Technically Mine (Love, Emerson Book 2)

by Isabel North

  He scowled. If he even tried to give her that one, she’d refuse him, and he wasn’t sure he’d be able to stay civilized if she thwarted him again.

  Instead of calling his assistant, Daniel, and getting him to courier a state-of-the-art phone over to her straight away, Gabe trudged on until he reached an electronics store, where he bought the closest model to her infuriating flip phone he could find.

  Then he went back to the board meeting he’d walked out of when he’d gotten Nora’s email, and listened to Bill screeching about his bad manners and worse attitude, before suggesting Gabe do whatever it took to get his head in the right place to deal with Nebula and the millions of dollars the company had sunk into it before he pushed the entire production off schedule, a competitor beat them to market, and he went bankrupt, taking every last one of his employees with him.

  Gabe knew what he needed to bring his focus back online, but Nora was proving reluctant to play.

  And besides. He’d given up struggling over Nebula. He should have told Bill two months ago, but he hadn’t come to terms with it two months ago.

  He was starting to get there, but he wasn’t ready to take the necessary steps to begin implementation.

  Not yet.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Nora crammed in the last mouthful of her chicken sandwich dinner, and snatched open the door. She’d expected Anna.

  It wasn’t Anna.

  Gabe Sterling loomed in the doorway, hands shoved in his pockets, broad shoulders rounded and tight.

  He didn’t say anything, just waited for her to chew and swallow her food. Premature. The sandwich fought back. Waving him in, she rushed to wash it down with the glass of Diet Coke on the table by her plate.

  “I’m not staying,” Gabe said from the doorway.

  She was surprised he hadn’t ambled in and made himself at home on her couch by now.

  Pulling a hand out of his pocket, he held something out to her. “Got this for you.”

  Nora took it. “My cell phone.” She turned it over in astonishment. “You fixed it? You’re a wizard!”

  He gave her a revolted look. “I’m not a wizard. If anything, I’m a mage. A warrior mage. With a credit card. It’s a new phone.”

  “You don’t like wizards?”

  “At the risk of revealing myself, once again, to be out of step with the world, no. I fucking hate wizards.”

  “But you like mages?” Nora leaned against the doorjamb. “What’s the difference?”

  “Mages are badass. They don’t need wands.”

  “Do you want to come inside?”

  “Yeah.”

  Nora stepped back. Gabe remained in the doorway. “I thought you wanted to come in?” she said.

  “Want to. Not going to. I’m not good company right now.”

  “I’m guessing that this—” she tried to give him the phone back, “—isn’t going to improve your mood.”

  He watched her push the phone against his chest but made no move to take it.

  “I can’t let you give me expensive gifts,” Nora said. “No laptops. No cell phones.”

  Gabe wrapped his fingers around her wrist when she tried to slip it into his pocket. “Nora. It’s not a gift. It’s an apology. A replacement for the one I broke.”

  She opened her mouth to argue.

  “Don’t,” he growled. “Don’t argue with me. Not you, too.”

  “Okay.” She felt weird accepting it. Then again he probably felt weird for breaking her old phone in the first place.

  Gabe always threw off a huge amount of energy, the air snapping and crackling around him. Tonight, though, it felt different. It felt dangerous. Uncontained. Like a storm front spreading in.

  Sunshine wandered over to see who their visitor was, and leaned against Nora’s legs. Struck with an idea, Nora asked him, “Are you busy? Do you have an hour or so to spare?”

  “No.”

  “I’m going to pretend I heard yes.” She reached for the hooks behind the door and took down Sunshine’s leash. She held it out to him. “Do me a favor and take Sunshine for her evening walk?”

  Gabe took the leash and examined it. “Pink?” he said.

  “Sunshine likes pink.”

  “I don’t like pink.”

  Nora smiled up at him. “I don’t care. Are you taking her for a walk or not? Because she’s all excited now.” She crouched beside Sunshine, who was on her butt, sweeping the floor with her tail while her front paws shifted in a dance of glee. “Do you want Uncle Gabe to take you for a walk? Yes, you do. Don’t you? Yes, you do.”

  “I don’t like Uncle Gabe,” he said, looking down at them. “You can call me Daddy.”

  Nora shot him a narrow-eyed look. “You’d better be talking to the dog right now.”

  He grinned. “Are you coming with us?” He bent and clipped the leash to Sunshine’s collar. She jumped up and started bumping into his legs in an effort to get him out the door and on with the important business of walkies.

  “Can’t,” Nora said. “I’m busy. Which is why you showing up is great timing.”

  “Busy, huh?”

  No, but her going for a walk wasn’t the point.

  Lines of tension radiated from the corners of Gabe’s eyes, and his jaw was tight. His shoulders had loosened a fraction, but not enough. The grin had already faded.

  “Thanks for this,” she said. “See you later.” She pushed him out and shut the door on them.

  Gabe’s voice came through the wood. “Got any of those poop baggies?”

  Nora hauled the door open, thrust a couple of baggies at him, and shut it in his face again. “Bye.”

  They were gone an hour and a half, and by the time they got back, he’d relaxed. Not a whole lot, but he wasn’t humming with tension anymore. As she’d hoped, spending time with the peaceful Sunshine had evened him out.

  Her great idea had also backfired, because Sunshine was now the proud owner of a new and expensive dark brown leather leash and matching collar they had apparently driven off to the nearest pet megastore to buy.

  And Gabe informed her that he’d decided to rent her dog.

  “You can’t rent my dog,” she told him.

  He sucked in a breath and locked eyes with Sunshine. She gave a gentle woof. He screwed up his face and sighed in defeat. “You win. I’ll buy her off you.”

  Nora gaped at him. “No! She’s not for sale. And you can’t commit to a houseplant, remember?”

  “I know that. But if you won’t let me rent her, then I have to buy her.”

  “If you want a dog, adopt one of your own.”

  “I want this one. She gets me. Look.” He pointed down to where Sunshine had draped herself over his boots. “I think I’m ready to take a chance and make a commitment. I want your dog.”

  “No.”

  “I can convince you. I’m good at negotiating.”

  Nora had the idea that Gabe Sterling’s version of negotiating wasn’t like most people’s. She thought it would be less of a delicate give-and-take to reach mutual satisfaction, and more of a barbarian conqueror lays waste to his enemies and rides off into the wilderness with the spoils of war situation.

  “What are you thinking about, Nora?” Gabe’s eyes were on her face, fascinated.

  Her cheeks heated. No way was she going to tell him. “When I said you can’t rent her, I meant you don’t have to rent her. You can borrow her.”

  “Any time I want?”

  “Any time you want. As long as you look after her, and you give her back.”

  ~ ~ ~

  “Let me get this straight,” Anna said the next morning. “He shows up with a new cell phone…and somehow he leaves with your dog?”

  “He didn’t leave with Sunshine. I dropped her off at the warehouse this morning. He’s borrowing her.”

  Anna rifled through Nora’s purse and found her phone. “Yeah. Watch him. The dog is just the start. He’s going to take everything you’ve got, Nora, if you don’t set so
me boundaries.”

  “I’m not sure he recognizes boundaries.”

  “He’s the type of guy to go looking for boundaries, just for the fun of tearing them down. But that’s my humble opinion. What do I know?”

  “I don’t have to worry about him breaching my boundaries. No sparks, remember?”

  Anna rolled her eyes. “Whatever.” She waggled the phone at Nora. “I’m disappointed with this piece of crap. He couldn’t stretch for an iPhone?”

  “I don’t want an iPhone, and he didn’t break an iPhone. He said he got the closest he could to my old one, ‘to save my fussin’.”

  “Fussin’?”

  “That’s what he said.”

  Anna flipped the phone open. “He set himself as the wallpaper and the camera is filled with dick pics, am I right?”

  “Ew. No. He left the wallpaper on the factory setting. He did take some photos, though.” Nora waited to say the last bit until she’d taken the phone back.

  Anna squawked and swiped for it. “I want to see!”

  “They’re not dick pics.”

  The pictures had puzzled her, and she’d spent a good hour scrolling through them. She already knew she’d scroll through them a few more times.

  Few hundred.

  “What are they pictures of, then?” Anna asked.

  Nora blushed. “Kittens.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah. Funny internet cat photos. Kittens.”

  “He filled the camera roll with photos of kittens.”

  “I think it’s a joke.”

  He hadn’t filled it. There were only a few photos, and they weren’t of kittens. They were of his tattoos.

  Nora didn’t quite understand the meaning behind the photos. She didn’t know if there even was any meaning, beyond the fact he knew his tats knocked her stupid. She hadn’t asked him, and she had no plans to.

  She also had no plans to delete them. She’d learned that particular lesson.

  Whatever was going on in Gabe’s life that was stressing him out, he seemed to be getting it under control. That, or hanging out with Sunshine was as effective for his stress-management as Nora had hoped.

  He had Sunshine with him at his office every day for a full week, and apart from when Nora dropped her off at his warehouse in the morning and Gabe dropped her back at Nora’s apartment in the evening, she didn’t see much of him.

  He must have been serious when he’d said there were no sparks between them.

  Which made it all the more unfortunate that the fire he’d lit inside her kept on raging.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Nora stood outside the Sterling Tech building. Holy crap.

  Fancy.

  Nope. Not the right word.

  Daunting. Predatory. Those words fit.

  It was a symphony of steel and glass, with angles that cut against the sky and dominated the entire area while standing aloof.

  Somewhere in there, Gabe was holding her dog hostage.

  Nora marched on in and headed for the front desk, making a deliberate effort not to curl her shoulders in a protective hunch as her boot heels clipped over the marble floor. The security guard, unsmiling, watched her approach.

  Halfway there, Nora paused to gawk at the stunning sculpture that hulked in the central atrium. It was a complicated, threatening twist of black and silver and gold metal. Some of the metal caught and viciously threw back the atrium’s light; other sections were highly textured with deep scores and gouges, and seemed to drink the light down. The sculpture made her think of a dragon and a tree at the same time. The hair on her arms lifted and her muscles tensed as she stared at it. She had the ridiculous thought that the thing…whatever it was…could come alive at any minute, and swallow her whole.

  “Can I help you, ma’am?”

  Nora jumped. The guard had come out from behind his desk without her noticing, and now stood at her elbow. She tore her eyes from the sculpture, careful to keep it in her peripheral vision as she said, “I’m here to see Mr. Sterling. I don’t have an appointment, but—”

  “That’s all right, Ms. Bowman. You can go right on up.”

  “How do you know who I am?”

  “You’re on the list.”

  What list?

  “Follow me, please.” The guard led her to the elevator and stood aside, ushering her in. “Top button for the penthouse,” he said, pointing.

  “Is that where his office is?”

  “His apartment.”

  Nora had an idea of exactly what list she was on. “I’m not here to go to his apartment,” she said frostily.

  “My mistake. Office is the floor below.” He flashed her a wink, leaned his upper body in to press the button, and withdrew.

  The ride was so smooth Nora didn’t realize the elevator had even moved until the doors binged open onto a supervillain’s lair.

  At least, that’s what it looked like, at first glance. Must have been all the chrome and the black marble.

  Nora hesitated but when the elevator doors started to close again, she scurried out. She stood for a good minute wondering how the hell she was going to find Sunshine before someone spotted her.

  Bill the angry lawyer strode past, did a double take while still walking, and came to an abrupt stop. He spun on a heel and surveyed her from head to toe in a way that had her clenching her fists and lifting her chin, then he sighed. “Great. Since you’re here, come with me. Let’s do this.”

  “I’m very well, thank you, Bill,” she said. “And how are you?”

  “Too busy for polite nonsense,” he shot over his shoulder, checking to see she was following.

  He did not, as Nora had expected, take her to Gabe. Instead she found herself in a cavernous conference room.

  She gazed around. Or maybe this was where the League of Evil convened.

  She shaded her eyes against the glaring blue-white lights and took in the enormous stone conference table with intricate metal inlay. Or performed their human sacrifices to the mighty gods of capitalism.

  Bill waited at the head of the table, gesturing her to take a seat. “Ms. Bowman, we have a problem.”

  Perching on the edge of a chair, she clasped her hands in her lap and fought the feeling she was about to be suspended by the principal. “Nora,” she said. “Just Nora’s fine.”

  “Nora.” He inclined his head as he sat. “Sterling’s going to throttle me if he finds out I’m interfering with whatever perverted little mating dance he’s doing for you, but there’s a whole lot more at stake here than his sex life.”

  Mating dance?

  “Things are on a knife edge at the company,” Bill continued. “You’re distracting him.”

  “Are you sure it’s not all the chrome that’s distracting him?” Nora waved a hand around. “He says he doesn’t like it, but he does seem to like shiny things, and there are a lot of reflective surfaces in here. A lot.”

  Bill laughed, then looked annoyed with himself. “While it was nice of you to give him the dog—”

  “I didn’t give him the dog. She’s my dog. He’s borrowing her for stress relief.”

  Bill jabbed the table with an index finger. “There’s the problem, right there. I need him stressed.”

  She frowned. “That doesn’t sound like something a friend would want. I thought you guys were friends. Didn’t you get tattoos together?”

  Bill’s nostrils flared and he blanked her tattoo comment. “Gabriel has a project he’s supposed to be working on. I’ve watched him for years, and I know how he does it. How he does his best stuff. He’s got a genius-level IQ, did you know that?”

  “I can’t say it ever came up in conversation.”

  “He’s an odd one, and—”

  “He’s not odd!” Nora said. “He’s lovely.”

  Bill snapped his mouth shut, leaned back in the chair, and steepled his fingers. “I’ve never heard anyone describe Gabriel as lovely before.”

  Because only a giant dork would say somethi
ng that stupid about a guy like him.

  Nora willed her blush to die down, and glared at Bill. “He’s not odd. He’s different. There’s nothing wrong with being different.”

  “This is how it goes, Nora. Gabriel gets an idea to write code, or he comes up with a program, or creates some piece of tech. He fixates on it. Lives and breathes it. I’m not gonna lie, it’s eerie to witness. Nothing exists for him except the work, and that’s the way it is, until the day he walks in and presents the board with something that will pull in billions of dollars of revenue and keep this company running for the next century.”

  “I don’t see what any of this has to do with me.”

  “The way his brain processes the world? I think it’s a constant noise for him. It must be like he’s living in the middle of the loudest rock concert you can imagine. It’s why he has such difficulty focusing. But when one of those ideas gets loud enough to catch his attention and he attaches, he’s gone. He’s in another dimension.”

  “I still don’t understand what it has to do with me,” Nora said.

  “You’re pulling his focus to yourself, and it needs to be on the Nebula project. He can’t give it everything with you hanging around in his life, competing.”

  “I’m not competing. And I’m not hanging around, either! I’m his interior designer’s assistant.”

  “Gabriel is not focusing on work. He’s focusing on you. He can’t build up to the state he needs to be in to create the next product, because you’re chilling him out by giving him a dog.” Bill’s voice rose. It wasn’t quite a yell, but it wasn’t far off.

  “I already told you, I didn’t give him the dog! Sunshine is mine.”

  “It is vital that we’re on the same page, Nora. There are a lot of people working in this office. If Sterling doesn’t pull his head out of his ass, their jobs are at stake. He has three more buildings like this one. All filled with people whose jobs are at stake.”

  “We’re not on the same page. We’re not even in the same library. I have no idea what you’re saying to me.”

  Bill slid a finger under his collar and tugged it away from his neck. “I’m worried about him. I’m looking around, trying to work out what went wrong, and the only change in his life I can pinpoint is you.”