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Ali gave him a grateful smile. That she could be passionate about. “I once offered to have sex with the next person who brought me a slice of black silk pie.” Then she immediately blushed. Had she said that aloud? “I was…um…I was in my apartment alone with my boyfriend at the time.”
Thankfully, Ken clearly thought it was funny. Paul flashed her a grin along with an eyebrow waggle. “And was it everything you hoped for?”
Ali shrugged. Might as well go with honesty. “Cheesecake, yes. Boyfriend, no.”
“Okay, last questions,” inserted Ken. “Ever seen someone kick a puppy? Trample flowers in the park?”
She frowned. “When I was a kid, we had a pet cat who was a huntress. I did everything I could to stop her, but she still caught things. Mice, bunnies, birds. It was awful the way she’d play with them. It was worse when she ate them.”
“Okay, that’s gross,” Ken agreed. “But it is their natural instinct.”
“I know. But it doesn’t mean I wanted to watch her do it. Or that I wanted her to gift me with her kills.”
Suddenly, Paul dropped the camera. “Perfect! That’s enough for the techies to get started with. Thanks, Ali!” Then with a wave, he moved over to the brunette who was just grabbing her coat.
Ali barely had time to remember he’d been filming her when bam, he was gone. It was rather disconcerting.
“He’s a high-energy kind of guy,” Ken said from where he stood beside her. “Especially right before a launch. He gets really jazzed on all the details and excitement.”
She watched as Paul simultaneously helped Ashley with her coat, passed Tina the camera while issuing instructions and still had time to flirt with Samantha.
“How many lattes a day does he drink?”
“Put it this way. I told him to just buy Starbucks. It’d be cheaper.”
Ali giggled, pressing her hand to her mouth as she did it.
“Don’t cover up,” Ken said as he gently pulled her hand down. “I like seeing you smile. Seeing you laugh is even better.”
Here it was. She’d been dreading it from the very beginning. It was one of those moments straight out of her fantasies where he had some reason to touch her and then they ended up just staring at each other. In her dreams, it took about two seconds for her to end up in his arms. Another ten before she was in his bed. But in real life, all she could do was look into his eyes and scream at her libido to shut up. No go. She just stood there looking while her nipples tightened and her belly trembled.
Hell.
Meanwhile, Ken seemed equally caught. He just looked at her, his eyes widening. She wondered if it was panic or terror. Part of her labeled it clear lust, but that came from her libido, which made up stuff all the time. She ignored it. And then suddenly, Paul was there, clapping his hands and completely breaking the moment. Ali jerked at the noise. So did Ken.
“Okay, Ken, I’ve got a zillion details to work out, but I’ve changed my mind about hanging around here eating dinner with you. I’m doing it at home with brandy and a cigar.”
“He doesn’t really drink brandy or smoke cigars,” Ken said in a low voice.
“I certainly do! But you’re right. Tonight is more likely to be hard lemonade. Can’t stand being in this building one more second and besides, there’s a Bulls game on tonight.”
Ali smiled. “That’s what my dad’s doing tonight. He’s a big fan.”
“Good man. Anyway, I’m outta here.” Tina rushed in with a big food sack and handed it to Paul, who promptly dug inside it. “Which means you get two subs.” He tossed the first wrapped foot-long sub at Ken, then the other.
“Hey!” cried Ken as he fumbled to catch the flying food. He got the first, but didn’t have a hand for the second. It caromed off his fingers and toward Ali. Thankfully, she had good reflexes. She managed to snatch it out of the air before disaster struck.
Fortunately, Paul had stopped throwing things. He just dropped the rest of the bag on the table. “I won’t toss the drinks at you. I know I’d be the one to clean up the mess.”
“Damn straight you would,” answered Ken, but Paul wasn’t listening. He’d already grabbed Tina’s arm and was asking her something about latex body paint. Two seconds later, Ken and Ali were the only people there. Not a problem, according to her libido. But Ali was working hard to be professional, so she firmly squelched the ideas running rampant through her brain.
“Um, you wanted to talk to me?”
“Oh. Um. Yeah. I noticed you got kind of a panicked look when playing the game came up.”
She swallowed. “Uh, yeah.”
“Not a big gamer?”
She shook her head.
“Ever played WOW? Warcrest? Legend of Zelda?”
She bit her lip and looked down.
“Okay,” he said slowly. “You understand, don’t you, that I need you to know this game inside and out? How to play, what to do—everything about it that you can learn in the next week.”
She nodded, feeling miserable. How the hell was she going to do that? But even as she was about ready to give up the job, her mind started playing out possibilities. Maybe she didn’t have a friend who was up on all the major games, but she knew where a game store was. She could talk to the guys there. Maybe they could teach her how to play. And while she was still thinking of ways around her problem, Ken pushed a sub sandwich into her hand. She looked at it then back up at him.
“Eat up,” he said. “Because right after this, you and I are going to party in the lounge.”
She stared at him, her lust doing a happy dance that was wholly inappropriate. Finally she managed, “Wh-what?”
“Adventure, mayhem, sex!” he quipped as he leaned across the table and snagged the food bag.
She swallowed, not knowing how to answer.
“Don’t worry. I’m really not that good at it. Not compared to the other guys. But at least I can make it fun.”
“What?”
He turned to her, his eyebrows raised. “We’re going to play the game. We’ve got it all set up in the lounge. I’ll walk you through the basics, then we can play it together.” He frowned. “What did you think I was talking about?”
“Um…nothing. The game. Of course.” Not like her libido was stuck on the word sex or anything.
“Trust me. I go easy on virgins.”
She had absolutely no response to that.
5
KEN LEANED BACK in the couch, his gaze on Ali. She had her lower lip caught between her teeth as she frowned at the screen. He didn’t even consider giving her a hint. First, because he had before and she’d told him quite clearly that she wanted to figure it out on her own. Second, because he had total faith that she could conquer this particular puzzle.
Because he’d learned in about ten minutes that she was smart.
She’d obviously not grown up with video games. Her eye–hand coordination wasn’t lightning-quick and she didn’t have the fluidity with the game controller that gamers did. So during fight sequences, she was at a severe disadvantage. But this game was as much about smarts as it was about fighting. In fact, he’d made sure the designers put in at least one smart solution to get past every obstacle. Brute force might help, but it wasn’t the only way.
“What if I try…this!” She rapidly moved her avatar around and experimented.
He didn’t answer. He already knew it wouldn’t work, but it was a good thing to try.
“Well, shoot,” she said and once again she started biting her lower lip. Even, white teeth. Red wet lip. God, he was hard for her. Hell, he’d been hard for her from the beginning. Sadly, he was her boss, so he held back. Besides, she was thinking and that was too sexy a sight for him to interrupt.
She grabbed her soda off the table and took another swig as she stared at the scene on the television. Then she thumbed through a few other screens, looking for a clue.
“Wait a minute…” she said.
There! She’d found it.
“Can you—”
“On it,” he said, quickly maneuvering his avatar to help hers.
“I’m going to—”
“I’ll brace you like this—”
“Now together—”
Bam! The Impenetrable Wall tumbled to the ground.
“Woo hoo!” she crowed, dropping the controller on her lap as she fell backward into the couch. “Damn, this game is hard!”
“You seem to be flying through it.”
She looked up at him in surprise. “Really?”
He nodded. “Really.”
Then she looked down at the game box. “Well, the game is designed for teens. I suppose I ought to be flying through it, huh?”
He shook his head as he leaned back into the couch right beside her. They were close enough to touch. In fact, he shifted his leg enough that their knees and some of her calf touched.
“That’s mostly a violence-and-sex rating. A lot of these puzzles will stump a teenager.”
She laughed. “Well, that’s reassuring to my ego. I’m smarter than the average sixteen-year-old.”
And sexy, too, with her eyes dancing and her lips wet and so close. He wanted to kiss her. She was thinking it, too. Or at least he thought she was. Her gaze had dropped to his mouth and her body had stilled. The air froze in his chest. Could he? Could she?
Guess not because she abruptly looked away. “Gee, um, what time is it?”
Stifling his disappointment, he glanced at the clock on the gaming machine. “One twenty-seven.”
“In the morning?” she gasped as she leaped off the couch. “Holy crap! I’ve got to go to work tomorrow. Er…today!”
He straightened slowly, shoving his hands into his pockets rather than reach for her. “Can you call in sick?”
“On my last few days there? Just because I stayed up too late gaming?” She blinked a moment then released a short laugh. “I never thought I’d hear myself say that.”
He smiled. Impossible not to smile when she laughed like that. “Well, consider it research for your new job.”
“I still gotta say goodbye to the old one first.” Then before he could comment, she held up her hand. “And I’m not calling in sick.” Then she sighed. “But I may take the afternoon off if I can’t keep my eyes open.”
He nodded. “Sounds like a fair compromise.”
“I’ll remember that, boss, if this happens again over the summer.”
He was watching her slip on her shoes, noticing the flash of bright red on her toenails, when her words hit him. “Hey, that’s not what I meant!”
She laughed. “Too late. You already said it!”
He released a fake grumble then started turning off the electronics. “Wait for me. I’ll walk you to your car.”
“You don’t need to—”
He stopped her with a shake of his head. “It’s a safe area, but there’s no sense in taking chances. Besides, I need to get home, too.”
She stopped arguing, and he quickly closed up the office. A couple of minutes later he had his satchel/briefcase strapped across his chest and together they headed for the elevators. Fortunately, he’d had enough time to think of another conversation topic. Or perhaps an old one.
“So you don’t have a brother or a male cousin or a boyfriend to show you video games?” If he were honest, it was the boyfriend part he was most interested in.
She laughed. “Actually, yes to all of those things.”
His heart plummeted. Fortunately, she didn’t seem to notice and kept talking.
“Three brothers, all much younger. A ton of male cousins and even a couple of boyfriends along the way. But none of them had the patience to teach me how to play. Not like you just did.” Then she flushed. “Was it terribly boring for you? To wait while I figured things out?”
“What? No! I had a great time.”
“Liar.”
He held up his hand in a three-fingered pledge. “Scouts’ honor. I had a great time. I like watching people figure things out.” That was a lie. He liked watching her figure things out.
The elevator arrived and they stepped in. He let her push the button for the parking garage since he didn’t know what level her car was on. Meanwhile, she kept up the flow of their conversation.
“You’re a great teacher. And I gotta say that it’s a welldesigned game.”
“Really? What parts did you especially like?”
She paused, eyeing him a little warily. “You really want to know?”
“Of course I want to know! You’re a brand-new gamer! If I could figure out how to interest people like you, then my financial woes would be over.”
She paused a moment, and her eyes narrowed. “You have financial woes?”
He sighed. “Don’t worry. The launch is safe. Let’s just say if the game doesn’t sell well, then I will have financial woes. As in piles and piles of them.”
She nodded, and he could tell she was thinking about that. But in the end she shrugged. “Okay, here you go off the top of my head. I really liked the story behind the game…”
