Waiting For It

by Allyson Lindt

  “Brilliant. If I’d know I had magic lips, I’d have done— Brilliant.”

  My cheeks were burning again, but not from desire this time. Done that sooner. I knew what he wanted to say, because I was itching to joke that, if your kisses come with programmer mojo, we need to do that more often.

  Not an option. I needed to relegate tonight’s make-out session to storage, no matter how incredibly delicious and tempting his kisses were... How much I’d enjoyed his hands roaming my body—

  “I’ll get my team started on this in the morning. Which means we’re done for the night.” My words tumbled out in a rush.

  “Smart thinking. We both need sleep.” Was he looking at me funny? I couldn’t bear to check. “Good work today.” His tone was strained.

  You too. You’re an amazing kisser. “Thanks.”

  “Walk you to your car?”

  “Sure.” I had to accept. We always walked out to the parking lot together during late nights. He insisted it was to keep me safe, and I liked the idea of him looking out for me.

  I grabbed my laptop—not that I would do any work between tonight and tomorrow morning, but just in case—and waited for Luke at the elevator.

  The silence we rode downstairs in was deafening.

  As we stepped into the parking garage, he coughed to clear his throat. “Anne...”

  “Yeah?” I didn’t pause in my stride or look at him. I couldn’t.

  He loosely grabbed my wrist, and a fresh shock of desire sped through me as he spun me to face him. “I don’t regret what happened up there. I probably should, but I’m not sorry for kissing you.”

  “Okay.” So not intelligent. “Me too.” Only mildly better.

  The corners of his mouth tugged up. His half-smile was as sexy as everything else he did. “But you’re also one of the best employees I’ve ever had. And I’m not saying that because you’ve got incredible lips. You’re one of my best hiring decisions.”

  “Thank you. I like working for you too. You’re a good boss.” The praise flushed me, but I could focus on the work parts of it and become a functionally vocal person again. I tugged free from his grip and kept walking. “Which is why I’m glad we stopped.”

  “Sure.” He didn’t sound convinced. “But it doesn’t change anything else between us. I can’t have this awkwardness. We need to be all right.”

  Easier said than done. “We’re fine.”

  “Anne?” The I call bullshit was clear in his tone.

  I should have assured him with more conviction.

  We reached my car. I was both grateful and disappointed for the excuse to cut the conversation short. “We’ll be fine. I just need some sleep.”

  “Okay. ’Night Anne.”

  I gave him one last glance. The lighting down here was harsh—bright in some spots, dark in others to cast deep shadows, and a nasty shade of yellow—but he still looked amazing. Sympathetic, concerned, and fuckable, all at the same time.

  “Night,” I said.

  As soon as I hit the main road, I cranked my radio and cracked my window to let the cold air hit my face.

  None of it erased the repeat in my head. The memory of making out with Luke like we were horny teenagers alternated between ending the way it had in his office and continuing as though we hadn’t been interrupted.

  By the time I got home, my body was on fire with fantasy fed by memory.

  I made it inside, and locked the door behind me. I’d purchased it when I started making good money, right as the market crashed, because I’d been convinced property was a good investment. Turned out my ex just wanted a bigger place I was paying for and he was crashing in.

  . There were days when living in this big a house by myself felt lonely. Tonight I didn’t mind the rambling house. The solitude meant I didn’t have to worry about anyone walking in on me.

  Sparks of desire danced under my skin, prompted by the images in my head of Luke gliding his palm up my chest, to tease me through my bra. My nipples, still rock hard, strained against cotton, begging for attention.

  I dropped my laptop by the front door and stripped off my shirt, letting my hands roam where Luke’s did in my head. To tug down the cups of my bra and free my breasts. To knead, and pinch and tug.

  The pleasure that spilled through me was different than me just feeling myself up. It was fueled by whispers of him. What if he’d come home with me?

  I backed myself to the wall at the fantasy of both of us being too eager to wait.

  He’d press into my body again, him dressed, me half-stripped down. Would he be gentle? God, I hoped not.

  I swore I could feel his hungry kisses, devouring me. Gliding down my neck. Alternating with playful nips and the occasional hard bite. Sucking on my nipples until I squirmed at the attention.

  In my mind, we fumbled with each other’s zipper, not wanting to break away from the kissing and exploration to give the task proper attention. In reality, I’d have to undo my own jeans.

  When I wrapped my fingers around his shaft, his groan echoed in my ear. It was the kind of sound that said, I’m tired of ignoring this.

  He’d shove my bottoms down as far as possible without breaking any other contact, and dip his fingers between my legs.

  I mimicked the motion, and my body jerked at the new touch. I’d prefer his hand, but wrapped in fantasy, mine would do. I was already wet and slick, thanks to a night of better-than-should-be-allowed making out.

  In my head, we were impatient. There was no more time for seduction. I stroked along my slit, dipping near my opening and then away, the way I wanted him to. My senses were screaming for relief, and my breath came in short gasps.

  I honed in on my clit, sliding my fingers on either side and stroking. Orgasm built inside but didn’t grant me relief.

  Was I whimpering out loud?

  I worked myself harder. Faster. The images in my head bled into the physical, until everything was a blur, except the sharp, disparate focus of my need.

  Come for me, Anne. I swore I heard his voice in my ear and felt the playful sting of teeth biting the lobe.

  Climax spilled through me, yanking a cry from my throat and shuddering over me.

  I kept up the frantic self-attention until I was too sensitive and jerking away from my own touch.

  Another gasp escaped when I rested fully against the wall. My legs were wobbly. I bet they’d be more so if Luke was here.

  I sank to the ground, and the cold entryway tile bit into my ass.

  I’d never dared entertain these thoughts before. Not consciously. Sure, my dreams betrayed me sometimes, and Luke visited me in them. But letting myself think about being with him gave the idea more shape and weight than it should have.

  Heat still flooded me. I’d linger in the afterglow a little longer.

  And hope post-coital bliss numbed the pit in my heart that reminded me this could only ever be a dream.

  Chapter Three

  Hangovers had never been an issue for me. I could hold my liquor with the best of them, and had drunk my friends under the table more than once.

  But as I got ready for work, my eyes burned in protest of being open, my skull throbbed, and my mouth felt like I’d slept with cotton stuffed in it. I could stand to sleep for another fifty years.

  Which meant never seeing my friends again. And surrendering my dream of moving into a Director position similar to Luke’s. That would suck. It also meant not working with Luke anymore. That would save me a lot of awkwardness... but it would also suck.

  I shook aside the darkish gray thoughts and got ready for work. I wasn’t running late according to office time, but I was for me. I liked to get there by seven thirty, because it gave me time to settle into the day before anyone else showed up.

  Was last night a mistake? Obvious answer was yes, but every time I brushed something across my lips—my fingers, the toothbrush, lip gloss—I swore I still felt Luke. And now we could never do that again.

  Was it really better t
o have made out and lost than never to have made out at all?

  Depended on how the next few weeks of fumbling through, pretending nothing happened, went.

  That should have been the last of those thoughts, but no, variations on the same repeated my entire drive to work, and when I settled into my desk, I was treated to the sequel.

  No new email should have come in between last night and this morning, so I let my computer load while I went to fetch coffee from the break room. If I ventured to the cafeteria downstairs, I could get extra espresso and more sugar than should be possible in a single drink, but that meant facing other people. I wasn’t quite ready for that yet.

  When I got back to my desk, there was an email from Luke. Just his name made my heart do a funny dance, set to the Final Fantasy battle music. I needed to get that under control. How long could I hide in my office before anyone wanted face-to-face interaction?

  According to Luke’s email, another thirty-seven minutes. Mandatory team meeting. Bullpen. 8:30.

  Hurrah.

  There was another email from Mike, my counterpart in our Sacramento office. I didn’t always care for him, but I respected his work ethic, considering it was an hour earlier there.

  You didn’t get those files delivered that you promised. Waiting since last week.

  Yeah, I didn’t care for him at all, especially since he’d copied Luke in a way that felt like I’m telling the boss on you.

  I forwarded him the message in question, that I’d sent when I said I would, with my nauseatingly polite Here you go. You must have missed this.

  His reply came in seconds later. I didn’t miss it. You didn’t send it before.

  I bit the inside of my cheek. If I didn’t have proof, I might believe him that I hadn’t done it. That I remembered wrong. Thank God for Sent Mail history.

  As people trickled in for the day, some of them waving as they passed my open office door, and others engrossed in their phones, I had zero focus.

  Get it under control, me. I have work to do.

  At 8:24, Chase knocked on my door. “Any idea what this is about?” he asked.

  “Nope.”

  “Interesting. Let’s go find out.” He gestured toward the Bullpen.

  Chase was Sadie’s older brother, and by proxy as good as my stepbrother—the sexy kind of stepbrother, people wrote romance novels about. If I hadn’t basically grown up in their house, I’d let myself pay more attention to how attractive he was. Dark hair, the same pale-blue eyes Sadie had, and the perfect amount of muscle in his arms to dip a girl and kiss her.

  I might be fooling everyone else, but I couldn’t lie to myself. I knew exactly how sexy Chase was, and unlike with Luke, I didn’t pretend the fantasies didn’t exist. I’d been daydreaming about Chase longer than I understood what the pulsing need between my thighs meant, when I thought about him kissing me.

  And now last night with Luke was back in my head, overlapping my Chase repository like a scorching double exposure.

  I gently tucked it all aside and fell into step beside Chase. He worked in Sales, not Development, but he was part of our team because he’d sold merchandising rights to several companies, for the game we were currently behind on. He had as much of a stake in the game hitting market as any of us did.

  We took a spot near the front of the area we called Bullpen. It was an empty space amid the cubicles, near the windows, where we would set up gaming parties, pizza days, or whatever required a little extra space.

  Including stand-up meetings.

  “Where’s the boss?” Chase whispered, when the clock ticked past 8:30.

  I shrugged. Good question. Luke was never late.

  When he finally stepped in front of the group a couple minutes later, his brow was pinched and his lips drawn in a thin line. A smile flickered across his face when he glanced at me.

  My stomach did little a series of little flip flops.

  “Someone looks like they’ve been force fed shit this morning,” Chase muttered.

  Luke’s glare said Chase hadn’t been as quiet as he’d intended.

  “Sorry for being late. I was talking to Zach.” Luke’s voice carried across the room without a problem, and all the chatter stopped. Zach was one of the two company owners, and not the one who usually dealt with developers. If he was taking up Luke’s time, odds were it included bad news.

  “This won’t take long,” Luke said. “You know I’m always as direct with you as I can be. Full transparency and all that.”

  And now the flips in my stomach had turned into gnawing edges of tension. Something was wrong, and Luke hadn’t been able to stop it. I rarely saw him like this, but when I did, he never had good news.

  He always went to bat for us with management, but some things couldn’t be diminished or erased. How badly this launch had gone, for instance.

  Luke scrubbed his face. “I know crunch has been hard on everyone, but I have to ask you to hold on a little longer.”

  In the history of the company, this was the first time employees had been asked to do something like put in sixty- to eighty-hour weeks, for months on end, to meet a deadline. In the past, a couple of days at a time or an extra weekend here and there was the most anyone saw. The overtime was voluntary and paid, but our team was so invested in this game, we’d all agreed.

  Rinslet was careful with their launch dates. They never made one public until they were ready to release, because they refused to miss a launch. This game was done six months ago. Everyone had signed off, alpha and beta tests were solid, and we were ready to go. And then everything fell apart. QA started failing. User acceptance testing. They were minor issues at first, but with each problem we fixed, more of the game broke.

  Chase raised his hand. Which—okay? This wasn’t that kind of an environment, and he’d never been a wait for my turn to talk kind of person.

  I didn’t think it was possible, but Luke’s expression grew darker. “Hughes.”

  “Your people are the best”—Chase nudged me lightly—“but my programming skills aren’t going to make anything better for anyone. What do you need me to do?”

  Sell the big bosses on going easy on us?

  Luke sighed. “That’s where full transparency comes in. Management is watching us closely. If we don’t get this right, other people may be brought in to help.”

  “And that’s... bad?” I could spin up another dozen developers in a day, and more staff would be wonderful.

  Chase tensed. I actually felt the slight tremor where his arm rested against mine. “Help to fill the gap left by anyone who won’t be here.”

  A wave of murmurs rolled through the room. Rinslet was going to fire people if we didn’t pull this off. Most likely starting with Luke and me, since we were overseeing development.

  “Are you threatening us?” someone else asked.

  Luke shook his head. “No. I’m telling you the way things are. I can’t guarantee jobs—yours, mine, anyone’s—if we miss this new deadline.”

  Here in Salt Lake City, there were only two big game developers—Rinslet and Digital Media—and working for DM meant full-time crunch and a lot less understanding from management.

  I didn’t want to find a new job. I liked working here. With good bosses and great benefits. With Luke. With Chase.

  Losing my job was definitely more terrifying than whether or not I had someone fun and sexy to watch during meetings.

  My lips tingled with a ghost of a memory of Luke’s kisses and the intensity in his. It was going to take a while to pretend I didn’t want that again.

  “I have faith in you guys.” The strength and confidence were back in Luke’s voice. “You’re going to rock this release. Back to work, and remember to clock all overtime.”

  The meeting broke up, and I headed back to my office, Chase walking next to me.

  “I’m guessing this means you don’t have time for lunch,” he said.

  I gave him a look I hoped properly conveyed are you fucking kidding me? I
was considering tossing a cot in the corner, so I didn’t have to waste time commuting. Going out to lunch was a luxury I couldn’t afford.

  He gave me a dry half-smile. “I’ll bring you some General Tsao’s?”

  “That would be amazing.” I’d made him grovel for what he did to Sadie, but she’d forgiven him and so did I. Which was good, because I hated being mad at him.

  He squeezed my arm. “See you in a few hours. You’ve got this.”

  What would it be like, to have as much faith in our ability to deliver as Chase and Luke seemed to?

  He left, and I dove back into work. I shut out the rest of the world and focused on code. We’d moved past the fingers flying over keys stage, and were in the stare at the screen and see why things were breaking point.

  A knock on my door startled me. I looked up, to see Chase holding a bag from our favorite Chinese place.

  “Sorry I’m late.” He crossed the room to hand me the food.

  I glanced at my clock. Almost one-thirty. Talk about losing track of time. My stomach grumbled at the scent of food. “I didn’t notice, so no worries” I took the bag, resisting the urge to tear into it and eat like an animal. I shouldn’t have skipped breakfast. “You’re the best. Thank you.”

  “Anytime. Really. You want dinner, too?”

  “We’re having pizza brought in.” Luke’s comment made me jump for the second time in as many minutes. He stepped into my office. “I need to talk to you for a minute.”

  I swore I could smell his cologne from here. I couldn’t really, but my brain was bent on convincing me otherwise. My thoughts ran rampant with memories, and my skin heated everywhere he’d touched last night.

  I wasn’t ready for one-on-one time in a closed space. Not yet. How were we supposed to pretend nothing had happened?

  Chapter Four

  I nodded at Chase, to imply I was in the middle of another conversation. “Can it wait just a few?”

  “It won’t take long, and it’s not top secret or anything. He can stay if he wants.”

  Was it weird that Luke wouldn’t look directly at Chase, or was I searching for a distraction, outside of the way my body was screaming to be closer to Luke?