“I almost want to see you say that to her, but I’m pretty sure she’d kick your ass.”
“Eat.” He picked up her pizza and held it for her.
“You are not feeding me.”
“Eat.”
“I’m a grown ass woman, I can feed myself.”
“Eat.”
“Are you trying to fatten me up? Is this something you’re into?”
“No.” Again he laughed, one hand stroking her back. “I’m into you if it counts. And if you’re hungry—eat.”
“Fine.” She took the pizza and bit off a mouthful. Deep down the warm fuzzies were swarming.
This time he let her wiggle off his lap. They stopped talking long enough to stuff their faces. By the time she wiped her fingers clean, her cell phone timer was going off.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“Kitten clock.”
She scooped up the empty plates and tray, carrying them back into the kitchen. Raul’s feet slapped on the floor, following close behind her. They tiptoed to the kitten nest and peered inside.
“Look! Look!” She smacked his arm in her excitement.
“I see.” He wrapped his arms around her. “I think Lola is giving us the stink eye.”
“But, Runty is in there!”
She was beyond thrilled to see the tiny kitten suckling along with his brothers and sisters. She’d bottle feed the baby for weeks if she had to, but knowing he was strong enough to fend for himself was even better.
“Let’s leave them alone.” Raul squeezed her, his head tucked into the curve of her neck.
“I know. It’s just so cool.”
“It is. Shit. It’s getting late.”
She glanced up at the digital clock under the TV.
“I guess I’d better go,” Raul said slowly.
Oh please, he did not want to go any more than she wanted him to go. He was totally giving her the opportunity to kick him out the door. It was cute, in an eye rolling, yeah right, sort of way. Besides, she hadn’t even gotten to the good part where she showed him her non-sexy ideas for a business strategy.
“You can go—or you can crash here and in the morning we can see who’s the better gamer.” She turned, looping her arms around his neck. “Your call.”
“I am off all weekend...” He slid his hands down her arms, over her shoulders to her back.
“So—yes?”
She had the fleeting impression something was up by the way he grinned.
Just what the heck—
Raul bent and grabbed her around the thighs, standing and lifting her all at once until she was folded over his shoulder. She yelped, scrambling to grab hold of something, except he was still naked as the day he was born.
“Raul! Put me down,” she howled.
“Nope.” He smacked her bare bottom with his palm, not hard, but the sound of it still startled her.
“Not funny.” She grabbed his ass, except the muscles were so firm there wasn’t hardly anything to grab hold of.
Raul flipped the lights off before carrying her back to the bedroom. He didn’t grunt, stumble or appear the least bit strained hauling her around like a caveman. It wasn’t the most comfortable thing in the world—but she’d also never been treated like a ragdoll.
It was more than a little hot.
He tossed her onto the bed. She bounced and sputtered, but he was already crawling up her body.
The game was on.
Raul glared at the screen. How did Miranda make it look so effortless?
She’d run him through the level solo once and then once together before leaving him alone to figure it out. It wasn’t even one of her games, and she was still wiping the floor with his ass.
“How’s it going?” Her steps thunked against the basement stairs.
“I hate this Goddamn level,” he grumbled.
“That well, huh?” She plopped down on the sofa next to him, feet stretched out toward him.
He stole one, then two glances at her.
Knee high socks... Shorts... All the blood in his body started pumping straight to his groin. That slouchy looking sweatshirt was awfully big. Could they both fit in there?
“Look out!” She yelped, pointing at the screen.
He whipped his head back around in time to see his health bar plummet and the laughing skull mock him for—once again—dying in battle.
“You almost had it.” She groaned.
“Then you distracted me.”
“It’s my fault you died? Please.” She rolled her eyes. “Learn to control yourself.”
Where was the fun in that? Losing control with her was way more enjoyable.
“Stop looking at me like that.” She planted her foot against his chest. “I’m pretty sure I’m sore.”
“I can make it feel better.”
“Stop.” She swatted his hand with a notebook. “I want to talk to you. I was going to bring this up last night, but then you pounced on me.”
“I seem to recall you liking the pouncing.”
Why was it the only thing on his mind when she was in the room was getting her naked? He was a guy who liked sex as much as anyone else, but with Miranda it was his only thought. That, and making her smile.
He crawled up her body and he swore his very cells were vibrating with the need to be near her.
“Raul, I’m trying to be serious.” She whacked him on the head with the damn notebook.
“We can’t have a serious conversation like this?” He shifted, forcing her legs apart until her body cradled his.
Yeah, conversing was the last thing on his mind.
“Can you pay attention?” She flipped the notebook open and held it between them so he had no option but to stare at it. “I ran some figures on rescue start-up costs and what it takes to be a nonprofit organization.”
Raul stared at the neat handwriting, his brain short circuiting. Everything went dark for a second, as though the power to his higher functions had been cut off. He blinked, a few brain cells starting to fire, connecting the dots.
“You—what?”
“Will you get off me? I can’t breathe.”
He sat up, blinking, and watched her spread four sheets of paper out. One was full of graphs, another of lists, a printed spreadsheet, and her handwritten notes.
“Okay, these are the state’s requirements. These are what I was able to dig up doing very little research. And these are my ideas. I know you didn’t ask for this, so you can tell me to shut up, but I was thinking that depending on how many people you have involved you could be up and running in six months, less if you can come up with some capital. What? Did I say something wrong?”
He stared at her, not the paper. He wasn’t ready to process the data. That wasn’t how he worked.
“What? Say something.” She wrapped her hands around her pen.
Miranda believed in him. What’s more, she’d taken him seriously. Without question. And no doubts. Not a one.
They stared at each other for a moment.
They weren’t far removed from strangers, they barely knew each other, and she’d done...this.
He glanced down at the pages, not sure where to start.
“When...did you do this?” He picked up the graph. He’d always done better with visuals, working with his hands.
“Mostly yesterday during a meeting I should have been paying more attention to. I got carried away, I know...I’m sorry. I do that sometimes.”
“What? Why?” He glanced up at her.
“You’re looking at me like I’m crazy.”
“Maybe you are. I just...wow...”
“You aren’t mad?”
“Mad? Hell no. What’s this?”
“That’s manpower costs. I didn’t know how many people you’re working with or anything...”
“There’s six of us. Me, four guys, and a vet tech.”
“Wow, okay, so if you and the tech could handle vetting the animals, that’s going to bring your costs way down.�
�� Miranda started scribbling on the paper. “The biggest problem I see is facilities and having to manage hours or something. It’s very unlikely this is going to pay the bills.”
“I assumed we’d all be working and doing this. Where...do I start?”
Miranda picked up the pages and set them in her lap. He scooted over, and she started with the hard stuff first. The numbers and the state requirements. From that framework, she had a range of ideas—from utterly impossible to stuff he could do in his sleep. They bounced things around, and she made even more notes. Instead of pulling him back from the land of crazy, she nudged him to think bigger until his head was close to exploding.
“I wanted to bring this up last...” Miranda pulled out her phone.
“Uh-oh, what’d I do?”
“Nothing bad... I just... It’s your website.” She made a face and set her phone on her knee.
“It’s not the best.”
“No, it’s really bad. The videos are good—let’s be honest, hot guy and baby animals is going to get attention—but there’s no call to action, no ‘support the puppies’ message. You’re losing support that would be incredibly easy for you to get.”
“One of the guys did it. I have no idea how to build a website.”
“Would it step on his toes if—maybe—I tinkered around and—”
“Are you kidding? He’d probably thank you.”
“Okay. Good. I have a marketing plan idea thing I’d like to work on, if it’s okay with you and your team. The first thing you guys need to do is figure out a name, we can draw up the paperwork and get that going. Then, it’s time to think about building your capital, maybe some fundraisers. Are you guys keeping animals or—?”
“Yes.” He scrubbed a hand over his face.
“What’s up? I don’t like that face.”
“We keep the animas we rescue at the house.”
“The house? Is this like—a location? A facility?”
“No. Our house. I live with the guys. We rent a house and hope the management company doesn’t make a surprise visit.”
“Oh, dear. Do I want to ask how many you have—?”
“Please, don’t. Every time I come home there’s another animal there.”
“Okay, so adoption events need to be at the top of the list, which will also bring in money. Fundraisers. Adoption events. Got it.”
She bent her head, her curls bobbing as she wrote down more of those million-dollar ideas swimming around in her head.
What had he ever done to deserve crashing into such an amazing woman?
6.
Miranda nearly bounced with excitement—and it wasn’t even anything she was involved with. Raul’s passion was contagious. She couldn’t help wanting him to succeed.
A new website and better SEO would increase their digital footprint significantly. Some decent branding on the videos, a little bit of marketing, and she was sure they’d gain traction. But all of that would cost money. And if Raul was putting everything he had into the rescue animals they had...where were the funds coming from?
She jotted down a few things to keep her hands busy.
It wouldn’t be a big deal to chip in. To help. But...
She swallowed.
This was how it started. All the time.
No, helping with a business plan, a website, and the vision wasn’t a big deal. It wasn’t like it would take a chunk of change. But then what? There would be costs. For the animals. For upkeep... And she knew herself. She was going to want to help.
And then what?
What happened when Raul got tired of her? When she became their go-to for funding?
It always happened this way.
She bit her lip.
Did she bail now? Back out while she still could?
She glanced up at Raul. He’d begun talking, and she’d half-heartedly listened to his gushing ideas for bows on collars and themed holiday wear. That passion... She could see him lighting the fires, keeping people going. He was like her, in that regard. It was what she was good at. But what came later?
He turned that inferno on her, the excitement beaming out of him. She grinned, because she couldn’t be around him and not smile. It’d been a long time since she’d had something to be happy about that wasn’t work related.
Raul leaned over and kissed her, his hands in her hair, his lips softening against hers.
She—melted. There was no other way to describe how her body reacted to him, how her mind went blank and her body warmed. She just...melted. Maybe because he’d somewhat nullified her physical insecurities and every touch and caress built on that, or maybe because she just wanted him badly enough, she couldn’t put the brakes on. He gave her a reason to not stare into the shadows and be afraid.
He pulled back, swiping his thumb over her mouth.
“You—are amazing.” He bent to pick up the papers that had scattered, and handed her the controller. “Your turn.”
“You’re still on this level?” She sighed dramatically, but she couldn’t blame him. He was trying it on the Killer setting with a level twenty character. It was about as impossible as he could get. She could do it, but that was because this was her life.
“Show me again.”
“Fine.”
She set the papers and notes on the side table, crossed one leg under her and let the other dangle off the leather sofa. The position assumed, she restarted the level from the beginning.
It was really unfair to Raul to compete with him. Even if it wasn’t a Grunge Games creation, it was still a Dark Matter game, which meant she’d had it long before it had been released to the public. Still, she liked a good dungeon crawler as good as the next person.
“Fucking hell—you just blew past them.” He threw up his hand.
“Yup.” If he hadn’t figured out the class abilities and how to power through them—that was his fault.
“God damn it. How did you do that?”
“Shut up. I’m trying to kill things and your chitty chat-chat-chat needs to stop.”
“Excuse me.”
“There’s the stairs.”
Her vision narrowed to the screen. She knew what came next, how long to let her mana build before she charged the next group of monsters and how to lay her traps to ensure she could handle them two at a time. As many times as he’d attempted the level, Raul should have some of it figured out by now.
“What—what—what are you doing?” She hit the pause and looked down at Raul.
He crouched in front of her on his knees, one hand up under her sweatshirt. The guilty look on his face was almost cute.
“What does it look like I’m doing?” He slid his fingers up under her bra.
It took a Herculean effort to not react. To not arch her back into his touch.
“I’m trying to beat the level for you, mister.” She managed a stern expression.
“Keep going. Don’t mind me. Or are you not good enough?” He pushed her bra up over her breasts.
She wavered between calling him on his shit and reacting to the challenge. She was good enough. When it came to games, she’d always been good—or better. He was simply an imp. If she stopped, she was pretty sure he’d pester her about it all weekend. If she kept going, well, she could rub his pretty face in it. Either way, this was fun. And her life needed more of that.
“Fine.” She bit off the word and jabbed the game back into action.
Heat crawled up her neck and pooled between her legs. She had to power through this before he got too creative. And Raul was creative. And talented. And...ooohhh, that spot...
Miranda dropped the first set of traps, then the second, pulling the cavern monsters toward her avatar. Raul’s head bumped the controller and she scowled at the screen, barely getting the first shot off in time to take out the forward rank.
“Hey, you’re moving around too much,” she grumbled.
“I’m where I wanna be.” Raul’s head and arms were in her sweatshirt. All she could see of
him was his back and butt.
Focus...not on him...
His fingers stroked over her nipples and she grit her teeth. She counted the seconds and watched the next set of monsters slip through the trap and close ranks on her avatar. Raul’s mouth wrapped around her, his tongue rubbing against her.
Fuck, this was so not fair.
She sucked in a deep breath and deployed her second attack. In as little as thirty seconds, she’d dispatched the herd of cavern clingers, and taken off down the left fork. Usually she’d crawl the dungeon a bit, picking up whatever loot she could get, but right now it was a race to the finish.
Raul switched breasts, teasing one nipple with his fingers and the other with his teeth. She slid further down the sofa, proving that she wasn’t impervious to melting, even when trying to focus.
Damn him.
“How you doing?” He peered up at her, stretching the neck of the sweatshirt out a bit more.
“Fine.”
“Just checking.”
Why did she not like the tone of his voice?
She didn’t have a moment to puzzle it out, the mid-level challenge was just ahead, and she needed more mana.
Raul shifted. She felt his fingers against her inner thigh.
“What are you doing?” She paused the game and glared down the front of her shirt at him.
“What? Can’t concentrate?” He ran the back of his fingers over her slit.
There was no way she could focus on surviving the last half of the level with him doing that. No way possible. If she remembered right, it would take at least fifteen minutes to knock out the whole level after she beat the mid-level challenge, a particularly nasty cave worm who shot poison spiky things.
“Don’t mind me.” Raul licked her breast and she sucked down a deep breath.
Oh, he was so going to regret this.
She could do this.
Miranda grit her teeth and stared at the screen. One bonus from just standing around, her mana supply was where she needed it. She pushed the avatar into a full-tilt run. If she couldn’t take the time to beat the challenge, she could always try to run through it. Which, at this character level, might be the smartest thing to do.
Raul’s fingers gently parted her folds. She bit her lip to keep from groaning, hooked her thumb around the joystick and kept her fingers firmly mashed against the hard plastic casing.
Mr. Purr-fect and the Geek (Gone Geek, #2) Page 6
