Time had stood still. The same pictures on the back staircase graced the walls. Ones of Sam, her dad, her grandparents.

At the top were two doors. The open one led to a bathroom. The closed one led to Sam’s room.

I reached for the door, easing it in.

I wasn’t sure what to expect on the other side. Sam could’ve been doing anything.

Talking on the phone.

Rearranging her furniture.

She could’ve been in bed, rubbing one out for all I knew.

I hadn’t expected to find her standing at her easel in one corner of the massive room, headphones on her ears as her brush moved over the canvas.

She was wearing shorts and a tank top, even though it was freezing thanks to an open window across the room. Her curvy hips swayed a little to the music, drawing my gaze down her body.

She looked lost in her own world, an alternate dimension save for the fact that her feet were firmly planted in the carpet. One leg stretched out, her foot tapping to whatever beat filled her headphones. Her toenails were the color of cherries.

She’d always had a figure. I knew it in high school and it was painfully evident now. Small, high boobs I’d never gotten truly acquainted with. Slim shoulders that were stronger than they looked. A narrow waist, flaring into round hips.

My gaze landed on the curve of her ass under the shorts.

This is really fucking bad.

I was standing in the bedroom of someone I hadn’t been friends with since high school. After letting myself in to plead my case on the advice of a four-year-old.

“Sam.” My voice was low, hoarse.

Nothing.

I cleared my throat. “Sam.” A little louder.

I approached her, reaching for the headphones on her ears.

She whirled before I could blink.

Shock registered before the pain.

But when it did, my eyes watered as I bent over, grasping for my nose.

“Lee? What the hell are you doing here?” she gasped from somewhere above me.

I couldn’t appreciate the fact that she’d used my nickname. I could barely open my eyes as I straightened. “Tried the front door,” I managed, sounding like I had a sinus infection. “Your bouncer wouldn’t let me in.”

I held up the key in one hand.

“So you sneak up on someone whose mom died in a home invasion?”

I swore. This was getting worse by the second.

She jerked her headphones from around her neck and dropped them on the table next to her art supplies. She reached for my wrist and pulled me across the hall to the bathroom.

“Samantha?” her father called up the stairs. “Did you say something?”

We exchanged a look. “Nothing, Dad!”

His footsteps receded, and I bent over the sink, pinching the bridge of my nose gingerly.

“Did I break it?” she murmured. Her voice was lower. Contrite.

“Maybe. You hit hard, Martinez. I’m impressed.”

A tissue appeared in front of my face and I grabbed it, pressing it against my nostrils.

I held out a hand and Sam passed me more. “Your dad still hates me.”

“He’s protective.”

I managed to tilt my head to the side enough to throw her a look. “He’s a pit bull. With a scalpel collection.”

When it seemed like the bleeding let up, I straightened.

I shifted a hip against the sink. The bathroom was small, and it had traces of her everywhere. Soft-looking gray towels. A bath poof dangling from the shower. Girly products corralled on the vanity.

I lifted a sparkly bottle from the tray. “White grapefruit and Mosa mint. What’s Mosa mint? Why isn’t regular mint good enough?”

Sam reached over me, her body brushing mine as she grabbed the container from my hand.

“Enough of raiding my bathroom.” She went back to her room, and I followed.

Inside, Sam stopped in front of her bed, turning to face me. “If you’re here about the concept art,” she said under her breath, “I can’t do it. I’m sorry if I held up your process, but you’ll need to go to someone else.”

“That’s not going to work.”

She blinked, playing with the sleeve of her shirt. “Why not?”

“Because no one’s fucking good enough.” I turned to pace the length of her room, spinning on my heel when I got to the wall. “I’ve gotten other samples. Recommendations from the artist who did the work on Phoenix.” I came back to her, pulling up just out of arms’ reach.

“I want you, Sam. I need you.”

Her gaze worked over mine, frustrated and confused. “I can’t do it.”

My attention landed on the painting on the easel, a scene of flowers in a field. “Looks like you haven’t even tried.”

She stalked in front of me, crossing to her desk and jerking open the drawer.

Sam pulled out a stack of papers, holding them up in front of me.

“I tried,” she muttered, holding up one and then the next and letting them float to the ground. I bent to pick one up.

It was good. Better than Epic’s by a mile.

But she was right. It wasn’t enough.

I crossed to the bed, taking a seat on it.

Sam picked up the other sheets and followed me, dropping onto the duvet at my side.

“Something’s missing,” I agreed. “But I know it’s something you can find. I’ve seen it.” I turned it over in my mind. “How much do you know about the game?”

“Not much. I’ve never played it.”

I nodded, thinking. “It’s about this post-apocalyptic world and a woman who’d escaped after years of genetic testing at the hands of an evil regime. She came home unharmed, except for one important difference… she had wings. She’d just found her family when the regime found her and burned her entire city to the ground.” My gaze fell to the carpet as I pictured it. “Nearly everyone died, except for the guy she loved. He was forced to leave, to take the survivors and lead them to safety somewhere unknown. She had to decide between going with them or starting a rising against the regime.”

I looked up to find Sam’s eyes unblinking, her lips parted in anticipation.

“She chooses the regime,” she murmured.

“She does.” I shook off the feelings threatening to take me over, the way a compelling story always did. “The gameplay’s insane. Max outdid himself.”

“What about the story?” Sam asked.

“What do you mean.”

“I mean who wrote it.”

I rubbed a hand over the back of my neck. “I did.”

Her stare made my body prickle with awareness.

It’d always felt like she could look into me, through me, when most people only saw what was on the surface.

“I read your article,” she said abruptly. “The one in GQ last month.” The single-page feature was what you got unless your first name was Ryan or your last name was Hemsworth. “It didn't say anything about you writing the stories for your games.”

I shrugged a shoulder. “Just that one. I hadn’t even planned to write it. But it was this idea that’d been in me for awhile. Tugging at the corners of my brain, never letting me go.”

I glanced past her at the canvases stacked by the walls. “You ever get like that with your art?”

“I used to,” she said softly. “Not since…”

“Since what?”

She shook her head. “Not in a long time.”

But she looked back down at the sketches, lost in thought.

Sam folded her arms across her body. “Okay. I’ll try again,” she said, her voice steady.

I wrapped my arms around her, feeling her surprised intake of breath. “You won't regret it, Sam.”

A noise downstairs reached my ears.

“Your dad still keep that Mo Vaughn baseball bat in the display case in the living room?” I murmured against her hair.

“Yeah.” She pulled back, her face inches from mine. Her eyes glinted up at me, wary and with a hint of humor. “He added a David Ortiz one a few years ago.”

I nodded. “I should go now.”

“That’s probably best.”