Chapter Ten
Liz
I’d hated working over the weekend, because I wanted more than anything to spend some time with Jamie. But Mishka was calling everyone in because she was worried about the We Scream app crashing and burning. Her solution was to rush through the next game, despite my advice that we take it slow and do it correctly the first time.
She hadn’t appreciated my opinion—sometimes it sucked being the voice of reason.
At the same time, I could sympathize with her. She was running a gaming business in a male-dominated arena. There had to be even more pressure on her to succeed.
But all that work meant my brain was extra tired and more prone to wandering. And my brain’s favorite new topic was Jamie. Specifically, Jamie naked and in my bed, or against the wall of a club, or in the foyer of his house, or in the front seat of his car… I couldn’t get rid of the thoughts if I tried, but I didn’t really try too hard.
Amy barely looked up from her desk when I waved and said that I was grabbing some lunch. “You want anything?” I asked her.
“Just some sleep,” she said.
“Great, I’ll get you a double shot of espresso.”
We’d all been working too hard.
As I stepped out of the building, I came face to face with none other than the man who had been dominating my daydreams—Jamie Tolbert.
“Hey,” he said. “I just came by to look for you.”
Those lips, so kissable. Those muscles, so touchable.
“Well, you found me,” I said. Not at all the things that had been running through my head, but it was probably inappropriate to start talking about all that on a busy sidewalk.
“Good. You have time for a quick lunch?”
Something about the low way his voice worked went straight to my panties. I struggled to gain control of my mental faculties, but inside I was a gibbering, lustful mess. “Definitely,” I said. “What do you have in mind?”
“Somewhere with a good atmosphere and privacy. Sound okay?”
So, he didn’t want to have lunch—he wanted a nooner. I was game. “Definitely.”
We walked for a little ways, and I wondered if we’d get in his car for a quickie there, or if he had a hotel in mind. But then we stopped in front of Ochos Hermanos, a Mexican restaurant that I’d tried once with Amy.
Not sex, then. Unless he was hoping to find a supply closet in there.
He took my hand. His fingers were warm and comforting against mine. We stepped inside, and my senses were assaulted with the scents of delicious food. I closed my eyes, inhaling.
“Two please,” he told the hostess.
As we walked to our table, I asked him, “Have you been here before?”
“No, but Aaron—my new business partner, you met him on Friday—he recommended it.” At the mention of Friday, Jamie’s eyes got a wicked gleam in them. But he sat down across from me at the table and asked for a margarita. “Anything for you?” he asked.
“The same, thanks.”
The waitress walked off, and Jamie looked at me seriously. “How’s your day going?”
I wanted to laugh. It was such an innocuous question, when all I could do was think about the next time we’d be alone together. “It’s going all right. There’s not a lot of energy in the office—getting called in to work on the weekend has everyone grumpy and tired.”
“That makes sense,” Jamie said.
“How about your day?”
“It’s going well. I like my new team, lots of great ideas flowing around. I think we’re going to end up with a really strong product.”
His mouth lifted up slightly to the left while he talked, and it made a tiny dimple in his cheek. I wanted to touch it. Here, across the tiny table from him, I felt like we were so close to each other, but not touching. It felt wrong.
But, right, we were having a conversation. “That sounds wonderful,” I said.
“It is.”
The waitress came back with our drinks. We ordered, and then she hustled off again. The restaurant was getting pretty crowded, but true to his word, we had some privacy in our little corner. It was quiet enough for a conversation, which seemed to be what he wanted.
Too bad all I could think about was how much I wanted to kiss him again.
We made small talk about work for a little while, and Jamie said, “I still can’t believe you don’t like games. But you work for a game developer.”
“I know, it’s terrible.”
“Not terrible, just a paradox.”
Our food arrived, and we nodded our thanks at the server.
I continued, “Well, I’m hoping one of the narrative games will take off one of these days, and it’ll catapult me into Hollywood.”
He raised his eyebrows. “You want to be an actress?”
“No,” I laughed. “I just want to meet Mark Wahlberg.” I pushed my foot forward until it was next to Jamie’s, then dragged my toe a little up his leg. “I just think he’s so sexy.”
Jamie grinned. “I’ve been told I look like him, you know.”
“I can see that,” I said. And I could. The same devil-may-care smile, the way his eyes squinted up when he got excited. The serious bedroom eyes he got when things were getting hot between us.
He scooted forward, and I felt his foot move against mine. It was so high school, but kind of sexy at the same time.
“Tell me something else about yourself,” he said.
“Well, I usually don’t take crazy risks. I’m too shy, usually.”
“Crazy risks like what? Skydiving? Shark cages?”
“No way on the shark cages. I hate the water. But no, like, I don’t know—finding an empty supply closet at a club and having sex in it.” As I said the words, I couldn’t help but reach under the table and touch his knee.
He grabbed my hand and pressed it to his thigh. His eyes were smoldering as he said, “What do you say we take the rest of our meals to go?”
“I’d like that.”
Five minutes later, we had the bill settled and to-go boxes in a bag. As we walked uphill toward my office building, Jamie’s hand roved over my back, once even dipping low to squeeze my ass.
In public. Oh, god, it was mortifying but at the same time thrilling. “Jamie,” I hissed.
He gave me a lazy grin. “Yeah?”
“What are you doing?”
“Claiming your ass.”
My cheeks were flushed with heat.
“I parked in this garage over here,” he said, pointing to a tall, concrete structure. “Walk me to my car?”
We both knew that walk me to my car, in this case, meant, come have sex with me in my car, and as crazy and impulsive and completely nuts as it sounded, I wanted to. I wanted this more than anything.
“Yeah,” I said. “Let’s go.”
Once inside the garage, he motioned that I should get in the passenger’s seat of his Porsche. I climbed in, not sure what we were doing.
“Just want to move the car,” he said. His hand was hot and heavy on my knee, inching upward. “Take off your pants.”
“I—” It was in my head that I should protest, but honestly, I didn’t want to. Without another word, I slipped off my shoes and shimmied out of my leggings. As soon as my thighs were bare, his hand was back, touching my skin, trailing insane little circles around. Every touch was a pulse of electricity, heating me more thoroughly than ever before.
I could barely concentrate on where we were going, but it seemed like just as he’d gotten the car moving, we stopped again. I looked around. We hadn’t left the parking garage, but he’d parked us on one of the upper levels, which was empty on a Monday afternoon—everyone extending their weekend, it seemed.
Jamie leaned across the seats and touched my cheek, my jaw. “You’re irresistible, Liz.”
And then his mouth was on mine, our lips pressing together hungrily. He worked his hand up inside my shirt and found my nipples through my bra. My head fell back against the seat, and I moaned.
He pulled back, unbuttoned his pants. He lifted himself up slightly, just enough that he could pull them down so they hit midway on his thigh. Then he reached across me and found a condom in the glove compartment. “Come over here,” he said. “Let’s have a replay of the last time we were in this car together.”
“I’m worried people will see.”
“There’s no one around,” he said, putting on the condom.
Feeling self-conscious that anyone could walk through this parking garage, at any second, I clambered over the seat until I straddled him. This was nuts. I was nuts. He thought I was irresistible, but here he had me doing something totally crazy, because I couldn’t keep my body away from his.
His cock was right there, waiting for me, so I lowered myself onto it. I had to stretch to accommodate him, but I was so wet there wasn’t even a twinge of discomfort. Then I lifted up, wanting more of the delicious friction that I could only get from having him inside me. He grabbed my hips, yanking me down again.
“Yes,” I said, “that’s perfect.”
We fell into a rhythm until I was panting, gasping, barely able to breathe because the pleasure was spiraling through me so completely. We came together, and ended it with a lazy kiss.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do with you,” he murmured, stroking my back, “but I hope it’s more of this.”