I lean into him, hugging him tight. “I knew you didn’t rip off those games,” I say against his neck, and he laughs. After his body stops shaking from laughter, I continue, “There’s nothing I want more than to work with you.”
He kisses my cheek, squeezing the life from me.
“You wanna ease up, Dad?” I ask, laughing.
He chuckles, releasing me from his grip.
I learned everything I know from him. Before I went to college, we spent hours together every day, and when he couldn’t be with me in person, he always video chatted with me. Just thinking of sketching out new worlds and ideas together brings a smile to my face.
“Are you ready?” he asks.
“To boldly go where no man has gone before…” I joke, quoting the opening of Star Trek: The Original Series, our favorite television show.
Our laughter fills the room, shaking through us.
“So, you think you can fix my game?”
He lifts my laptop from the table and scans the code in front of him. “I’m givin’ her all she’s got, Captain,” he quips, making a reference to Scotty from Star Trek.
I shake my head, laughing, and my dad joins me. Man, we’re legit nerds. You wouldn’t know it by looking at us, though there’s no denying it. My older brother is nothing like us. Sure, he’s into technology and loves playing video games, but he’s more of a businessman. The same can be said for my sister. I think she just likes ordering people around. But my dad and me, we’re the same in every way.
“I can’t wait to get started,” I tell him.
He slaps my back. “Me, too, Jamer.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Shannon
On my way home from class, I get a text from Jamie asking to meet him in the game room at the SAC. It’s an odd request, even for him. It’s been five days since Jamie begged me for another chance, and I’m finally ready to give him one.
Typing out a quick reply, I change directions.
Why does he want to meet at the SAC? The last time we spoke, he promised to make a grand gesture to show that he’s serious. Greasy food and foosball aren’t exactly romantic. I rush through the open doors at the Student Activity Center and follow the crowd upstairs.
When I step inside the game room, I’m surprised to find Jamie and a few of our friends—Jordan, Bex, Jemma, and Taylor are standing next to Preston, Drake, Tucker, Trent, and Jamie. No one else is in the room, which is unusual at this hour. The game room is usually crammed with jocks fighting over the air hockey and foosball tables, the nerds in the corner where Jamie is playing Xbox.
I approach Jamie, giving him a confused look. “What’s going on?”
“I want to show you something.” He smiles so wide it reaches his blue eyes.
Jamie’s hand slips behind my back, and he edges me closer to the projection screen on the wall. Several gaming systems are set up in front of it with controllers on the floor. I never understood why the university would want to encourage students to play games while they’re at school.
Our friends follow behind us, and I look over at Bex and Taylor to see if they’ll give me a hint as to what Jamie has up his sleeve. Bex shrugs, holding up her hands with a goofy expression on her face. No one seems to know why we’re here.
Jamie lifts a remote from the table in front of the couch and flicks on the screen. I stare at the video game in front of me, wondering why it doesn’t look the least bit familiar. It’s called Quest for Shanaya. The graphics are amazing, so bright and vivid they practically jump off the screen.
From the main menu, Jamie selects two players, a warrior woman with blonde hair dressed in a tight black outfit, a sword in hand. She looks fierce, like the kind of woman who can kick some serious ass. A few characters like her are in Mage Wars, but the closer I study her face, I realize she’s… me. Holy shit, this girl could pass as my twin.
I angle my body toward Jamie, my mouth open in complete shock. He notices my expression, rewarding me with a cute smile.
“I had a hard time capturing your beauty,” he says, pointing at the woman. “But I think you turned out just right in the end. What do you think?”
His eyes find mine, and I have to blink back the tears forming. “This is…” I shake my head, at a loss for words. “You did this for me?”
He nods, inching toward me, his fingers slipping between mine. “For us.”
I reach up to cup the side of his face with my hand, and he sucks in a deep breath. “Too much?”
“No, it’s perfect,” I whisper, staring into his eyes. “You’re perfect. I can’t believe you wrote me into your video game.”
“You are my game,” he admits. “You’re my muse. I want you in my life, Shan. In every part of it. I was an idiot to let you go. Every time I close my eyes, I think of you. When I roll over in bed, I reach for you. I miss you. I need you. It’s always been you. You were right in front of me all of these years, and I was too stupid to see it. I’ve learned over the past few months that time is a commodity, and I don’t want to waste another second without you.”
Now, the tears spill from my eyes, coating my cheeks. “Jamie,” I choke out.
“Every line of code in this game…” he says, motioning toward the screen, “… I wrote for you. But there aren’t enough ones and zeros in the universe to express how much I love you.”
I chuckle, even though his words weren’t meant to be funny. “Did you just… tell me you love me more than binary code?”
“No… yes. I guess so.” Jamie puts his face in his hands and sighs, now laughing as he looks at me. “Binary is a two-symbol system, kind of like us. You need both the one and the zero.”
He’s so adorable when he does his nerd speak. Most of the time, I don’t understand all the complexities of coding and video games, but I love seeing how much his face lights up when he talks about it.
“Which one would I be?” I ask, joking. “The one or the zero?”
“Zero,” he says without hesitation.
“How come?”
“Because zero comes first. But you will always be my number one.”
I fling myself into his arms and kiss him so hard it takes my breath away. He lifts me up, clutching me against his chest. Our friends clap and whistle in the background, some of them making dirty comments. We ignore all of it, lost in each other, drowning in our love for one another.
Once our lips separate, I’m out of breath, my head spinning. “I love you, too,” I whisper, and he smiles in response. “So… are we playing the game or what?”
He glances over his shoulder at the screen and then leads me by the hand to sit at one of the couches in front of the gaming console.
“I was stuck until you came into my life,” he admits. “I couldn’t finish this game, and that’s because you were missing. But you gave me the motivation I needed to get my shit together. You helped me see what I needed to do.”
“What’s my character’s name?”
“Princess Shanaya.”
“Shan-ay-a?” I over exaggerate the pronunciation, not knowing if I’m right.
He nods. “Yeah. It’s not my most creative name, but I wanted something that sounds like Shannon.”
The game is named after me. It’s Jamie quest for me… for Shanaya.
I smile. “I’m a princess. How come I’m not a queen?”
He hands me a controller and laughs. “Because Princess Shanaya will eventually become the Queen of Dragonsbane.”
Squeezing the controller in my hand, I smile. “And does the Queen of Dragonsbane marry the king?”
“The Lord of Winterbourne…” he says, gesturing toward his character, who looks like him down to the very last feature, “… has to fight all of the Lords of the High Houses to prove his loyalty to Princess Shanaya. After he does, then he’ll become worthy of ruling alongside her.”
“Sounds like you have your work cut out for you,” I quip, grinning like an idiot. “And how does Princess Shanaya prove she’s worthy
of the crown?”
“She has to slay the dragon and drink its blood.”
My nose wrinkles in disgust. “Eww, that’s gross. You want me to drink blood?”
“It’s not as gross as it sounds.” He chuckles. “Just go with it, okay? The dragon’s blood turns into the elixir of life, and that’s what gives Princess Shanaya the power to rule Dragonsbane.”
“You’re incredible, Jamie.” I let out a breath of air that he steals away from me with one look. “Your mind is one of my favorite things about you.”
He lifts his shirt to reveal a hint of his muscular stomach and says, “You sure it’s not my abs?” Jamie laughs at his joke, winking at me as he lowers his shirt. “Most women go for the abs.”
I snort at his comment. “Good thing I’m not most women.”
He hooks his arm around my back and smacks a kiss on my forehead. “Thank God for that.”
As if no time has passed, we go back to being us, back to where we started. And with graduation two weeks away, we’re closer to starting our future together.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Shannon
“I found a truck,” I tell Jamie, rushing into our bedroom with his laptop in my hands.
We moved into an apartment his father owns on the Philadelphia waterfront after graduation where we’ve lived for the past six months. Jamie said he couldn’t live without me by his side, and he meant it. Since that day in the game room, we have been inseparable.
“I want to buy it.” I add, “But the seller says it needs some work. You’re good with just about everything. Any chance you know how to fix engines?”
With a goofy look on his handsome face, he rolls his chair out from in front of his computer desk. Jamie spends a lot of time in his office now that he’s working on expanding the world he created in Quest for Shanaya. The game is so popular among beta testers that he’s about to launch the full version to the world in the next few months.
“Let me see.” He meets me at the center of the room, taking the laptop from my hand. “Not a bad deal considering its condition.”
Jamie glances at the listing I found online for a food truck. It’s an old metal truck with a pop-up awning that’s rusted in certain places and could use some TLC. It needs a lot of love, actually.
“So, the owner says it needs a lot of work, but the price is right.” I press my hand to his shoulder, and he peeks up at me with wide blue eyes. “Don’t you think?”
He sets the computer on the floor and pulls me onto his lap. “Just let me buy a new one for you, Shan. Then you can use the money you saved to get started. You’ll need equipment and supplies to open Shake-and-Cake.”
“Jamie, no…” I brush my fingers down his arm, and tiny bumps dot along his skin. “I don’t want a handout. I have to do this on my own, but this is all I can afford.”
Jamie has more money than he knows what to do with, and I have just enough to buy a shitty truck. Now that he’s the Chief Technology Officer of his dad’s new company, JMG Developers, named after him and his siblings—Jamie, Mike, and Grace—he’s even wealthier. They’re building their second tech empire, and the game Jamie created for me is their star product.
“I’ll do whatever you want,” he says sucking my bottom lip into his mouth. “Just tell me what you need me to do.”
I close my eyes and kiss him back, my skin burning from his touch. “I want to buy it,” I whisper against his lips. “Do you think you can fix the engine? Maybe help me salvage some of the exterior metal that’s rusted and give it a little shine?”
“Killian is good with cars,” he says, leaning back in the chair to look into my eyes. “I can call him if you want. He owes me a favor.”
“I thought Killian was only good at stealing cars,” I quip.
Killian Kade, Jamie’s former teammate, stole one of my sorority sister’s cars right from the covered parking lot on campus. She waited months to tell us the truth, and I don’t blame her. What Killian did was unreal. But he had a good reason, or at least she thought so.
Jamie chuckles at my comment. “Killian’s good at that, too. If he can’t fix the truck I’m sure one of his friends can. They own an auto body shop in South Philly. I’ll make him give me the friends and family discount,” he finishes with a wink.
I wrap my arms around his neck and kiss him hard, my head swimming. He squeezes me tight, muttering all the dirty things he wants to do to me between breaths. We sink into each other, our mouths melded together, our bodies fused as one. Without breaking the kiss, I push my skirt over my hips and slide my panties to the side. Jamie’s already unbuttoning his jeans, his hard cock fisted in his hand.
I moan as I lower onto him, and Jamie grips my hips, digging his fingers into my sides. He hisses as he fills me completely. The sexy expression on his face sends me over the edge. Jamie has the body of a Greek god and the mind of a genius. He’s the perfect combination—smart, sexy, and all mine.
I press my hands on his shoulders, moving in unison with him. Jamie leans forward to pull down my top, and when he sucks on my nipple an intense pleasure rocks through my body.
“Oh my God, Jamie,” I cry out, riding him even harder, chasing the high we’re both craving.
“That’s it, Shan,” he says, his voice deep like gravel, his breath warming my nipple. “Come for me, baby.”
“I forgot to take my pill,” I warn.
I’ve been so busy lately planning for my new business that I keep forgetting to do routine things.
“I don’t care,” he growls. “You’re mine. Forever. Always.”
I smile at his words and press my lips to his. He slips his tongue into my mouth, each kiss bringing me closer to the peak of my climax. My orgasm floods through me, the sheer intensity of it causing my body to tighten as I find my release. He grips my hips, his fingers pressing hard into my skin. Jamie’s not far behind me, and when he comes, his entire body trembles, shaking through me.
I collapse on top of him, out of breath and unable to speak, resting my head on his shoulder.
“I have a surprise for you,” he manages to say, still a little winded.
I perk up at the mention of a surprise. “You didn’t have to get me anything.”
He waves me off as if it’s nothing and lifts me off his lap. I fix my skirt and panties into place as he stuffs himself back into his pants. Jamie rolls the chair back over to his desk.
Four computer monitors, the same ones from his bedroom on campus, are spread across the desk. I have no idea what any of it means. Some of it’s code, I think. I can’t even read HTML without asking him a hundred questions, and that’s nowhere near as hard as the other languages.
Jamie pats his thigh for me to sit, and then hooks his arm around my back to keep me in place. “I wrote a new ending to Quest for Shanaya.”
“How come? I thought it was ready.”
He flashes a devious grin. “Because Shanaya’s life is about to change.”
“Oh, is that so?” I raise an eyebrow at him, curious about his new addition. “Well, then, let me play my game.”
“Your game,” he snorts.
“Am I not Shanaya?”
He nods and then kisses my cheek. “I made a few changes since the last time you played with me. I think you’ll like what I did.”
Instead of playing on a gaming console, he resumes the game from his computer. Quest for Shanaya and the entire Dragonsbane World appears on the screen. I already slayed the dragon, drank his blood, and secured my position as the Queen of Dragonsbane, but Jamie still hasn’t joined me.
His character, the Lord of Winterbourne, is one kill away from becoming worthy of my hand in marriage. And that’s when it hits me—the reason why Jamie has waited so long to win his own game. He should’ve won six months ago. Hitting the buttons on the keyboard, Jamie is focused, determined to win this time.
Instead of playing the game, he enters a few commands. Cheat codes he could’ve used months ago. If anyone knows how to beat
the final level, it’s Jamie. As his character approaches Queen Shanaya, my throat closes up. Jamie takes my hand in his, using the other to touch the side of my face. With one eye on the screen, I look at Jamie, wondering if the game will imitate real life.
“You’re the queen of my world,” he declares, his tone soft but serious. “And now that I’m king, I want to be at your side. I want us to rule together.”
“I have no idea if you mean your fictional world or the one we live in, but I couldn’t care less as long as we’re together.”
I mean every word. Jamie is my life, and I couldn’t imagine spending a single day without him in it.
The corner of his mouth lifts as he reaches into the drawer in front of him. My jaw drops when he raises his open palm to reveal a robin’s egg blue box from Tiffany. The white bow is still tied on top of the small box.
He holds it out to me in offering. I tug on the bow and drop it on the desk. Jamie flips the lid to reveal a small black box. As he cracks open the top, I gasp at the sight of the massive diamond ring nestled inside the velvet.
“I love you, Shannon. You’re the love of my life.”
He turns in his chair to hit a button on the keyboard, and after he does, the Lord of Winterbourne drops to one knee in front of Queen Shanaya. Jamie takes the ring from the box, and then slides me off his lap, sinking to the floor on one knee to mirror his counterpart.
“Shannon, will you marry me?”
I nod, tears spilling down my cheeks. “Yes. Of course, I’ll marry you.”
Covering my mouth with both hands, I stare down at him in awe. My eyes move from Jamie to the Lord of Winterbourne, who’s frozen in place.
“How come your character isn’t moving?” I ask Jamie, assuming he’s following the lead.
“Because the game is on a loop. I have to satisfy the requirement before I can close it.”
“Speak in English, please,” I say, laughing.
“Give me your hand…” he says with a wicked smirk, “… and I’ll show you.”
Jocking Jameson: Face-Off Legacy #4 Page 14
