by Baron Sord
“You’re an artist too?” Stazia giggled.
“What do you mean too?”
She thought, And a stud? “Um, I mean, an artist and a software guy.”
“Yeah,” I said. “It’s kind of a hobby.” I wasn’t going to tell her I dreamed of quitting YouDoIt so I could draw comics for a living. I wouldn’t want it getting back to Sanjay. I needed to keep my job at YouDoIt for the foreseeable future.
“Can I see?” Stazia asked.
“Sure.” I reluctantly handed her the drawings of Lady Liberty.
Stazia set her phone and car keys on my bed before paging through the drawings slowly, her eyes roaming appreciatively over my artwork. “Wow, Doug. You’re really good.”
“Thanks,” I said half-heartedly. Good was a gross overstatement. Adequate was more accurate.
“No, I mean it! What are you doing working at YouDoIt?”
“It pays the bills.”
“What are all these?” She looked at my bookcase full of graphic novels and trade-paperbacks.
“Superhero comics,” I said, waiting for her to call them cartoon kid things like Pinstripe had, or tell me I needed to focus on becoming the CEO of YouDoIt like Vanessa had thought but not said aloud.
She laughed, “You really like comic books, don’t you?”
“Yeah, so? I like to draw them. Is that a crime?” I was feeling a trifle defensive. I couldn’t help it. Everything about Stazia screamed high school cheerleader and everything about me — except my looks — screamed eternal nerd.
She said, “I took art class in high school but I wasn’t very good. Can you teach me? I always wanted to learn how to draw better.” She ran her hands down her hips again, shimmied, and smiled up at me.
This time, I didn’t look at her cleavage. I searched her emerald eyes and said, “Really? You want to learn more about drawing? Now?”
“Uh huh,” she nodded. Anything to stop me from tearing my clothes off and jumping into bed with you. “Show me. I mean, if you don’t mind.”
“Why not?” I pulled out my drafting chair and set her down in it. Pulled out a clean sheet of printer paper from the stack on my bookcase and handed her a pencil. Knelt next to her because I didn’t have another chair. “Uh, what can you draw?”
She shrugged, “Stick figures, I guess. Flowers. Animals. I used to draw horses all the time when I was little.”
“Can you draw a horse now?” I wanted to see how much she knew. I didn’t want to show her something too far beyond her current drawing skills.
“I’m so out of practice,” she said. He’s so good. I don’t want him thinking I’m faking.
“How about something easier? Can you draw a stick figure princess?”
“Oh, that’s easy,” she said confidently. A few minutes later, she had drawn a decent picture of a princess. “How’s that?”
“Better than a stick figure,” I chuckled. It really was. “How much art did you take?”
“Two semesters,” she said. “But that was like, forever ago.”
“Doesn’t look like it to me,” I grinned. “Maybe I should have you teach me.”
“Shut up,” she laughed and leaned into me. “Show me something. Teach me something I don’t know.”
“What do you know about perspective?”
“Is that the thing with vanishing points?”
“Actually, yeah,” I smiled, impressed.
“Oh, I was terrible at that.”
“It’s not as hard as everyone thinks.”
“I doubt that,” she purred.
She was right.
I was hard as a fricking rock.
Stazia was a knockout, she smelled like heaven, and she had given me a picture of her boobs less than two hours ago. Here she was in my fricking bedroom asking for drawing lessons? I couldn’t believe any of this was happening. It was statistically too good to be true. Too many facts about Stunning Stazia were just right. Too right.
There had to be a catch.
Had to be.
Without thinking, I blurted, “Are you a stripper?”
“What?!” she laughed. It was unclear if she was amused or annoyed. Possibly both. She folded her arms protectively across her chest and frowned. Definitely annoyed now.
I instantly grimaced, “Forget I asked. Forget I said anything.” I had just ruined my chances with her and I knew it.
Stazia rolled her eyes in disgust, “Did you hear that at work?” She was practically scowling.
Fuck. There went my chances with Stunning Stazia. Easy come, easy go, right? It had taken me less than 30 minutes to screw up the good thing we had going. Turned out 30 days of having beautiful women throw themselves at you wasn’t enough to overcome your nerdy inexperience with dating. Maybe after another 3 years, I might figure out how to not act like a dork. No, it would take at least 30 years. If I was lucky.
Stazia pursed her lips in irritation, “Well?”
Not wanting to look at her, I hung my head, “Yeah, I heard it at work.”
“Ugh. I told you that place is a gossip factory.”
“I don’t care if you are. I mean it.”
Lady Liberty was a stripper. I didn’t care if Stazia was one too.
“I’m not a stripper,” Stazia sighed. “People have been saying that since I started at YouDoIt.”
“You’re not?” I was surprised.
Clearly offended, she said, “Is it that hard to believe, Doug?”
“Not at all.”
“It’s okay, you can say it. Everyone else does. The blonde with the big boobs is a slut. I’ve been hearing it since middle school. Well guess what. Stazia Wilcox isn’t a slut!” She scowled and shook her head, “I really need to change my last name.”
Without warning, I snorted a laugh.
She whacked my arm. “You try living with my last name and these boobs! It’s such a pain!”
“Is it really your last name?” I asked tentatively, not sure if I should, but unable to resist.
“Yes!” she whacked my arm again. “I never heard the end of it in high school!” She said in a snide voice, “Boys were always like, I will suck your cox if you suck mine! They were always saying that like it was the funniest thing ever! News flash! It’s not!” She broke into easy laughter.
“I would never ask you to suck my cox,” I snickered. “I only have one.”
“Would you stop?!” She was still laughing, but she whacked my arm again.
“I’m serious! I don’t have multiple cox! I have one mammoth megayacht!”
Her eyes lit up with pure joy and she laughed like candy, “I can’t believe you said that to that guy!”
“It seemed like the right thing at the time,” I grinned.
“You’re too much, Doug Moore.”
“Hey, how do you know my last name?”
“You told me, silly.”
“I did?”
“Yeah, when I gave you the… you know.”
I shook my head, “I can’t believe you did that. Are those your boobs, or just a picture you found on the internet?”
“They’re totally mine! Can’t you tell?!”
“No! I’ve never seen them before!” I laughed. “When did you… photocopy them?”
“Today at work,” she said, blushing beet red.
“Really?”
“I know, I know! It’s crazy! I don’t know what I was thinking! I almost got caught in the copy room when I did it! Good thing I had the door locked! Doug, I can’t stop thinking about you! I’ve been obsessing over you since I first saw you two weeks ago!”
“You have?” I couldn’t believe it. Neither could my dick, which was twitching in surprise every time she laughed at whatever I said.
“Obviously! Why else do you think I invited you to lunch today?!”
My looks, obviously. Was I offended that Stazia was in my house solely because of my super-powered and possibly fleeting looks? Not at all. Everything about this felt right. But I still couldn’t believe it.
I said, “So you don’t strip?”
She smirked, “Hell no! It’s degrading. I don’t care what women say about paying their college tuition. I would never do it. My body is my body! I’d rather do sales.” Her emerald eyes searched mine and she thought, Most of all, I’d like to do you…
I was right there with her.
For me, things had never gone so easily with a woman in my entire life. Not even with the ones I had slept with like my ex French Gigi. As Arnold liked to call her, Sleazy Gigi, a title she had earned not because of her bedroom skills but because she had never mentioned to me that she had a second boyfriend the entire time she was dating me, some French douche named Jean who lived in Paris. Admittedly, I didn’t know the first thing about Jean. Maybe he didn’t know the first thing about me, and maybe he wasn’t a douche. But Gigi was. A used douche, if you asked Arnold.
With Stazia, the most amazing aspect was the fact I wasn’t even trying, yet she liked me — unlike Lady Liberty. Nor had I murdered someone in front of Stazia, which had prevented anything from developing between me and Brianna after I had killed her insane neighbor Karambit Kayhill. Best of all, Stazia didn’t want to prosecute me like Justine Escala would if she ever found out the truth.
That said, I wasn’t sure how Stazia would feel about me if she ever found out my kill count. Four. Ice Statue Sully, Kayhill, Sumo Miguel, and his brother Golden Grill Javier. Man, that was a conversation I was not looking forward to having with anyone, least of all Stazia. Heck, not even Arnold knew about Miguel and Javier. I wasn’t in any hurry to tell him either.
Stazia gave me a flirty look, her lips glistening, and thought, Kiss me already.
I was still kneeling on the floor next to where she sat at my drafting table. I was about to lean in and kiss her, but I hesitated because I kept seeing Javier’s gold teeth flashing in my mind’s eye.
Bzzz! Bzzz! Bzzz!
“Sorry, my phone,” Stazia said. “That’s work.” She turned to the bed where her phone sat on the blanket with her keys. “Can you hand me that? I need to check it.”
“Sure.” I twisted and grabbed it and handed it to her.
Her eyes flicked across the screen and widened in horror. “Oh shit! I totally forgot I have a client conference call back at the office at two! I have to go!” She shot to her feet and grabbed her keys from my bed like they were the keys to her chastity belt, which was now closed for business. “I have to go, Doug! You made me totally drop the ball! Shit, shit, shit!”
Talk about coitus disappointus.
I remained kneeling where I was on my carpet, wishing her phone hadn’t buzzed or I had heard her wrong. I said, “Are you sure?”
“Yes I’m sure! I’m going to get fired if I don’t make it!” She rushed out the door of the guest house.
I followed, slamming it shut behind me.
“Which way is it?!” She demanded in a panic, looking around the large yard.
I led her out the side gate to the sidewalk.
“Oh no! My car is back at Amante’s!” She looked up and down my street. “Where is it?! Shit, shit, shit!”
“This way,” I fast-walked down the sidewalk, leading the way.
“Wait up! I can’t walk that fast in these heels! Or this skirt!” She was panicking. Her face strained as she lifted one foot and started hopping while trying to unbuckle the strap on her heel. “I never should’ve done this!” she whimpered. “It’ll take forever to get to my car!”
“Not if I carry you.”
“Can you?” she said in desperation.
“Of course I can.” I bent down and literally swept her off her feet and into my arms. She was light as a feather.
“Oh!” she gasped.
Her cleavage was right under my nose.
I inhaled a slice of heaven and almost passed out with desire for this woman.
“Doug! I need to go!”
“Yeah, sorry.” I took off running up the street with her bouncing in my arms.
“Oh my God! How fast are you going?!”
“I don’t know,” I grunted, focused on running. We had to be going at least 15mph, maybe even 20. I wasn’t willing to go any faster. If I did, people might take notice and start asking questions, especially Stazia. It wasn’t prepared to tell her about being the Masked Jumper or Wildfire. I never did that on a first date. Ha ha.
Less than a minute later, we were back at Amante’s.
“I can’t believe we made it this fast!” she cheered.
“Where’s your car?!”
“That way!” she pointed, leading me around the corner to a racy red Ford Mustang GT that looked brand new and was parallel parked between several other cars. “That’s it! The red Mustang!” She pressed the button on her remote and the lights flashed.
I set her down on her heels in front of the driver’s door.
“I have to go,” she said as she opened the door, dropping her keys on the street. “Shit!” She bent down to get them.
I swooped down and picked them up faster than she could. “Here.”
“Thanks.” She took them and accidentally dropped her phone clattering to the pavement. “Ugh!”
Again, I grabbed it and handed it to her.
“You’re a lifesaver, Doug Moore.”
“That’s what I do,” I said with no hint of irony because it was the literal truth.
Frazzled, she looked around for a second and said, “What am I doing? Work! I have to go back to work!”
“Do you want me to drive? I wouldn’t want you getting in an accident.” Yes, I could predict the future when it came to distress calls, and normally I was constantly hearing them, but with Stazia swallowing my full attention, it was like they had stopped. They hadn’t, I had simply stopped noticing them because fricking Stunning Stazia was all over me. Merely talking to her made me forget my own name. Once she had started touching me with her boobs, she was the only thing I noticed.
Now, I tuned briefly into the morass of distress calls swirling in my mind, listening for anything that sounded like her getting in an accident. I didn’t hear anything specific to her, but that didn’t mean she was 100% safe. With the randomness inherent in distress call messages, I might not hear hers for five minutes or even ten. Or, I might hear it, but not realize it was her because the distress calls were often distorted, garbled, or echoey. There was no way to know if she was 100% safe unless I drove her.
I said, “I can drive you.”
“Maybe you better,” she said, handing me her keys. She swept her long blonde hair out of her face as she climbed out of the car.
I ran around and opened the passenger door for her.
“Such a gentleman,” she said and dropped into the seat.
I was so keyed up, I almost jumped over her car to get to the driver’s side faster, but stopped myself at the last second and went around like a normal person. Didn’t want her asking questions.
Once I was in the driver’s seat, I quickly adjusted the mirrors. “Where’s the start button?” I glanced around the dash.
“There!” she said, leaning over to press the red button near the automatic stick shift.
“Thanks.” I revved the engine and it thundered like a wild herd of stallions stampeding under the hood, hence its namesake.
After checking for traffic, I pulled the Mustang out of the space and sped toward the freeway. Once we were on the 163, I blasted north toward Serra Mesa at 90mph, weaving in and out of traffic like it was standing still.
Stazia’s Mustang hugged the road like it was on rails. It had hardly any body-sway as I cut from one lane to the next. I rarely had the opportunity to drive a car this nice, or go this fast. During distress calls, I almost always obeyed the speed limit lest the cops pull me over and delay me from saving someone’s life. Thankfully, my caution had yet to cost anyone their life or even result in an unnecessary injury.
Now, all I could think about was saving Stazia.
Damn right I threw caution to the wind.
/> My love life was on the line.
Meanwhile, Stazia was clutching her door handle and the center console with her manicured French nails like her life depended on it. She thought, I am so horny right now I can taste it! Doug is a stud! It’s like we’re in a race car movie! And the way he carried me?! Talk about hot! This man has muscles and then some!
I smirked to myself while focusing on the road and crossing my fingers that the officers of the CHP (California Highway Patrol) were too busy to notice me egregiously breaking the speed limit. The speedometer of the Mustang was hovering around 95, and getting dangerously close to 100. Getting a ticket now meant Stazia would be late and I would say goodbye to my driver’s license.
What can I say?
Stazia was worth the risk.
Minutes later, we pulled into the parking lot at YouDoIt.
“Oh my God!” Stazia cheered. “We made it!”
The clock on the dash read 1:56pm.
She said, “Can you just drop me off at the side door and park somewhere else?”
“Huh?”
“I don’t want anyone seeing us together! Gossip factory, remember?”
“Right,” I nodded.
She pointed a stern finger at me, “Don’t you tell anyone at work about our little lunch today, okay? People will talk.”
“Got it.” I said, driving around to the side door near shipping and receiving. I stopped the Mustang and put it in park, but left the engine idling. “What should I do with your car?”
“Drive it someplace? You figure it out! But don’t let anyone see you!” She opened her door.
I opened mine and said, “Let me get your door for you.”
She slammed her door shut. “No! Stay in the car!”
“Sorry.” I closed my door with a thunk. “Gossip, right?”
“Right.” She leaned over the center console and kissed me briefly on the lips, then wiped mine with her thumb. “Lipstick. I can’t thank you enough for this, Doug. I promise I’ll make it up to you later. I have to go!” She opened her door, jumped out, and slammed the door in my face.
I had never been more happy to have a woman slam a door in my face. Grinning from ear to ear, I drove slowly away.
