ASH SHOVED YET ANOTHER strand of wet hair behind her ear, and hunched her shoulders against the wind. Normally this kind of storm made her grin, like earlier, with Mischa. What was she thinking? Where did she expect something like that would go? Why did she even bother to accept his offer?

The night wasn’t going to end any other way. It couldn’t. There was no way she was letting a guy like that see the dump of a studio apartment she and Kelly lived in, even from the outside. Ash couldn’t go home with him, she had too much work to do tonight.

But for a few brief hours, she pretended she was a normal adult, hanging out with an attractive man who enjoyed her company because of who she was. She’d shoved aside concerns about unpaid bills and late rent and keeping Kelly safe, and fallen into everything about Mischa.

Ash patted her purse, assuring herself her phone was still there. In three days, she could afford to put minutes on her plan, and then she’d text him back. With even the tiniest bit of luck, he’d remember her.

She reached home, trudged up the driveway, and to the apartment entrance in back, under the main house. Darkness greeted her when she pushed inside. She didn’t bother with the lights as she changed into dry clothes and ran a comb through her hair.

Damp locks fell around her shoulders. She settled onto her mattress-slash-workspace. Hers and Kelly’s beds, plus the TV sitting on a milk crate against the wall, were the only furniture in the room.

She pulled her laptop from its bag, grateful she’d splurged on the watertight case, plugged it in, and flipped up the lid. The harsh light cast odd shadows around the room, painting everything but the screen in an eerie silhouette.

The website she’d been on earlier blinked back at her, an entire user database filling the screen. She’d forgotten about that. The real estate company had a huge security flaw—basic stuff—in their information. Maybe she could finally prove to a potential employer that she had the skill she claimed.

Most of what she’d learned had been on-the-job with a previous employer. That, combined with the shitty reference, plus her age and lack of a college degree, made it difficult to even get an interview. She’d learned early on that listing herself as G. Taylor, rather than putting her full name on the resume, helped with the callbacks. Just not the conversions.

She took screenshots of what she’d discovered, typed up a cover letter, and sent her resume off to the real estate contractor. She was fortunate the people who rented the house upstairs let her use their number for applications, so she got calls even when she couldn’t afford to put time on her phone. Time for a long night of job hunting.

Working until she wore herself out was the only way she could sleep through the anxiety. Submitting another batch of job applications should help with that, but it just meant she’d be pacing until the rejections started rolling in. In a day she could go back to her cashier job, and numb her mind there.

For now, she’d distract herself with snippets of the evening with Mischa. The conversation. His arm around her waist while she was on his board. The definition of muscle she felt under his T-shirt. Kissing him in the pouring rain.

She smiled in the dimly lit room, and pushed herself to the next job listing.

*

DRIVING HOME IN SOAKING wet clothes wasn’t nearly the intoxicating adventure that kissing Ash in the rain was. Mischa was already yanking off his shirt when he walked in the front door. He cut a straight line to the bathroom, and tossed his clothes on the counter.

It wasn’t so simple to shed the lingering sensation of soft lips against his. Short nails against the back of his neck. Hard nipples digging into his chest when Ash pressed closer.

His dick stood at attention, begging for the release he didn’t get earlier. He cranked the water in the shower to near-scorching, and stepped under the stream to chase the chill of the storm away.

It didn’t matter how many places he tried to redirect his thoughts—work, sports, skating—they kept drifting back to Ash. He gripped his shaft with a soapy fist, and a groan tore from his throat. It wasn’t the same as sliding inside her, but the fantasy he couldn’t ignore was pretty vivid.

It started with guiding her behind the coffee shop, away from the lights and the street. Mischief danced behind her glasses when he pushed her shirt up. He lowered his mouth to suck on a nipple—he was betting they were pink—warming the swollen nub with a series of licks and nibbles, before pulling away to let the storm cool her skin again.

He played with the other breast through her shirt, rubbing the rough texture across sensitive flesh.

He drifted into the fantasy, slowly stroking his cock. She had that amazing voice—light chimes dancing with his thoughts—and her cries would be more delicious.

She dragged her nails down his back and arched against his touch, molding her body to his. Conveniently enough, fantasy-Ash wore a skirt. He glided his hand over her ass and down her leg, teasing the inside of her thigh, and devouring her moans with a series of kisses.

He hooked her leg over his hip, her skirt sliding up in the process.

Her smirk was playful, and she’d probably say something like your hands are full. Now what?

I guess you’ll have to help me out. In his head he ground against her, emphasizing his point with his erection against her mound. In the shower, he increased his pace, squeezing his shaft tighter, pleasure building inside and tingling from his toes to his fingertips.

She freed him before he realized she’d undone his jeans, cool fingertips gliding along his hot skin, bumping the head of his cock against her panties.

He nibbled her ear, begging to slide inside her. When she dragged out the teasing too long, he dropped his hand from her breast to cover her grip on him. Holding her captive, he used his dick to shove aside lacy lingerie, then pulled both their hands away to thrust inside her.

Fuck, she was tight. As the water from the shower beat down on him, he stroked faster and harder, falling half out of the daydream, focused as much on his grip as how slick the woman in his fantasy was. He jerked against his palm, so close, but not able to fall over the edge.

In his head, she buried her face against his neck, muffling her screams as she came, her pussy clenching around him, squeezing until he couldn’t hold back.

It was the visual he needed. His balls tightened, and orgasm spilled through him and over his hand. Spurting to hit the shower wall. He bucked his hips in time with the climax, thrusting and fucking his hand until he was spent.

The fantasy faded, but didn’t vanish. A ghost of what-wasn’t hovered in his mind as he rested his forehead against the cool tile of the shower wall.

When he caught his breath, he realized the water was growing cold. It was a taunting reminder of earlier, and he hurried to finish bathing.

He stepped into the bathroom, dried off, and wrapped a towel around his waist. The fogged mirror showed him a kaleidoscope of color that was a blur of the ink across his chest and arms. The flash in his mind was her soft touch along the feather on the back of his hand. The way she sang the lines from The Flight of Icarus. His cock twitched again.

He grabbed his clothes in frustration, and tossed them in the hamper on his way into his bedroom. She hadn’t even been a random hookup. Ash was nothing more than a woman he bought coffee for and, given her brush-off, he’d never see her again.

He must be hung up on her because she’d turned him down. It had been a while since his ego demanded that kind of validation. But work sucked right now, and the whole night was more like when he was younger, all the way down to jerking off in the shower when he didn’t get laid, so validation seemed as good an excuse as anything.

It was almost eleven, and Mischa had meetings in the morning.

He lay down, but sleep wasn’t around for him to grab. Where was his phone? Not because he thought Ash had texted him with her number—despite the chanting in his head—but he wanted to see if social media would put him to sleep.

He found the device on the table by the front door, grabbed it, and took it back to bed with him.

He swiped the screen as he walked, scrolling through the standard late night newsletters in his personal mail, then moving to his work inbox. Which should be empty, given his dry spell of inspiration since the Wolfram deal stopped looking positive.

There was one message waiting for him. Job Application, Database Developer.

It would wait until morning.

His brain cut in, teasing him with hints of rain and soft lips and a lilting voice. “Fuck.” He swapped out his towel for a pair of boxers and a T-shirt, and headed toward his home office. If he was awake, he might as well work.

Funny how the person he hoped would distract him from the woes of business for a few hours had done such a good job that he needed a reverse flip to get her out of his head.

He pulled up the resume on his laptop, along with the cover letter. There was a second document attached, and he switched to that one first, curious about the large file size.

It was a series of screenshots. They would be his website, but they were cluttered with a dump of his user information. All the logins for the site.

What the fuck?

He switched back to the cover letter, and skimmed. Key words stood out. SQL injection on your login page...have the knowledge to fix the issue...look forward to meeting with you, to discuss resolution...before someone else discovers this flaw in your security.

Anger seared through him, burning away most of the lust. Some asshole had hacked his site, and was trying to extort a job out of him? Who the hell was this guy? G. Taylor, according to the resume.

Mischa was tempted to call the number now, and wake this jerk up. He wasn’t the bastard here, though. He’d wait until morning, but he wouldn’t be happy about it.