I show up at Emma’s house at eight on the dot. Maudette’s already there, tidying up her kitchen while Emma nervously hovers over her.

“You really don’t have to,” Emma says as I open her door. “Please, you only need to watch Julie.”

“The girl’s asleep,” Maudette says. “And your kitchen is filthy. Either let me clean it now or force me to wait for you to leave.”

I clear my throat. “Am I interrupting?”

Emma looks over at me, exasperated. “Maudette keeps cleaning, and I keep telling her that’s not necessary.”

“Maudette, am I paying you to clean?” I ask her.

She shrugs. “Nope, guess not. But I’m going to whether you pay me for it or not.”

“Okay, guess we can’t do anything about it.” I hold my arm out for Emma. “Shall we?”

She stares at me, looks at Maudette, and then sighs. “Well, shit, I guess I lost that fight.”

I grin at her and Maudette laughs before she goes back to cleaning. Emma slinks over to me and reluctantly takes my arm.

“Where to, Prince Charming?” she asks.

“You’ll see.” I look over my shoulder. “Bye, Maudette. We won’t be late.”

“You kids have fun now, ya hear?”

I grin at her stereotypical southern folksy charm before leading Emma out of her apartment, down the steps, and into the back of a waiting black town car.

“Where are we going?” she asks me as the car pulls out into traffic. The driver rolls the privacy window up and I nod at him in the mirror before he disappears.

“You’ll see,” I say with a vague smile.

I can tell that annoys her. “Is being vague and dragging me around wherever you want a part of the contract, too?” she asks.

“Probably,” I say, shrugging. “I didn’t read the whole thing.”

“You didn’t—you didn’t what?” she asks, practically gagging.

I laugh at her and shrug a little bit. “Relax,” I say. “It’s a sex contract. I fuck you however I want until you get pregnant. It’s not so complicated.”

“It’s definitely complicated,” she says. “And not however you want.”

“I know, I know, your ‘anal’ clause,” I say, waving her away.

“Oh god,” she groans. “Don’t call it my ‘anal clause,’ please.”

“Why not?” I ask, cocking my head at her. “That’s what it is, right?”

“I mean, yeah, but you don’t have it say it that way. Isn’t there a nicer way?”

I stroke my chin a little bit. “Rectum Addendum?”

“Worse,” she says, “way, way worse.”

“I think Rectum Addendum is perfect,” I insist.

“We’ll call it the Special Circumstances Clause,” she says sternly.

“Rectum. Addendum.”

We have a staring contest for a second before she finally breaks into laughter. I join her, grinning huge. I haven’t laughed like this in a while, and it feels really good.

The car pulls up in front of a large building, just on time. I lean over her, pointing at it. “Here we are,” I say.

“Really? Another warehouse?”

I nod. “A really nice one, though.”

“Great. Will Dirk be here?”

“Actually, yes,” I say, getting out of the car. I pause to look back in at her. “But he won’t be serving food.”

She blinks at me. “David, what is Dirk going to be doing?” she asks as we get out of the car together. “David, seriously, what is Dirk going to be doing?”

“Nothing important,” I say.

“We’re coming here to have sex, right? Forgive me for wondering why a random engineer from your company is going to be present.”

I smirk at her and pretend to look scandalized. “We’re coming here to have sex?”

She nods a little uncertainly. “I mean, that’s what I thought, at least.”

“Huh. Well, I’m definitely not going to turn that down.” I stop as we get to the door and look at her up and down. She’s wearing a dress with a black top, the straps crossed and showing some skin on her back, the skirt loose and white. It’s both flirting, sexy, but still somehow formal and appropriate for a real meal. I don’t know how she managed that one, but she did. I feel my cock stir, but I stay on task. “I mean, look at you.”

She blushes again. “Cut it out.”

“I’m just saying you look good.” I smirk at her a little bit and lean closer. “Take a compliment,” I say softly, and move away from her quickly.

I leave her standing there as I swipe my Envoy ID card to unlock the side door. I step inside, holding it open for her as she passes me, her heels clacking on the floor as we walk into the cavernous space.

This warehouse is just like the one built into our main building, but with one key difference. There aren’t a bunch of different stations testing all different products and technology. This warehouse was designed and built to test one single product, our most important product in the world.

The Envoy Mark 2 sits about twenty feet away from us. It’s a handsome car, sleek but not showy. It took a long time to get the design down, but I think the team really nailed it. Emma takes a sharp breath when she sees it.

“David, is that…?” She trails off a little bit.

I grin and nod. “Yep, that’s it. The Mark 2.”

Her eyes go wide and she turns over to it. She walks over and slowly does a lap around it, running her hand over the paint. The car’s black with markings painted all over it for safety and testing purposes. I smile and watch as she does this, almost reverently, and I know she’s loving this moment.

Emma’s a real believer. Despite her desire to make autonomous cars more ethical, she believes in the technology, maybe even more than I do. I can see it in her eyes and in her work, but most of all I can see it in the way she touches this car.

“I didn’t think anyone was supposed to see it,” she says.

“Most people aren’t,” I confirm. “We’re keeping this as tightly wrapped up as possible.”

“How many?”

I cock my head. “Oh, maybe fifty people at this point.”

“No, I mean, how many did you build so far?”

“Ah,” I say, smiling softly. “Just this one.”

She blinks and turns back to it, staring. I love this moment more than anything else. I wish I could live this moment over and over again. Very few people in the world would look at the Mark 2 like she’s looking at it, and it’s a pleasure to be around her right now. This is how I felt when I first saw it.

“Why are you showing it to me?” she asks.

I shrug a little and walk up next to her. “Well, a few reasons. But mostly because I think you appreciate it.”

“I do,” she says softly.

“I can see that.” I laugh a little bit, but not maliciously. “I felt the same way, by the way. I felt in awe of it.”

“But you invented it.”

I shrug a little. “I invented the first few prototypes, but the Envoy is so much more than me at this point. The Mark 1 wasn’t even my design anymore by the end, not entirely at least. The Mark 2 has even less of me, and I’m sure the Mark 3 will have even less. And one day, self-driving cars will have none of my vision in them, and I can’t wait.”

“Why?” she asks, surprised by that last part.

“Because they’ll be even better than I can imagine them. I’m only one person, after all.”

She watches me closely for a second and I get the sense that she’s studying me. It actually starts to make me self-conscious, which I never really feel, so I step up to the Mark 2 and pull open the door.

“Want to?” I ask.

“Fuck, yes,” she says.

I laugh again and we climb inside. I let her sit in the driver’s side, although there’s no steering wheel, not in the Mark 2. The Mark 1 has a wheel but it only engages in emergencies, and it’s mostly there just for legal reasons. Those reasons are gone now, thanks to Olivia’s work, so there’s no need for the steering wheel at all.

She takes a deep breath and lets it out. “Weird,” she says, gesturing where the wheel usually is.

“I know,” I say. “You get used to it.”

The doors shut automatically and the inside of the car lights up as it reads my fingerprint. The engine starts and Emma laughs.

“Biometrics?”

“Bingo.”

The car suddenly starts moving, and Emma laughs, surprised. It’s so smooth and even, much smoother than a human could do. We slowly begin to drive around the vast warehouse, going about ten miles per hour. The space was cleared out for this purpose and a few pylons were put up to give the Mark 2 something to steer around.

“Who’s controlling it?” she asks.

“Nobody, not really at least. Dirk’s in the control room but he’s just monitoring the data. Since the Mark 2 isn’t hooked up to the central systems yet, we need to keep a close eye on it. But eventually, it’ll be all on its own.”

“Amazing,” she says softly, and starts to fiddle with the controls.

I explain to her what everything does and she listens, half in awe and half in childlike excitement. Even the small details seem to thrill her, and I love watching her enjoy this. It’s almost as good as fucking her, although I want to fuck her, and badly. Every time she moves, her skirt hikes up just a little bit more, showing off her gorgeous legs. I love the skin of her back, so smooth and beautiful, and her lips drive me absolutely wild.

We move around the space a few times, and on the last lap we fall into silence. I let her enjoy this moment, since I don’t know when she’ll be able to get back into the Mark 2 before it launches, if she ever can. When we finish the lap, the car stops, and the doors open on their own.

We climb out and I wave up at the control room. I can just barely see Dirk in there, and I’m pretty sure he’s flipping me off.

At least I didn’t make him wear a waiter’s outfit.

“Thanks for this, David,” Emma says softly, coming around to stand in front of me. “Seriously. It’s amazing.”

“Good. I’m really glad you liked it.” I nod again up at Dirk and we start walking back toward the door. The Mark 2 goes into auto mode again, shutting itself up and slowly gliding back into the center of the room. Emma laughs with pure delight when she notices.

We get back outside of the warehouse. An hour’s passed, and the car’s right where we left it. “You said something in there,” she says to me suddenly. “You said there were a few reasons you wanted to show me that.”

“Oh, did I?” I give her a little grin.

“What are they?”

“You’ll find out tomorrow.”

She narrows her eyes at me. “David.”

“Tomorrow. I’m starving right now. How’s dinner sound?”

“Dinner sounds good.” Her expression softens. “So, uh, tonight, are we…?”

“No,” I say. “Not tonight. Just dinner, and dinner’s optional. I can take you home. I have an early morning tomorrow.”

She hesitates a second. “Dinner’s optional?”

“Absolutely,” I say. “The contract is for your pussy, not your stomach.”

She snorts a little laugh, which is cute as hell. “Okay, fine,” she says. “Dinner sounds good.”

“Come on.” I take her by the hand, completely on reflex. If she notices and thinks it’s strange, she doesn’t pull away. We walk hand in hand back to the town car, get in back, and head off to eat a meal together.

It’s hard to explain, even to myself, what I felt when I watched her look at the Mark 2 back there. It was something special, almost transcendent, to see someone so in love with an idea come face to face with the physical manifestation of that idea. It was like love, or maybe like sex, but either way it was beautiful. I’m happy I showed her.

And I’m happy I take her to dinner, because she’s really, really good company.