella was already fishing through the top drawer of her desk as she spoke, looking around for the disk that contained her anti-malware program. Once she found it she gently pushed herself away from her desk, crossing the floor of the office until she found herself standing in front of the elevator. A few moments later she was stepping out onto the upper floor where Bradley and Rachel’s offices were housed, waving in greeting to Marcy as she strode past.
She sat herself down at Rachel’s computer, pulling open the task manager and letting her eyes scan the list of programs that were currently running. She singled out at least four different programs that shouldn’t have been running, clicking her tongue gently as she slid the anti-malware disk into the CD drive of Rachel’s desktop. She initialized the program and let it start to run, leaning back in Rachel’s chair as she watched the progress bar slowly creeping along. When it finally finished she pulled the disk out, smiling as she performed a few basic tests. Apparently satisfied with her work, she made her way back downstairs.
Bella’s schedule remained just as busy for the next two weeks, the only real source of joy she seemed to have in those days being the promise of her Valentine’s Day date with Tristan. She felt like she might explode from all of the excitement that she felt coursing through her each time she so much as glanced in Tristan’s direction, but she somehow managed to keep it contained. She did, however, begin to ask him to go to lunch with her more often. The first couple of times he turned her down, but when she asked him the Wednesday before Valentine’s Day he surprised her by actually agreeing to come along. While it had been a little awkward at first, Bella soon managed to get herself to the point that she was comfortably able to keep up a conversation with him.
She had taken to dressing up in professional yet enticing clothing, wanting to communicate her desire to Tristan in a subtle way that wouldn’t distract too much from work or be too obvious. She was wearing dresses that accentuated her curves, and a few times she had even managed to work up the courage to go without underwear. The dresses were all long enough that she could still bend down without putting her goodies on display, and the added thrill of Tristan being able to cop a feel should he ever work up the courage to try only seemed to spur her on more and more in her behavior. She knew he was probably too professional to ever do such a thing, but that didn’t stop her mind from fantasizing about it.
She was beginning to get more and more convinced every day that she and Tristan could have a chance at making a relationship work, and her mind began to think up ways that she might be able to get him to go out with her. She
figured that she should maybe buy him something for Valentine’s Day, though what to get him was a question she didn’t quite have the answer to yet. She had ideas, some of which were a little more risqué than others, and given the fact that she still had thetime she could still think on it. Something would surely come to her, given enough time.
Chapter Nine
Tristan
Tristan couldn’t help but notice, in the couple of weeks leading up to Valentine’s Day, that Bella’s wardrobe seemed to have taken an unexpected deviation from the norm. Usually, she would dress in remarkably plain business clothes that showed off her professionalism in exchange for lacking any sexual appeal. It had been that habit which had made it so that Tristan had never paid much attention to her outside of being his coworker, as well as one of the things that had made him want to chase Isabella, who dressed in the exact opposite manner. Now, however, Bella seemed to have taken a leaf out of her friend’s book.
Each day, her choice of dress had become far more noticeable, whether it was the low-cut tops that allowed hints of her bra to poke out or the dresses that so nicely accentuated her body. It had made it a little more difficult for Tristan to focus on his work the last couple of weeks since he had been spending a lot more time in Bella’s office going over their plans for their approaching project. Tristan had just finished ironing out the details, and Bradley told him that he could expect to hear from him on Friday when he came to his final decision, and that wouldn’t be for another four days. That meant that he could spend some time taking it a little easier, but since he didn’t want to appear to be doing nothing the whole time he was at work he had decided to spend more time with Bella.
She didn’t seem to be opposed to having him around, and if anything, she seemed almost genuinely pleased to have an excuse to spend more time with him. She had apparently been a little confused on some of the aspects of how to link certain media sites into the catalog, so together, the two of them were spending a lot of time doing research together. It was Tristan who eventually discovered how to do it, and together the two of them managed to put together a code that would do what they wanted. When he clicked on one of the items of the mock catalog that they were testing on, he was quite pleased to see a window pop up giving the option to share the link for the item on Facebook and Twitter.
“Finally!” Tristan exclaimed excitedly, standing up from the chair that he had been sitting in as a wide grin spread across his face. “I finally got the damn thing to work!”
“Congratulations, Tristan,” Bella said gently, smiling over at him bashfully. “How did you figure it out?”
“Well, I can’t take all of the credit,” he said with a smile, moving over to her and squeezing her shoulder gently. “It was because of you that I managed to figure it out. You must be my good luck charm,” he added, quickly saving the project so they wouldn’t lose their progress.
He didn’t seem to notice the blush that had spread across Bella’s face at his words, nor did he seem to notice the way that her fingers began to fidget slightly in front of her. He was a little too busy stretching, his back feeling stiff from having spent the last three hours hunched over in a chair. He picked up the tablet that he did a lot of his work on and opened up the company’s Facebook page. His eyes scanned over the multitude of new comments that had come pouring in the last couple of days, satisfaction etched on his face as he read through the many positive comments that had come in. He was relieved to see that there were no seemingly negative comments on the page, though their company hadn’t really ever had bad press. Everyone took their job far too seriously to let substandard quality be an issue, and since Ryan was not shy about letting people know when they were slipping up, the workers all made sure that everything was well polished.
“Well, Bella, I think that I am going to head back to my own office now. I’ll come back if I have any further questions for you today, but for the most part, I think that we are going to be able to move ahead with implementing these new features into the catalog,”he said with a smile before heading out of the office towards his own. He was surprised to find Amun there, his Indian friend seeming to be more than a little agitated.
“Ah, there you are, Tristan,” Amun said energetically, his hands wringing nervously in front of him. “I was wondering where you had disappeared off to.”
“I was going over some coding stuff with Bella in thepreparation of our new project to integrate social media functionality into the catalog. I figured that this might help to spread our influence since customers would be able to show their friends and family stuff that they have bought from us. That way, if their loved ones are also interested in that item, they can go directly to our site via the link that would be included in the post. I want to make it so that they would be directly linked to the products, which would expedite the process of them being able to order,” Tristan said simply, excitement obvious in his voice.
“Ah, alright. I was just looking for you because I wanted to tell you that I did it. I managed to sneak a Valentine into Isabella’s office. I made sure not to sign my name, even though I really wanted to. Do you think this is going to work? How will I be able to let her know that I am supposed to be her date?” He looked obviously confused, something that Tristan couldn’t help to be a little amused by. It reminded him of helping his friends ask out their crushes in high school.
“Did you tell her that you wanted to meet her here at the office?” Tristan took a seat at his desk, lacing his fingers in front of his body as he leaned back slightly.
“Yeah, I put that in the postscript,” Amun said, smiling as he pulled up one of the spare chairs in Tristan’s office and sat down across from him. “I told her that she should meet me here at 2pm on the dot. I hope this works,” he added uncertainly, biting the nail of his thumb gently in his nervousness.
“I’m sure it will be just fine,” Tristan said, gently reaching over and patting his friend on the knee in a reassuring manner. “Just don’t psyche yourself out ahead of time.”
“Easier said than done,” Amun said with a sigh, his hand rubbing the top of his head. “I’ve never asked someone as good looking as Isabella out before, whether for Valentine’s Day or any other holiday. I don’t know if I will even be able to have a chance with her.”
“I think you are selling yourself short, buddy. Any girl would be lucky to have you. You are really considerate, and you have a great sense of humor. I think that you will see that once you actually confess your feelings to Isabella that you will be able to feel a little more confident,” Tristan said, his eyes moving to gaze in the direction of Bella’s office, where he could just barely see her sitting at her desk. His heart began to beat faster in his chest, and he found himself having to swallow to wet his suddenly dry throat.
“Thanks, Tristan, I’m glad that I have such a good friend who I can go to about stuff like this,” Amun said, a smile finally managing to spread across his face. “I couldn’t have asked for a better wingman.”
“No problem. Now, if you will excuse me, it is almost time to head home for the day and I have some paperwork that I need to take up to Bradley,” Tristan replied casually, leaning over so that he could fish the file with the papers that he needed out of the middle drawer of his desk. He had made sure to mark it clearly with a sticky note, so it didn’t take much time at all for him to find it. He stood up with the folder tucked under his arm, giving Amun a playful salute before heading out of his office and walking across the floor to the elevator.
When he arrived at Bradley’s office he greeted Marcy with a warm smile, the older woman immediately returning his greeting in her usual cheerful way.
“Hey there, Marcy, how are things going with you?” Tristan asked, stopping in front of her desk so as to not seem rude.
“Hello, Tristan. Things are going just fine with me, thank you for asking. Just another exciting day working as a secretary for this fine company, you know how it is,” she said with a laugh, Tristan not quite abl
e to tell whether she was being sarcastic or genuine.
“That is good to hear. Say, is Bradley in his office still, or did he head home for the day?” he asked as he held up the folder, gesturing towards it with his free hand. “I have some paperwork that I was supposed to turn into him today before I left, so I figured I would do that now that I actually found myself with some downtime.”
“Well, unfortunately, you just missed him. Bradley headed home about ten minutes ago. He and Rachel both left. If you would like, you can give me the file and I can give it to him when he gets in first thing tomorrow morning,” she said suggestively, her hand already reaching out for the folder.
“That would be great,” he replied, handing the file over to her with a smile on his face. “Thanks for the help, Marcy.”
“Don’t mention it. It is what I am here for, after all,” she said with a grin, setting the folder down on her desk and quickly scribbling some words onto a piece of paper before setting it on top of the folder. “I will make sure that he gets this.”
Tristan stood thinking as the elevator made its way back down to the first floor, his hand stroking his strong chin gently as he waited. With Valentine’s Day being only a couple of days away, it seemed prudent that he started putting together whatever gifts he planned to give Bella on that day. He didn’t want to be boring by just giving her flowers and chocolate, something that he was sure wouldn’t score him many points with her. The only problem was that he didn’t really know what it was that she liked. He never was the kind of guy who was good at just randomly picking out gifts for people.